The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
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I have a tenant renting a single room from me. He's been doing gig work but says with the economy getting worse- AKA declining disposable income for things like uber- he finally has to get a real job(I suspect student loan payment resumptions are a bigger factor than declining disposable income). He has a BA in parent's basement studies, somewhat adjacent to a classics degree but not actually classics, and says that he had a nervous breakdown working for the public school system(which will hire any degree holder not on a sex offender registry). His people skills are not good and he is unwilling to learn Spanish or do hard blue collar work. He's previously done some online tutoring in English as a second language for wealthy foreigners, but for some reason that's not an option anymore- I think the PRC changed its laws and work got harder to come by or something like that.
What can I advise him to do that will pay his bills at least well enough that it stands little chance of becoming my problem as his landlord? I took him in as a favor to his brother and can't kick him out without either a much stronger reason than he's already generated or sacrificing that relationship as well.
Wait, the public school system is that easy to get in to? I have a degree and aren't on any registries that I know of.
Mine is, although there's a lot of extra paperwork and it comes with a salary cut to not have a masters degree or a teaching certificate. YMMV on yours, though.
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Sounds like he might want to send his resume to a few temp agencies.
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He sounds like he would do well in a government job. The public school experience will help him stand out from other candidates. Many government jobs do not require specialized skills or much in the way of people skills.
Once you have a government job it is easy to advance in the government because the hiring process favors people with government specific experience. There are many types of government jobs so he should be able to find something that appeals to him (clerk, bus driver, parks maintenance, etc.). If there is a lot of competition for government jobs in his area there is always to option to start with a less competitive limited term employment opportunity and transfer to full time position later.
Many entry-level government jobs pay significantly higher than minimum wage and are easier and more flexible than minimum wage jobs. Additionally, many governments have pensions, longevity programs, and fringe benefits so people can do quite well through sheer diligence.
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