Posts in Career
Redefining Failure and Moving Forward
Redefining Failure and Moving Forward

It’s been six months since I graduated from university and if I’m perfectly candid, it’s been a rough ride. People keep telling me that it’s okay to not know what you’re doing at this stage in life. “You’re so young, take time to figure it out!”

I have been told some variation of that statement hundreds of times since April. As reassuring as it is to hear, I haven’t felt content with what I’m doing since I was in school. I miss writing every day. I miss being challenged, studying, learning new things and that fly-by-the-seat-of-my pants adrenaline rush I get anytime I’m working under a strict deadline. 

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Dreams, CareerMegan HoeglerFeatured Comment
When Purpose Wavers
When Purpose Wavers

But difficult classes, loneliness, discontent, and failed experiments quickly overshadowed the idyllic concept I had of this season of life. What had once felt so solid in my mind began to crumble and it's only now, one year later, that little buds of insight are poking through that shattered concrete of some of the blocks I'd built upon my foundation.

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Career, DreamsBree WatkinsComment
Losing Your Life to Busy
Losing Your Life to Busy

I have a new job, which is why I now wake up before the sun. It’s a nonprofit job, an Americorps job; I don’t get paid much (read: like, below minimum wage), so I have a second part-time job on top of this new full-time job. Throughout the day, my inboxes fill up with my other two “jobs”— freelance work for another nonprofit and running That First Year.

I’m busy.

But I know this busyness isn’t unique to me. You’re busy, too. We all are.

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Career, LifeAlly WillisFeatured Comment
Lessons from an Eraser
Lessons from an Eraser

Nothing can prepare you for feeling unprepared in the “real world.” There’s no glossary, no professorial advisor, no syllabus, and, perhaps the most disorienting, no grades. I don’t know how I did during my last tutoring session. I’m not sure of my strengths in my last interview (although, I can confidently report many weaknesses).

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Career, Dreams, LifeC. CarrollFeaturedComment
Finding Happy One Year Later
Finding Happy One Year Later

Last Thursday, I got an email from my company’s CEO.

“Congratulations,” it read, “on the most important decision of your life thus far. You’ve been with us for an entire year!”

The email was a little presumptuous; I found it a little off-putting. But it reminded me of a milestone I would have marched right past had it not been for a standardized company email and nice little bonus gift in my paycheck—I’ve been living this adult life for 365 days.

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Dreams, Career, LifeAmanda BeadlescombFeaturedComment
The Art of Sitting: Filling the Time In Between
The Art of Sitting: Filling the Time In Between

My last college deadline was to be completely packed up and checked out of my on-campus townhouse by 4 pm on graduation day. Yes, after the nervous excitement of placing my cap just-so, figuring out how the mysterious hood was supposed to sit uncomfortably around my neck, waiting to be called to claim my diploma, successfully navigating my way across the stage without falling, and after waiting through another speech and another send-off, I had to rush back to my room and leave my four-year home in two short hours.

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Graduation, Career, DreamsC. CarrollFeaturedComment
On Bad Days and Getting Dressed for Work
On Bad Days and Getting Dressed for Work

I recently started a new job that’s had me up before I’d like to be and at home on the weekends catching up on work-related duties. It’s an opportunity and a half but my poor anxious heart is struggling. It’s not exactly what I want to be doing (lounging on a beach being fed grapes paid for by my fat book advance) but… it’s cool and I’m working on it.

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Career, LifeStephanie PhilpFeatured Comment
The Thing About Plans Is This
The Thing About Plans Is This

They change.

Flights change. Book release dates change. Dinners with friends change. Sometimes, however, when you think you’ve made perfect, unbreakable plans that you truly want to work, it’s hard to realize, remember, and accept that some plans change.

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Life, CareerKalee CowanComment
A New Blog, A Better Blog
A New Blog, A Better Blog

New things, better things.

That’s been a go-to phrase for me for the past several months, a reminder in a rather transition-heavy and emotionally-turbulent time in my life to keep my eyes set on the good things to come rather than the worries I usually burden myself with needlessly.

And in the spirit of new things, better things comes along That First Year getting a makeover.

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Travel, Style, Money, Life, Health, Graduation, Grad School, Dreams, Career, RelationshipsAlly WillisFeaturedComment
Not What You Want, But What You Need
Not What You Want, But What You Need

I saw the finish line. It was close. I never thought I would make it but there I was: six weeks from wearing that awkward too-small cap and oversized gown. I was pages away from closing the book yet with the strongest desire to call it quits and throw it away. 

I felt lost. I was anxious and ready to move somewhere new and exciting. I was ready to walk away from everything I worked to build and everything I chased after just for something new. I wasn’t secure in myself, where I was going in life, or the standing I held with the people around me. 

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Dreams, Graduation, CareerCaitlin SoileauComment
Nothing is Forever
Nothing is Forever

It’s my first day on the job as a bike courier and when I look into the bag and see what’s happened, I’m sure it’s also going to be my last. Probably, I shouldn’t have put my metal lock in the same compartment as cans of soda. But also… why couldn’t he have just ordered more fries?!

One of the cans has been punched in the gut and is leaking from the corners of its now-bent frame. Actually, it’s just dripping now, it’s done leaking. My entire bag and its contents are soaked.

Did I mention I’m also lost?

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Career, DreamsStephanie PhilpFeaturedComment
Ready or Not: On Finding Balance
Ready or Not: On Finding Balance

Unsurprisingly, ever since graduation, I’ve been having trouble envisioning myself doing this for the next thirty or forty years. As familiar as I am with delayed gratification, this is starting to seem like there’s no end in sight.

I did, however, have about three months off between finishing my degree and starting work. In between all the (additional) studying I did for my upcoming rotations, I carved out some time for some serious introspection. 

I knew I couldn’t continue like this. If there’s one thing I’m afraid of, it’s turning into a jaded doctor that only goes into work for a paycheck and treats each patient like another five-minute appointment - ready or not, next person! - that point when you stop caring about the person sitting in front of you.

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Career, Dreams, LifeElle YoungComment
Stop the World, I Want to Get Off: An Amateur Prayer
Stop the World, I Want to Get Off: An Amateur Prayer

Things are changing. Not just the usual kind of change, where you finish one thing and move onto the next and then panic and cry like millions of other kids, excuse me—young adults, my age. I'm sure you get that one a lot. The "help me, I'm jobless" one. And I'm sure you do your best, don't get me wrong, but while we're on the subject, how in the world does a kid who spent all of his senior year of high school dressed as the Statue of Liberty and speaking in a mildly offensive German accent get scouted by Google and offered a company car, YouDammit?

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Career, Graduation, Life, RelationshipsKatie SerenaFeaturedComment