Coping With Job Loss
Coping With Job Loss: Overcoming
Crisis and Moving toward Success
Presenter: Diane Kern, Ph.D.
Creator of Happy & Healthy U Seminars
The loss of a job is
one of the most difficult life events and source of significant stress. Experiencing emotional distress in response
to losing one’s job is very common and to be expected. The typical experience is grief, which is
constituted by several emotional stages.
The model of such grief is characterized by the following stages:
1.
Shock,
Disbelief, and Denial: This is often
the initial reaction to losing a job; that the job loss does not feel
real.
2.
Anger/ Resentment/ Bitterness: Feeling angered about the manner in which
one’s job was terminated is very common.
It is important to recognize the underlying feelings that prompt the
anger. Such anger is particularly
intense when one feels that they were unfairly terminated; mistreated while
they were employed; or unappreciated and undervalued.
3.
Bargaining: This is the sense that maybe one can suddenly
change and undo the job loss. However,
this is a temporary way that the mind
eases the pain and grasps for a way to regain control
4.
Sadness /
Depression: These are feelings of
despair and hopelessness. There may
also be some self-blame.
Diminished self-esteem is often
experienced, due to the stigma of job loss, as well as the actual financial
strain that may result. This may leave
the former employee feeling inadequate to meet their financial obligations and
plagued by a sense of shame.
5.
Acceptance: This is the acknowledgement of the painful
and disruptive event; while realizing and desiring to go on. Instead of engaging in psychological defenses
and ways to avoid and minimize the pain; this stage embraces the reality of
this difficult occurrence and the desire to get unstuck and move on. It is at
this point that one is truly ready to search for a new job or explore other healthy,
career related options.
The key to
successfully coping with and surviving a job loss is to work through your
feelings; not to avoid them or get stuck in them. The goal is to eventually move on. Moving on for many may mean finding another
job. For others, it may mean early retirement
or establishing a new career. Below is a
model for moving on with one’s life.
Spiritually: It is important that you assign meaning to
this experience and make sense out of it.
This is also
an opportunity to confirm or redefine one’s
sense of purpose. Exercise your
faith. Meditation and prayer
can bring a sense of calm, centering, and
hope. Such quieting practices are also
helpful in terms of being able to access and hear one’s inner voice. This is also where we exercise our integrity
and allow our healthy, positive standards to guide our actions.
Physically:
Experiencing major stress, such as a job loss can impact one’s health by
weakening the immune system, thereby, rendering us more vulnerable for
illness. Therefore, it is essential that
we refrain from self-medicating or excessive use of drugs or alcohol. Instead
this is the time to concentrate on maintaining one’s health and strength through
proper nutrition, exercise and rest.
Also, this is where all of one’s physical and survival needs are
important. This means addressing one’s
financial needs by having a plan; utilizing savings; and tapping into other
resources, such as unemployment benefits, or other services.
Emotionally: Here is where our attitude about ourselves
and this experience is crucial in determining our ability to recover from this
crisis. It is important that one
validates the distressing feelings experienced and to remember that it is
natural and part of the grieving such a loss.
It is also essential to recognize that the experience of losing a job,
even when fired with cause, does not define a person. Therefore, do not internalize the experience
and beat yourself up. This is only
likely to lead to a depressive state that can keep you stuck. Also do not act
out in either self-destructive, violent or other inappropriate ways. Acting out usually creates yet a whole new set
of problems, ranging from legal or criminal charges to negative repercussions
to one’s reputation. Such reactions will
only result in negative consequences for you with potentially lasting damage to
one’s career life. Exercise self-discipline around your legitimate anger in a
way that allows you to retain your sense of self, integrity and power. Instead of getting stuck in self-blame, it
is healthy to fairly evaluate one’s role in the job performance and in one’s firing. This places us in the healthy posture to
address our issues or skill deficits.
In cases of wrongful termination, it is sometimes
helpful to stand up for and exercise one’s rights. Such actions may take the form of filing a
formal grievance or pursuing legal
action. Another option could simply consist of a written dispute of the firing that would be
placed on record. This can be a healthy way to discharge one’s anger and
possibly accomplish re-instatement or restitution. Being clear about the purpose of contesting a
firing is essential. If we do not have a
desired goal in mind, it could become very easy to get mired in a protracted
fight. Therefore, it is important to recognize one’s stamina for waging such major
battles and balancing such actions with continuing to function well in other
aspects of everyday life. Also, it is
important that one balances such actions against the need to move on to
regaining our career life. Therefore, it
behooves us to decide the relative value of
the various options to fight a job loss against their possible toll or negative
impact on our lives.
Mentally
or Intellectually: Identifying and
reminding one’s self about one’s talents, skills, and abilities is very
important at this time. Also, recognize
the valuable contributions you made and accomplishments you achieved in your
work. Engaging in such reflective exercises can serve as the basis of preparing
for a new job or career. In addition, it
is helpful to feel good about oneself and to realize that one’s value and
skills are not contingent upon or defined by one’s job. In other words, we own our value and skill
set. This may also assist a person in recognizing new opportunities and
developing new interests and skills. The
goal is to regain a sense of empowerment and to become proactive in terms of
utilizing our strengths toward reshaping our career lives.
Socially
/ Interpersonally: Reaching out to
one’s social network for support can be very helpful. First of all, it is important to know that
there are those who care about us and to be reminded that we are not defined
by; nor is our worth dependent on our jobs or by the incomes we earn. Those,
who truly care about and value us will not denigrate us due to a job loss. In
addition, reaching out to others, who have lost jobs and participating in some
level of shared support, helps us realize that we are not alone and that our
experience is common. Therefore, losing
a job does not result in one becoming a “loser”.
Networking with others is a very useful way
of connecting socially with others to exchange information and resources for
possible job leads. First of all,
letting other trusted individuals in your social circle know that you are now
job hunting and what it is you are seeking is a first line of networking. Other forms of career networking consist of
attending job search groups, joining professional organizations related to your
interests or particular profession, and obtaining a mentor .
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