How You May Be Sabotaging Your Job Search And What to Do About It
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Your mindset—or what you believe about yourself and the world—has a real impact on your job search success.
Our brains are wired for negativity, so it’s completely natural to have thoughts that sound like:
“No one is hiring right now.”
“I chose the wrong career.”
“No one is going to hire me at my age.”
As tempting as it is to believe these types of negative thoughts, doing so will sabotage your job search success because your thoughts and beliefs influence your actions and how you show up.
With a scarcity mindset—for example, believing that no one is hiring—you may not feel as motivated to do what it takes to get hired. During job interviews or networking chats, you may unintentionally come across as needy, negative or desperate. When you don’t get the job, your brain gets more evidence that jobs are few and far between.
If you get stuck in this kind of negative feedback loop when it comes to your job search, try adopting an abundance mindset. An abundance mindset is choosing to believe that there is truly enough for everyone to go around, including you. It takes work to retrain your brain and overcome negativity bias, but I promise it’s worth a try.
Here are five ways to cultivate a more abundant mindset when job searching:
Find gratitude where you are. If you’re working but haven’t found your dream job yet, decide to feel gratitude for something you do have. Maybe it’s the ability to earn a living, your colleagues, or the clients or customers you help. If you aren’t currently working, can you find gratitude for the extra time to regroup, reset or spend time on your own terms?
Remember your past successes. Think about a time when you have been offered a new job or exciting opportunity. Remember how amazing it felt? Choose to see that as proof that it can happen. Tell yourself, “I did it once, and I’ll do it again.”
Seek inspiration from the newly hired. Take a few minutes each day to scroll through your LinkedIn feed and look for people who have recently announced new positions. (Hint: check out #hired, #newhire, #newjob). Allow yourself to be inspired. If they can do it, so can you.
Boost your confidence. Job searching can be hard on your self esteem. Try this confidence-building exercise: Write down 100 things you’ve accomplished throughout your life, no matter how big or how small. Keep the list handy and read it when you need a boost.
Serve others. With all of the self promotion required for job searching, it’s no wonder that the process can feel self-centered. As an anecdote, consider ways to serve others during this time. Lend your skills to volunteer with a local organization or pay it forward by helping other job seekers. Adopt a generous, service-oriented approach and see what shifts for you.
An abundance mindset can give you an advantage in a competitive job market. When you truly believe that the right opportunity is out there for you, you’ll do what it takes to find it. It’s only a matter of time before you do.