Having The Willpower To Win Again After Losing Your Job

The longer I live, the more I realize that everybody is going to go through something at some point in their life and it doesn't matter which country they're from, their race, age, or gender. EVERYBODY!

If you’ve fallen or have been dealt a bad hand, do you have the willpower to win again? It takes willpower to get up after life has knocked you down. Whether you retired and lost your identity, was fired, reorganized, or harassed to the point of resigning, it’s tough.

Falling is devastating to people who’ve achieved certain levels of success because the higher you rise, the further you fall. You can either see your circumstances as a way to refresh your life and start anew or you can crumble into the pain and never get up again.

I resigned from a successful six figure career with three and a half years left to retire with a full pension in 2012. If I wouldn’t have resigned, I'm certain I would have suffered a stroke or a heart attack from working long hours in a job I loved, while not managing the stress of the harassers and haters I resented.

I fell into a hole deeper than the Grand Canyon and didn’t know if I’d ever emerge. It became clear that I had to do something different to get up because complaining about it wasn’t moving me forward.

The faster I was willing to let go of whom I used to be, should have been, or could have been, and shifted my perspective to looking within to discover whom I was going to be, the more Light shined in the dark tunnel.

Nearly six months after resigning, I met the former VP of Marketing for a Fortune 500 company and she was the saddest person I had ever met. She was outside a Starbucks, dressed in her power suit and was ready to tell the story of how she was reorganized out of her company to anyone that would listen.

She was depressed and stuck in the devastation of whom she used to be and didn't have clear direction on what she wanted to do next. She, like many people I’ve encountered in the past few years, wasn't making the DECISION to move forward and wondered why she couldn’t get a new job despite her amazing list of credentials and experience.

I asked several questions about her vision for the future, but she was stuck in the past and after getting depressed talking to her, I bid her farewell and left. If she simply shifted her perspective of whom she wanted to be and let go of whom she used to be, her results would have changed quicker.

Why Some Successful People Fall Down and Stay Down

When a successful leader transitions out of an organization, a severance package is usually included and while this is a fair benefit, there are unintended consequences for people who feel wronged.

If you get paid 12 – 36 months of severance on your way out, it gives you the ability to stew in disappointment, perceived failure, sadness and resentment for the person who ousted you or resentment for things not working out.

Money makes you comfortable and if your lifestyle expenses are supported for an extended period, you don't have a reason to get up fast and make it happen for yourself.

It's easy to fall into a pit of depression or despair and blame other people for what happened if you have a pillow of money to make you comfortable.

Fortunately, I didn't have that. I didn't get a severance and left before I got my pension. I also didn’t apply for the VA (veteran administration) benefits. I had 17 medical conditions when I left and would have been paid several thousand dollars a month for it. But I didn't want it because I didn’t want to be comfortable in a lifestyle that was below the vision I had for myself.

Disclaimer - This has no bearing on the military and members who rightfully deserve benefits. This is part of my personal journey.

The pain of being in that deep hole was so immense that I didn’t want to get out of the bed in the morning, but I had to GET UP because if I didn’t work, I didn’t eat. This moved me through the pain of shoulda, woulda, coulda and gave me the strength to get up daily and work until I won AGAIN.

Every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to burn his ships and cut all sources of retreat. Only by so doing can one be sure of maintaining that state of mind known as a burning desire to win, essential to success.” – Napoleon Hill

If you’re fortunate to get a severance, don’t get comfortable in your misery. Use it to go to events or invest in somebody to teach you whom you're going to be in this next phase of your life.

Are You Reaping What You’ve Sown?

There are so many stories about toxic leaders and those who don’t look out for others. Be careful how you treat people because the same people you treat like crap going up are the same people that you're going to see on the way down.

You can’t truly be a victim if you victimized others and whether you know it or not, someone is always keeping the books.

With the Law of Karma, if you treated people unfairly, talked down to them while you were on a throne or did some things that would make your grandmother clutch her pearls, that stuff is going to come back to you. The challenges you're going through may be a reciprocation of how you treated others.

“Life is a game of boomerangs. Whatever you put out comes back to you with astounding accuracy.”- Florence Scovel Shinn

Are you fair to the people in your office? Do you snap at people in stores or restaurants? Do you gossip about celebrities and how they should be running their households?

Hmmmmm…

Has your negative karma come back to reconcile the books? This requires honest self-reflection and getting out of victim mode and accepting responsibility for where you are.

To shift your life for the best, consider activating new karma by doing good deeds to stack the books in your favor or to neutralize the bad karma you’ve put out. Start serving, volunteering, speaking life into others, complimenting strangers, or holding doors open for people. ANYTHING to get you moving forward in your life.

If you’ve fallen into a hole, it's time to GET UP and develop the willpower to win again. If you've already achieved a certain income level, then that level is possible for you again.

Consider setting your ego aside and realize that you're no longer who you used to be, but you have the full capacity to create whom you want to be. Start serving at a higher capacity and sow good seeds and energy into the world. It will surely be returned with astounding accuracy.

Christy Rutherford is a Harvard Business School Alumna, certified Executive Leadership Coach from Georgetown University and 6-time best-selling author.