How to deal with this feeling of overwhelming pointlessness?

I am (or at least I was before the strike) a working TV writer. Everyone I know who is working now got the job through personal connections (mostly coming up as someone's assistant). Not sure why I'm bothering to write samples when I don't have any friends with shows going right now and no one is buying anything unless you already have a studio deal (and often not even then). I do (did) fine for myself but I'm not famous and definitely don't have the network to package things in a meaningful way. I have great reps but even they can only do so much in this landscape. How to deal with feeling like I'm just wasting my time?