It’s okay. You’re not the only one.
Before graduation came, I had all these plans. I had my life figured out. I was going to take a year off before I went to grad school and joined the military. I was going to save up money so I could travel. I was going to finish the book I was writing and get more work done on my photography.
It’s the middle of June and none of that has happened. Well, other than the year off, but doing nothing is kind of hard to mess up.
Right before graduation I was offered a temporary job with my school working with incoming freshman. A job is a job, right? Excitedly, I accepted. This was before I realized that the job didn’t start until the end of June. No one wants to hire an employee for six weeks before she has to take a leave of absence and no one wants to hire an employee for a job three months out. So, here I am essentially jobless. That put a hurting on the whole “saving for travel” plan.
A week after graduation my boyfriend and I visited military recruiters. I wish I could say I was in the long and tedious trial of paperwork and phone call check-ups like my boyfriend, but no, because, unlike my boyfriend, I want to be an officer. Not just an officer, a medical corps officer. Or, what the military sees, a walking vacuum of money for six to eight years.
This wasn’t supposed to be me. I was the one that had everything figured out. I had job applications shooting out of my laptop like a confetti gun. I was the one that earned Gold Stars. I had resume builders and job references. I wasn’t going to fall into the post-graduation trap.
And here I am.
This isn’t a pity party, this is me mocking my own naivety.
This is also an encouragement letter. I know I’m not the only one out there that feels this way, but I realize that sometimes I feel like I am. With Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, you name it, you see all your friends, classmates, and, sometimes the worst of them all, that girl you secretly hated in high school getting great jobs, being accepted into prestigious grad schools or buying new expensive toys. It seems like everyone except you has their lives together, right?
Well that’s what I thought and it was killing me inside.
Finally, one night, I sat in my boyfriend’s car and broke down. I thought I was a failure. I thought I had messed up my life.
And my boyfriend grabbed my hand, looked me straight in the eyes, and asked me:
“What’s written on the inside of your ring?”
My class ring. My Band of Gold. Something I fought tooth and nail every day for four years to earn the right of wearing.
The answer is, “Now The World.”
The engraving came from a phrase I made up during my time as a cadet, “First the Ring, now the world.” A reminder that if I could complete Knob year, earn the Ring and graduate from The Citadel, I could take on the world.
I put that saying in my ring for times just like the one I was in, times when I felt downtrodden and defeated, like I wouldn’t get to accomplish my dreams.
I took off my ring to see those words shining back at me. My boyfriend, who is not exactly a craftsman with words, finished the pep talk with a few sentences that still resonate with me weeks later:
“You are one of the most brilliant people I have ever met. You’re dedicated and strong. Just the fact you’re worried about your future means you’re going to be fine.”
And it clicked.
To everyone, college graduate or not, that is reading this who has no idea where their life is going, I assume you are reading this because you are concerned or worried, and that’s a good thing.
The fact that you are anxious about where your future is headed means you care. It means you aren’t just sitting around accepting the fact you have no job or no goals. You want to make your life better.
After that talk, I called two of my friends, one of whom graduated two years before me, and one who had graduated a year before me. I told them about my worries about my future and they both told almost the exact same thing:
“It’s been almost a year (two years), and I’m just now getting into the career path that I want. Calm down. You’re doing fine.”
When we graduate, we’re told that we can change the world, that we are the future. It’s true, but that doesn’t mean it happens as gloriously as our commencement speaker describes, nor does it happen as soon as we are handed our diploma.
The truth is, yeah, some people have their lives together. They get great jobs as soon as they graduate. Or some of the lucky ones find out they have a job or graduate school lined up even before they walk across the stage. They can afford fun fancy things.
Well, we are human. We like attention and affirmation. So of course they are going to post about it on Facebook. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just the truth.
Those of us that don’t have our lives figured out yet, well most of us aren’t going to be updating status and posting pictures about that. Or if we do, it’s usually in the form of fun self-deprecating memes.
For every friend on Facebook that seems to have it all figured out, another ten are just like you.
I'm not here saying that one day your life will magically piece itself together and all the anxiety will poof away and that you shouldn't worry anymore. No, our lives aren't fairy tales. Princes and fairy godmothers aren't going to show up and whisk us away in a cloud of glitter and confetti.
I know how overwhelming staring at a job application after job application can be. How it's just easier to close the laptop and go out with friends to try and forget about it.
Take it in steps. One job application a day. No TV. No phone (I'm serious, leave it in another room.) Turn off your Internet if you can. No distractions.
Instead of trying to crank out five to six job applications and leaving them all half-finished, you are actually accomplishing something without pulling your hair out.
Even if you have no idea what you want to do with your life, it doesn't matter, do something. Getting a job you hate will quickly help you realize what you don't want out of life, as well as being a paycheck and a resume builder.
Life is hard. Being a college graduate with your entire life in front of you is scary. I get it. Hell, I’m living it. But don’t hate yourself. It’s okay to not have all of the answers. It’s okay to not know what you want out of life. From one terrified, unemployed college graduate to another: You’re gonna try, you’re going to fail (sorry), but you’ll figure it out.
