Bad anxiety during recruiting after interviews fizzled out

I’m currently enrolled in one of the top MSF programs in the US- I have solid experiences in boutiques and big companies. Recruiting was going well, I was networking consistently and landed a few first rounds that mostly fizzled out. It made me doubt myself, and now I feel anxious interviewing and networking, I feel like I’m not good enough for the job. I dry heave a few times a day in my room thinking about how I am falling behind and it’s eating into my life in a significant way. I force myself to exercise and do school work. All things considered I am doing fine, in a good program, decent internships, did well in undergrad. But my headspace has been really foggy recently, and I wonder if I can handle the job if I can’t even recruit properly. I’ve been researching other functions besides IB and might start pursuing something else.

Social anxiety is kicking in too, feel like I’ve been putting an act on to seem cool and composed when it’s eating me up inside.

 
Most Helpful

I have anxiety as well. There are some things you can do to limit it. 

- Less caffeine

- Avoid alcohol

- Prescription to benzodiazepines

- Working out regularly

- Getting enough sleep

- Eating healthy, staying well hydrated 

For me personally, I don't follow some of these sometimes and suffer the consequences. Then I'll take a Xanax or something. I don't take much benzos though, only 1-2mg per week. The benzos should be an aid to get back to normal and then you should come off of them. But, I generally like to have some benzos on hand.

Also, if you have some other underlying cause of anxiety like not being able to get a job, then you should use that as fuel to work harder and apply more. Above all if you are looking for a job and feel despair or negativity, seek to fall back on your routine of working out and eating healthy and sleeping well and do the best you can for the day and acknowledge mentally you did your best for the day and then go to sleep and try it again. Trust me, I've applied to thousands of jobs (and hundreds of interviews) and have had to get over resume gaps and have been there. Get a solid routine and you will feel less despair.

Not sure if you're into it, but I've made an Excel sheet with each line as a job opportunity; rows were location, position description, title, pay requested, pay offered, website, notes etc. Then every application is a victory. Highlight rows depending on if you have been rejected or another color for a phone interview or physical interview, another color for an offer, and if you just focus on building the spreadsheet, an offer will finally come.

I have a lot of anxiety built up before interviews, but most of the time I act fine in interviews when they start and am not anxious. I also have a lot of race anxiety before running races or triathlons. Then when I'm in the race I feel fine. 

"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
 

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