Depending on the length of unemployment, a person can experience a wide spectrum of emotions. Many of those emotions can be difficult to manage and control. It is not uncommon to enjoy some time off during the first days of unemployment. At the beginning there is usually optimism regarding new employment opportunities. For some people, having some time off might be exactly what they were longing for, even if that time did not come as a result of a personal choice. One quickly realizes, however (and some people faster than others), that being unemployed is not the same thing as being on holiday. During a holiday one knows that there is a limit to the time off, and this time is usually perceived as a reward for doing a (good) job – a job which will resumed after the time off. Contrary to this, time off for an unemployed person is unlimited, and can be associated with a sense of frustration, apprehension, lack of confidence, anxiety or guilt. This is, of course, on top of the financial considerations.

My personal experience is that it is crucial to keep oneself busy during unemployment. Unoccupied adults tend to spiral down into unhealthy or destructive behaviours, the same way unoccupied teenagers tend to be attracted to exciting drugs and cool gangs. Keeping oneself busy, however, does not mean to be overloaded with activities, especially not with repetitive or frustrating ones. In fact, doing this would cause the exact opposite result to the one intended, which is to feel productive and useful and to have the sense of moving forward. Feeling productive in general (not only in the job search) is key in dealing with the psychological impact of unemployment. This is perhaps the reason why women with (young) children, who dedicate an important part of their time and focus to them, seem to be less susceptible to the psychological pressures of unemployment (as long as they have a partner who is supporting them financially). This was the case for Rose and Paige. Their children gave structure to their days even in the absence of a job. As driven professionals, however, they wanted more.

I firmly believe that a person should have a minimum of three goals at any given time, each relating to different aspects of life. I personally find it useful to have at least one goal relating to career/profession (category 1), one goal relating to relationships (category 2) and one goal relating to getting better at something or learning or doing something new that is not directly related to the profession (category 3). The reason for this is that when things fail or do not move forward in one category, one can still remain motivated by the satisfaction attained by moving forward with the goals in the other categories. If I did not have this rule in my life, I am not sure I could have coped with unemployment. In fact, I believe this to be so critical to my personal motivation that I have a list summarizing my short-, middle- and long-term goals on a wall near my room. I look at this list every single day. This way I am reminded of the many dimensions of my life, and I can see that there is always something which is somehow moving forward.

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Goals in category 2: relationships

I have always been good at setting myself goals in the other two categories, but I tend to give less attention to the ones relating to relationships. There are several reasons for this.

During the time I was unemployed, the main reason not to nurture relationships was my need to avoid situations where I could be asked about my search for work. People always have something to ask, a recommendation or a judgement. While most of the time these remarks were well intentioned, they were also often redundant, superficial and energy-depleting. Furthermore, it seemed as if everybody else was doing better than me and I had somehow to defend myself for lagging behind. The last aspect was much more a product of my imagination than a reality. But independently of that, the result was that it became easier for me to avoid people and to alienate myself. It turned out to be pretty easy because my family was living in another continent, my husband was working most of the time and I had very few real friends in Switzerland.

Given that most of my relationships were under pressure during my unemployment, I constantly and actively needed to make an effort to prevent them from suffering damage. I am afraid I am not the best example for setting successful goals in this category, but below are some of the goals I did focus on.

Joining groups of interest. The easiest way to create new relationships is by joining club, teams or associations focused in an area of interest like sports, music, dancing or cooking. I particularly found expat communities very interesting, and participated (and still participate) in several events organized by InterNations. InterNations is a global expat network of 3.6 million members in 420 cities worldwide, as of August 2019.^[i] InterNations communities are present in all major Swiss cities, including Zurich, Basel, Bern and Geneva, and each community has groups formed around different interests. Some weeks I went to see a movie with a group in Basel, others I went to a barbeque with a group in Bern, and others still I met with Spanish-speaking people in a bar with a group in Zurich. One of my goals in this category was thus to attend at least two events every month. Although being part of a group does not necessarily mean making (close) friends, it does provide a space for sharing interests with other people and for getting to know other stories.

In the case of foreigners with small children, some very interesting groups can be found by interacting with other parents in the school or the park. For Paige, these interactions allowed her to create a new circle of friends during the time she was unemployed – a circle that she maintained after finding a job. I must highlight, however, that I have repeatedly heard foreign nationals complain of their failed attempts to establish relationships with other Swiss parents. It is possible that this is matter of language barriers or cultural differences. But it is possible too that we foreigners react to imaginary prejudices.

Keeping in regular contact with the important people. At one point I decided to make a list of the people who were bringing something positive to my life and with whom I wanted to keep in regular contact. Although it is arguably possible to keep some sort of contact with most friends and family, it is virtually impossible to nurture all the relationships. In my opinion, deep relationships cannot be nurtured with ‘likes’ and comments on Facebook and Instagram. On my list I chose 14 friends and eight family members, and I set the goal of getting in contact with them at least every two months. Since the majority of the people on my list were not living close by, most of the contact was made through phone calls, emails or long sessions of WhatsApp texts. But whenever possible I tried to meet them in person. This was the only realistic goal that worked for me.

Being open about my struggle and clean up relationships. I think one of the hardest things for me to do was to share some of the more negative aspects of my struggle with other people, especially with the important people who were not physically close by. I would often avoid the unemployment subject altogether, and I would disguise the scale of my personal problems. At a certain point I realized I was no longer experiencing any deep relationships, because I was no longer sharing. My first goal was to change that. I also realized that many of the relationships I had built in Switzerland were circumstantial and although they felt very intense in the good moments, they failed to provide me with any support in the bad moments. I stopped investing in those relationships, and I gave them a different place in my life. My goal was to accept that.

Improving the quality and quantity of time with my husband. This is perhaps the goal into which I put the most concerted effort. My husband and I sat down one day and made a list of the things we wanted to change (one could say that we made this mutual goal as SMART as possible). Some of the things in the list were waking up during the weekdays at the same time and eating breakfast together, cooking something exciting together at least once a week, redecorating the flat to give it more of a home feeling, and eating dinner together at the table instead of in front of the TV. I think that working on this goal is very important in a marriage in general. But I believe it becomes essential that in times of pressure, such as when one of the partners becomes unemployed or has a serious lack of work–life balance.

Considering that the goals in this second category are focused on basic aspects of life that exist beyond the years of employment, they are perhaps the most significant goals of all.

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^[i] InterNations, ‘Our mission’ (no date), available at www.internations.org/about-internations.

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