27yo’s wild move after being made redundant

A 27-year-old Australian worker has revealed the wild way she responded after she was told she would be losing her job.

Amie Maclaine is fleeing the country after being made redundant from her full-time marketing gig and feeling absolutely liberated.

She’s planning on spending all her money, has no return date, and is very keen to go out and live her life.

“I got made redundant from my job. So I booked one-way flights to Europe and plan to spend every cent in my bank account with no plan for the other end,” she shared online.

It might sound drastic, bordering on irresponsible, but for the young worker, it feels like the correct response to a job loss.

Amie Maclaine revealed her plans after losing her job. Picture: TikTok/amiemaclaine

She was left ‘shocked’ after being made redundant from her job. Picture: Instagram/amiemaclaine

Ms Maclaine, 27, resides in Canberra, and she’s always made conservative choices. She went to university, landed a graduate job, and worked her way up … and then the corporate ladder was pulled out from her while she was still climbing it.

The young worker was left “shocked” when her employer informed her that she was being made redundant.

“The redundancy was a massive shock. The group let go of the entire marketing team, which is really sad,” she told news.com.au.

The redundancy wasn’t immediate and Ms Maclaine, earning an $85,000 yearly salary, spent the next two weeks heading into the office as if she hadn’t just lost her job.

“I was in a massive state of shock. It was hard to comprehend going to work every day with everyone that still had a job,” she admitted.

She worked full-time in marketing. Picture: Instagram/amiemaclaine

Despite the bad news, she's thriving. Picture: Instagram/amiemaclaine

She's going overseas with no return ticket. Picture:Instagram/amiemaclaine

When Ms Maclaine first found out she’d lost her job, she kept it to herself, and she felt “embarrassed” even though she knew she hadn’t done anything wrong.

It was not until she spoke to her friends that she realised how common it was. Three of her mates living across Australia had also been made redundant at the same time.

It made her want to talk about it.

“Just because you get made redundant doesn’t mean your life is over,” she said.

It also made her start to think about what she wanted her own life to look like.

Did she need to get on SEEK and start applying for other jobs, or was it time for a reset?

The 27-year-old was currently living at home with her mum and not paying “stupid amounts of rent” for the first time in years, so she was in a good position not to need to jump straight into the next job.

Ms Maclaine had been in her early twenties when the pandemic hit and she’d been grieving that loss of time ever since.

She was meant to be out partying, travelling, and dating, but instead, she’d been housebound and doing rapid antigen tests.

“I just felt like I lost the youth of my twenties through the pandemic,” she said.

The pressure of the pandemic was also combined with the fact that Ms Maclaine had spent so much of her twenties dealing with some very grown-up things.

“In 2021, my dad passed away from cancer, and then last year, one of my best friend’s brothers passed away from cancer, and he was only 28,” she said.

The combination of loss and losing her job made her realise something.

“Life is too short,” she said.

Sure, she could stay, save her pennies, find another job, and continue on with the 9-5 hustle, or she could use this moment as an opportunity.

“Once I’d come to the terms with it, I was like, this is a great opportunity to travel. To tick off stuff on my bucket list that I’ve been wanting to do forever,” she said.

Plus, when would this opportunity come again? Sure, it was forced on her, but it also allowed her to re-evaluate.

“Whenever am I going to get another opportunity handed to me like that? To be forced to take the time off, and I didn’t have to resign to take six months off,” she said.

Right now, for the first time in ages, she feels so “liberated” and sees the redundancy as a “blessing in disguise”.

“I’m very fortunate that the redundancy didn’t shake up my life too much, I wasn’t struggling financially, and it presented me with an opportunity to do the things I love,” she said.

Originally published as 27yo’s wild move after being made redundant