Keeping Your Head After Losing Your Job (9 page)

Shame is something that you have to “buy into.” No one can make you feel ashamed unless you actually believe the irrational thoughts that lead to shame. For example, imagine the following dialogue between your shame thoughts and your rational thoughts:

SHAME THOUGHTS: You should feel ashamed that people might know that you don’t have a job.

RATIONAL THOUGHTS: Really, why should I feel ashamed? I haven’t done anything immoral, illegal or malicious. Perhaps you can help me understand why I should feel ashamed of not having a job.

SHAME THOUGHTS: Well, because everyone will think you are a loser.

RATIONAL THOUGHTS: I doubt that everyone will think I am a loser. I am still the same person I was when I had a job. I lost a job—millions of people do. In fact, about one-third of the population will lose their jobs in a three-year period. I don’t think of them as losers.

SHAME THOUGHTS: Well, it’s terrible if even one person thinks less of you.

RATIONAL THOUGHTS: Why would it be terrible if someone thinks less of me? It only suggests that they don’t really understand the nature of unemployment. It sounds like you are saying that I should base my feelings on what an irrational, intolerant, judgmental person thinks. That doesn’t make much sense to me.

SHAME THOUGHTS: Well, I think less of you.

RATIONAL THOUGHTS: Yes, I know you do. You are judgmental and intolerant. You aren’t my real friend. I have news for you: I don’t care what you think of me!

Confront your shame

Are you ready to confront your shame and put it down? You have already looked at some ways to think differently—and you may be changing how you actually feel. But the real test is acting against your shame. Here are some things to consider actually doing:

1: Tell someone you are avoiding that you lost your job.
But before you tell them, write down what you predict they will say. Ask yourself why you have been reluctant to contact them—then challenge your thinking. For example, you might have been thinking, “They will think less of me.” Your challenges could be, “I don’t really know what they might think. If they think less of me, it says something about them, not about me. Why should I care if someone else is not understanding? It may also be that they could be understanding and I have misjudged them. Perhaps I can give them a chance to see if they can be a good friend.”

2: Go to places where people might see you
. For example, if you are like some people, you may be barricading yourself in your home. Go out during the day and walk around. Let people see that you are not going to work. Treat yourself like you are free to go anywhere that you want to. Ask yourself if you have been imprisoning yourself because of your fear of what others might think. Then consider how much more important it is for you to be free to do what you want to do. You really don’t know if other people are even thinking about you. If they are, it’s up to them to be understanding and decent. Perhaps they will lose their jobs next week.

Keep increasing your anti-shame behavior each day and each week. If you are talking with someone, tell them that you are in-between jobs. Go out to stores, health clubs, restaurants, see friends, make contacts, talk to people. The more time you get out of your shame and start living your life again, the better you will feel.

EXERCISE: BE PROACTIVE ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS OF SHAME

Work through the following points:

•
What would be the advantage of feeling less shame and going to places and meeting people that you have avoided?

•
Identify your shame thoughts and challenge them. Put down your shame.

•
Should you base your feelings about yourself on what an intolerant and unsupportive person might think of you?

•
Tell someone you are avoiding that you lost your job.

•
Go to places where people might see you.

•
Take your life back.

9: Show some compassion towards yourself

You are going through one of the more difficult times in your life, and you will need all your energy and all your confidence. You will need to be the best that you can be in meeting this challenge.
You will need to have you on your side.

What does that self-critical voice sound like? Can you form an imaginary visual image of that character that keeps putting you down? Perhaps it feels like a harsh, high-pitched, sharp, grating voice. Perhaps you can imagine it pointing at you, scolding you, telling you how bad you are. There is no compassion in that voice, it doesn’t want to support you. It’s not on your side.

If you have been criticizing yourself, you have been acting as your own worst enemy. Your self-criticism won’t motivate you; it will demoralize you. It’s not realistic—even if you have made mistakes—it’s better to self-correct than to self-criticize. It’s better to be kind to yourself and reward yourself every time you do something that is positive. I know it may sound frivolous to say this, but imagine you were training the dog to do something new. You would reward him every step of the way. I like to tell my clients that it’s sometimes good to
be your own dog.
Be kind, reward, support and love. That’s how I treat my dog. That’s how I try to treat myself.

