Dear Stanley,
I just lost my job. I feel very angry and want to kill everybody. At the same time, I have to go out and look for a new job every day, put on a happy face, and act like I’m a dynamic person ready to leap into action — while really all I want to do is hang around the house in my pajamas and start drinking at noon. Is there anything I can do to knock myself out of this? I’m really in no frame of mind to do interviews.
Down in the Dumps
Dear Dumps,
I’m very sorry. Losing your job is more than simply a loss of income. Your job is who you are. To a certain extent it defines how you dress, where and when you eat and drink, your standing in the world. The more status and goodies attached to your former position, the harder the landing when you come down off that high.
For instance, there’s a restaurant near my office where everybody in the industry eats lunch. The front room is filled with people who have jobs. They all know each other, and their position in the business cosmology is reflected in the seating arrangement in the room. The big swinging Richards occupy the tables by the wall, with the most prestigious gasbags in the corner spot near the potted plant. In the middle of the room — in front of a big, mirrored center post — well-placed dignitaries (in their own mind) munch on Cobb salad and discuss the vagaries of fate. Behind that post, still-respectable but slightly less inflated players rumble and twitter. And then there’s the back room. It’s also full. Full of people who aren’t really aware that they are lunching in the social equivalent of Siberia. A few weeks ago, I saw an old boss of mine, who used to sit at the corner table way up front, slink back into the depths of the “Garden Room,” as the back room is politely known. He’s been gone a while. He looks okay. But without his stripes, he’s just another guy waiting for his avocado.
I’m not saying it’s not faintly disgusting to think that way, but that’s what business is all about. And when you don’t have the stars and bars on your shoulder, the world looks like a different place. Questions arise, such as “Who am I really?” and “What should I be doing with my life between now and death?” Who needs such questions? It’s far better to have a job.
And then there’s the money. Even those who are employed worry about it. But the feeling of watching all you’ve built up start dripping away is intolerable. I don’t have to tell you that. We’ve all been there at one time or another. But being unemployed after a long period of gainful employment is the worst feeling of all. I was an actor for a long time, which is to say I was unemployed a lot. But I was much younger then. I assumed the future would brighten up. And I basically owned nothing but a pair of sweat pants, one suit and tie, and a leather headband I made from a kit at Tandy. Now? If anything happened to my job? I don’t want to think about it.
It’s easy to tell you to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and all that kind of nonsense. Of course you’re not going to be doing that. Don’t you hate it when people tell you to cheer up? I know I do.
You are, however, going to have to get yourself into gear. This you can do through two things, one interior and one exterior. From the inside, you’re going to have to use the one greatest asset you have right now — your anger. Anger is a terrific motivator. It wakes you up with a lump in your stomach every morning. It keeps you from falling asleep at night. You can eat your anger and make yourself sick, or you can use it to generate ideas, resumes, pitches, appointments, whatever keeps you in motion. That second part is the key to your external strategy: constant motion. My friend Larry just lost his longtime post as the head of a department at a big publishing company. He is now running around town offering himself up for print and video interviews as a recently fired person. I’m not kidding. The media is starving for people to interview about the recession. He’s now got a small cottage industry going as a spokesperson for fired people. It’s not the thing I would do. But it’s what he’s doing, and it’s keeping him sane and in front of people, one of whom just might give him his next job.
Stay angry. Stay hungry. Stay busy. When you must, pretend to feel better in order to make whatever impressions you need to. The rest of time, be as miserable as you like. There are time in life when you just have to suck it up and go through the motions until things get better. They do, you know.
