For those who find themselves unemployed and are trying to cope with negative feelings it is advisable to focus on what is truly important. Connect deeply with friends and family that are a part of your life. Discover a new hobby while seeking work. Consider taking a part time job that won’t make you rich but keeps you involved with other people. The initial setbacks that come from losing a steady and sizable income can be an inconvenience that can affect the self esteem. Do your best to remember that you are a decent human being that is merely facing an undesirable situation. As long as you still have enough food, clothing, shelter, and health you should be able to manage better than many people in the world.
Looking for a job and facing continuous rejection is quite a unique feeling. Signs of negative thinking can be seen when you just hope to hear a definite no from a potential employer instead of remaining quietly ignored by the companies that have thousands of applicants and only a few available positions. Typically after a few months of unsuccessful employment seeking the next phase moves to either acceptance of part time work or further rejection from jobs that may not hire you because you are overqualified. McDonald’s is more likely to hire a 16 year old kid that will be there for a while over a 30 year old college graduate former corporate worker suddenly finding themselves out of work. The employers know who can be utilized best, and someone who is overqualified will tend to leave a low end job the instant they are able to find a better position elsewhere.
When individuals reach the point of realizing that any savings, borrowing opportunities, and simple help from loved ones are no longer options for financial assistance a feeling of desperation can set in. If you do own any possessions of value it is time to sell in order to have money to live on. At the point of having no income to contribute it is essential that one uses their creativity to arrange living situations that may seriously reduce the cost of housing or rent. Speak with your current landlord or mortgage officer and see if there are any ways you can provide them with services while you look for work. They may be quite reasonable and sympathetic with your circumstances if you are honest and show them that you are sincerely trying to locate a job.
Luckily most job seekers will never quite reach the point where they are forced to sell every thing they own in order to make ends meet. Despite the vast amounts of competition in many fields there are always thousands of opportunities that need to be filled at any given moment in large cities. Continue to do your best to seek what you really want and do everything in your power to obtain the job goal of your dreams.
If the truly unfortunate moment arrives where you have no money, no job, and can’t afford to stay at the place you have been it is time to form another plan quickly. Hopefully most may have family and friends that they could stay with temporarily while trying to get back to some type of employment. If that is not an option one could seek government assistance, charitable donations, or arrange a deal with a local business to do remedial chores in exchange for food and shelter. This is the time when things may seem as if they will never get better and life itself may seem to be cruel. It is your responsibility to summon the courage to believe that things will get better through time and effort. Once one has sunk to horrid low points they will be able to gain a greater appreciation for the better times experienced and will have nothing but time to concentrate on how to achieve more for their lives. Although this scenario is not likely to happen to many the possibility exists for it to happen to virtually anyone if circumstances are difficult. Be compassionate to those experiencing adversity in the job hunt. Make every attempt to be able to show prospective employers your hope for the future instead of dwelling on past mistakes even in the most challenging parts of the job hunt. Eventually you should be rewarded with work again.
In order to prevent anything financially disastrous to take place it is best if one can accept less than pleasant job situations at certain times and keep attempting to improve current situations. By no means will this be an easy task, it may seem impossible to get the real job that is wanted at times, and one can easily be trapped by feelings of fear, doubt, and despair in times of unemployment or underemployment. Find the coping strategies that work best for you and keep moving toward opportunities that could provide for a better way of life. Good luck in your job hunting!
Coping With the Stages of Unemployment and Tough Times
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Walter R •I feel that statements made in the article are valid as I deal with unemployment, my background check information is somewhat less than desired, therefore as diligent as I am with my job search, I stumble due to the things I did in the past, Assault with intent to injure, it was a fight, what was I suppose to do ? of course I intend to hurt that person of conflict, that's the ways of fighting, whether I was wrong or right, I still try and stay positive in hopes of finding financial gain, and what's on my background check has been at least seven years ago. Thanks again for your encouragement. God Bless, W. -
Shelley M •Liked it. Thank you.
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Helene R. •Thanks for the article. I have felt these feelings so many times and try not to get discouraged. Its very difficult. I know I am not alone now for sure. What I cant stand is hearing that unemployment is at its lowest. Are they not counting the hundreds of thousands who still havent found work after unemployment ran out. I have been out of work for 6 or 7 years now. I have sent thousands of resumes out. At some points I totally gave up but started up again. I have had part time jobs one that last 3days, one for 2 months and one for three years. I have a degree and over 16 years experience in the social services field. Many times I want to give up but some people have it worse. I never thought I would ever be in this position again. I looked into going back to college but they are saying if the degree is over 10 years old they wont count. What the hell is this? It does count, everything I have done counts. I pray that everyone on this board gets help and find what they are looking for. btw Carol C. why have you stayed with husband who has been so selfish with you all these years. Hope you have the strength to leave him one day and find your own way-get rid of the baggage.
