A roadmap to recovery from layoff
You’ve been laid off and feel like you’ve been kicked in the teeth and had your heart ripped from chest, thrown to the ground from 40,000 feet in the air and spat upon. Does that sum up your feelings pretty well?
Before starting a roadmap to recovery from layoff, you must believe in your heart of hearts that being laid off was not your fault, you did not cause it to happen. You are a victim of a poor economy, someone else’s bad decisions (like AIG) and a reactionary public scared off from buying. Understand that your feeling like a part of you has died is real because that is what has happened. You are not physically dying, it is the way that you defined yourself that has died. ‘The way you defined yourself’ means that all of us define ourselves by what we do whether it’s job title, paycheck, job function, or people we help. What we do with our lives is how we say to ourselves and others this is who I am. Think about it, when you meet someone for the first time what is one of the top three questions you ask, ‘what do you do?’
Warning… this is written very directly and without any intention of being harsh. It takes more than a pat on the back and chin up attitude to pick your life back up again. If you are having trouble coping to the point where you are not leaving your house or cannot control negative emotions then you need to get professional help, stop reading this and pick up the phone. A subjective grief counselor, not related to you, can help you map out your layoff recovery plan.
Start your road map to recovery from layoff:
1. Vent. Write down all your upset, frustration, anger, finger pointing and regrets. I used Laid Off Pissed Off.com because I’m so upset the world has to know about it! The goal of this action is that you have an outlet into which you can pour out your emotions. Pouring out your emotions enables you to visualize them and put them into a perspective that you can cope with and you can move on.
2. Treat yourself with kindness and love. Do for yourself exactly what you would do if your best friend had lost someone close to them. This is not overly dramatic because in a sense, there was a death, it was a part of yourself that is no longer there. There are 5 emotional stages of job loss that you will go through and being kind to yourself will ease your stress. Give yourself a 7 day vacation from myself and my misery. The premise of the vacation from yourself is to stop being miserable for 7 consecutive days and do the things you love. Veg out in-front of the television for hours at a time, cry till you can’t cry anymore, eat brownies, make love, fulfill a fantasy or several, go out with the girls or play a round of poker. Notice there is nothing here that costs a lot of money – play poker with fake money or have a potluck night with friends, simply be creative with what you have in the house . Don’t over do it to where you have changed a dress size, disrespected yourself or spent money you don’t have because these just bring on a set of all new problems. The goal is to smile as often as possible.
The rationale of smiling often is that you are giving yourself the permission to laugh and smile again. Psychologically, when you lose your sense of self and are depressed your mind and body think and react negatively to the depression. That is why when people are upset or down the sadness seems to emanate from their bodies. Their eyes are not as shiny, they have poor posture, seem distracted or have cold and flu like aches and symptoms. You need to refocus your thoughts and retrain your mind and body, the muscle that it is, and force it to be positive.
3. Make a new routine. So far, you have poured out your emotions on paper or on Laid Off Pissed Off.com and taken a vacation from yourself to get in the right frame of mind to start over and find a way to make money. Everyday you did the same routine of preparing for work. So now, you are the job Monday through Friday because looking for a job is a full-time job. Get up early, get dressed in normal clothes not the oversized shirt and boxers, and do a little something with your hair and get prepared to go to work at your new job – your job hunt. Set aside several hours to research popular job search engines, starting your own business online jobs to earn extra cash and freelance job search. Consider retraining for a new career. Research the activities you like to do for possible job opportunities. For example, if you like working out you could be a personal trainer, if you enjoy helping people achieve their goals you could be a life coach, or if you like writing you can write for blogs.
4. Budget budget budget. It goes without saying that you have a dribble of money from unemployment and it doesn’t last forever. Undoubtedly, budgeting is part of every thought you have and there are so many things that you can do to cut-back that it’s a whole other chapter.
5. Exercise. Physically do something for an hour every day to reduce stress. Being home or depressed slows your metabolism because you’re not moving your mind or body as much. The lack of activity also means that you will not sleep as easily or through the night. Who can sleep when their losing their home and are broke? I’m there and although I don’t really sleep well anymore, I am not as restless when my mind is racing at night with worry. Exercising will clear away the sadness from your heart and mind.
An obvious benefit of exercise is weight control. Use this time off as an opportunity to get fit. There are many free and easy services like GetFit Boca Raton and My Food Diary that provide you with exercise routines, diet and weight trackers, recipes that save you money over buying less healthy processed foods and goal setting. Participating in local fitness events like marathons and fun walks are terrific ways to meet people, get fit, be outside and keep your competitive edge alive whilst staying in budget since it’s free.
6. Family. If you haven’t already learned a valuable lesson of being laid off, family is the most important thing in your life. Undeniably, your family has been strained and attacked by unemployment. Your family is key to your layoff recovery. Unless your spouse or partner is a total jerk, you have emotional support and someone willing to hear you say out loud all that troubles you. Communicate with your him/her and your children to share what has happened, how you are feeling and what you are doing about it. Communication is glue that will keep you all together and on the right path. If your family does not know what is happening with you they cannot help you and they may mistakenly perceive you to be perpetuating your own sadness unwillingness to move on. Perceptions such as these will turn to resentment and more stress. Be honest and ask yourself, how long would you be able to stay in a relationship where you were being shut-out , financially trapped and surrounded by negativity?
Having a family is a tremendous source of strength, use it. Being alone and having to go through a layoff, losing a home and struggling to rebuild a life is almost devastating emotionally. You constantly ask yourself, what is it all for, did I really sacrifice a family for a paycheck or, my personal favorite, is it too late to start-over? I am sure that these reasons are why memberships to dating services have doubled in the last two months and condom sales are way up! A cheery thought.
Layoff recovery is tough and something you have to do everyday. Put your game face on and succeed at your new job – you by creating your own layoff recovery road map. The world is changing every day, new opportunities are being born and you will move on.
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Thank you for this post. It’s comforting to know I’m not the only person that feels like a part of them has died. I lost my job last week and this is exactly what I needed to read to get me back on track again. It does feel like a death but I do believe “in every difficulty lies opportunity”, as Einstein said. Good luck to everyone going through being laid off. It will only lead to a better opportunity!