About 1.5 months ago you realized that you had to quit your job. You had been excited about the job — it seemed like a good fit, and for the first time in your life you were making enough money that you didn’t have to worry. But it wasn’t a good fit, for a lot of reasons that we won’t go into now. (It seemed designed to stress you out. It was the first job you’ve ever not enjoyed.) For the purposes of this post, “you” are me. So here is what you do.

1. Look for work. Constantly. Write and rewrite your cover letters. Despair on days where no suitable openings appear on the job sites. You are limited to one small city because that’s where your wife works and your wife has a good job, so you’re not going anywhere for probably a long time. Your next job is somewhere in this city.

2. Write that novel. The one about super heroes. Double its considerable length in your first month of unemployment. You don’t write that much more on a day-by-day basis when you’re out of work (you average 1,000-1,200 words, rather than 700-1,000) but it adds up fast. Think about what you will write when the novel is over. It will have to be short stories. This is novel #7, it’s time to get published (this one, and/or #6) or admit that it’s not going to happen.

3. But it has to happen. READ MORE >