Things I've discovered while job hunting

I have been job hunting for a couple of weeks now. I walked into the new year with the goal of finding a high-paying job that would allow me to never again having to choose between buying underwear and being able to eat.

When I started job hunting, on one hand I was really clear on what I wanted to do for a living (writing), yet I had an open mind in terms of what that was going to look like. Contracting? Temping? Permanent, full-time position?

I decided to take my time to ponder all the possibilities. I could see the pros and cons of all of them. And they all seemed terribly stressful, and ended up making me very upset at the constant reminder that we live in a society where walking barefoot in the woods is not an acceptable way of making a living.

So in the past two weeks, every day I’ve tucked myself away in a corner of the library and scrolled through endless job seeking websites and recruitment agencies.

I haven’t found a job yet, but I’ve definitely come to some conclusions.

• Being on benefits sucks
  As much as I am grateful to be eligible for financial support, it makes me feel shit and I want to be able to stop relying on it as soon as I can. It’s also been confusing af while contracting, and the information on how and when to put your benefits on hold is so unclear that I ended up being in debit, which obviously added more stress to the already stressful reality of not having a stable income.

• I am selective
  There was a time when I applied for jobs out of desperation. I would go for anything: from dog walking to office admin, from dish washing to fence painting. Not anymore. Now that I’ve seen what a good job looks like, there’s no going back. No more minimum wage for me, no more customer service. I am aiming high, and only going for positions that meet my prerequisites and that hopefully won’t make me type a resignation letter during my lunch break two weeks in.

• I shall avoid the 9 to 5 grind like the plague
  I’m finding focusing so dang hard. Even writing this, on my own website, something that always gives me immense joy and sense of accomplishment, right now feels like an insurmountable task. Editing CVs and writing cover letters day in, day out requires an immense amount of energy that I don’t seem to possess right now. Which makes me wonder: maybe I’m not ready to jump back into full-time work. I am clearly still tired after last year’s final push.

• I value time to do my own thing
  I definitely don’t want a job that leaves me no time for myself. I want to be able to write, go to the gym, cook, spend time with friends, and do all the things that make me happy without being exhausted by the end of it. I definitely need a three-day weekend. At the end fo the day, a job is just a job, and life is way more than that.

• I want multiple sources of income
  Contracting sounds fancy, yet incredibly stressful. I’ve realised that my ideal working situation is a part-time job (something small, like 10 hours a week, just to feel safe that I have money coming in no matter what) accompanied by a couple of days a week of contracting (where I make the big bucks). On top of that, I want to have enough writing gigs to keep me afloat: my Patreon, my online shop, some publications here and there (I’ve got a couple coming up and I’m so exited!).

• I’m done being broke
  Having said that, I am also prioritising replenishing my saving account, so down the line I do want a job that pays me like I’ve never been paid before. But I might have to be a bit more patient before that comes along.

What’s your experience with job hunting? Have you, like me, been through the hard times of a career shift? Are you familiar with the pain of attaching CVs, and the pointlessness of cover letters?

Stay tuned if you want to know how the job hunt progresses. And keep your fingers crossed!