11 Set a Timer on the Pity Party

In addition to my role as Queen of Failure, I also consider myself the Princess of Pity Parties. I love a good pity party and am an expert at hosting. Throughout my many pity parties, for myself of course, I have lamented that no one works harder than I do, no one appreciates what I do, no one has sacrificed more than I have—the list goes on and on. If this were interactive, right about now I’d cue the violins to start playing a funeral dirge. And yes please, I’d like some cheese to go with my whine. Thank you very much. You get the idea. And judging from the number of my students who use this resilience strategy, I am not the only woman who loves a good pity party.

There is nothing inherently wrong with occasionally feeling sorry for yourself. I get it. Sometimes a good cry, and a pint of Graeter’s ice cream, just helps. What I’m talking about is wallowing in the self-pity. Like hogs wallowing in mud, the problem with wallowing is that you get stuck. And when you’re stuck, you’re ruminating, you’re beating yourself up, and you’re not moving forward to take advantage of opportunities that come your way.

Let me share an extreme example of an excessive pity party that droned on for way too long. Long story short, while teaching at another school, I was turned down from promotion. There are a lot of ugly backstories, but that’s not what I want to focus on. My focus here is how I reacted to that failure. The cause of the failure was a result of several things I could not control. But the one thing I could control was my reaction to the failure, and eventually I did, but it was way too long in coming and not one of my best moments.

Keep in mind, this took place long before I knew anything about resilience. No one had ever talked to me about resilience and I’m not even sure I knew the word. The concept of getting over failure was foreign to me; I thought failure signaled the end. After getting turned down I floundered for a year-and-a-half feeling sorry for myself—poor me, it’s so unfair (and yes it was, but that’s not the issue), how could they do this after all I’ve done for them, etc., etc., etc. You get the drift. I continued to stay stuck, seething about the decision, until a kind soul—interestingly enough, a man—pulled me aside. He said, “Jane, read the letter. They’re not asking for much. Do what they are asking and apply again.” Holy cow! The lightbulb went on. I was spending all my cognitive and emotional energy debating whether I should appeal the decision, file a lawsuit, leave for another school, or hire an arsonist. (Note: I wasn’t really serious about the arsonist but on especially angry days, the thought of causing damage did creep into, and fortunately out of, my mind.) The thought of re-applying for a promotion never occurred to me. Seriously. Doing what the committee asked (which was easy) and applying again, never crossed my mind. Once rejected, I jumped to the conclusion, meant always rejected. Talk about a lack of resilience. Crown me the poster child. I think about this example and wonder how many other women have taken a “no” to mean “never,” when it really meant “not yet.” And to be clear, it’s not fair when we have to reapply while mediocre men sail through. But only when we reapply, and get the promotion or appointment, will we accumulate the power needed to change the system. We need to keep re-applying so our daughters and granddaughters won’t have to.

As previously noted, researchers have found that women are 40% less likely than men to reapply for a leadership position once they have been turned down. Ouch. Clearly, I am not alone. And, as was true in my case, there are other external factors that are likely neither fair nor just which come into play in the initial rejection. I get that. There are a lot of people who don’t want women in leadership positions and set double standards, explicitly or implicitly, when evaluating women for promotion. True. And that needs to change. But cultural and social change is a long time coming. Meanwhile, we need to work on what we can control—how we react to failure. If we lack resilience and quit after one rejection, they’ve won and we’re done.

I still believe in the benefit of taking time to mourn your losses (For a good discussion on loss, see Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser). Failure is a loss. While waiting to hear if you got the job, you imagine the apartment, the city, and lifestyle that awaits you with this new job. A job rejection, or failure to get the offer, is the loss of that dream. While waiting to hear if your manuscript is accepted, you fantasize about telling all your friends and family about your publication. A rejection means that dream is over. And the loss of a dream deserves to be mourned. The key is to not get stuck—for days, weeks, or months—in mourning.

To allow yourself time to grieve the loss, but not get stuck in a pity party, use a timer to set a specific amount of time that you allow yourself to grieve. How much time? My recommendation is to make the amount of time commiserate with the level of loss or failure. For small losses—an internship rejection, a negative interaction with a customer, or a less-than-perfect grade—I tend to keep the pity party small and set the timer for anywhere from five minutes to two hours. For more severe losses, I may allow myself a day to mourn. But no more than a day. Experiment and choose the time that works for you.

