Build Your Mental Strength These 10 Ways

You need mental strength to get through a job search, especially if you want to pass the rigors of several interviews or waiting weeks to hear back from someone in HR. Try some of these 10 exercises to develop mental fortitude as you aim to better your professional life.

1. Set Goals

Set manageable goals that lead to a larger goal. If you set a large goal without taking incremental steps, you may find a big goal to be overwhelming. Recognize that mental strength can come from doing daily tasks that turn into a larger goal at some point in the future.

2. Face Your Fears

Fearing something makes you uncomfortable because you have to face the unknown. Step out of your comfort zone and try something new to accomplish your goals and move ahead in life. Even if you fail to accomplish something new, you learn a different way to deal with mental obstacles.

3. Realize the Greater Purpose

You may have to go through some uncomfortable situations to develop mental strength. If your goal is to drink less coffee, then stopping at your local coffee shop for espresso defeats that idea. Although you may get a caffeine headache during the day, not having regular caffeine has better long-term benefits for your health.

4. Move Toward Becoming Successful

Do little things that put you in a mindset for success. If you want to work out more, invest in some good running shoes or buy a bicycle. Leave your shoes or bicycle in your bedroom so it's the first thing you see every morning to remind yourself to exercise.

5. Get Rid of Negativity

Getting rid of negativity and negative thoughts increases your positive outlook on life. This means shunning negative people in your life and perhaps practicing mindfulness meditation to appreciate the current moment.

6. Temper Emotions With Logic

It's good to follow your instincts, but your best decision-making abilities combine the best of emotions and logic. When you move toward a goal, take concerted steps in a rational pattern but recognize you're happy along the way toward achieving that goal.

7. Fulfill Your Purpose

Perform a mental exercise that helps you see what purpose you want for your life. Then, take your goals and move them toward fulfilling this purpose because you, and only you, want to do so without a care of what other people think.

8. Figure Out Why

Rather than coming up with excuses for not doing something, find an explanation as to why things turned out the way they did. Then you can get to the bottom of a situation to solve the problem with your mental strength rather than giving up on an important task.

9. 15-Minute Rule

Try something for 15 minutes and get one goal done. You have 96 increments of 15 minutes every day, so make the most of them.

10. Challenge Yourself

Challenge yourself on purpose so you grow as an individual. That doesn't mean do something dangerous, but mental strength comes from stepping out of your comfort zone.

Use these principles on a job search and you might discover you had mental strength all along. Perhaps all you needed was a little courage to stretch your wings and fly.

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