Being your own friend

Imagine if you were to become your best compassionate and loving friend. Every hour of every day this friend would be there, cheering you on, praising you for the steps you are taking to make your life better. This friend is filled with kindness: “Hey, I know you lost your job, but I am always your friend, I will be there even more for you during this time.” This compassionate best friend is filled with warmth—her voice is soft, gentle, and soothing—she puts her arms around you and strokes your hair. She reminds you that you are loved. Perhaps your self-critical voice sounds louder in your mind, and may seem more forceful and convincing. But you will need some compassion for yourself, some kindness. Everything you do during this time between jobs should remind you that you are the one who has to take care of yourself—you are the one that you need, and you are the one who can direct loving kindness towards yourself, especially when you are feeling down, lost, and all alone. You are never all alone, if you have yourself on your side.

I asked Karen (who previously worked as a software salesperson) to tell me how she would treat her daughter if she had lost her job. “I would tell her that I love her, I am always here for her. I would tell her that she can count on me, that I want to help. I would give her a hug.” I then asked Karen if she could imagine doing that for herself. “You know, I am a lot more compassionate towards other people than I have been towards myself.” Directing compassion inwards is as important as directing it outwards. You are human, you also need and deserve loving kindness.

EXERCISE: PRACTICE SHOWING COMPASSION

Work through the following questions to establish the difference between a self-critical voice and one of compassion and the feelings it would evoke.

•
What does that self-critical voice sound like?

•
If you were to imagine it as a person, what would it look like?

•
What would the most loving, warm and kind voice sound like to you? Who would it remind you of?

•
What would it be saying to you?

•
Imagine expressing this compassionate loving kindness towards someone you love who is going through unemployment.

•
What would it feel like to express that towards yourself?

5

DON’T GET STUCK IN YOUR HEAD

You probably remember Ken from Chapter One, who complained that the worst time of the day was when he got up, because he had nothing to do. He would sit in his apartment going over all the bad things that seemed to have happened to him. He would wake up in the morning and lie in bed for an hour brooding over how terrible it was that he got fired. He would recall the image of being told that he had lost his job, recalling how bad it felt, and his thoughts would then take off: “Why me? Didn’t I do a good job? It’s not fair. I can’t believe this happened to me.” Getting up, having his coffee, he would distract himself with the morning news, but then, once alone again with his thoughts, he would continue with further over-thinking: “I feel like a loser. How can I face the day? I have nothing to do.” His thoughts would turn to worries about the future: “Will I ever get a job?” and “How can I support my family?” Over and over again, his mind was off and running, making him feel worse and worse.

Ken was like many unemployed people who are facing the difficulty of what to do with all that “free time.” You may be similar; you probably spend an inordinate amount of time “thinking about things.” These repeated, negative thoughts are called “rumination” and you will remember that I mentioned them in passing in earlier chapters. Cows “ruminate” when they chew on their cud, continually chomping away for long periods of time. When you chew on your thoughts, going over the same ones and getting no answers and no solutions, you are also ruminating. It’s not just having a single thought and then moving on; it’s as if you are stuck in your head, spinning your wheels, getting deeper and deeper into negativity, digging yourself a deeper hole.

You sit at home, isolated, and keep playing out scenes in your head: “Why did this happen to me?”, “I can’t believe I don’t have a job,” or “This really is lousy.” You dwell on it, chewing it over, repeating the same negative thoughts over and over. You keep focusing on questions that may have no answer, like “How could this happen to me?” or “Why me?”, or focusing on how bad you feel, “I can’t believe I’m so depressed.” You may replay in your head the experience of getting fired: “I can’t get it out of my head that she told me my contract was terminated.” You may ruminate about the unfairness of it all, the sense that you are stuck, or the belief that everything is hopeless. Sometimes you ruminate about your physical aches and pains—which may be quite real—but you continue to focus on them, feeling worse and worse.

The reasons you might be ruminating

You may be ruminating so you can work out why this happened—as if repeating the negative thoughts will answer a question. But the fact that you don’t have a job right now and that you need to find better ways to cope is the
reality
you must deal with. Rumination won’t provide an answer that will solve your problems.

