How Do You Keep Going When Nothing’s Happening?
The unpredictable rhythm of freelance dreams and existential laundry
What do you do with that empty space where anything could happen—but nothing does?
Sometimes you avoid it. Or manage it. Depends on the day.
Maybe with workouts, books, hobbies—or by rewatching Stranger Things for the third time.
It’s that period where everything’s quiet, but you feel like something is just about to shift.
Like this is all just the waiting room for something wonderful.
You wait—for the alarm to go off.
For the phone to ring.
For that email that says: you’ve got the interview.
And in the meantime, I start questioning everything.
Questioning how much more I can take.
How long I’ll keep chasing something that may never happen the way I imagined.
Or worse—may not happen at all, because there are thousands of people more talented, better resourced, or simply healthier than I am.
Will I ever be “enough” for a normal job?
Will I always be stuck hoping for the next freelance project to show up?
Also—fuck—I need to do laundry.
And spend quality time with my family.
And drink water. And move my body.
All while trying not to collapse under the quiet dread of living in limbo.
WTF is this.
It’s hard to explain.
But it feels like dissociating from your own life because nothing in it is bringing you back to yourself.
Being an adult is so damn hard.
Starting a new career, surviving health issues, and trying to afford that birthday dress I’ve been staring at for months.
All of it—at once.
And still, I speak from a place of relative safety.
I’m married.
My husband can support us for now while I study, while we live in our first apartment as migrants in the golden city of oud perfumes and sandstorms.
And still, I keep waiting…
Waiting for my life to begin.
Waiting to feel like I’m not stuck to the bed, the couch, the routine.
Waiting to fall asleep already knowing what plans I’ll make with my friends over the weekend.
(The few friends I have already have steady jobs. They’re out there building moments.)
It’s wild how a piece of paper—money—is both a gift and a trap.
We are constant negotiators of our own joy and our own futures.
Pieces of colored paper.
I’ve seen them in four formats, maybe more.
None of them stay in my hands.
Or in my bank account.
In this strange divorce-triangle between my future, my ego, and the other woman—money—I'm left with nothing decent to claim.
And honestly, it feels like the world is gently nudging me toward being a housewife.
Am I really going to be one?
My inner child is not taking that idea well.
And I don’t have an answer to comfort her.
She’s messy and stubborn. But all she wants is to live.
I read this article once, about how your brain chemistry changes after long exposure to uncertainty.
Even if you light 20 incense sticks a day, your body knows.
Your nervous system reads the room.
And it doesn’t feel safe.
So it panics.
And months and months of that?
Yeah… it gets into your bones.
Maybe someone reading this thinks I complain too much.
Maybe I do.
But I’m happy with my tiny family of two.
That doesn’t erase the fear of turning 50 without a pension.
Without parents to help.
Without backup.
There’s this constant, quiet terror of ending up back in my rural hometown—raising cows to survive.
(Literally. Cows.)
Freelancing with no contacts and no cash cushion is brutal.
No one believes in you—even when you're just asking for 2% of the whole deal.
And while I study, and search, and keep reading the signs inside me—I think:
Damn. I just want to enjoy this day.
But I can’t afford to.
LOL. The irony writes itself.
So I focus on what I can control.
And if God exists—tell him not to forget me.
I just want enough to visit my grandparents in Argentina.
That flight? Four months' rent.
Some days, I feel stuck in a loop.
Staring out my window at highways and glass towers that sparkle at night like New York.
And I see the beauty.
But I can’t feel it.
It’s like the woman I’ve become is stuck on standby.
Battery at 5%. Not low enough to shut off. Not high enough to actually run.
The other day, I cut my hair.
After months of saying I’d grow it long.
Maybe I just needed to feel in control of something.
And guess what? I hated it.
Still stuck in pause mode.
I hate this thing—this… fog.
I don’t even have a name for it.
Just a heavy layer I can’t peel off.
And no idea how to fix it.
But I don’t want to end this sounding like the most fragile human on the planet.
Even though, yes, we love a good expat meltdown moment.
At the end of the day—I owe this to myself.
No one else is going to celebrate my milestones, even if they look microscopic compared to other people’s lives.
So here’s a list of my little winning moments from the past six months:
My health is great (even if I’m still at war with sleep).
I can go out alone now—with more confidence and independence.
I made a group of Argentine friends. Ate delicious food. Laughed loud.
I attended several women’s networking events.
A woman with years of experience in Dubai helped me rewrite my CV. I don’t know yet if it’s working, but for someone with no mentor or roadmap? That was huge.
I cried a lot. But I kept going. And that counts too.
The peace that comes with a stable life is something you only learn to treasure when you’ve already lost a lot—or everything.
If you’re still here reading, I hope you go home tonight and hug whatever it is that keeps you grounded.
Today, I’m writing this half apathetic, half tired.
But giving yourself permission to be is one thing.
Giving up is another.
And I’m not giving up yet.
