How to recover from losing a job or quitting a failed career

Know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em

Life is about progression and change. There’s no way around it. And the same goes for your professional life. Whether you decide to move on to something else on your own accord or you were forced into the change, it’s necessary to make peace with your past while learning to embrace your new future. But sometimes that’s not so easy or natural to do. However, in order to succeed in your new life, it’s essential.

No matter if you quit, closed up shop, were laid off, or even fired, you may start to feel like a failure and that you didn’t accomplish everything you should have at that particular job. Unfortunately, you can’t change the past. There is nothing you can do today to make a difference yesterday. So, instead, use those feelings as motivation to give 100% in your next career opportunity or find ways to be successful so you don’t feel as though you’ve failed. Instead of letting what you feel as failure define you, let it fuel you.

Turning the page is rarely easy, but…

Leaving your current job, under any circumstance, is rarely easy. Try your best not to burn bridges unless you’re sure you’ll never need to cross that bridge in the future. Wrap up any projects you were working on or pass them on to someone else before you leave so you will have enough time to get them up to speed. If applicable, create a list of your daily responsibilities and tasks. This can help your company know where to start and what to look for if they decide to fill your position in the future. However, depending on the reason for the career change, it may not always be the easiest or most practical thing to do.

Next is perhaps the hardest part of finding yourself in this situation—you actually have to move on. But remember, it’s a process. It is easy to think back and reminisce about your past career or where you’d be now if you had stayed. You need to let go of all of that. Instead, turn yourself around and focus on your new career, your new opportunities. Chances are there will be a time in which your new career becomes your old career.

The takeaway

If you keep looking back to the past, that feeling of failure will continue to haunt you. The only way to rid yourself of those negative and unproductive feelings is to let it go and find something new and promising to latch on to. You can’t better yourself unless you’re pushed out of your comfort zone. Take advantage of it. You never know if another opportunity like the one in front of you will make a second appearance.