Keeping Your Head After Losing Your Job (29 page)

Help yourself through helping others

We are often so preoccupied with ourselves, but we were not meant to be alone. In Chapter Ten, I suggested you get outside yourself, connect with others, participate, network, take chances meeting people, reach out, use social networking, and volunteer. The more connections you have, the more potential sources of rewards are available. This has been especially important during your time between jobs, since losing your job may have led to a loss of personal connections that matter. But you can continue building your support network, even when you go back to work. You will always need friends, always need contacts, always need support. If you keep yourself connected and make people matter to you, you won’t have to worry about being alone.

Care for yourself

Your health and your self-care habits are important—not only during the time between jobs but for every day of your life. In Chapter Eleven, I described how you can use this time to get into better physical—and, therefore, mental—shape, or you can allow things to fall apart. Exercising regularly, eating a heart-healthy, balanced, diet, and reducing or eliminating alcohol and tobacco are great ideas for your entire life. This is something I always emphasize for anyone between jobs, since the temptation to overeat, remain passive, and overdrink is so strong. But getting in shape is not the same thing as
staying
in shape. In taking it to the future, you can remind yourself that self-care is your responsibility. No one can do that except you. It’s easy to let things fall apart and a lot harder to put them back together. In taking it to the future, you may want to remind yourself that feeling better depends on acting better. And exercise, diet, and health habits are part of that. But it’s your actions that will determine this.

Pay it forward

I want to ask you to consider one more idea—one more way of taking it to the future. If you have used these ideas and helped yourself, then you are both wise and lucky. Lucky to be able to do it, wise to choose it. You’ve worked hard to help yourself. You’ve overcome your fear of discomfort, you’ve challenged and changed your thoughts, and you’ve acted in spite of the way you felt. You have taken the time between jobs to learn new things, practice new habits. That’s good.

But what I would like you to think about is how you can help other people. No, I’m not suggesting that you become a therapist. But I am sure you may have friends and family who will have difficult times. Some of it may be related to their own experiences of being unemployed. Some of it may be due to setbacks, frustrations, or problems in their lives. There is always someone out there who is going to have a hard time.

There’s a wonderful way of looking at paying it forward. If you have much, give your wealth; if you have little, give your heart.

You now have these techniques that you’ve used. You’ve helped yourself, you feel better. That’s great.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could
pass it on
? I’ve given you these skills, now it’s your turn to give the skills to someone else. Help someone to help themself. Teach them what you have learned. You’ve made your world a better place, now make their world better.

Who was it that once said, “whoever saves a life, has saved an entire world”?

REFERENCES

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robert L. Leahy (BA, MS, PhD, Yale University), Director of The American Institute for Cognitive Therapy (
www.CognitiveTherapyNYC.com
), completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania Medical School under the direction of Dr. Aaron Beck, the founder of cognitive therapy. Dr. Leahy is the Past-President of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Past-President of the International Association of Cognitive Psychotherapy, Past-President of the Academy of Cognitive Therapy, Director of the American Institute for Cognitive Therapy (NYC) and Clinical Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Weill-Cornell University Medical School. He is the Honorary Life-time President, New York City Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Association and a Distinguished Founding Fellow, Diplomate, of the Academy of Cognitive Therapy. He has received the Aaron T. Beck Award for outstanding contributions in cognitive therapy.

Dr. Leahy was Associate Editor of the
Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy
(serving as Editor 1998–2003) and he is now Associate Editor of the
International Journal of Cognitive Therapy
. He serves on a number of scientific committees for international conferences on cognitive behavioral therapy and is a frequent keynote speaker and workshop leader at conferences and universities throughout the world.

Dr. Leahy is author and editor of 21 books, including
Treatment Plans and Interventions for Depression and Anxiety Disorders
(with Holland),
Overcoming Resistance in Cognitive Therapy
,
Bipolar Disorder: A Cognitive Therapy Approach
(with Newman, Beck, Reilly-Harrington, and Gyulai),
Cognitive Therapy Techniques
,
Roadblocks in Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy
,
Psychological Treatments of Bipolar Disorder
(ed. with Johnson), C
ontemporary Cognitive Therapy
,
The Therapeutic Relationship in the Cognitive Behavioral Psychotherapies
(ed. with Gilbert) and
The Worry Cure,
which received critical praise from the
New York Times
and has been selected by
Self
magazine as one of the top eight self-help books of all time.
The Worry Cure
has been translated into twelve languages and is a selection of the Book of the Month Club, Literary Guild and numerous other book clubs. Eleven of his clinical books have been book club selections. His two recent popular audience books are
Anxiety-Free: Unravel Your Fears before They Unravel You
and
Beat the Blues Before They Beat You: How to Overcome Depression
.

Dr. Leahy’s recent clinical books include
Emotion Regulation in Psychotherapy: A Practitioner’s Guide
(with Tirch and Napolitano),
Treatment Plans and Interventions for Depression and Anxiety Disorders
, Second Edition (with Holland and McGinn), and
Treatment Plans and Interventions for Bulimia and Binge-Eating Disorder
(with Zweig). He is the general editor of a series of books to be published by Guilford Press:
Treatment Plans and Interventions for Evidence-Based Psychotherapy
. His books have been translated into 18 languages and are used throughout the world in training cognitive behavioral therapists.