My graduation is drawing nearer and nearer…less than 3 weeks away.
I’ve been carrying around a fairly formidable list of worries lately.
Along with worry about not being able to find a job, the realization that it may literally take years to get a permanent position somewhere, concern that I don’t know how I’d even handle working full time in an office, frustration with the way parts of my life aren’t going as planned, and an extensive list of other rather negative emotions, is the looming fear that I maybe have wasted years of my life and gads of dollars on an education that isn’t going to result in any sort of tangible outcome (perhaps more specifically, a job actually related to my field of study that results in a paycheck).
“Don’t worry about it,” numerous people have said to me, or at least implied. And I truly wish I could, I just…don’t know how. I always knew that getting a job would take work, but a conversation with a colleague at my internship made me realize just how MUCH work it might take. In his case, years of it.
And it makes me concerned that these years I have spent in college, taking classes and making friends and working several jobs and paying lots and lots of money…well, maybe those years would have been better spent trying to get a job.
Maybe my main complaint is that the system seems so broken: I go to college because I’m told it will help me get a better job, I work really hard at going to college and work jobs to put me through that don’t mean much on my resume, and then every job I try to apply for when I graduate tells me they want experience, but it’s impossible to get experience because no one wants to hire anyone without it.
Vicious.
So yes, in recent weeks I’ve had some freak outs; those will probably continue.
But in church this morning I was reminded of something very, very important. An assurance that not everyone can claim, but that I, as a believer in Jesus, can.
“Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.” I Corinthians 15:57
Not.
In.
Vain.
Whoa.
It doesn’t say specifically, “Brianna, it was not foolish of you to go to college, because it is the labor of the Lord.” But I can honestly say I feel like I would have been denying God’s call if I HADN’T gone to college—and more specifically, if I hadn’t gone to Kuyper College. So many things worked out when it seemed like they weren’t going to that I have been shown repeatedbly that it is where I was meant to be.
Now, that still doesn’t get me a job, it still doesn’t pay back my loans, and it still doesn’t completely calm my in-turmoil soul.
But it helps a little. There’s gotta be something to it, since I truly believe it’s where God wanted me.
Even though I can’t see it. This thing called college—this was not in vain.
Til next time…
~Brianna!~
The Art of Becoming 
Alison is experiencing some of those same frustrations when searching for a job. On one hand, most places hire internally so even though they are very impressed with your resume, if you don’t already have a foot in the door, you have no chance. On the other hand, when she applies for the jobs that would get her foot in the door, she is told she is over-qualified (true) and they are afraid she’d likely jump to another job if it were offered (also true) so they aren’t interested in hiring her. It’s a Catch 22 but God is using it to mold her life experiences and make her the person He desires her to be. He’ll do the same for you!