Being independent is addictive!

I started looking for a new job since the mid of March this year, after leaving the last organisation due to their financial crisis. I looked throughout the month of April and into the first week of May. By this time, I have no shame in admitting, I had stepped into depression.

Not getting a job for this long, was driving me crazy. It wasn't that I was unaware of the market situation and didn't come across the numerous posts on LinkedIn where people were saying that they haven't been able to get a job for almost a year now. But it was just that, I have quit as well as lost jobs before. And never did it take me more than 3-4 weeks to get a new job.
The few interviews I was getting, were quite humiliating because the interviewers had already formed an opinion about me based on my short stints and were just conducting the interview to grill me. A few HRs called and said, "you've left jobs so soon that you don't have a stand in asking for a desired CTC". One HR straightaway offered that I can get the job but with 10% hike only, and a day later she mentioned that there will be a 20% salary deduction.
I was struggling to stay positive but still I decided not to break in front of these null & void opportunities.
Being in the advertising industry for 6 years, I have seen and tolerated a lot. I didn't want to be taken advantage of, any more!
I kept applying. A lot of people started reaching out to me over LinkedIn DMs. They were trying to help me out. They were sharing mail IDs of people in their circle. But nothing worked out.

But. By the end of May, I had fallen in love with my independence.
I was getting freelance projects. There was no stress of a bad boss sitting on my head. There was no feud with the client servicing person. There was no communication gap between the client and me. There was no set rule of timings and attendance, that I was enticed to break!

You see, people like me, work because they love their work. But if we are told, or forced, or bossed around, to do the same work, we feel a strong repulsion.

When I was getting these freelance opportunities, I was directly talking to the client. Understanding their requirement better. They were understanding me better, trusting me more, because there was no other SPOC to steal the charm. I was quoting the price I thought was right for the kind of brief and the requirement. The client understood my expertise and my value, and agreed for the quotes. I felt more respected, in comparison with the times when I was working at a few organisations. And this independence felt addictive.

I started getting decent offers, but I wasn't willing to go back to being a slave. So, an offer that was more than decent had to do the trick for me. Along with the money, now the work culture and the kind of people in the organisation were also the key factors driving me towards the decision of taking the offer and going back into the grind.
What happened next is a story for another time. But for now, all I can say is that I'm sailing on two boats, trying to make the right decision, best for my future.