Work or vanish
...a reflection on labour, scarcity, and quiet refusal
“There is a square; there is an oblong. They rise; they fall; they conceal the desire to be free.” (Virginia Woolf, The Waves)
The world we move through, its systems, its scaffolding, is not built to nurture life, not really.
It hums with the quiet mechanics of filtration, of silent sorting and subtle control. Resources do not flow to where they are most needed; they drift instead toward where they best mould behaviour - through the gentle pressure of lack, through the soft chains of dependency.
Labour, once imagined as a form of self-expression, of becoming, is no longer that. It is simply the toll we pay to access the most basic rights. The right to exist is no longer a given, it is something to be earned. And what makes one worthy? Not the sincerity of their contribution, not the quiet beauty of their work, but their place in the circuitry. Usefulness is no longer soulful or tangible, it is structural. It is the ability to stay plugged into the machine.
We are told stories of freedom in labor, of endless opportunity, of a world where merit paves the way. “To each according to their talents,” they say, as though the system sees all gifts with equal eyes. But beneath the glow of this rhetoric lies a quiet sorting. Some merits are golden tickets; others, invisible ink.
The dreamer who stirs collective imagination is gently pushed to the margins, her worth whispered away. Meanwhile, the one who moves numbers between folders, never touching the soil of creation, is applauded, protected, named essential. Not because of truth or value - but because the system has already decided who gets to belong.
The architecture of our economy is not an accident - it is designed like shifting sand, never letting you stand still for long. Fleeting contracts, borrowed homes, futures suspended on the breath of markets and moods. It feels chaotic, but it isn’t a flaw, it is the blueprint. Because a life in flux is easier to steer. A person grounded, anchored, at peace - such a person is harder to move. Harder to manage. So the ground is kept deliberately unsteady, and we learn to call that uncertainty normal.
Beneath it all, it’s fear that moves the gears - quiet, constant, unquestioned. The fear of losing what grants you place: the job, the title, the rented walls, the fragile promise of care. Legitimacy, it turns out, is conditional. The system whispers its terms gently but firmly: if you crave security, then fall in line. Work. Smile. Don’t resist. Don’t ask why. Feed the machine your energy and your hours, and it might let you keep the lights on. If you’re lucky - and loyal - it may even let you rest for a week, somewhere far from the tension it taught you to call normal.
What began as the gentle rhythm of exchange - of giving, sharing, sustaining - has been replaced by something colder: a quiet contract of debt. You arrive in the world empty-handed, and before your first dream can settle, you are already asked to prove your right to stay. Economics no longer nourishes - it negotiates. Not with kindness, but with veiled demands. You don’t simply receive - you must pull, strive, justify. Living is not a given, it is earned. Hunger is not met with compassion, but with a price tag.
Even when there is more than enough, your access is never free. It is conditional, provisional, always hanging by a thread. Money, in this world, is no longer just currency. It is a passcode. A badge. A permission slip to exist. Try to slip quietly beyond its borders, and the system stirs - like an immune response to a perceived threat. Opt out, and you’re suddenly recast: not free, but deviant. A freeloader. A drifter. Someone who doesn’t “contribute,” who resists being measured.
The irony is tender and strange - you’re not seen as dangerous for what you do, but for what you refuse to need. For not dancing to the incentives, for not chasing the rewards. To step outside the rhythm is to invite correction: sometimes through prescriptions, sometimes through isolation, sometimes through the slow ache of being unseen.
This isn’t merely a story of inequality, it is something more insidious, more elegantly disguised. It is that true independence, the kind that isn’t transacted or tethered, is treated as defiance. In a world designed around participation, opting out isn’t seen as freedom - it is seen as rebellion.
Don’t ask for a salary? You’re not playing the game. Don’t rely on an employer? Then you’re not in the architecture. And if you’re not in the architecture, the doors close quietly, one by one. You’re not denied because you lack ability, or even effort - you’re denied because you’re not plugged into the system’s circuitry. Because you stepped outside the vertical chain of command.
Here, resources don’t follow need. They follow allegiance. They’re dispensed not to support life, but to reward alignment. To access the essentials - shelter, food, legitimacy - you must show you’re still in the loop, still part of the structure that feeds itself.
The illusion, of course, is choice. But in truth, the options are scripted. You are offered paths, yes - but all within the same terrain. And to stray from it, to try and live on the margins, to grow your own rhythm instead of marching to theirs - that is when the system pulls back its support and watches you scramble.
At its heart, this isn’t an economy of growth or generosity. It’s an economy of regulation, of quiet obedience. Not one built on the pursuit of wealth for all, but on the careful distribution of just enough - just enough to keep you reaching, never arriving. Not abundance, but permission. Not provision, but proof of submission.
It wears the mask of freedom, this system. On the surface, there’s choice - an open menu of paths: finance, tech, the arts, start-ups, design. Pick your passion, they say. Build your life, your way. And it does feel free, for a moment. Like standing at the edge of a vast field with endless trails branching out.
But beneath that illusion, all the trails loop back to the same condition: work, or disappear. Not working isn’t just frowned upon, it makes you invisible. The freedom offered is not freedom from the system, but within it. You may pick your role, but not the rules.
Because when work is the price of survival, choice becomes choreography. You’re not choosing a life - you’re selecting your tether. You’re allowed color and variation, as long as you don’t leave the boundaries. The moment you step out, the world shifts. The smiles fade. The support vanishes.
It becomes clear then: the arena was never just a place to play, it was the only place where your points counted. Outside it, you’re nothing but a silhouette. Like a game that invites you to roam freely, but wipes your score the moment you exit.
The system doesn’t stop you from leaving. It simply ensures that if you do, you lose the right to stay afloat. That’s the trick. It doesn’t bind you, it erases you.
Economics isn’t merely the realm of money, it is the gatekeeper of access, a delicate network that divides the world into those who circulate within its endless exchange and those who are left on the fringe. It whispers that inclusion is a birthright, yet even a quiet step away from the designated role marks you as an interloper, a “parasite” unworthy of the sustenance it controls.
In this quiet ballet, value isn’t born of creation, but is painstakingly shuffled and redistributed. You find yourself given just below the threshold you need, not as an act of care, but as a means to maintain an invisible order a series of norms that keep you moving, keep you dreaming, and most importantly, keep you confined within the boundaries of the system. It offers not abundance, but a permission slip to remain, a fragile guarantee of belonging in an ever-watchful arena.
P.S. What’s been haunting the corners of your mind lately? What questions do you carry quietly? Tell me in the comments — I’m listening.
the transition of believing the world has your back to realizing it's simply keeping you afloat long enough to throw you into the working world is a hard one. It's dehumanizing and depressing but you have no other options but to go through this flow of "this sucks but what choice do I have". I hate that this is what we have unwillingly gone through and will continue to drag ourselves through. Loved this piece :)
Great read!