Keeping Your Head After Losing Your Job (11 page)

Bill also identified the disadvantages of the Victim Role. These included constant anger, frustration, depression, irritability around his family, complaining, feelings of helplessness, humiliation, rumination, and difficulty living his life day to day.

The dilemma for Bill was how to move on from the Victim Role without having to say “It’s OK that I was treated badly.” How could he do that?

I suggested that he could always believe he had been given a raw deal and that it was unfair, and that his boss was a pig. That was a belief that he could hold for the rest of his life. The issue was not the truth of the belief, or the right to hold it. The issue was
getting stuck
in the Victim Role. Yes, he
had
been a victim on the job and got fired, but he had a choice of whether he would wake up tomorrow and choose to look at the world as a victim. He could choose to look at the world in terms of valued goals, productive action, and being effective. The victim role could be in the past tense: “I was a victim.” The present tense could be, “I am now being effective.” Yes, there is a choice.

We began to discuss the idea of making a choice when he found himself ruminating about being treated unfairly, or complaining to his wife and feeling misunderstood. “Bill, you can choose which way you go when you have these thoughts about how unfair it is,” I said. “You can decide to start ruminating, or you can decide if there are some useful goals for you to pursue.” Bill thought about this, knowing this was exactly the problem he had to face. He had to decide if he was going to continue sinking into the role of being a victim, or choose to focus on useful behavior. He knew he couldn’t do both.

Getting started on Being Effective

Looking back at our list of examples for Means–Ends Thinking on page 102, how could Bill put into use the different parts of Being Effective? The first thing was to think about the future and what he wanted it to be (
future orientation
). I asked him what specific goals he had. Bill wanted to get a job, but he also wanted to get into better physical condition, and he wanted to cut back on his drinking. He wanted to have a better relationship with his wife and kids—to end the arguing and the bickering and the crying (
goal orientation
). I asked him to think of these as problems to be solved—rather than problems to blame on someone else, or to blame on himself (
problem solving
). “OK,” he said, “I suppose I really need to work on looking for a job, and research some of these companies, and network with people.”

I suggested it would be helpful if he viewed himself as taking
personal responsibility
for these things—not to blame himself or burden himself with this—but to view this as requiring that he had to do something, that it was going to be up to him. “What obstacles have you overcome in your life?” I asked him. Bill recounted how he had worked in a bakery when he was a child, and had worked long hours in unpleasant conditions—but he had made his own money, and he didn’t have to rely on his father for anything. He described how he and his wife started out with nothing, but eventually got a small house, then they had their first child, and he had worked long hours in his new job trying to get ahead. “You know, I’m really good at solving problems. I’ve overcome a lot in my life,” he said.

I suggested that this was another time in his life when he might
invest in discomfort—
he might be willing to do the hard things now so it might be easier in the future (
delay of gratification
). “You’re right. I really need to get more self-discipline, keep working hard to make it better. I’ve been feeling sorry for myself, and that’s got me nowhere,” he said.

“Well, you have a right to have sympathy for yourself and to recognize that things have been unfair and hard for you, but when you shift to thinking about Being Effective, I noticed that your mood changed.”

“Yeah. I noticed, too. I felt like my old self again.”

Seeing our goals ahead gives us strength to fight on

That’s where we wanted to be—to get back to being empowered, energized—to keep your goals in front of you. If you have been knocked down, get up and fight even harder to win back your life. But it’s up to you. Falling back down into the Victim Role actually re-victimizes you. You’ve been knocked down, but you don’t want to keep yourself down when there is hard work that you can do to make it better.

EXERCISE: HOW TO THINK LIKE AN EMPOWERED PERSON

Look at the various ways that you might think in a more empowered way. For example, to focus on how you can get from where you are now to valued goals in the future. This is Means–Ends Thinking. Write out some examples of each of these and try to notice this way of thinking and acting during the week to come. How does it make you feel when you think and act in an empowered way? How is it affecting your relationships? Here are some areas to think about and a few examples to help you.

Thinking in an empowered way	Examples of how you can do this
Future orientation	I can continue looking more widely for a possible opening somewhere
Goal orientation	I can focus on positive goals every day
Problem solving
Personal responsibility
Invest in discomfort
Delay of gratification

Getting results from Means–Ends Thinking

Bill kept track of the more empowered ways of thinking over the next week. He began to develop a “business plan” for his life and for his job search. This involved cutting back on drinking and overeating, and increasing his exercise. His plan for the job search was getting his CV in order, identifying prospects to contact for networking, and making plans to set up informational interviews in the future. His goals were to exercise three times each week, monitor his drinking, and contact at least ten people. He had a plan. He began to think of the situation as a problem to solve—or, in his case, “problems” to solve. Since he realized that he had a long history of being good at solving real problems, this energized him and activated him to make decisions and do things, it also increased his hope about getting better and finding a job. He wavered a bit on “personal responsibility,” and was still ruminating and complaining about the old boss, but now he realized what he was doing and that this way of thinking and behaving only added to his sense of helplessness.

