When the Ground Disappears: Finding Your Way Through Job Loss

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The headlines keep coming. Tech giants announcing massive layoffs in the thousands. Entire teams dissolved in a single email. And beyond the tech industry, waves of cuts rippling through sector after sector. If you're one of the people who opened that email—or if you've been carrying this weight from an earlier wave—I want you to know something before we go any further:

This is allowed to be as hard as it feels.

I'm not writing this as someone who figured it all out and came back to share the wisdom. I'm writing as someone walking through my own dark night. I don't claim perfection. I just know that this territory can be brutally challenging, and I've learned a few things that help me stay upright. Maybe they'll help you too.

The Weight No One Talks About

Losing a job is difficult for anyone. But let's be honest about something that often goes unspoken: for those of us who built our identity around providing, around being the steady one, around having an answer when someone asks "what do you do?"—this isn't just a career setback. It can feel like an unraveling of who we are.

This is especially true for high-functioning people—the ones who always had it together, who were praised for their reliability and competence. The outside world may see someone who's handling it fine. Inside, the ground is gone.

I've sat with men in my practice who would never admit to anyone else how close they came to the edge after a layoff. Strong, capable people who suddenly couldn't see a way forward. That's not weakness. That's what happens when the story you've been living inside suddenly has no next chapter.

If you're in that place right now—the scary place, the 3AM place where the thoughts get dark—please know you're not alone, and please reach out to someone. A friend. A therapist. A crisis line. This moment is not the whole story, even when it feels like it is.

The Voice That Lies

There's a voice that shows up in seasons like this. It sounds like truth, but it's not. It says things like:

You failed. They saw through you. You weren't good enough. You'll never recover from this.

This voice presents itself as clear-eyed realism. It feels like you're finally seeing yourself accurately. Here's what I know, both clinically and personally: that voice is a story, not a fact. You can change the story now, in the present moment. That is powerful to understand. 

Carol Dweck's research on mindset illuminates something crucial here. A fixed mindset interprets setbacks as evidence of permanent inadequacy—I lost my job because of who I am. A growth mindset creates just enough space to reframe—I lost my job, and I'm in a hard situation that I can move through.

That might sound like a small shift. It's not. It's the difference between drowning and treading water.

Mindfulness teaches the same thing from a different angle: Notice the thought. You are not the thought. Thoughts arise automatically under stress; awareness is what gives you choice. When that brutal inner voice speaks, you don't have to believe it. You can observe it, name it, and choose not to let it narrate your life.

In fact, one of the most powerful practices I teach is this: identify the inner critic. Give it a name if that helps—some of my clients call theirs "The Judge" or "The Accountant" or something more colorful. When you hear it start its familiar script, you can say: I see you. I know what you're doing. And you don't get to drive right now.

Then—and this is the crucial part—you invite a different voice forward. The compassionate one. The voice that speaks to you the way you'd speak to a close friend who was suffering. This voice doesn't minimize what you're going through. It meets you with unconditional attention and says: This is hard. You're allowed to struggle. And you are still worthy of love—not because of what you produce, but because of who you are.

This isn't about positive thinking or pretending everything is fine. It's about recognizing that your worth was never located in your job title to begin with.

The Michelangelo Effect

There's a story about Michelangelo that I keep returning to. When asked how he created the David, he reportedly said he simply removed everything that wasn't David. The masterpiece was already inside the marble. His job was to reveal it.

What if that's what this season is doing?

Not destroying you. Revealing you.

Most of us accumulate layers over time—roles we took on to meet expectations, identities we constructed to feel secure, armor we built to protect ourselves from uncertainty. Some of that marble served us once. Some of it may have been weighing us down without our realizing it.

A layoff is a brutal chisel. I won't pretend otherwise. But it's also, potentially, an invitation to ask questions that success kept at bay:

What is no longer true about the life I was living?

What had hardened around me that I'm ready to release?

Who am I when I'm not defined by a title, a salary, a role?

These are not easy questions. They're also the questions that lead somewhere real. If you want to sit with them more deeply, I've written about self-inquiry practices for examining limiting beliefs—a companion to this kind of inner work.

What Helps

I won't give you a five-step plan. I don't think that's what you need right now. But here's what's helping me, and what I offer to the people I work with:

Slow down before you speed up. The pressure to immediately apply to a hundred jobs, to "stay busy," to fix this as fast as possible—it makes sense, but it can also be a way of avoiding what's actually happening inside you. Give yourself permission to feel the disruption before you rush to resolve it. When you're ready to move forward, I've written more about navigating career transitions mindfully.

Separate who you are from what happened. This is the mindfulness move. This is the growth mindset move. You can grieve the loss without letting it define your identity. Both things can be true: this is painful, and you are still whole.

Find your people. Isolation feeds the dark thoughts. Connection interrupts them. You don't have to have it together to reach out. Sometimes "I'm struggling" is the bravest and most important sentence you can speak.

Let this reveal something. Not right away. Not on demand. But stay open to the possibility that something has been waiting beneath the marble—something more true, more yours, than what you lost.

Walking Together

I don't know your specific situation. I don't know what bills are due or what conversations you're dreading or what you see when you look in the mirror right now. But I know this territory. I'm walking through my own version of it.

And I believe that this hard passage—as disorienting as it is—doesn't have to be the end of your story. It might be the place where a truer version of you begins to emerge.

If you're struggling and want someone to walk alongside you, I'm here. That's the work I do. But more than that, I just wanted you to know: you're not alone in the dark.

Questions People Ask

How do I cope with losing my job when my identity was tied to it? Start by recognizing that the pain you're feeling isn't weakness—it's grief. Your identity was built around something real. Mindfulness can help you observe the thoughts and emotions without being consumed by them, while self-compassion allows you to meet yourself with kindness instead of criticism. Over time, you may discover that who you are runs deeper than any role.

Is it normal to feel this devastated by a layoff? Yes. Especially if you were someone who "had it together"—who built your sense of self around providing, achieving, or being the reliable one. Job loss can feel like an existential crisis, not just a career setback. That response is human, not dramatic.

How can mindfulness help with job loss? Mindfulness creates space between you and your thoughts. When the inner critic says "you failed" or "you'll never recover," mindfulness helps you recognize that as a thought, not a truth. It doesn't make the pain disappear, but it gives you choice in how you respond to it.

James O'Neill, LCPC, is a therapist and mindfulness teacher at Journey Mindfulness, LLC in Ellicott City, Maryland. He works with individuals navigating life transitions, identity shifts, and the full catastrophe of living. Learn more at journeymindfulness.com.