There is a specific kind of silence that follows a job loss. It is not the silence of a quiet room. It is the silence of a story you have been telling yourself suddenly stopping mid-sentence.
I have experienced that silence more than once. And each time, what came after it taught me something that no business school, no mentor, and no career coach ever could.
What Nobody Tells You About Losing a Job
The practical side of job loss gets a lot of attention — update your CV, work your network, apply for roles. That advice is not wrong. But it skips the part that actually determines whether your next chapter is better than the last one: what you do with the story you tell yourself about what just happened.
Most people tell themselves one of two stories. Either “I failed” — which leads to shrinking. Or “They were wrong about me” — which leads to repeating the same patterns in the next role.
Neither story is useful. There is a third one.
The Third Story: This Is the Reset
Every time I lost a role — or left one — I eventually arrived at the same realisation: the ending was not the problem. The ending was the permission slip.
Permission to stop doing work that was not aligned with who I was becoming. Permission to move to a country that scared me. Permission to try an industry I had always been curious about but never had the excuse to enter.
The reset is not a punishment. It is a forced upgrade — if you choose to treat it that way.
4 Practical Lessons from Starting Over (Multiple Times)
1. Confidence Is Rebuilt Through Action, Not Affirmation
After a setback, the instinct is to wait until you feel ready. But confidence does not come before action — it comes from action. The first step does not need to be a big one. It just needs to happen. Then the next one. Confidence is a by-product of momentum, not a prerequisite for it.
2. Your Identity Should Never Be Fully Tied to Your Job Title
When a role ends and your whole identity was inside it, the loss is twice as heavy. The professionals who recover fastest are the ones who have a sense of self that exists outside of what they do for a living. Build that deliberately — through relationships, interests, values, and the way you show up for people — not just through your career.
3. The Market Does Not Owe You Recognition — You Have to Claim It
Especially for immigrants and expats, it is easy to wait for the new country or the new industry to “discover” you. It does not work that way. You have to show up, speak up, and make your value visible. Nobody is going to translate your experience for you. That is your job.
4. The Setback Always Contains the Lesson for the Next Stage
Every difficult ending in my career, when I look back at it now, contained exactly the information I needed for what came next. A role that ended badly taught me what kind of leadership I would never accept again. A business that struggled taught me what kind of clients I needed to stop saying yes to. The lesson is always in the loss — if you are willing to look for it.
You Are Not Starting Over. You Are Starting Smarter.
There is a difference between starting over and starting smarter. When you restart with everything you have already learned, you are not back at zero. You are at a different starting line — one that is closer to where you actually want to go.
In Restart, I share the real moments where I had to choose between shrinking and rebuilding — and the specific mindset shifts that made the difference each time.
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