Susan Rietano Davey* says there are five actions women can take to manage the inner critic that’s standing between them and their dream job.
You see your dream job posted, and the description is a perfect match for your skills and experience.
Even better, you know the hiring manager in the department!
As you begin working on the application, however, a voice in your head says: “your resume is all wrong; you have to do it over”.
And, before you know it, you’re agreeing: “It is all wrong, but I can’t fix it now; I’m way too busy” — and the opportunity passes you by.
Sound familiar? Of course it does.
All of us hear those critical voices at some point, but it’s what we do about them that matters most.
Critical voices can prevent you from getting out in the market, and keep you stuck.
They result from a negative mindset that can sabotage your job search, while a positive mindset can launch it.
In our full course, Managing Your Job Seeking Mindset, we teach and model effective strategies for developing and sustaining the proper mental state to ensure a successful job search.
You can start now by practicing this 5-step process for replacing your negative voices with positive ones to help you get and stay on track:
- Become aware
Replacing negative voices begins with recognising that they exist.
Rather than pushing them aside, see if you can sit with the discomfort of really listening to them and finding out to whom in your life they may belong.
- Turn up the volume
Reflect on these voices and recognise how they control you. Giving them a persona can help.
Generally, your voices fall into these categories:
- The Perfectionist:
Maybe it was a high school English teacher who made you feel like anything you wrote wasn’t good enough.
- The Hider:
Perhaps this is your well-intentioned parents who, hoping to minimize your risk of rejection, share all of the reasons it doesn’t make sense for you to apply for this highly competitive role in a tough economy.
- The Pleaser or Performer:
This is the voice of you juggling the various demands in your life and needing to always appear like you have it all together.
By labelling a negative voice and giving it a persona, you gain the power to separate from it.
- Interrupt the voices
You control the volume on these voices – and you can turn them down using this ABC trick.
A. Awareness:
My English teacher’s voice is running me.
B. Breathe:
Get in your body and out of your head; pull awareness from your English teacher’s voice to your Breath
C. Count:
With your feet firmly on the floor, Breathe in one, two, three, four, five, and breathe out six, seven, eight, nine, ten.
Sit tall; hold your hands comfortably on your lap, and do this for a couple of rounds until you feel yourself reset.
- Step into your power
Once you’ve quieted those voices, it’s time to embrace the discomfort.
Writing your resume, making a networking call, and publishing your LinkedIn profile are all very vulnerable activities because putting yourself out there always comes with the risk of rejection.
You can use a mantra to help yourself push through the discomfort – something like: “This feels risky and uncomfortable, and I’m doing it anyway.”
Talking like this to yourself will push you through what’s difficult.
- Praise yourself
This is not a joke. Replacing negative, critical voices with voices of praise, can change the game.
It can also help combat against the scientific fact that our brains are hardwired for negativity.
Praise can help you forge new neural pathways built for positivity. If praising yourself feels unnatural, ask yourself this: “what would I say to my best friend if their dream job came calling and they were doubting themselves?”
You deserve the same kind, encouraging treatment you’d give a friend.
*Susan Rietano Davey is the Co-Founder and Owner of Prepare to Launch.
This article first appeared at linkedin.com.
