I want to be upfront about something: I went into this experiment expecting a different result.
I think that's important context. I wasn't naive, exactly. I understood, in the abstract, that communism involves labor redistribution and collective resource management and all of that. I took a political theory class in college. I have the tote bag. But I also have a very strong personal brand, a Spotify playlist called "Slow Revolution" that has 847 followers, and a genuine, non-ironic belief that any society worth living in would find a place for someone with my particular constellation of gifts.
The algorithm disagreed. Firmly. With coordinates.
The Setup
Here's what I fed into the system — and by "the system" I mean a ChatGPT prompt I spent forty minutes crafting, which I titled "Revolutionary Life Alignment: A Holistic Labor Assignment Tool Based On Personal Aesthetic, Values, and Vibrational Frequency." I want to be transparent about the methodology.
I provided:
- My Pinterest board (312 pins, themes: linen everything, decolonized kitchens, cottagecore but make it political, women reading books in soft light, mushrooms)
- My Spotify "Soft Life" playlist (Phoebe Bridgers, Novo Amor, some Icelandic ambient stuff I found during a particularly intense Mercury retrograde)
- My Instagram bio, which currently reads: "grief-informed creative | decolonizing wellness one breath at a time | she/her | virgo sun, cancer moon, scorpio rising | currently: becoming"
- My actual job history, which I'll get to
- A 600-word personal statement I wrote describing my "offering to the collective" which I am not going to reproduce here in full because I have retained some dignity
Photo: Phoebe Bridgers, via www.nme.com
I also included my Enneagram type (4w5, obviously), my Human Design chart (Projector, Emotional Authority, 3/5 profile), and a paragraph explaining that I don't do well with fluorescent lighting or environments that "don't honor the nervous system."
I pressed enter. I waited. I made myself a matcha.
What The Algorithm Said About My Gifts
The response began promisingly. It acknowledged my "rich inner landscape" and noted my "demonstrated capacity for symbolic thinking and aesthetic curation." It observed that I had, over the past four years, built a genuine community around my values. It mentioned my podcast (fourteen episodes, the last one dropped in March 2023, I've been "taking a creative pause").
I felt seen. I sipped my matcha.
Then it said: "In a Soviet-style command economy operating under conditions of material scarcity and centralized labor allocation, the skills you have described would be classified under 'non-essential cultural production' and reassigned to sectors with active deficit conditions."
I put down the matcha.
The Part Where It Got Specific
I should explain my actual job history, because the algorithm leaned on it heavily and I think context matters.
For the past six years I have worked as: a part-time barista (left because the manager "didn't respect energetic boundaries"), a freelance content strategist (three clients, sporadic), a certified sound bowl practitioner (fourteen paying clients total, mostly people I already knew), and, most recently, a "somatic wellness educator" which means I run a Substack that twelve people pay $7 a month for, plus I occasionally facilitate a breathwork circle in my friend Jade's living room.
The algorithm processed all of this.
It then produced what it called a "Revolutionary Labor Compatibility Assessment," which I will now share with you in full, because I believe in radical transparency and also because I'm still processing the emotions and writing is how I metabolize.
Assessment Result: Fish Processing Facility, Vladivostok Maritime District. Recommended role: Quality Control and Sorting (Entry Level). Rationale: Subject demonstrates pattern recognition skills (aesthetic curation), tolerance for repetitive sensory input (sound bowl work), and comfort with non-traditional working environments (Jade's living room). The maritime processing sector has consistent labor deficits. Vladivostok offers significant natural beauty. The nervous system concern is noted; the facility has windows.
Photo: Vladivostok Maritime District, via wpassets.porttechnology.org
The facility has windows.
That was the accommodation. Windows.
The Part Where I Pushed Back
I want to be honest: I did not accept this gracefully. I went back to the algorithm four more times.
First, I reframed my somatic work as "labor wellness optimization" and suggested I could serve as a breathwork facilitator for collective workers experiencing burnout. The algorithm replied that Soviet-era labor management addressed worker fatigue through mandatory rest periods and production bonuses, not breathwork, and that my skills remained most applicable to the fish facility, where physical labor demands would make the breathwork, if anything, more personally relevant to me.
Then I argued that my podcast demonstrated media production skills that could serve the state propaganda apparatus. The algorithm noted that my podcast had fourteen episodes and the last one was eight months ago, and that the state propaganda apparatus requires consistency and output volume. It suggested I might assist with facility announcements at the Vladivostok plant. The facility has a PA system.
I tried submitting my Pinterest board as evidence of "visual communications expertise." The algorithm said the board was 68% images of linen and 14% mushrooms and that neither translated to a recognized design credential under the Revolutionary Labor Classification System.
Finally, I asked if my Cancer moon offered any relevant emotional labor skills that might qualify me for a counseling or community support role. The algorithm paused — I assume this is what the processing delay represents — and then said that astrology is not a recognized credentialing framework in command economies and that I should bring warm layers to Vladivostok, as the maritime winters are significant.
What I Learned, And What I'm Still Sitting With
I'm not going to pretend this was comfortable. It wasn't. I cried a little, and then I ate some sourdough, and then I sat with it the way my therapist taught me, which is to say I opened TikTok and watched forty minutes of "aesthetic communism" content, which is how I got into this in the first place.
And here's the thing about aesthetic communism on TikTok, the thing the algorithm helped me understand: it is communism with the fish removed. It's the linen and the community garden and the "nobody works a soul-crushing job" part. It is not the part where someone has to process the fish. It's not the Vladivostok part.
Somebody has to do the Vladivostok part. In every version of the thing. That's what the math requires.
I am, apparently, that somebody. The algorithm was very clear about this. It even gave me a start date.
I haven't booked flights. I'm taking a creative pause while I sit with the assignment.
But I did look up Vladivostok on Pinterest.
The sea, honestly, is beautiful. I found some linen content from the region. There's a woman in a cable-knit sweater standing on a dock.
I repinned it. I'm working through this at my own pace.
The author's Substack, "Becoming (In Process)," is available at a sliding scale of $7/month. The breathwork circle meets the second Tuesday of each month in Jade's living room, pending Jade's availability and the collective's harvest schedule.