This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Trinette Faint, a 54-year-old ex-Google employee turned actor, screenwriter, and entrepreneur who recently moved to Montpellier, France. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I started out in production and as a personal assistant in the 1990s. I continued my career in 2011 as the US payroll manager, travel manager, and executive assistant to the CEO of Russell Reynolds Associates in New York. I went on to hold a similar role at Nike before working as a copywriter and editor for an Italian luxury skincare brand.
My most recent corporate role was from August 2018 through November 2024 as an executive business partner at Google. I was also a writer, events manager, and PR coordinator.
I was unexpectedly let go from Google in November 2024
After my layoff, I had knee surgery in December. I spent that December and most of January 2025 recovering.
From late January 2025 to now, I’ve been taking a creative gap year (and a half), which has involved writing, acting, filmmaking, and launching Chez Faint, my networking and retreat company, in addition to working as a contract field marketing manager for Udacity, which is part of Accenture.
I earned just over $200,000 from Google when I left the company, including base salary and equity exercised at the time. Now, my income has been sporadic. I was definitely financially destabilized by the layoff, but I’m much more fulfilled than ever before. The trade-off has absolutely been worth it.
I was traumatized, angry, and shocked by my layoff
My manager told me the layoff was performance-related, but I never felt that was true.
My senior dog, Avery, died two weeks before I was laid off, and I was already scheduled for knee surgery in late December. I contacted my surgeon, and they moved up the procedure a few weeks so that it, along with my physical therapy, would be covered by my insurance before it ran out. Given this, jumping back into tech was not top of mind.
Right after I was laid off, I realized the same thing had happened to my character, Peri, in my TV script “Peri Does Europe.” Peri was fired from her tech job the day before she was to go to London to meet up with friends for a trip through Europe, where she subsequently pursued her dormant creative dreams.
I wrote the scene four months earlier, and like Peri, I was going to London the day after I was let go. I absorbed this startling revelation, and apparent manifestation, and took it as a sign to fully be the creative person I always was but had been too busy with work to be.
After I got laid off, I needed to see what was possible
From starting out as a teenage model in Paris to landing on the cover of “Vogue Knitting” at 49 to earning my screenwriting certificate from UCLA to publishing novels and essays to my TV pilots winning awards, I knew my time to embrace my creative side had come.
As a requirement for receiving unemployment benefits, I had to be looking for another job, so I applied for executive assistant, communications, and marketing roles. Very often, I’d apply for something through LinkedIn, and the recruiter would respond, but then ghost me later.
This process produced its own anxiety, and I ultimately decided to scrap it all and dive fully into my creativity. When I did that, things started to change. I started booking acting jobs, and interest in my screenwriting picked up.
Here’s how my creative gap year has played out so far
I kicked off my gap year with the first of six acting classes and began French lessons. I signed up for an immersion course in Montpellier, France, over the summer.
I attended SXSW in March. In April, I attended the London Screenwriters Festival, where I pitched my screenplays. In May, I attended a writers’ retreat and held book signings for my novel.
I auditioned a lot and started booking principal roles in commercials. I had my first international dinner for my business in Rome in July. I wrote my short film “Party Pants” in the spring.
Courtesy of Trinette Faint
When I returned from Europe to my home in Boston, I produced, codirected, and starred in my short film, and was awarded best actress at the Berlin Indie Film Festival.
To fund my gap year, I used savings, severance pay, and unemployment benefits, which lasted for about a year, rented out my guest room on Airbnb, took on acting jobs, and worked a part-time contract role. My financial situation has made me hungrier for success and even less afraid to work hard for it.
What has surprised me most is how much the universe has provided when I needed it
For example, after I signed up for the writer’s retreat, I received an Airbnb booking that covered the cost of it and then some.
The most surprising thing that has validated my journey was attending SXSW. I was at the film and TV happy hour on the first day when a man approached me and asked if I was an actor. When I said yes, he went on to say that he was a producer, that his wife was writing a series, and that he had not been able to cast this particular character, who, based on an actual person, was a very tall Black woman. I’m 6’1″.
He said he came to SXSW to find someone, and I said, “This was why I came, to be found.” There have been many such miracles and happenings along the way.
It’s no longer a gap year; it’s my new career path
Courtesy of Trinette Faint
After visiting Montpellier last summer, I decided to move here. My next project is working with Paris- and LA-based producers to produce my “Collette’s Caleb” TV pilot.
Pursuing what you want in life can be financially destabilizing, terrifying, and isolating. It can also be incredibly rewarding and fulfilling, but you have to start. Take a small step every day toward your goal, and before you realize it, you’ll have made a giant leap.
From losing my dog and job, to recovering from knee surgery, to becoming an award-winning actor and filmmaker, blows my mind. A year and a half in, my future is brighter than ever before. I have zero regrets and no plans to change anything if I need a more stable income in the future.
