by Ameenah Gumbi | Sep 1, 2021 | Personal Growth
Being unemployed is a terrible situation to find yourself in Nigeria as unemployment rises to 33% in the country. No matter the reason, we want you to know that there are fun things to do while unemployed without spending money with a little bit of creativity.
7 Things You Could do Without Spending Money That Will Improve Your Mental Health
1. Picnic With Family and/or Friends
Spending time with family or your friends could expand your lifespan up to 50% according to Dr. Thatcher. Spending time with your family or friends on a picnic should not cost you a lot of money if you plan. Pick a location close by or you can search on Google maps the nearest garden to your house. If you are in Abuja, you can take your family to Jabi Lake or Capital Hub, or Central Park for a picnic. You can bring your utensils, water, and drinks from home.
You can make dessert and bring or cook a dish at home and take it to the picnic. Make sure you keep it simple, don’t frit. Enjoy your picnic and family time, don’t stress yourself. What a better fun way to improve your lifespan without spending money and in the company of loved ones!
2. Looking for Fun Things to Do While Unemployted? Try Photography
If you ever wondered what having a photography skill is like, now is the best time to venture into it. You can write a list of things and places you want to take pictures of and have a brief tour on your own. This will hone your skills without spending money.
Be patient if you want to try photography. You would not want all your pictures looking blurry. Slowing down and being patient is one way to getting, clearer, and better pictures. Choose a specific time in a day to take pictures. Ask your family and friend to criticize your snapshots to explore and have fun. You can use this in the future if you choose photography as your career in the future.
3. Reading is a Fun Act to do While Unemployed
If you enjoyed reading and had little time to read more books in the past, now is the time when you have no job. Reading books is soothing to the mind especially if you can’t afford to buy new books on your own. Reading has several benefits as stated by Heidi Moawad. You can join a book club within your community or read e-books from a different site for free. You can get audiobooks for free or subscribe if you can afford them.
My favorite is Blinkist. If you prefer hard copies, you can read the books from your local library or from a friend’s library. You can also exchange your books for new ones if you can’t afford them in local bookstores. You can buy new ones if it is not out of your budget. Also, you can be a beta reader in one of the freelance sites if you enjoy reading books whenever you decide to earn a living.
4. Do More of Voluntary Service
I know many people will not think of volunteering as a fun thing to do while unemployed. Trust me, it is so much fun! You could make new friends, visit places you could not afford, help put a smile on someone’s face. You could be a change agent as well as develop new skills that could help you in the future when you land a job. Also, you don’t have to be rich to care about the less privileged.
You can offer Pro Bono services to NGOs within your community, give items you longer need to those in need. In addition, give books that you no longer need, offer to help in community outreach. Also, you could join a fundraising project they are always fun.
Make sure that what you are volunteering in is something lively and worth your time. You are adding value to yourself and helping those in need.
5. Learn to Code
Picking up a new skill that is a high-income skill and in demand like coding is one way to enjoy your unemployment. You can teach yourself programming at no cost, start a new career with something you are passionate about.
There are tons of sites to learn coding for free and I happen to love this site the most. Choose the type of coding language you wish to learn, you should read a book or two about coding. As you are learning, try making it practical, build a kid’s toy-like those they learn from a STEM class. Watch YouTube videos, practice with personal projects and reward yourself. Have fun playing with codes using reverse engineering, you will learn. Join a Bootcamp, make new friends, socialize and enjoy your time.
6. Dancing
Losing weight does not come easy when you have no money to pay for gym classes or buy equipment to exercise at home or follow a strict diet. Dancing is a fun way to increase heart rate, blood circulation, improve core muscles while still losing weight. The best part is you do not have to spend a dime! All you need is music to dance to either on your phone or TV and your dancing outfit in the comfort of your room.
7. Engage in Painting
When you are unemployed, you have nothing but time. What better fun things to do while unemployed than painting to your heart’s content! To have fun painting, try focusing and enjoy the process. Don’t look forward to the result. Painting a good piece is all about details. Enjoy each stroke, take your time. Sip your favorite tea or juice while painting. If you are like me, put on your headphones and paint while dancing, let it flow. Remember, you are not trying to please anyone, so take your time to destress. Try painting different art, choose a place and time to paint, and have fun that’s the goal!
Conclusion
No matter the situation you find yourself in while being jobless, it’s always best to have fun things to do while unemployed for your health and sanity. Being unemployed in Nigeria can be a blessing in disguise or a curse when you have responsibilities. Regardless of your situation, know that you can have fun without spending money.
What are the fun things you would do if you are jobless in Nigeria? Kindly leave your comments below and also share with your loved ones let us know what you all think.
Go have fun, ciao!
by Abu Hafsah | Sep 1, 2021 | Relationships & Weddings
Jealousy could result from being suspicious towards your partner; resentment towards someone for a perceived advantage or superiority they hold, and envy towards another’s possessions, or a close concern for someone. Arguably, jealousy is something everyone is born with; it is one’s inert ability, funny. In some cases, jealousies are advantageous while in some cases, problematic, which could even result in a breakup. There are different reasons or causes of jealousy in a relationship, some of which are:
Causes of Jealousy in a Relationship
1. Keeping in Touch With Your Ex
Some relationships end between partners due to incompatibility, disagreement, infidelity, and the likes, while some are as a result of external forces outside of those in the relationship. If the latter is the case, there is a proclivity that one will feel the need to see, talk to, or mingle with their ex because the love is still there. Now when this happens, the present partner, be it the guy or the lady will start to feel jealous.