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Kristie H •This article was the bit of hope I needed. After losing my job of 25 years, I have been actively job seeking since the first of July of this year. I don't know that I have such a unique experience, but I certainly do feel all alone just the same The company I worked for closed and after 25 years of working for them I never imagined I would have to look for work again, planed on staying there until I couldn't physically work any more. It seems everything happened in an instant. Just like that, my world was upside down. No health insurance, no job, seemingly no options. I received help from a family member for housing so I still have a place to live but have up everything else to afford medicine.So, five months later, no job, my retirement fund gone and no one hiring a late 50, single female with a high school education and no options to further the education. I don't qualify for a loan or a grant based on my previous year salary. It feels pretty hopeless and many days I fight depression. Articles like these do help. Thanks!
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This article was the very thing I needed to read. After being laid off from my previous job, I have been actively job seeking since the first of this year. I don't know that I have such a unique experience, but I certainly do feel all alone at times. I was laid off from a company after 25 years, at a time where I was looking forward to retirement or at least partially so. It seems everything happened in an instance. I was looking for another place to live and had found it, two days before we (our department) got the news that our jobs were being terminated at the end of the year. Just like that, my world was upside down. No home, no job, seemingly no options. I received help from a family member for housing but it meant a new city, new state entirely. So here I sit, eleven months later, no job, decreasing benefits, my retirement fund gone and no one hiring a mid 50, single female with a high school education and no options to further the education. I don't qualify for a loan or a grant based on my previous year salary. It feels pretty hopeless. Articles like these do help. Thanks!
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Cynthia Greene •This article was very informative. It follows the emotional cycle I am going through currently. Having been an independent consultant for the past 4 years, finding either a full time position or the next consulting "gig" is discouraging. Having numerous interviews, all sounding hopeful, only to finally receive the response that the job just isn't "right for your credentials" (overqualified), or as one of the respondents to this article indicated, the much dreaded "regret" email to the required online application to all of these companies, leaves one weary, frustrated, deflated, and wearing on one's self esteem! After 25+ years experience it would be a bitter pill to swallow to accept a position below one's abilities. However, like the article indicates, it is coming to the point where it is a "fight for survival" and one must do whatever it takes not to lose everything a lifetime of hard work has accomplished!
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Steve C •I thank you all for your reply postings to the interesting article, “Coping with the Stages of Unemployment and Tough Times”. I can relate to Diane B’s posting, in regard to age discrimination, although my period of unemployment has not been as long as hers, nor has the financial hardship been as extreme, yet. I hope not to get to that point. My skills are in the art & design realm, too, & I have seen all too much similarity in her experiences in computer design program updates & job search. After 20 years with the same company, I was taken by surprise when laid-off. Being 57 years old, I believe, has much to do with my industry specific hurdles. I, too, am intent on remaining a productive individual in the work force & remain diligent to pursue and find a position, albeit a reduced salary from what I was accustomed, if need be.I have not had one interview with a prospective employer within my 3 months of searching. I know others have experienced more rejection than I. Getting my foot in the door is the first hurdle. Yesterday a recruiter called me after I submitted a resume for a job I was more than qualified for. He didn’t have any information on that job, other than the salary, which he told me was ½ of what I was previously earning. He requested I email my resume to him. I told him I sent it along with a cover letter to the recruitment website where the job was posted. He said he never saw it & asked if I would send it directly to his email address which he gave me. I am absolutely amazed of the process. I asked him what “keyword(s)” may have directed my resume to him. He didn’t know that answer either. Besides wondering how these recruiters can obtain & hold their job, I cannot understand how HR department folk determine if a resume should go any further into the hiring process, when so many of them have no idea what the positions available entail. It appears they (or a server search system) use a search of keywords that unfortunately eliminate qualified candidates that may be missing those keywords. I embrace technology & what computers offer, but removing the human element to the point that we are “just a number” will not help many people get the interviews they deserve to sell themselves. Good luck to you all & I hope this economy improves & we all get back to work soon!
