> As I take a break from Google

I take it you believe you could go back? I think your time in Google might be at an end, forever.

Unless your exit path was to an alphabet backed entity, you're more valuable to them as a non retained worker right now: they're downsizing.

By the time this ship changes course back to expansion you'd be either too expensive or behind an age/skills curve. Hungrier people will eat your lunch surely?

> Just like the long golden age boosted the current morale crisis, these few years of choppy waters will help rebound the optimism when the fortunes inevitably turn for the better

I would not take it for granted that fortunes will turn for the better for a specific company. Big corporate entities can coast decades in a state that is agonizingly stagnant compared to their golden days.