For example, one morning I received a tearful email from a woman in my Women in Sales class. She explained that her boyfriend (i.e., the man of her dreams) had broken up with her the night before and she was too distraught to attend class that afternoon. I understood. Her relationship with her boyfriend had failed and, along with it, her dreams for the future that she had envisioned with him. Imagine my pleasant surprise when she showed up in class, albeit with red eyes instead of her usual sparkly self, but sitting in her seat and participating as always. When I expressed curiosity that she was in class given the earlier email, she told me that she put a timer on the pity party. She set a timer for three hours—most of the morning—and cried her eyes out. When the timer went off, she was done crying. She blew her nose, wiped her eyes and declared it time to move on with her life. She was proud of herself for not wallowing in her pain and for showing up for class. And I was proud of her too.

I saw a variation of this strategy while leading a corporate workshop on resilience. One of the women executives in the group noted that, when she calls her mom to complain about the frustration of working in a predominately male organization (need I say more?), her mom gives her five minutes to vent. That’s it. The executive gets five minutes to whine to her mom and feel sorry for herself. After five minutes, her mom stops the conversation and redirects to something positive. I have a sneaky suspicion that this mother was intentionally or unintentionally instrumental in helping her daughter build the resilience responsible for her success in the corporate ranks. Would that we could all be fortunate enough to have wise mothers.

I have also used this strategy when helping students navigate their careers. A former Women in Sales student called me one day asking for career advice. She spent the first twenty minutes of our conversation talking about her current job and the toxic environment she dealt with. I did not disagree and, in fact, concurred that it was time for her to move on. We talked about her resume and then she started rehashing the same destructive incidents that she’d already stated and I’d already heard. I said, Enough! And reminded her about putting a timer on the pity party. I gently chided her—you can spend 15 minutes droning on about the soul-sucking negative place you work, or you could be writing a job letter. Which will serve you better? As we ended our conversation, she promised to restrict the pity party to five minutes a day and devote the rest of her time job hunting. And, last I heard, she landed a great sales job with a company that appreciates her. A good win.

Throughout this guidebook, I encourage you to practice failing with small stuff so you’re prepared when larger losses occur. While, thank goodness, I don’t have to use these resilience strategies often for major failures, I do need to employ them occasionally, and this is one I use for failure and loss. There was a time when my husband needed to step away from his position and it hurt the whole family. While we were grieving the loss of life as we knew it, there were days when I could barely get out of bed, much less try to accomplish something meaningful at work. Fortunately, I have a flexible schedule and was able to take a grieving day. Keep in mind it was a grieving day—not a week, not a month, not even two days. More than one day and we’re talking about depression. But I would take one day, sit on my back deck, stare into space because I couldn’t move, and then go to bed. The funny thing, that I cannot explain other than by the grace of God, is that somehow allowing myself one day to grieve made it possible for me to bounce back the following day. I was always afraid that allowing an entire day of grief would evolve into weeks of self-pity. It never happened. By giving myself a day, I got back to business the next day.

Another similar strategy that is closely related to this one is to postpone the pity party. When something bad happens and you want to burst into tears, instead, promise yourself that you can cry in the shower later, but you need to hold it together now. I’ve used this one multiple times. At another school, an efficient but socially awkward department head interrupted me as I was about to walk into my classroom. He informed me that my position had been eliminated and I needed to start looking for another teaching position. As much as I wanted to burst into tears, I had a class to teach and students who needed to learn the information we were covering that day. So, I promised myself I could cry in the car on my way home from work. But right now, I had a job to do and I needed to get in there and teach my class. The funny thing about postponing the pity party is that by the time I got around to feeling sorry for myself, I didn’t feel like crying anymore. I didn’t need the pity party. And BTW, I kept my job.

Please note that this strategy—like all of the strategies—doesn’t always work for everyone. Setting a timer on the pity party is a student favorite. But it is also one that doesn’t always work for everyone in every instance. In some cases, as is the case of my students, you may set a timer on the pity party, but when the timer goes off, you’re still thinking and ruminating about the failure. If this is the case, try a different resilience strategy; putting a timer on the pity party is not working for you in this case. In instances like this, I suggest trying the “press pause and change the tape” strategy. It’s clear your mind is stuck focusing on the failure so you need to press pause and change the tape to something positive.

It’s OK to feel bad when you fail but put a timer on your pity party. Set a timer, then go ahead and cry about not getting your dream job, dream account, much-deserved promotion, man of your dreams, or whatever else you’re mourning. When the timer goes off, you’re done feeling sorry for yourself. Wipe your eyes, put a smile on your face, walk out the door, and start working on your next proposal.

An executive in one of my women’s leadership courses shared how she used this with her daughter. When her daughter calls to complain, whine, or moan about some life event—when my daughters were growing up I used to call it the crisis du jour—this mother would put a timer on for five minutes and explain that the daughter has five minutes to complain, whine, moan, and lament that the world is not fair. When the timer goes off-ding!—the mother changes the conversation to another topic. Brilliant. I wish I had known about this strategy when my daughters were younger. However, I can attest it works well with children, and students, of any age.