So my weekend of sorting my life out went something along the lines of:
Saturday
Procrastination, switch computer on, procrastination, procrastination, procrastination....sleep.
Sunday
Procrastination, procrastination, email people until my mind becomes numb, procrastination, sleep.
So all-in-all it was sort of productive...sort of...
Of the emails I sent I got ONE reply back. Granted all it was saying was that they didn't have any vacancies blah, blah, blah. But the fact that they replied meant alot as at it was some sort of acknowledgment that I exist in the world!
So in conclusion, my weekend of sorting my life out was a bit of a waste. I had forgotten how depressing job searching actually is.
In retrospect however I felt a bit aimless when searching through the vast, brain-engulfing entity that is otherwise known as the world wide web. Though I had made a list of companies to send emails to; which had, at first, seemed long, I quickly found myself at the end of said list and began googling nonsensical things like:
Safe to say, that these sorts of searches didn't really yield the results that I had been expecting, such as:
- Astronaut: only 5 GCSE's needed
- Time Traveller: Must be well informed about all four series' of Mad Men
- I can't even think of a third suggestion because these jobs don't exist! Let's all, however, pretend that it would have been hilarious...
What does come up are various websites spouting advice on how to find a job. Read it if you want to, any advice is good advice right now.
I haven't even got any sort of rule that I have learnt about this weekend! Therefore like my weekend today's blog entry is empty, inconclusive and unsure of what's going on.
But still the battle for finding a job continues. Unrelenting as always.
Lots of recruitment agencies are hiring but what are they recruiting for?
Because I sure can't find anything.
That is all. More on my weekend of sorting my life out later, though what I've just written should be an indication of how well it's going.
Parents. As the age old saying goes; you can't live with them, you just can't live with them. But as some of you might find, once leaving Uni going back to live with the family is not something that appeals in terms of that-"i've paid my own bills and fed myself for three years and now you don't think I can get the bus at night"- kind of way.
From personal experience I try to counter this by rarely being in the house so I can therefore fully appreciate the time I spend with the family. However by living with your parents after finishing Uni you give up certain rights, such as privacy; particularly when it comes to job hunting.
This is something that the family will follow with great interest and boundless curiosity. If you haven't received some sort of article torn out from some newspaper spouting rubbish about 'graduate jobs' and the 'current financial climate' then count yourself very lucky.
To some extent the family has the right to do this as in one way or another they will have supported your education thereby causing a shift in emotions from: the immense pride they felt on your Graduation Day (which if you played your cards right should have bought you at least a few weeks of slacking off) to an underlying expectation that now is the time to be doing something with your life. This therefore leads me to my second rule.
Rule 2: Do not listen to your parents.
Funny Story: after coming down the stairs from a blissful lie-in though still having to go to work in the afternoon. I find a note from my father with references to the careers section of that days newspaper telling me to read it and "quickly" apply to the placements that they were suggesting. To be fair to him he does not have a clue as to what I want to do with my life nor does he know about 'My Plan'. But the placements were for various chain stores and the like. What annoyed me was that this was after the conversation I had had with my parents telling them how I felt retail wasn't really for me. Though I don't think it needs saying, I put that little note in the bin.
Second to the sage advice that your parents will give you is, not only their tact at making you feel like crap for not having found a job yet, but also their strange ability to know which of your friends have got jobs already as well as their constant reminders to you about this very thing.
The advice that your parents will give you about what lies ahead can often be soul-destroying. The innate ability each one of us, as sons and daughters, have is to want to please our parents. Though sometimes we protest that this is not the case it can sometimes cause you to take offers or follow certain paths that aren't really for you.
Though this can be true for many situations it also leads me to my third rule when finding a job:
Rule 3: Listen to your parents
Parents are wise and have lived a fruitful life full of experiences! Why would you ever take the advice of someone stuck in a full-time job, which to them feels like someone squeezing the air out of their lungs, and who constantly refers to a 'Plan' which hasn't progressed past the first stage!
In reality parents and other people you know will always put in their two cents about how to find a job and what to do. But it's up to you to pick and choose the advice that you take. Sometimes certain offers that you might get from parents and others may help in the long run but as long as you know that you have a goal that you want to achieve and you don't become complacent then that goal will always be achievable.