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Diane B •I agree with the many people here bemoaning the layoffs of boomers and other long-time good employees. It seems to be a scary game of age discrimination in some cases combined with get someone younger cheaper without having to train them in new technology everyone wants to use. (Ever noticed in a coffee or donut shop - where I have to go for people contact at least once a day while job hunting but living alone - as I did one day that no one of the maybe 15 other people in the place TALKED to each other. Everyone was on a cell phone or computer, not necessarily working, either. And Unemployment people tell us to update our computer skills but businesses are just looking for everything they can get whether they need it or not for cheaper prices than long-time employees earn. Unfortunately, many of the people I watch when out haven't a clue how to interact with others LIVE, which sooner or later is a major skill for workers. Meanwhile, everyone coaching job hunters says update your computer skills - which I've tried to do - but the people I'm seeing "working" in coffee shops are half the time not working for their employers but goofing off. I'm beginning to notice this because my former coworkers noticed I got on Facebook (on advice of employment councilors, only to find that I'm inundated by completely unprofessional Facebook messages from people supposedly working but their messages are pix of their new dog, jokes etc. All day long they appear in my email and I just delete them. Meantime my LinkedIn profile, when I figured out how to get recommendations, proved much better, so I can now refer possible employers or contacts to see my recommendations at LinkedIn as well as on my emailed/job banks' etc. resume. Wouldn't it be interesting to put a bug in our former employers' ears about checking out Facebook to see their so-called working employees just chatting on Facebook etc. and completely unrelated to work. Meantime, I like others of you, have send out hundreds and hundreds of resumes and had three interviews, no jobs from them. The part-time job I have - which is restoring my depressed psyche when I'm there - came from a former colleague I'd worked with - who will forever be a saint in my estimation.But there is also a good deal of age discrimination going on under the guise of the rest of us, if older, don't have this or that computer program just an earlier version etc. (that works just as well, if not better, than the newer one). And try learning the new ones - especially design ones among those I've used in my career - without having the program (cost $600 or so in the design program I need ) on your own computer. Now I'm worrying about having to replace my computer with a laptop because my operating system no longer has support - that means. The people who are winning at the job market are computer companies and businesses laying of higher paid older workers in favor of cheaper younger ones they think will save them money and last a long time and bring new blood to the business but they do recreational blogging about non-work subjects all day.Well, back to "work" job-hunting - but maybe we should start pointing out to those still working and at the management level what some of their remaining employees are really doing all day. And recasting my resume endlessly to try to get key words - that vary with the maybe 5 types of major careers I could do - wears me down. I, too, am at the depression at least once a week stage (sometimes much more often) contemplating retiring early and STILL not having enough to live on because I've had to tap my IRA four times now - and periodically feeling "dumb" about computers though I have used them decades longer than those getting the jobs because they are younger so come cheaper and with so-called blogging "expertise" to help the business hiring them. Some of the businesses should take a look at what's really getting blogged by their employees periodically all day long (EAch individual I'm seeing is blogging 5 and 6 times a day and not about work at all. Maybe we should forward these to our former employers.But you do have to try new methods - not necessarily blogging for jobs - and it does seem to help to contact former colleagues and friends RE your job hunting - if only to remind you that some of them care about you. I know who my REAL friends are now, that's for sure. And I will be their real friend if they ever find themselves unemployed too. But employers, please please take notice that there's more social blogging going on at work than work getting done in some cases, and it's not 50 and 60 year olds doing the blogging, tweeting etc., it the people lower on the pay scale that you think are saving you money because you pay them less. There's more than something just wrong about this picture - there's something wrong with the assumptions that cheap labor means good labor and savings.
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Donald M •I thought that the advise and suggestions offered in this article were very informative. Sometimes our emotions can mislead us when we do not have a set of goals to follow, or the discipline needed in order to achieve these goals. Thank you for providing a guideline to follow.
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Rose W •Very interesting article. I began my search looking for a position as a Supervisor and after several weeks I decided to look for the lesser position and this is what I find. The hiring managers in my last two interviews could not believe that I would be satisfied with a lesser position. They were convinced that I would become bored. I tried to convince them in several different ways that the lesser position is what I wanted. (Week 12 of unemployment)
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Cyndy N •I am an RN and I have been out of work for over a year now. I lost my home, car, husband. I am looking for work and I go to multiple web-sites and put in apps. I do not get any phone calls or emails. I get so depressed all of the time. At 53, I really can't afford loans to go back to school. So much, for living a comfortable life....
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Beverlee L •Great article and so true! Thank you for putting into words what I am feeling after a foreclosure and bankruptcy . At my age, 68 , all my savings was in my house. Part time work as an RN is hard to find and not where I thought I would be at this time in my life!
