So in the past few months, I’ve been searching for a job. It’s a tedious and lengthy process which for me seems to go in stages…

Have you experienced any of those?

1. You decide jobseeking is not a problem, but an opportunity to be solved. Hooray! Could we have another glass of wine over here, please?
2. You try to do all the household chores that were impossible to do with a job. The flat is cleaner than it ever was before.
3. This time, you will not make the stupid mistake of simply waiting to hear back from the perfect job. You will find a nice, friendly, part-time job to earn money and avoid the no-money crisis
4. You fill in 10 or so horribly complex online application forms which require all your high-school grades and the middle name of your father’s second pet.
5. You receive 2 snarky generic emails and no response at all from anyone else.
6. After no news for a long while, you get invited for an interview! Hooray!
7. No news from interview.
8. Still no news from interview
9. “You were one of the strongest candidates, but after much hesitation, we decided to take someone else. Sorry”
10. This is all fine. This means you are a good, strong candidate and will find a job soon. This is all fine.
11. You decide you will use free time to catch up with friends
12. You realize all your friends have jobs or are studying and have no time to catch up with you.
13. You invited to two job interviews- one full-time, one-part time, day after day same week. You feel like glamorous desirable job seeker Beyoncé.
14. You discover that interview shoes are horribly uncomfortable to travel in.
15. You patch up the remains of your feet on a bench in a park, thinking to yourself that you will have to wear the same shoes the next day for the other interview.
16. You get told that HR has made a mistake, and your interview was actually scheduled for the following week and all your travel and foot pain has been in vain.
17. You trot back home, grumbling beneath your breath.
18. You go to your second interview in boots, because well, pain is a distraction.
19. You fail to get either job.
20. You decide life is meaningless and jobs are capitalism’s way of making us unhappy. Unemployment is freedom.
21. You realize you have far too little money left and that you really need a job. Like NOW.
22. Friend suggests you should remove your degrees from your CV as this makes you look overqualified.
23. You stare at the jobs board to discover that, indeed, the massive loan you have incurred in acquiring your degrees seems to have been a complete waste of money and time
24. You question all your life decisions up to this point.
25. Parent reminds you that you are useless at lying, and therefore removing the degrees is a very bad idea.
26. You wonder why all job candidates required in listings are passionate extrovert team-workers with leadership skills who have at least five years’ experience with some obscure software you have never heard of and will never hear of again.
27. You fail to get any job interviews, even though you are still applying
28. You wonder whether you are the only shy introvert left on planet Earth
29. You decide that the best idea is to go cheer-me-up shopping. What you really need to succeed at interviews is a nice dress and some new nail polish. This will surely help.
30. You fail to get a job after another interview.
31. You have hardly any money left after the “cheer-me-up” shopping lunacy.
32. You wonder whether you are doing something incredibly stupid during interviews. You ask for feedback.
33. “It is our company policy not to give feedback”
34. Maybe you should try academia as a career?
35. You see how much it would cost to get another degree and decide that academia is only really for millionaires. Anyhow, with another degree, you’d be even less employable than you are now.
36. Is it possible to be less employable than you are right now?
37. You buy one of the ridiculous books attempting to help you answer every question at a job interview.
38. At a job interview, you get told that “No other interviewee has shown such extensive knowledge of our company.”
39. You fail to get the job “as we have found a more experienced candidate would be more suited to the role”
40. You attempt to get sales job to earn money before Christmas, but are told that the shop is “only interested in candidates who are available on Boxing Day”. You have already bought tickets home at Christmas when you still had money.
41. You get a pile of books from the library relating to motivation and job seeking and CVs… books can solve everything, right?
42. Hopefully, at some point, you will be able to add “You get a job”. Sadly, not yet…