When I got the news that I was offered a job in the field that I went to school for I immediately wanted to share the news. Everyone congratulated me, but some also told me that I was lucky. I'm not lucky. I didn't get this job by chance. I didn't enter a raffle for the position. I worked for this. Luck has nothing to do with it.
I figured out what I wanted to do when I was in high school. I knew that in my life I was supposed to work within a tv station. I knew that I wanted to direct, or edit, or make commercials - anything. I knew in the deepest parts of my heart that I wanted to work in that setting so I went after it. I made sure that I was accepted into a school that had the major that I wanted to focus on and I made sure that I got into that major. Thought I ended up shifting my views my junior year, I still had my heart set on the same goal. I went from a Film & Moving Image major to an Interdisciplinary Studies major with a focus in Film & Moving Image and Business Management. I knew that in order to advance myself it would be better to understand the technical aspects of the career and the business side too.
Fast forward two years and I finally graduated with my Bachelors degree. By the time graduation hit I had applied to probably a dozen jobs and I had zero interviews in television. During school I worked in banking and I had a couple there, but not where I really wanted. I was feeling really stressed out because my Facebook was filled with happy students talking about the jobs they would start after graduation. Even though I was so excited for my classmates, I was feeling so discouraged. I kept asking myself, "What is wrong with me?" I knew that it wasn't right for me to think of myself this way but it was just so hard not too.
While at work one day I checked my email and there it was. There was an email from a job I had applied too. My heart started pounding. I opened it immediately and a smile plastered itself across my face. The email was about scheduling an interview. I was ecstatic. There were two reasons that I was so happy about this email. One was because it was in the field that I studied in school and two the position was only two hours away from my home town. Two hours may seem like a lot to most people but being from Delaware, that's nothing for a job in the industry. I emailed the woman back and I knew in my gut that this was finally it. This was the position for me.
A couple of days later I had a phone interview and it went so well. After talking for nearly half an hour, the feeling in my gut only grew stronger and when she asked me to drive down for an "in-person" interview it intensified even more. A week later I took the two hour drive. Normally with interviews I'm a nervous babbling mess. With this one, I was calm. I had no fear and that day I was offered and I accepted the position.
I was so incredibly proud of myself. I worked for this. I knew that this was the position for me and I went out and got it. I knew that there was no sense of being nervous because I knew in the deepest parts of myself that if this position was meant for me that I would be offered it. I start in a little over two weeks and I couldn't be more excited for my future.
Luck isn't what defines your career, your hard work does. It's true that hard work and determination really do pay off in the end.
