Chioma's Blog

When I completed my masters, I was so sure I was going to get a job immediately. For context, I was coming from a place of relative ease. I have not necessarily had the best life, or the easiest life, but certain things have come to me easily. For example, admission to school at any level. Primary, secondary, university, graduate school – for me, it has always been the same story. I get in on the first try. No stress, no drama, just apply and get in. I know people who wait years to get into school, especially at the college level and for graduate school, but I couldn’t relate to that life. More or less, it has been the same way with jobs. Prior to my post-graduate phase, almost all of my jobs had come to me. After uni, I got the perfect job because someone mentioned my name where it mattered. After youth service, I got another great job by twitting at the company I had dreams of working with. They called me and gave me a job.

So you see, ease, ease and more ease. I was living a blessed life. So I kind of expected this to continue after I was done with my masters degree. Please note that I am not, and have never been a nepo baby. My family is average, we are not starving but we are not connected enough to get whatever we want by dropping names. I just know book, as my country people will say. I am intelligent, and I am a hard and good worker. So I’m usually able to get in on merit.

So masters done, I started the job search. I got rejection 1. I told myself it was a fluke, and maybe that job was not for me. Then rejection 2. 3. 4. 10. 25. For a full year, I applied and applied and applied. Over and over, I got rejected and rejected and rejected. I was applying to PhD programs at the same time, and you guessed it. Two application cycles, multiple rejections. One admission without funding, which is basically the same thing as a rejection because who is paying for PhD tuition out of pocket? Certainly not me.

After one agonizing year, during which I started to believe that I must be quite stupid if I couldn’t land a job after a full year, I got an offer and started a new job. A few months after, I applied to only one school and I got in. In a few months time, I will be a PhD student. Is God not good like this?

I’m writing this for myself, more than for you my dearest readers. While you can read this and be encouraged that eventually, everything will work out for good, I need the reminder. I need to not forget that I went through the proverbial fire and came out smelling of roses because God really was working things out for my good. My new school for PhD? A 30 minute walk from my job and an hour’s commute (on public transit) from my house. All the other schools I applied to in the past? Out of state, and I would have had to be away from my family for long periods of time.

Yeah, I’m writing so that I do not forget that God has been good to me. Testimony 1 down, a hundred more to go. The problem with always having smooth sailing is that you don’t even know what you can and can’t do. If you have a hidden flaw, you can’t even fix it. That one year showed me sides of myself that I didn’t like at all. But I am grateful, because it is a fault you are aware of that you can fix. I’m not perfect or anything like that but yeah, a problem known is a problem half-solved. Or something like that, lol.

Bye,

Chioma.