I watched a documentary the other night that wound up having a profound affect on me, it was called Lemonade. The film was about, well, I'll just rip the short version from the site:
What do people who were once paid to be creative for a living do when they’re laid off? They get creative with their own lives. Lemonade is an inspirational film about 16 advertising professionals who lost their jobs and found their calling, encouraging people to listen to that little voice inside their head that asks, “What if?”
You may not be an advertising professional or work in a creative field; and hell, you may not even be on the verge of or even close to losing your job, but it certainly gives you something to think about. With my creative life in flux as it has been the last year or so, and with my leaving BLAM! Ventures--the publishing company I co-founded--last fall, I found the stories of the sixteen people involved at turns moving, enlightening and familiar.
Lemonade creator Erik Proulx is one of those sixteen, he founded the blog Please Feed The Animals to help other advertising professionals transition to new lives. In creating Lemonade, he sought to give hope to those in a position he'd been in three times himself, on the receiving end of a pink slip.
From coffee roasting to painting to gender transitioning, the breadth of change these people have gone through is simply amazing, and demonstrates that the world doesn't end when you lose a job. In fact, it can be the beginning you never knew you needed. Here is the trailer:
One of the best, and most often quoted lines in the film comes from Lisa Hickey, who said:
“Don’t be the person looking for a job. Be the person doing something interesting.”
You can watch the full video here on Hulu. If you've ever thought about what you'd do if you lost your job, or even if you've thought about ditching your job and following your dreams, the 35 minutes is well worth your time.
