Job Searching...ugh.

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My oh my.  Searching for a new job, a short-term job, new career prospects, etc. is extremely depressing.  I've been unemployed for 2 months now and I'm starting to feel like I'm completely worthless.  This post isn't supposed to be one where I fish for sweet comments or anything, I just want to publicly express how bad this is making me feel. 

I went to Columbia College Chicago for a journalism degree.  I moved to Chicago to finish school there and to live that 'big city dream' that I had for so long.  I had already finished my gen-ed in Kansas City and was ready to start that career I had always wanted.  Except, having to jump straight into non-stop journalism classes was too overwhelming for me.  It was 2 years of nothing but writing, writing, writing and needless to say I got burnt out big time.  It's not easy to come up with a gazillion article topics in one week for the four different courses I was taking at a time.  It was stressful and not very much fun and when graduation time came, I tried to get a job in the field but truthfully, I was ready to just get a job that paid well and was easy to do.  So that's what I did.  I got a job at a corporate law firm that paid extremely well, I advanced quickly and was comfortable for three years too many.  I got my own apartment so I could kiss the roommate days goodbye, eventually moved in with my boyfriend and supported him while he figured out what he wanted to do with his life.  Keeping that law firm job was too easy of a decision.  I had a great supervisor whom I was good friends with, we often went out for happy hour drinks and I really, really loved that paycheck.  But then I started hating it as I let you all be fully aware of and I had to give it up to keep myself happy and sane.

And now I'm here.  My husband is fully supporting me now while I try and figure out my life, which is hands down the greatest gift he could ever give me.  But I'm struggling.  I'm having a hard time getting over the fact that I don't have a job nor have much career ambition or passion about anything in specific.  You see, as I search for jobs, I'm becoming more and more depressed because that law firm job kind of set me back in a lot of ways.  I don't have proper experience under my belt to just jump back into journalism.  My copy editing skills are rather poor and online courses to freshen up aren't within our budget.  Why did I take that job and get further away from what I paid so much money to learn?  I just feel like I dug myself into this giant hole that's really difficult to climb out of.  I look around and see all of my friends with passion and determination and it makes me really happy for them.  So why haven't I figured out what I want to do? 

So here's the other part of this story.  I do know that I think I'd like to own a store one day.  In my mind, it's off in the future and it takes place somewhere that we move to and settle down.  Somewhere that our home is, with those perfect dark wood floors and giant kitchen and woodsy land and garage are.  Somewhere with sweet people and less competition than Chicago.  Somewhere with an abundance of amazing nature.  Somewhere that's just not here.  But the problem is, I don't make things that you sell at stores.  I just buy things that are sold at stores.  I have an eye for things, I think I could be good at recruiting designers and artists to collaborate with.  But...how do you start?  And when do I start?  There's just so many 'what if's' to this equation that it scares me to even think of trying to pursue it. 

I'm rambling.  I'm sorry. 

I just don't know what to do.  I don't know what kind of job to look for but I feel that I need to do something with my days.  I enjoy being home and I think I'd like the opportunity to work from home.  I think I'm open to new possibilities too, I just don't know what those are.  I have things I want to do with my sacred free time, like learn Spanish and learn to knit and write music, etc.  I don't even know where I'm going with this.  I just want to feel like I'm worth something. And I don't want to wind up with another job that just pushes me even farther away from maybe going back to copy editing or getting closer to opening up a store.  It's just so confusing.  I'm not big into being confused.  And the lack of a job makes it even harder to be able to move forward with my dreams of moving away from Chicago and owning a home with my husband.

Sigh.

Thanks for listening to me rant.  You are all lovely.