Is "Entry-Level" Even Entry-Level Anymore?

Job Search Depression... it's real. I didn't believe it, but it is. 3 weeks on the job hunt and I've come up with nothing (except an offer for Disney English that I declined due to me not wanting to move across the world at the moment).

A delusional me has applied to jobs in NYC, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Dallas--and have yet to receive a word from any type of job that I would actually want. I have become so desperate that I even applied for a live-in nanny position on the Upper East Side, which in retrospect, is highly-unlikely. 

I have done all the things that society has told me to do thus far. Graduate high school, get into college, go to college, get some sort of internship, and graduate college. A person cannot help but think they're not good enough in comparison to the other millions of applicants fighting for the same job you are fighting for. I've come to the conclusion that entry-level positions are no longer entry-level positions. This is obvious of course. All the jobs that I want to apply or have applied for either require or prefer a master's degree. Welp, I'm only here with my puny bachelor's degree. 

So, I've done the unthinkable... I've applied to graduate school. The last thing I think I would do considering I declined my parent's idea of me going to law school. I just submitted my application and my non-refundable application fee about five minutes ago and I've just submitted my transcript. I feel odd writing about these things because I write them into existence and I am terrified of what it will do.

A random statistic I read once said that your resume is pulled out once for every 30 job applications. That’s a 1 in 30 chance. The future sounds pretty fucking bleak if that’s the case. 

So, I applied to 41 jobs on Indeed.com—the most random jobs. Some jobs were jobs that I wanted like editorial assistant positions in NYC and SanFran and the others were cold calling “entry-level” jobs. I can’t even tell you how many more jobs I actually applied to when going through a company website. Let’s just round up the number to 60 to make things easier. 

Out of said 60 jobs, I got calls for an interview from 5 companies. Two teaching abroad jobs in China and Korea, a random sales company in Massachusetts, a special education aide in San Francisco and a writing specialist for a local community college. I did a video interview with one of the teaching abroad jobs, but I don’t think that teaching abroad is right for me. I don’t think I’m brave enough to move to a foreign country and commit for a year. The idea of it sounds lovely—the travel and life experiences it can give you, but when I was actually offered it, the actuality of it was daunting in which I declined. The second job I had an interview with was the community college as a writing specialist. 

My limitations I have faced in the job search so far have led me to question my choice in my undergraduate degree. Who the heck majors in English? While in my undergrad I was posed with all of the questions “what can you do with an English degree?” “Do you want to teach” Blah. Blah. Blah. The truth is, one can do plenty of things with a degree in English, but at the same time, be so limited. Job search depression is real. It is a constant slap in the face of rejection, which hurts. You can’t get a job without experience, you can’t get experience without a job—in other words, you can’t win. 

But don’t pity me! I still have hope, a small silver lining that is. Maybe I have to go back to school to be more marketable with a master's degree. Although, I’m not sure how much more marketable I’ll be with a master's in the program I applied for. Maybe I’ll write a book with the many ideas that skid across my brain and turn myself into a novelist. Or maybe and the most likely of these options, maybe I will become a full-time stay at home daughter.