The Hour Before an Interview
For the hour before an interview, when the preparation is done and the nerves arrive anyway. It settles the practical things early, puts three stories within reach, and gives you something to say if your mind goes blank.
Confidence · Work · Anxiety · 9 items · whenever you need it
The checklist
- Be somewhere nearby twenty minutes early — arriving in a rush is a feeling you then have to talk through.
- Read your own application once, not five times — they will ask about what you wrote, not what you crammed.
- Have three stories ready rather than a script — a story you can tell survives a question you did not expect.
- Write down one question you actually want answered — it is often the part they remember afterward.
- Drink water and eat something small — a dry mouth and an empty stomach both read as nerves.
- Put your phone away before you walk in — the last thing you read sets the mood you arrive in.
- Breathe out slowly for a count of six — a long exhale settles the body faster than a pep talk.
- Decide now what you will say if you blank — “Can I come back to that?” is a complete answer.
- Plan the first thing you do when it ends — a coffee or a walk gives the rest of the day somewhere to land.
Use this checklist Free account: tick items off and keep each day's record.
How to use it
Run through it whenever you need it, honestly and without scoring yourself. A checklist is a way of noticing, not a test: an item you cannot tick is information about the day, not a verdict on you. Over a few weeks the pattern of what gets ticked and what does not says more than any single pass.
With a free Theraglee account the checklist remembers each pass, so you can look back. Without one, you can still read it here and keep your own copy.