They're all doing terrific! You're not. You're barely hanging on. You used to be a winner, but now you're not so sure. How can you pull yourself out of this?
I've felt like that. Everyone in New York had a job except me. I would never work again. I was ruining interviews although I knew better I had run for years in Philadelphia. Yet I was unable to job hunt properly. I was relatively new to New York and divorced. Even going to my house in the country depressed me: a woman wanted me to sell it, join her cult, and have a seventy one year old as my roommate. It seemed to be my fate.
Then I got a call from my father a hurricane was about to hit New York. When I told him my situation, he directed me to get rid of the cult lady and take the next train out. I got out just as the hurricane blew in, and he and I spent three beautiful days alone at my parents' ocean place. He nurtured me, including playing ten motivational tapes on "being a winner"!
The winners in life think constantly in terms of I can, I will and I am. Losers, on the other hand, concentrate their waking thoughts on what they should have or would have done, or what they can't do.
He wined and dined and took care of me. We watched a six hour tape of my family history the births and birthdays, Christmases past, marriages and parties. We talked about life and the big picture. I had no strength. He nurtured me and gave me strength.
What can you do if you can't get this kind of nurturing? Perhaps I've learned a few lessons that may help you.
PUT THINGS IN PERSPECTIVE
You've worked ten or twenty years, and you'll work ten or twenty more. In the grand scheme of things, this moment will be a blip: an aberration in the past.
Focusing on the present will make you depressed, and will also make you a poor interviewee. You will find it difficult to brag about your past or see the future. You will provide too much information about what put you in this situation.
Interviewers don't care. They want to hear what you can do for them. When they ask why you are looking, give a brief, light, logical explanation, and then drop it.
Focus on what you have done in the past, and what you can do in the future. You do have a future, you know although you may feel locked in your present situation. Even some young people say it is too late for them. But a lot can happen in ten years and most of what happens is up to you.
GET SUPPORT
Gone are the old support systems: Extended families, and even nuclear families, are gone. We no longer look to our community for support. Today, we are more alone than at any other time; yet we are supposed to be tougher and take care of ourselves. But relying solely on yourself is not the answer. How can you fill yourself up when you are emotionally and spiritually empty?
Job hunters often need some kind of emotional and spiritual support because this is a trying time. Our egos are at stake. We feel vulnerable and uncared for. We need realistic support from people who know what we are going through.
Join a job hunt counseling group to be with others who know what you are going through. A job hunt group gives emotional support, concrete advice, and feedback.
If possible, rely on your friends and family. I could count on a call from my former husband most mornings after I returned from breakfast just so we both could make sure I was really job hunting. I scheduled lunches with friends and gave them an honest report or practiced my job hunting lines with them. Don't abuse your relationships by relying on one or two people. Find lots of sources of support. Consider joining a church or synagogue (they're supposed to be nice to you there).
REMEMBER THAT THIS IS PART OF A BIGGER PICTURE
We, ignorant of ourselves, beg often our own harms, which the Wise Power denies us for our own good; so we find profit by losing of our prayers.
SHAKESPEARE
Antony and Cleopatra
...so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. ISAIAH 55:9
Why me? Why now? Shakespeare thought there might be someone bigger than ourselves watching over everything a Wise Power. My mother (and probably yours, too) always said that "everything happens for the best."
And we know that all things work together for good of them that love God.
ROMANS 8:28
If you believe that things happen for a purpose, think about the good in your own situation. What was the "purpose" of my unemployment? Because of it I experienced a closeness with my father that still affects me, I became a better counselor, and I stopped working twelve hour days.
Though shattered when they lose their jobs, many people say in retrospect it was the best thing that could have happened to them. Some say the time of transition was the most rewarding experience of their lives.
Every adversity has the seed of an equivalent or greater benefit. W. CLEMENT STONE
Perhaps you, too, can learn from this experience and also make some sense of it. This is a time when people often:
- decide what they really should be doing with their careers (I had resisted becoming a full time career consultant because I liked the prestige of the jobs I had held)
- better their situations, taking off on another upward drive in their careers
- develop their personalities; learn skills that will last their entire lives
- reexamine their values and decide what is now important to them
The trouble with the rat race is that if you win, you're still a rat. LILY TOMLIN
CONTINUE TO DO YOUR JOB
When you were in your old job, there were days when you didn't feel like doing it, but you did it anyway because it was your responsibility. Job hunting is your job right now. Some days you don't feel like doing it, but you must. Make a phone call. Write a proposal. Research a company. Do your best every day. No matter how you feel. And somehow it will get done, just as any job gets done. Some practical suggestions:
- Job hunting is your job. Make it professional. Organize it. Get a job hunt calendar to track what you are doing. Use The Five O'clock Club's Interview Record to more professionally track your efforts and results.
- Set goals. Don't think of whether you want to make calls and write letters. Of course you don't. Just do them anyway. Spend most of your time interviewing that's how you get a job. Remember that depression leads to inactivity, which leads to more depression.
- If you're at the three month mark or beyond, you may be at a low point. It's hard to push on. Get a fresh start. Pretend you're starting all over again.
- Finding a job is your responsibility. Don't depend on anyone else (search firms, friends) to find it for you.
- Watch your drinking, eating, smoking. They can get out of hand. Take care of yourself physically. Get dressed. Look good. Get some exercise. Eat healthy foods. You may need a few days off to recharge.
- Don't postpone having fun until you get a job. If you are unemployed, schedule at least three hours of fun a week. Do something you normally are unable to do when you are working. I went out to breakfast every morning, indulged in reading the Times, and then went back to my apartment to job hunt. I also went to auction houses, and bought a beautiful desk at Sotheby's when I sold my country house.
- Assess your financial situation. What is your backup plan if your unemployment goes on for a certain number of months? If need be, I had planned to take in a roommate, sell furniture, and take out a loan. It turned out not to be necessary, but by planning ahead I knew I would not wind up on the street.
- Remember: you are distracted. Job hunters get mugged, walk into wallsand lose things. This is not an ordinary situation, and extraordinary things happen. Be on your guard.
- Observe the results of what you do in a job hunt. Results are indicators of the correctness of your actions and can help refine your techniques.
- Become a good job hunter so you can compete in this market. It takes practice, but the better you are, the less anxious you will be.