Rumination leads to depression and keeps you depressed.
¹⁰
People who ruminate withdraw from the real world, often isolating themselves from other people. When you ruminate you are almost always focused on something negative—what is going on in your head. Because you are focused on all the negative chatter in your head you are accessing negative content and emotions, which makes you feel even worse. In addition, you are less likely to engage in positive activities now. It adds to your sense of helplessness and makes you feel worse.

Why do we ruminate? People who ruminate actually think that they will work things out, solve a problem and avoid making the same mistake in the future.
¹¹
Of course, there may be some truth that ruminating may “give you closure,” or lead to solutions—but excessive rumination simply makes you more depressed. So what can you do if you are out of work and find yourself ruminating?

1: Catch yourself ruminating and keep track of it

It seems that many of my new clients are not aware they have been ruminating. It’s as if their mind is always busy, always nagging them, but they are so used to it that they don’t realize they are doing it. And, of course, they don’t realize that they have a choice. It’s like the white noise in the background; you don’t realize it’s there until it’s not there.

Run through this check to see whether you are ruminating. Do these thoughts ring true?

•
I find myself having repetitive thoughts.

•
I seem to pay a lot of attention to what is on my mind.

•
I have a hard time letting go of my thoughts.

One of my clients, Harry, who had a long history of more traditional talking therapy, didn’t realize that he had been a chronic ruminator. “I think I have been ruminating since I was a kid,” he said, adding, “I ruminate all the time.” But the fact was that he was more likely to ruminate when he was not busy or when he noticed that someone was doing well and, therefore, “getting ahead of him.” He was less likely to ruminate when he was playing with his son, talking with his wife, or reading something of interest. When he was not busy, however, the negative ruminations would pop into his head and he would dwell on them. It’s as if he thought he had to spend a lot of time with whatever negative thought came around. It didn’t occur to him that he had a choice about getting entangled with his negative thoughts. And when he heard about someone else doing well, it triggered his negative ruminations about himself doing poorly. So, in our sessions, we identified that his “trouble time” was when he was by himself and hearing about someone else doing well. By narrowing down to these trouble times he was able to quickly catch his rumination and have a plan to carry out to turn it around. The pointers that I discuss in this chapter were extremely helpful to him.

Another of my clients ruminated about how being unemployed was not consistent with how he saw himself. Ken, however, was stuck in the unfairness of being unemployed. He said, “I don’t understand. I have a good education, I did everything right, worked for a good company, but now I am out of work. This is not what I expected. I did everything right.” He kept repeating these negative thoughts, making himself sadder and angrier.

The benefits of awareness

Simply being aware that “I am ruminating now” can be helpful. It’s natural to have some rumination—most people who are out of work know that. But you may be hijacked by these thoughts and find yourself caught up in them to no avail. Another sign of your rumination is endless, repetitive complaining about the same thing: how bad it is, how unfair it is. You wonder why you are stuck and unable to move on.

You can keep track of your rumination by checking off the number of times you ruminate during the day, what the thoughts are, what your mood is, and what triggered the rumination. For example, Claire found that she ruminated more when she isolated herself in her apartment and began to think about looking for a job. Rather than taking positive action—either to look for a job or do something constructive for herself—she would begin to ruminate. She noticed that her rumination was associated with feeling sad, anxious, and angry. It was never associated with feeling good.

Another of my clients noticed that he was ruminating more when he sat down to pay his bills. This triggered negative thoughts about how unfair it was that his boss had fired him, reminding him that he didn’t have the income he had in the past. His rumination thoughts were, “This is so unfair. I can’t believe he did this to me. I feel so depressed. This is awful.” His mood was always negative when he ruminated. When he began this rumination he would feel worse, pour himself a drink, ruminate more, have another drink, and then find himself feeling numb. His rumination about the unfairness just led to numbness. As he drank more, he became more depressed, had difficulty staying asleep, and felt hung over the next day. And then he would ruminate all over again, repeating the cycle.

Recognize the triggers

Use the table below to find out what triggers the rumination and what your feelings are. See if there is a pattern to the triggers, the things you are saying to yourself, and the mood that you have. Then ask yourself, “Is this really helping me?”

