Times Of Swaziland: UNEMPLOYMENT GROWING TRIGGER OF DEPRESSION

UNEMPLOYMENT GROWING TRIGGER OF DEPRESSION
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Editor on 31/08/2022 08:17:00


Sir,
In a country where there is a high level of unemployment, our mental wellness
remains compromised. We are not doing a lot to push awareness and educate young
people about looking after their emotional and psychological well-being.
Furthermore, unemployment is a growing trigger that is driving many young people
into depression.
Development
Erik Erikson postulates that, “Healthy personality and emotional development
during adulthood require that a person believes they are making strides to
enrich themselves by contributing to their family and community. Otherwise,
self-esteem is compromised during unemployment, leading to anxiety and
self-doubt.” Seemingly, there is a direct relationship between unemployment
and deteriorating mental wellness.
Many people find themselves at a crossroads. They need to keep a job to provide
for themselves and their families. The same job at times contributes towards
building positive and healthy self-esteem. Nevertheless, at times workplaces are
toxic and lead to a deterioration of mental well-being, thus making joblessness
a major psychosocial issue. It is a serious conundrum; if you choose to stay in
a toxic working environment, your mental health gets compromised. If you take
the bold step to choose yourself and protect your wellness in all aspects, being
unemployed eventually leads to you being depressed and feeling frustrated by not
being able to provide for yourself and get the things that money can buy. You
feel useless.
Skills
In our social gatherings, over the weekends, many of us don’t look forward to
Monday mornings. We dread the thought of waking up early to go and exchange our
skills and expertise for remuneration. We want the money but the thought of
going to work is bittersweet. Many of us are employed and unhappy people. We are
equally unemployed and unhappy people. The sooner we realise that having choices
for everyone is imperative for their well-being, the quicker we deal with the
issue of unemployment, the easier it is going to be for many young people to be
in a good space. We have to admit it, joblessness is dehumanising.
With the scarcity of jobs, when a young person resigns from a job, we
automatically think they’ve got another job or a better opportunity. The
general assumption is that there is no way an employed person can just resign
from his or her job if they don’t have an offer on the table. It is unheard of
for a person to choose their mental well-being over a job. Many would even call
you stupid for doing so.  Those who are not single and come from dual-income
households can negotiate with their significant others if they feel work is
weighing them down. However, others have to stick it out. The other devastating
part is that workplaces are investing more in empowering employees to be more
effective in doing their jobs but do little to nothing to ensure that employees
are in a good space emotionally and psychologically. The same workload,
management, colleagues and clients at times create an unpleasant work
environment.
Now, more than ever, we need happy employees, we need more options for jobs. We
need to eradicate unemployment to ensure that employers appreciate employees. In
today’s world, if you fight for your rights at work, the employer can easily
dismiss you as ungrateful. They have the audacity to tell you that ‘you
clearly don’t want this job. Many young people out there would kill for this
job’. In other words, the toxicities in the workplace should not be addressed;
what remains important to those who hire us is that we have a job. That attitude
is wrong.
Psychologists and sociologists have argued as far back as the Great Depression
that unemployment damages emotional health and undermines the social fabric of
society. We should not have to choose between a job and our mental health. There
should be endless job opportunities and this will ensure that when young people
feel like their jobs are suffocating them, they can respectfully resign and look
for greener pastures elsewhere.
Kabelo Chabalala