People in 1776 and 1788 had plenty of bills and responsibilities, and lived far closer to the edge than almost anyone in America lives now.
You are correct in that it cannot be a man-the-barricades revolution. But imagining that everything will be OK by spending a few minutes in a voting booth a few times a decade, or spending a month or two promoting a secular messiah is foolish occupation.
Actually living closer to the edge makes it easier to drop everything and man the barricades. If you don’t have a job anyway you can’t lose your job. Of course even then a lot of work went into making payroll for the army of the revolution. That’s when you know society is really hitting a breaking point, when somebody is giving the revolution a budget.
I don’t know about things being OK, but I do know life will go on. It might go on sucky, but it will go on.