The pain may not be as deep as losing a child, parent, or spouse and it may be better than undergoing a severe personal injury, but the despair brought on by being unemployed can be a close second. This is a pain that sticks with you constantly. You may be able to find occasional diversions or be fortunate enough to have the psychological makeup to exercise mental rationalizations that can keep you sane, but for most, if not all, the dejection felt by not having work is profound. This condition should be faced with the fortitude you would have to muster if one of the above-mentioned tragedies were to happen.
Think what you will of Raum Emanuel, the President’s Chief of Staff, but I love his line, “Never let a crisis go to waste”, or some such policy driving quip of his. When you’re faced with lemons, what choice do you have but to make lemonade. What’s the alternative? Depression, paralysis, and confusion? I would think you’d rather choose something that gives you forward momentum.
Doing something of value will help you cope. Your spirit may be so shocked by circumstances that to attempt a fruitful activity may not feel any more productive than just carrying on as if you were in control of your life. It may be very hard to pull yourself out of bed or away from the TV or away from the bottle or the smoke or whatever, but again, what choice do you really have to make things better? If a German concentration camp prisoner like Victor Frankl can find meaning and personal strength during his situation, cannot most of us deal with a comparatively easier situation like unemployment?
So, what to do? I suggest two things. One, get is to get engaged with a systematic and very personal career search. And two, is to consider volunteering for a cause you value.
Use this time to deeply explore what it is you want from work and how it can best intersect with the rest of your life. Ask yourself if you have been on a path that you love and want to continue navigating or if you would really rather do something different. Either way, you can put together a self-improvement project and be able to devote more time to it than would be possible if you were working full time. It’s a great time to be both contemplative and calculating. Make finding a job be your job. Your boss is yourself. Perform for this executive as exactingly as you would for someone you really wanted to impress. Start planning. It’ll help, I promise.
Volunteering can give you something structured and scheduled to do that contributes to an initiative that you would like to see advanced. I don’t need to start a list of things that you can do. It is endless. There is no limit to the ways that we can make the world a better place in which to live. Find your way (or ways) and commit yourself to it. No, you won’t make money. But among all the intangible benefits that can be derived from such an effort, two practical goodies can come about… Uno, you will increase your network of connections that may come in useful someday, and dos, you have something worthy to put on your resume to account for the time you were not “working”.
Best of luck with this life challenge. I know it’s not easy.
