In Defiance of Murphy's Law

I've been a week out of Hackbright, and to say I'm stressed would be an understatement. Every day I wake up wondering how I should best optimize my time for the day; should I spend it tossing cold applications into the abyss of forgotten resumes, emailing people asking them to tell me how they got their jobs, studying on LeetCode/Hacker Rank/Cracking the Coding Interview/Problem Solving with Algorithms, or working on my next project?

The answer is usually: preferably all of the above. It's exhausting, and the thing is, I knew it was going to be. I signed up for this life and now I have to own it. This fun-employment is not going to get the better of me.

It's happened more than once where I've emailed people about job openings at their companies that I see posted online only to have them tell me they just filled the positions.

It's disappointing and almost feels like my joblessness is following the rules of Murphy's Law. Then, I step back and see the (somewhat cliched) silver linings. I've made some great connections so far who are willing to help me outside of just passing my resume along or giving me a recruiter's contact info. I've been humbled by the realization that getting a job in the tech industry isn't just attending a bootcamp and learning how to write an app. I have a greater admiration for every single engineer who has had to go through phone screens, whiteboarding interviews, networking, studying, building more projects and putting themselves out of their comfort zone just to get to that final job offer.

The real, final test is now. Now is when I'm put to the test of whether I want to watch another episode of New Girl or work through another coding challenge. Do I want to spend that extra $5 on a beer at a bar (actually, sometimes maybe yes) that I can get for $2/bottle if I bought a six pack and drank it at home, or on a cup of coffee with a person I just met who can provide me valuable insight into the job search process? Do I want to spend that extra hour of time window-shopping for things I can't afford right now, or on reading up how to design a good elevator bank?

I'm faced with hard decisions and questions every day, and sometimes things that seem like they can go wrong will go wrong. What really matters is how I face that adversity and put myself in perspective. I'm really looking forward to when I can look back on this time period of my life and give someone else the wisdom, help and advice they need to move things along. But until then, onwards to the studying and job hunting!