EXERCISE: KEEPING A DAILY RECORD OF RUMINATION

It is useful to keep track of your rumination—your repetitive negative thoughts. These are thoughts that you keep going over and over and can’t seem to get out of your mind. They may also be complaints that you keep repeating. What events or situations trigger this rumination? What are you thinking when you are repeating these thoughts? What mood or feeling do you have when you do this? Are you feeling sad, angry, frustrated or helpless—or do you have any positive feelings? Here’s an example of how to do it.

2: Examine the costs and benefits of ruminating

I asked Harry what he hoped to get out of his rumination about being unemployed, and he said, “I suppose I am trying to make sense of what happened. I can’t seem to work out how this could have happened to me. Did I do something wrong?” Claire thought she would be able to work out how to avoid this kind of thing in the future: “If I can work out what happened, then I won’t get fired the next time.” People ruminate because they often think this will help make sense of what has happened, it will help them avoid the problem, they can now solve the problem if they ruminate, and their rumination will help motivate them (“I don’t just want to sit back and accept it the way it is. If I think about it, I can motivate myself to find a job.”). Others think their rumination will eliminate uncertainty, which they think is a bad thing: “If I think about it, I will know for sure why things happened. Then I can rest.”

But there are costs to ruminating about your situation. Certainly, you don’t have a job, but rumination is not likely to help you find one. Rumination is not the same thing as solving a problem or taking action. For most people who ruminate, it results in more depression and anxiety. It sends you on a mission of misery where you hope to find answers to questions that don’t have answers (“Why me?”) or where the answers won’t help you anyway. What you really may need is not
answers
; but a
plan to live your life
more effectively now, during this time between jobs—and a plan to find the next job.

A path to depression

Claire thought her rumination would help her work out why she was let go. She spent hours trying to “work it out,” and found herself dwelling on her sadness and anxiety, overeating and isolating herself from her friends. As we talked about the costs and benefits of rumination, she began to realize that her rumination was actually perpetuating her depression about being unemployed. I said, “Could it be that your rumination, as a response to the situation, has now become almost as much a source of your depression as the fact that you are unemployed?” Although she knew that her unemployment was a real problem, her rumination was only compounding it.

What do you think you will get out of this rumination? Will it really help you to solve any problems? Will you get closure? What are the costs to you? Is it making you more depressed and angry?

EXERCISE: IDENTIFY THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF RUMINATING

Once you have a daily list of how you ruminate, start to list all the costs and benefits that you think you will get from ruminating. Don’t try to be rational and say, “There are no benefits.” Everyone who ruminates believes there is some potential benefit. Here’s an example of the sort of thing people write.

Costs	Benefit
Makes me miserable. I feel stuck	Maybe I will work out why this happened to me

When you start ruminating, you may believe that you will get something out of these repetitive negative thoughts. What do you think the benefits will be? Don’t try to be rational. Just be honest. Do you think that rumination will motivate you, give you the answer, provide closure, eliminate uncertainty, solve your problems, avoid bad things in the future, or are there other potential benefits that you hope to gain? What are the costs to you of ruminating? Are there negative effects on your mood, your ability to live effectively now, or even on your relationships? How would you weigh out the costs and benefits? If you had to divide 100 points between the costs and the benefits, would the costs outweigh the benefits?

3: Explore the evidence that your rumination is helping you

Now that you have identified your beliefs about the advantages of rumination, let’s examine if it is really working—are you really getting what you are aiming for by spending all this time with these repetitive thoughts?

For example, is your rumination really solving your problem? And what is the problem that you are trying to solve? Is it finding a new job? Enjoying your life today? Having a better relationship with your partner? Let’s take the idea that your rumination is motivating you. Really? How? Or is it making you more depressed and less involved in real life?

What does the evidence show you?

Look at table and list some of the advantages that you think you might be getting from rumination (just refer to the previous table that you completed above). Now list the evidence that you are really getting that advantage and the evidence that you are not. For example, Ken thought that ruminating would motivate him to look for a job. The evidence that it
was
helping was that he did spend part of the day looking for a job. But the evidence that it
wasn’t
helping is that he would have looked for a job even if he hadn’t ruminated. The other evidence that it wasn’t motivating him is that the rumination made him more depressed, angry, and helpless and this often led him to overdrink and overeat.