It's time to think 5-year plan now.
Most people lack common courtesy. At least this is the opinion I have formed whilst working in my current job. Retail. It is also one of the variety of reasons why I want to leave this job NOW. When various customers bring you to tears twice in one day, I think that should be the point in which you say I've had enough.
Now I could come up with a whole host of reasons why the job I am currently doing is intolerable. But that's just boring and self-pitying. The point that I was trying to get at was that along the way your Plan can get changed due to Blips.
If we refer back to My Plan in part a) we can see that initially I was going to change my part-time job, which I took on to fund my way through Uni, into a full-time job. I did this successfully. However, the location change, in terms of ghetto-ness levels, proved to be quite significant towards my enjoyment of said job.
A graph to show the levels of 'ghetto-ness' in the stores I worked in.
Red- Uni store
Blue- The current store
Through this very sophisticated looking graph I am attempting to show you a Blip that I came across whilst putting my plan into action. The Blip being the realisation that I couldn't stand working in retail anymore.*
So My Plan gets changed:
My Plan My New Plan
a) make my part-time job my full time job thereby earning money whilst...
b) looking for new (less soul-destroying) part-time job, applying for work experience, volunteer stuff and internships.
c) make contacts through aforementioned work experience, volunteer stuff and internships and get permanent job.
d) quit previous soul-sucking full-time job with some sort of clever/self-aggrandising outburst at manager. (hair-flip non-essential)
e) become astonishingly successful and rich.
Though not in my original Plan I felt that looking for a new part-time job was an important change to make in order to prevent a downward spiral into crazy-town (situated next to lazy-town).
It's always important to remember that if you are in situations like this they aren't or don't have to be permanent.
Life is always going to come up with unexpected surprises both good; like a free ice-cream sundae on a hot day, and bad; like a rude customer who continues to shout at you because the stupid top she wants isn't in stock even though you have politely told her where she can find a similar one and informed her about the delivery that the store gets regularly!
...I digress.
Most likely you will come across Blips that will change your Plan, like I have. The way to deal with them is Head On. Yes, it's been a shock to the system but friends have helped as has the inner-belief that you must have in yourself.
You can do it! You really can!
*having worked in Retail for approximately 3 years I can safely say that I entirely respect what they do and applaud anyone that chooses it as a career choice. It's extremely interesting and more than just standing at a cash desk.
As I write this post some 18-19 year-olds sleep soundly in their beds (as that is what the youth of today do) dreaming of the prospect of going to University. An educational mecca where they can fill their braniums with a whole host of knowledge which, in theory, should prepare them for the "Wider Working World".
In. Theory.
Employment statistics regarding graduates tend to be quite surprising; showing that most students after graduating are able to get jobs (80-90%) whatever University they went to or whatever degree they studied. However a key question which is missing from these statistics is whether this is the job they intended to do once they had graduated.
From a personal perspective I can answer this question with a resounding "NO". In terms of My Plan (a phrase which will most likely become a common occurrence throughout this blog) I am on track.
My Plan
a) make my part-time job my full time job thereby earning money whilst...
b) applying for work experience, volunteer stuff and internships.
c) make contacts through aforementioned work experience, volunteer stuff and internships and get permanent job.
d) quit previous soul-sucking full-time job with some sort of clever/self-aggrandising outburst at manager. (hair-flip non-essential)
e) become astonishingly successful and rich.
Though I am still making the transition to part b) all-in-all the five parts of the Plan I feel, or at least felt, were entirely do-able. However I forgot a few things whilst envisioning said Plan. Which brings us neatly to my first rule when finding a job:
Rule 1: You are your own worst enemy.
It is extremely easy to lose focus or become disheartened whilst job-seeking. I haven't even started looking properly for a job and yet many, many times I have found my self sobbing in some quiet corner or dramatically flailing my hands whilst describing to an empathetic friend my strife at working somewhere I don't want to and struggling to figure out if I have what it takes to realise my dreams. Just to reiterate, this was before I had even started properly looking for a job. *sigh*
It's easy to stay in the same place and think about 'what if's', it's harder to take the plunge and see if there is any truth to the words you've been spouting about "what you want to be when you grow up".
Anybody wanna dive with me?
