I've applied to 1,000 jobs since earning my master's and am still unemployed. I'm frustrated because I thought I did everything right.
For most of my life, I operated on a clear formula: excel in school, build a polished résumé, study abroad, learn languages, earn a master’s degree, and cultivate global awareness. Do everything right, and the rest will follow.
I studied journalism and media, leaning into storytelling from the start. Rome, Florence, Kuwait, Scotland—I didn’t just visit these places; I learned how to move through them. I became fluent in systems and spaces never designed for a first-generation student. Later, I returned to Rome as part of the inaugural master’s cohort in international affairs at John Cabot University, focusing on global justice, human rights, and representation. I contributed to research on the gig economy, attended UN conferences in Italy and Azerbaijan, and carefully assembled what I believed was an undeniable, competitive profile.
I finished my degree early, convinced I’d checked every box. Yet the job market didn’t open.
Since graduating, I’ve submitted over a thousand applications. I applied across continents and industries: UN agencies and NGOs in Rome, humanitarian organizations, communications roles, research positions, and media jobs back in the U.S. I tailored every résumé. I wrote cover letters that took hours. I memorized mission statements, leveraged every connection, and prepared for interviews like they were final exams.
Out of a thousand applications, I landed fifteen interviews. Only two advanced to the second round. Fewer than five of the positions I interviewed for were ever filled. The rest vanished into silence, only to reappear weeks or months later as if nothing had happened. I stopped feeling like I was competing for jobs. I was competing for the possibility of them.
Rejection is painful, but uncertainty is paralyzing. When you’re turned down, you can usually point to a reason: more experience, a stronger candidate, a mismatch. But what do you do when there’s no answer at all? When roles stay open indefinitely. When you clear multiple hurdles and still hear nothing back. The silence breeds doubt. You start questioning your degree, your choices, your worth. I did everything I was told would make me employable. So why did I feel more lost than ever?
At some point, waiting stopped being an option. I had to start building.
During undergrad, I’d spent four years working in publicity and creative marketing—a skill set I’d quietly shelved while chasing “real” international work. When the traditional doors stayed shut, I returned to it. Now, I freelance as a creative director and marketing strategist. I design campaigns, craft visual narratives, and help clients build cohesive brand identities. From social strategy and email marketing to editorial shoots and visual branding, I’ve done it all.
It’s not the stability I was promised, and it’s not the full-time role I envisioned. But it’s mine. I built it. Freelancing taught me that I don’t need institutional permission to create work that matters. Still, there’s a wide gap between surviving and feeling secure. I’m still learning how to cross it.
The absence of traditional stability forced me to ask a harder question: *What kind of work do I actually want to be doing?*
The answer keeps circling back to storytelling. I want to be a creative director who centers BIPOC narratives with care, accuracy, and depth. I want to build media that refuses to flatten cultures into trends or reduce people to stereotypes. I want work that feels honest, layered, and intentional. This is the work I’ve been drawn to for years. And it’s the work I kept postponing, waiting for a stable title to give me permission to begin. Now I see it clearly: the path I was following was never meant to lead me here.
I don’t have a neat ending to this story. I’m still applying for jobs. I’m still freelancing. I’m still trying to make sense of a system that feels arbitrary, opaque, and at times, impossible. But I also know this: the effort hasn’t been wasted. It just redirected me. Maybe the formula was never the point. Maybe the point was learning how to build something of my own.