What profession should you invest in to secure the future in a post-coronavirus world?
Worldwide employment is in free fall. Layoffs caused by the COVID-19 pandemic have wreaked havoc on an already vulnerable workforce in areas that, sooner rather than later, would be replaced by AI and on businesses and industries no longer relevant. Even though US unemployment’s rate dropped to 13.3% in May, it is still the highest since the Great Depression. However, this crisis could become a positive turning point if people leverage the opportunities it offers to change our perspective on society.
As a consequence of the coronavirus, 1.6 billion workers—nearly half of the world’s workforce—could suffer “massive damage” to their livelihoods, according to the UN’s International Labor Organization. The work landscape is constantly evolving, and not all of today’s occupations will be here tomorrow. Will we have our jobs a year from now? What profession could guarantee your future?
Even before the pandemic outbreak, the University of Oxford estimated that approximately half of US jobs would be at risk in the near future due to the adoption of new technologies. The pace of economic change will now accelerate faster than expected because the pandemic will devastate in ongoing waves, experts warn. Non-essential businesses will quickly disappear from the landscape, and with them, many professions.
The areas that will be in the largest demand are in the field of human relations. Experts in how to create connections between people, in building beneficial and deep mutual relationships, will be in highest demand in the labor market.
Future Job Openings
Connection building—this is the profession of the future. We have never handled human connection properly and we see the results in our frayed and torn social fabric at all levels of human interaction. The relations we have been familiar with are built on natural, biological interlinkage: between man and woman, between mother and child, and so on—connection based on human instinctual impulses. The call of the future is to engage in higher-level relationships that are beyond our innate biological nature—not relationships that depend on reflexive desire, but those that make us feel the simple truth that we are all one.
Why will this be in such high demand? It is so because the trend of evolution in nature is to integrate the human race into one interconnected system. The coronavirus calls for us to cooperate together to survive and progress, to be considerate of one another, to make sure that our actions do not hurt others.
Until now, we have made our living from professions and businesses focused on providing various goods and services to one another. From now on, we will move a step forward, from purely materialistic occupations to occupations that relate more to the heart, to human connection. Building relationships between all human beings, with those who are very different from us, and especially with those we initially hate, is not an easy task. It requires training to understand human nature, as well as exercises in proper communication with others. In such training, a person will be invited to join a group of people he or she does not know and perhaps even differs from. Through workshops and discussion circles, the individual will learn how to integrate with other people, work smoothly together, and treat them with care and understanding. Each one will learn how to build a relationship above the natural gap with others until the person feels everyone as close.
It is written, “love covers all crimes.” Covering our differences with love is the foundation of a new attitude toward society and the world. This principle stems from the knowledge that there is only one force in nature –as integral and inclusive as it is- and we must emulate its actions to achieve balance and harmony in our lives.
Work That Is Good For All
The more successful we are in building connections, the more comfortable and thriving our lives will be because in our world, nothing is missing other than good relationships between people.
It will be our work to develop a sort of new internal software that works according to one overall formula: In every form of communication between people or business, we should aim to achieve the optimal result of maximum benefit for all. For this to happen, everyone must learn how to direct themselves to fulfill the desire of others, rather than their natural desire.
In order to grasp the potential of this new practice, we will need to change our mindset in order to create improved habits that will become second nature. By doing exercises that demonstrate how, in an integral society, the good of others is my good also, we will gradually develop new skills and qualities.
Quality connections such as these will fill us with sublime satisfaction. Through the development of love for others, we will begin to feel the force that unites all parts of nature into one complete system. Sensing this is the highest state of development one can achieve.
Therefore, the next step in the evolution of employment is to first provide everyone with all their basic material needs, and beyond that, to build internal connections among people in order to reveal the sublime reality that expands beyond boundaries.
For this purpose, humanity will need to study the art of connection, and experts in this field will be in high demand to lead the process. In the post-coronavirus world, investment in connection will ensure a good future for you, your loved ones, and the world, opening our limited vision to a boundless perspective of a bright new reality.
