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How to Handle Your Anger After a Layoff

Featured Author:

CareerDiva

CareerDiva is a blog maintained by Eve Tahmincioglu, journalist, author, and columnist.

As a career and workplace expert, Eve is also the author of From the Sandbox to the Corner Office: Lessons Learned on the Journey to the Top, and the Your Career columnist for MSNBC.com.

Eve further writes Your Biz, a small business and entrepreneurship blog for MSNBC.com.

More articles from this author:

• Fighting Toxic Workplaces Without an HR Department
• The Problem with Economic Predictions
• Working Mom? How to Toughen Up

Let’s start with this simple truism — Layoffs suck!

It sucks to get laid off, and many of you out there are pissed off about it.

I don’t blame you. It’s natural to be angry.

Many of you have told me what bothered you most was that it just “wasn’t fair” that your manager would boot you out after so many years. Others have this gnawing anger they just can’t overcome, and that anger is often directed at your former boss. Revenge seems pretty sweet right about now as some of you fantasize about your boss getting his or her comeuppance.

Well, none of that is going to help you, my unemployed friend.

I’m not belittling the anger you feel, and some of it is good, but lately I’ve been hearing more and more stories of unemployed individuals who cracked and shot up there whole families.

I know, these guys were probably wacko to begin with, but seething in anger will marinate you in bad vibes and keep you from launching an effective job search.

“When anger builds, it can get out of hand,” says Jo Anne White, a therapist from New Jersey, who’s also an author and professional coach. “It can create more stress for a person, and more of a sense of negativity in terms of any interactions they have with other people, and how they’re presenting themselves to other people.”

White isn’t opposed to a little anger, because it helps you get it out of yourself and find ways to deal with it. But wallowing in negativity, she says, will only impact your emotional and job-hunting state.

How do you know if you’re harboring anger too long: “If they’re holding onto the anger for months and it’s interfering with relationships with a spouse, kids, friends; or if in every situation they are not seeing the glass half full, and it’s distorting every other aspect of their lives.”