Bill recalled being on the running team at school, and that “discomfort” was a sign of a good workout. He used the idea of “constructive discomfort”—that is, the willingness to do hard things in pursuit of valued goals. He actually felt more proud of the fact that he was doing some things that were uncomfortable—things that his negative mind thought, “I shouldn’t have to do what I don’t want to do.” He was beginning to reframe this as, “I need to do what I don’t want to do so I can get what I want to get.”

His mood visibly changed in the next session. He was getting more fired up.

4: Turn off revenge

What’s the most natural response to being humiliated, put down, rejected, and hurt? It’s to seek revenge. We are hard-wired this way. Our ancestors who were attacked or humiliated knew there was an enemy who would not stop with just pushing you around. He would eventually kill you, kill your children, and take the women as slaves. The only response that made sense to our prehistoric ancestors was to kill before you got killed. But that was a long time ago and revenge has a price that you will not want to bear. It’s just that your first feeling—your inclination at times—is to seek out revenge, to get back at the bastards who hurt you.

One client, Carol, described her recurring thoughts and fantasies of getting revenge against her former boss. She would replay in her mind images of going in and telling him what a horrible person he was. She fantasized about spreading the word to his competition that he was unethical and a liar. The more she held these fantasies, the angrier she became, which led her calming herself with a few drinks, but with a sly smile on her face as she recounted her fantasies of retaliation.

Recognize the role of revenge in the victim’s mind

The desire for retaliation is a major part of the Victim Role—it almost completes it: you got fired; you have been miserable; get revenge and the score is even. But life may not be about evening the score. It may be about building a better life. If you focus on your enemy, you are not going to focus on other goals. Of course, Bill was the expert at these revenge fantasies. He would pour himself another drink and dream up another way to get back at his enemy—the former boss. It was like inviting the boss into the privacy of his home so that he could fantasize about miserable mental torture. Ruminating, escalating anger, living in a fantasy world that got him nowhere—it’s all too human, unfortunately. That’s how we are wired.

“So Bill, you can be enemy-focused, or you can focus on your goals. Which do you really want to do?” Now, Bill had every right to be angry—he had been treated unfairly—but he also knew that his revenge fantasies just magnified his feelings of humiliation and helplessness. After all, if he acted on these fantasies, he would destroy his credibility with the business community and everyone he knew. The revenge would really be on him.

Change the focus

The next week, Bill came back to therapy and said it was very helpful to think about this contrast between focusing on an enemy vs. focusing on positive goals. “I got a lot done this past week—and I also drank less. I worked on my job search, contacted some people, and even arranged a meeting. It’s not a job interview, just an information meeting, but it’s something. I actually felt I had made progress.”

The great thing about practicing the skills of Being Effective is that you are no longer helpless. You actually have some real things to do in the real world. You can take action, make plans and accomplish goals. Perhaps the world won’t change as quickly as you like, but when you are caught in the Victim Role you are trapped in the past and the only “action” is in your head, and it’s all fantasy—it’s useless.

EXERCISE: THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF REVENGE

What are the costs and benefits of thinking about or seeking revenge? Look at the example below and write out your own version.

Costs	Benefits
Miserable, angry, feeling stuck	Perhaps if I get back at them I can move on

Now think about the following questions:

•
How is this thinking affecting your mood, your choices and your relationships?

•
What does it mean to you if you set aside revenge thinking and decide not to pursue it?

EXERCISE: THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF EMPOWERED THINKING

If you set aside revenge thinking and focus on empowered thinking, what would be the costs and benefits of that? Again, look at the example below and think of your own costs and benefits.

Costs	Benefits
It’s like saying that it didn’t happen to me– that it’s OK. It isn’t!	I can take control of what I can and let go of past resentments. I can focus on positive goals

Now answer this question:

•
What would you do differently?

The reasons why you may hold on to revenge fantasies

Let’s now look at what you are saying to yourself that makes it hard for you to set aside revenge fantasies. Do any of the following make sense to you if you turn away from seeking and fantasizing about revenge?

•
It means I am saying it’s OK for people to treat me unfairly.

•
It means I am not a “real man”/“real woman.”

•
It means I am weak or inferior.

•
Other people will see I am weak and take advantage of me.

•
It’s not consistent with the way I see myself: someone who stands up for his/her rights.

•
I could never respect myself unless I got back at them.

•
I could never stop thinking about this if I didn’t get revenge.

•
I need to win—they need to lose.

These are powerful and ultimately destructive thoughts. But, as I said in the beginning, we are hard-wired to seek retaliation against those who have hurt us. You should try to identify your own, individual thoughts about seeking revenge—because this is a powerful emotion that you are facing.

Look at some of the common revenge thoughts above and ask yourself if they really are rational, reasonable and helpful. You can look at some possible ways of challenging these negative vengeful thoughts and ask yourself if there are additional ways of challenging them. Is there another way of looking at these thoughts so that the vengeful feelings don’t come back to haunt you? Here are some answers to the statements made above: