Developing Patience in Your Job Search

I’ve done a lot of personal work over the years and one of the things that I’ve come to realize about myself is that patience and I are not the best of friends. Time and time again I have seen things work out in my life for the better, even though it has not necessarily been on my timing. But yet there always comes that moment when I start to doubt all the work I’ve done and worry about the result.

This point comes at different times for people during their job search. Most of us will hit the wall of frustration hard. Everyone will react differently; it may be that push we need to get just a little bit more creative or it may force us to retreat from our job search feeling as though our next opportunity is never going to arrive.

For me it usually does both, I retreat, sometimes I even wallow, and then once it’s all out of my system I pick myself up and think about what I could be doing differently, and how can I make the process enjoyable again.

I have heard different numbers about how long the job search takes, some say 3-6 months most recently I heard 6-9 months, which when you are looking for a job can be a long time. So how do we keep motivated, consistent and most of all patient.

One of the things that has always helped me is an inner knowing that things will always play out in the end. I can look back on my life and in my job search and no matter how long it has taken me I was able to transition into the career I wanted. I moved from legal recruiting to human services and then to education. These past accomplishments fuel my fire, I know that if I did it once I could do it again.

Another thing that has helped me is having a good support group. During my last job search another co-worker and I were looking at the same time (I do not recommend discussing your job search with co-workers, this happened to be a special situation). We were able to keep each other on track with what we were doing. Just make sure to try and look at other people’s results as a sign that it will also happen for you, instead of with jealousy. Use it as fuel to continue your efforts.

Better than mastering patience is to develop a spirit of persistence in the job search. The will to keep going, and stay consistence will take you far not only within your search but in all other personal and professional goals.