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Katherine M •this article helped me get back on track,I too am a nurse for 21 years now the reason I cant get work is the state of florida has decided that A mistake i made 18 years ago has to be on the license check making me untouchable It doesnt say how long ago or other details like I did everything I was supposed to do and went on to be a great nurse it just says Suspension/Stayed thats it so no one wants me!So I started advertising myself as a courier what I did in Ca many years ago and I go for job on monday and I'm taking free computer classes at the library and enrolled at the college for two very low cost classes so I can learn the computers I need to at least get an entry level position in todays computer world!Oh yeah you in Ca why would you even tell unemployment just go take the classes you need We all have to do what we have to do!and the RN check your license you never know whats on it I found out by accident and it shocked me in to reality!Well I wish you all good luck :)
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Pam C •NOT very helpful-depressing when you need uplifting.I am finding the 57 yr old woman is not valued in our country anymore. It makes you wonder what is to become of the over 50 people-does anyone even care? THEY SHOULD-someday it will be their turn.
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Helga B •For those of us who've already walked down the loosing everything trail, this particular article simply reinforces all my fears of heading there again, because I can't pay for the education I need, nor can I borrow the money. I haven't worked since 2009. As an RN, that may as well mean "go back to zero cos your experience isn't recent enough..oh, and you ARE TOO OLD".This is a very negative article for me.
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Robin F •I'm 58, a U.S. Navy Veteran (Iran Hostage Era) a husband and father. Unfortunately through no fault of my own, I'm one of the thousands of of senior people, currently unemployed. ( I was working as a contractor and the job contract ended July 2012). I've been unemployed before. The worst was during 9/11/2001. I couldn't find a job for almost 10 months then. I go through all the feelings phases of unemployment almost daily but you keep going on. My family depends on me and I would go crazy if I didn't keep trying to find gainful employment. I've worked all my adult life. I don't know what else to do. I still believe that some where down the road something will happen for me and things will get better. Just keep your spirits up and keep trying to seek comfort from family and friends when you are down and keep thinking that there is a job out there for you.
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Ellen P •This is a good article. It helps me understand the normal scope and feelings of being jobless. If I had any idea what a difference it would make in me having a BS in nursing, rather than a AD I would have started working on it years ago. I might have to complete that education before I can find what I am happy at.
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Susan H •I would like to take a class or 2 to further my education. But it is my understanding that I would loose my unemployment benefits here in California. It just does not seem right that taking a class to learn a new skill would disqualify you for benefits, but it is a question on the EDD from you fill out every 2 weeks to get your check?????
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Mike B •62 year old male, just shy of 26 years in Adult Proprietary education then comes July 13, 2012. I am called to the Chief Operations Officer's office and told that "that Friday the 13th. was my last day. I feel so very betrayed after being told just this past April of 2012 that I was an asset to the school. I have over 35 years of experience in dealing with people but I don't have the paper on the wall. I am so terrified that tears are running down my eyes as I write this. Go back to school? Pay back another student loan? That is simply not possible. I am as crushed as most all that are here. Keeping my chin up is becoming very hard to do. I eat very little and laugh even less. I have always been told that the Good Lord will never give us more than we can bear but I am surely wondering but I know that He is my only hope. It simply kills me when my wife mentions a real "need" that I cannot afford. I don't spend money unless I absolutely have to. If it were not for my Heavenly Father and a loving and supportive wife, I would not be here today. My heart goes out to each of you and I promise to start praying for ALL. Just a favor: please, please say a prayer for me, too. Blessings and Prayers for ALL!
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FRANK F •This was a very good article, with a lot of good insight, that I'm sure a lot of people are experiencing, right now. The running out of money part is really starting to hit home, and yes, you must maintain a sense of optimism, in the face of despair, and desperation. That being said, I'm grateful for your advice, and guidance, and look forward to the next.
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Walter S •I think that the article that you have here is very informative.Lots of people will get the advice that they require before a disaster happens to them. I have been out of work for some time but i am not giving up my job search. If people will give a little effort when looking for a job something soon will come there way.
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Denise B •Makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the tips and encouragement.
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Clyde W •That sounds very calming but overlooks the restructuring of the labor market and the implications,long term.
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Tracy B •I would suggest adding to this excellent article, a piece about eating healthy, taking breaks from the computer in the form of walking, or a workout video. Physical activity generates healthy hormones,stops nervous binge eating, and creates a sense of well-being.
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ninah s •I do not want to go back to school They have nothing to offer that I want to take second the two work skills have do not have schooling one might if I wanted to own a restaurant but at 52 I do not and the other is painter I do not want to go into designing or decorating I just want a simple things a job as either a dishwasher in a restaurant or as a painter of apartments and houses so at 52 you have nothing to offer me schooling wise that I would be willing to get loans or to put myself in hock for second is already stated my age 52 how many years do I have left to work All I'm asking is find me work in painting or restaurant dishwashing not how to do resumes interviews and the rest of the crap all of my contacts are in the same boat asI'm
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