Also, in a situation whereby a couple is divorced and both are happily married to different people, there is a need for the ex to communicate with each other most especially if there are kids in between; the wellbeing of their children is their responsibility. Now as a partner of either of the two, jealousy is something you will feel. You can’t help it.
2. Having Friends of the Opposite Sex
This is one of the common causes of jealousy in a relationship, only a few persons will disagree. Most people like the feeling of “I am the only for my man/woman and so, no one from the opposite sex should come close to my man/woman”.
In Northern Nigeria, it is evident that men and women hardly engage in boy/girl friendship and so, when you see your partner with the opposite sex, jealousy will set in. On the contrary, this is not true among the educated Northern Nigerians, majorly.
3. Inadequate Attention
Everyone by nature needs attention – attention from the opposite sex, be it your boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, or wife.
When you care about someone, you will require lots of attention from them. If that attention you crave is channeled in a different direction, jealousy will set in. In the case of a boy/girl relationship, a partner (married couples including) feels jealous when the other is busy concentrating more on other stuff or devoting most of their time in, maybe sports, work, studies etcetera.
Married couples, especially husbands, complain a lot. Most women tend to give more of their attention to their children than their husbands. The attention decreases as the number of children increases. They kind of feel their husbands are grown-ups and so can take care of themselves, but their kids are vulnerable. This results in jealousy on the side of the husbands.
For instance, I once read a story online by a whore saying, a man asked for her hands in marriage simply because he doesn’t get the attention he wants from his wife. She (the whore) eventually turned him down because she doesn’t want to be in any committed relationship. How absurd!
4. Feeling Insecure
This is the fear of been replaced due to one’s incompetence, complacency, or inability to do certain things for their partner. This comes into play when you feel you are not exactly what your partner wants in a man or woman, or when you are not self-confident.
Insecure feeling tends to make you feel jealous whenever you see your partner with someone who has what they want or need that you don’t. This feeling can be blood-sucking; one needs to find a way to do away with it.
It might interest you to read on Improve Your Self-Confidence With These 6 Proven Ways and The Feeling of Insecurity and How to Avoid It.
5. Competition
In the Northern part of Nigeria, sometimes siblings find themselves living in the same house or compound with their wives.
Oftentimes, women tend to disagree on things amongst themselves by default – things that may not even matter at all. This causes jealousy in a situation whereby one of the siblings happens to be richer, more handsome, has a sense of dressing, etc. than the other. The latter’s wife may sometimes get jealous of the former’s wife. This gives birth to an ‘unhealthy competition’. In some cases, this jealousy or rivalry is stronger and fiercer than one between or amongst co-wives.
6. Trust Issues
Trust is something partners need to earn between themselves, not demand. In a situation where a partner is making frequent calls or being visited regularly by a colleague of the opposite sex from the office or workplace, this causes jealousy; or a situation where partners have been engaged in pre-marital sex (in the case of married couples and boy/girl relationship), it is easy for jealousy in regards to that surface.
Whenever your partner is not with you, you feel they are with someone else. Avoiding premarital sex and unnecessary communication between you and the opposite sex will play a huge role in eliminating jealousy between partners.
7. Perfectionism
This is one of the causes of jealousy in a relationship. Perfectionism is an unwillingness to settle for anything less than perfect. Some people are perfectionists; a brother of mine is like that too. Everything and everyone has to be perfect or else, not significant.
People like that get easily jealous when they see you (their partner) with someone better than them.
Loosen up a little, and you will find everyone perfect in their own way, you perfectionist! Lolz.
8. Stalking Your Partner
Another cause of jealousy is when you keep following or stalking your partner; knowing his/her every movement, monitoring their phone calls or text messages, unnecessarily meddling in their affairs, and the likes.
No one is perfect; we all make mistakes. By so doing, you will find things that are hurting and make you jealous – things that you will later wish you never saw or heard.
9. Complementing on Other Peoples’ Attractiveness
Some people are fond of doing so, most especially men. Do not do this to your partner most especially in their presence. Not cool!
Everyone needs to feel they are the most attractive person their partner’s eyes have ever seen (even if obviously, the reverse is the case), anything short of that could be a disaster.
Guys, STOP IT!
10. Not Telling Your Partner What Makes You Jealous
If you are feeling jealous in a relationship, chances are your partner already knows, or they don’t. In either case, let them know what makes you jealous through effective communication means, and help them know how to avoid it.
Keeping it all to yourself won’t solve anything. Trust me. If they probably haven’t noticed you are jealous, telling them will be a good idea.
Conclusion
All the above-mentioned causes of jealousy and more could result in nullifying a relationship.
A jealous partner is oftentimes too busy to see the reality of things around their partners; they only tend to see what their hearts or minds want them to see.
The best and ultimate thing to do is to TRUST your partner more than anyone, and it’s a GOAL!
If you find the article useful, kindly comment on the comments section, and also, tell which of the causes of jealousy do you think was left out?
Related: 7 Reasons Why Relationships Fail
