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Hang in there - It does eventually get better. I was in a very similar situation - unable to find work after college. It took me three years from graduation be

Hang in there - It does eventually get better. I was in a very similar situation - unable to find work after college. It took me three years from graduation before I landed a job that was even tangentially related to what I wanted to do. In the interrim I did a bit of everything from bagging groceries to furniture delivery to repo work. The hardest part about it all was trying to find an explanation for my family as to why I'd spent those years in college. Or to explain why I couldn't find work. "Can't you try this? Can't you try that?" (Well, mom, that's what I was trying _last_ year and it didn't exactly work then.) There isn't always a reason. Sometimes it's just bad timing. I stuck with my search, slowly (too slowly) expanded the list of places I'd be willing to live or the list of jobs I'd be willing to take. A decade later and I'm doing what I had set out to do in the first place.

trentmb 12y ago
> "Can't you try this? Can't you try that?" (Well, mom, that's what I was trying _last_ year and it didn't exactly work then.) At least once a day! Thanks for taking the time to write.
kagamine 12y ago
Sometimes the 'noise' from other people is the 2nd hardest part. I was told by an engineer in his 50s to go from door to door asking to speak to the boss because that's what he did with his 17 year old son and it worked for him. I was wtf-ing. I'm a web-dev and was 38 years old at the time. Having my dad drive me around with a cv wouldn't have helped. After about 6 months unemployed I was asked to attend a govt sponsored course once a week. I was skeptical thinking it would be a waste of time and that I knew how to write a CV and type a letter dammit. BUT! the guy who was my contact was solid, gave me good advice too but the two most important things he did: 1. He had contacts because he was essentially a recruiter but working through the govt. (that got me a trial period leading to a full time job) 2. He got me up and across town every Wednesday for 9am and told me a thousand times how smart I was gave me the confidence boost I needed to see through the jungle of BS that is jobhunting. My point being: don't negate any opportunities because they look bad at first glance. Comb your hair and go, do your best. We've all been to interviews where the job looked great, but then you arrive and it's clear you maybe don't want this job or like these people, but the opposite also happens. My current job was as a COBOL programmer - it never happened from day one, they were looking for a webdev really but the job description was written by a cobol dev who was overworked. What he actually needed was a working framework so he could use his time on backend programming. it may sound trite, but every opportunity is to be attempted.

trentmb 12y ago

> "Can't you try this? Can't you try that?" (Well, mom, that's what I was trying _last_ year and it didn't exactly work then.) At least once a day! Thanks for taking the time to write.

kagamine 12y ago

Sometimes the 'noise' from other people is the 2nd hardest part. I was told by an engineer in his 50s to go from door to door asking to speak to the boss because that's what he did with his 17 year old son and it worked for him. I was wtf-ing. I'm a web-dev and was 38 years old at the time. Having my dad drive me around with a cv wouldn't have helped. After about 6 months unemployed I was asked to attend a govt sponsored course once a week. I was skeptical thinking it would be a waste of time and that I knew how to write a CV and type a letter dammit. BUT! the guy who was my contact was solid, gave me good advice too but the two most important things he did: 1. He had contacts because he was essentially a recruiter but working through the govt. (that got me a trial period leading to a full time job) 2. He got me up and across town every Wednesday for 9am and told me a thousand times how smart I was gave me the confidence boost I needed to see through the jungle of BS that is jobhunting. My point being: don't negate any opportunities because they look bad at first glance. Comb your hair and go, do your best. We've all been to interviews where the job looked great, but then you arrive and it's clear you maybe don't want this job or like these people, but the opposite also happens. My current job was as a COBOL programmer - it never happened from day one, they were looking for a webdev really but the job description was written by a cobol dev who was overworked. What he actually needed was a working framework so he could use his time on backend programming. it may sound trite, but every opportunity is to be attempted.