I have sad news. If you get a great job after you graduate college, you’re still going to be poor. Ok, cue the sad trombone noise. I can’t believe I’m being this depressing on hump day!

But, I’m being serious and honest. Even if you get a entry level job out of college, money is low, low, low, low (and you won’t be buying boots wit dah fur, if you catch my drift). A few months after graduation, I got a fabulous job — the one I had dreamed about all throughout college. And it was the real thing! I had a salary, benefits, Monday-Friday gig and a huge smile plastered on my face. My paychecks were strong and lovely and I could officially afford my own apartment.

Get ready for another sad trombone noise.

Unfortunately, making enough money to make a small living after college was an incognito reality check for me. After spending my life living on an hourly wage or no wage at all, making that much money made me greedy and unrealistic. I started spending my paychecks freely. I shopped a lot (and not in the clearance rack) and when I started having to pay loans, I hardly had any money at all. I’d cringe whenever I filled up my gas tank, curse when I signed my rent check and had a bad mood if I ever had to pay extra for utilities on my apartment.

Basically, if you get that big girl job after college and start making real money, you don’t have any money at all. In fact, I should have had the mindset that I was more poor than before. Because I finally had the means to pay off the four years I spent sleeping and taking pop quizzes.

With all of the spending I was doing, while paying loans, while paying rent, while paying for my cell phone/groceries — saving money wasn’t even an option. At least it didn’t seem like it was. I could never catch up. I could never have more money in my bank account than I had the month before. Nothing was working. I couldn’t even swear off the mall and save some dough. Having money seemed impossible! What is this real world business? I can’t even go to Pottery Barn and buy fun stainless steel utensils for my kitchen!

Stop the sad trombone noises and see the glimmer of hope. I have some advice. As a warning though, you may need to swallow some pride. Because not having any money is a huge ego check and a sign you need to make some sacrifices to save the ching ching.

My first bit of advice? Move home for a year. YES, it seems embarrassing and awful. It seems like you would never have a social life again. But you will. And I’ve heard from many different people that not moving home at a young age was the worst decision of their life. Their life! Think about it. After college, all you need to do is catch up with your bills and how is one suppose to do that when they are writing a $700 rent check every month? Besides, it’s better to move home now than in your 30′s when you’re hundreds of dollars deep in credit card bills? Just sayin’.

My second bit of advice? Put aside envelopes for saving money. Label the envelopes: Coach purse, Spring Break, Car Insurance. Every paycheck, take out some cash and put $10 into each envelope. Then, instead of spending freely, you will know the means of money that are available to you for each perk. Credit card payments, no more!

Finally, live within your means and be realistic. The first three years of our careers are the hardest ever for money. Just because we have real jobs, doesn’t mean we can live like we’ve had real jobs for ten years. It’s all part of growing up.

“Oh.Em.Gee.  And then I woke up in his bed and he had peed all over his Superman sheets after we made out for four hours.”

“If one more person raises their hand in class and asks what time the final exam is as it is written in the 80 page syllabus, I’m going to vow to never eat a scone from the caf ever again. And that’s serious.”

“I think somebody farted in class today and I hope it wasn’t the hot dude. I really like looking at him and that would totally ruin things for me.”

These aren’t conversations I have anymore. In fact, I can’t even believe I used to have them. They are completely pointless, entirely stupid and absolutely glorious.  Ok FINE, I wish I still talked about this kind of stuff on a daily basis – but things have been a little different in my new post grad life. I never said people don’t fart in meetings rooms, but they aren’t sexy and I won’t tell anyone about it.

I’ve noticed a huge shift in my conversations lately. They’re like, slightly grown up. Flash Notice: I still talk about sex, flatulence, snot and totally gross 5-year-old boy things – just bare with me while I try to sound cool and old. Here are the top five new things I’m chatting about these days (that I’m not quite used to yet): Read More »

[Life after college is hard. Like really hard. But it's not so hard that you should curl up in a ball and watch E! marathons all day long. Not only are we covering the experience from a first-hand perspective, but we're now covering it from a how-to-survive-it perspective. Every week, we're going to bringing the best advice to getting through your first post-grad year. Because sometimes, your grandmother's "just go to law school" advice just doesn't cut it.]

So you’ve made it to the real world and you got yourself a real job. Congrats. Oh, and just a quick head’s up before you put in that order for business cards. You’re overqualified for your job. No matter what it is, you’re overqualified.

How do I know?

Because almost every entry-level position requires the bare minimum in terms of skills — especially if you went to a specialized school for a specific major. So forget what your professors told you about the industry and get ready to roll up your sleeves and be an intern-plus. What makes you an intern plus? You’re going to get paid to do very elementary work.

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The best part of school is not going to school. Or so you thought, back in the days of recess, friendship bracelets and raising your hand to use the bathroom. The stray feigned sick day was enough to hold you over until you hit the real jackpot: summer vacation. Even in high school, when summer meant staying up late to finish that last beer instead of finishing the latest Goosebumps book, June welcomed a much-needed freedom from responsibility.

Come college, however, the best times usually happen during the semesters, not between them. You’ve heard it before — especially if you’re a regular CollegeCandy reader – high school friends tend to drift apart, hometowns suddenly become boring and living with your parents…ick, don’t even get me started. The idea of a blue popsicle and a trip to the local pool sounds borderline painful when you could potentially be at Dollar Beer Night with your campus besties.

And so the concept of summer quickly loses its luster. Facebook newsfeeds are clogged with “Get me back to football season,” “Miss my [insert school name] girls!” and “Counting down to move- in!” sentiments. Because seriously, who wants to be stuck at home with nothing to do but get their nails done and shop and maybe stop by a part-time job a couple times a week and then go back to shopping and free lunches with mom and…. Read More »

This last Saturday, I woke up at promptly 10:30 a.m. stretched like a cat in my comfy, fluffy girl-bed, got up slowly and wandered into my kitchen for some toast. My feet were cold against my linoleum floor, my eyes were still a little sleepy and a soft breeze blew my crack-head bed hair into my eyelashes. And you know what I did after that?

I cleaned out my refrigerator. I even used Windex.

This is what I would like to call a “grown-up moment.” Times like these (where I clean out moldy chicken salad from my refrigerator door) are small adult moments. And trust me, I have big ones too. Why do I want to share them with you? Well, when I was in college – where washing a single dish, “tweaking” my resume between naps and considering the gym were all labeled hard work – I thought I would never grow up to feel big adult moments. But I already have! And so many of them. So, let’s get serious. I’m going to show you my top five:

1. Getting my first real job

It really can happen people. You will have a job, someday. I’ll be honest – when I was offered my job, I danced in an office with my boss with glee, got in my car and started crying. Crying tears of…joy. And for the record, tears of joy aren’t salty – they taste like cotton candy. And I swear the clouds were pink that day. I remember feeling so complete and accomplished, I could have stuck a rock up my ass and turned it into a diamond. I was that good. All of my worries about making everyone proud diminished.  Because I was making myself proud. Read More »

I don’t know who I want to succeed more, me or Justin Beiber.  The fact J-Beebs sold out Madison Square Garden at the ripe age of sixteen puts me in a really difficult position with my personal standards.  And the fact I’m comparing my life to a pre-pubescent child puts me in a really difficult position with my personal reputation.

All throughout my college life, I felt like I was being shoved into a giant, human cannon.  I was constantly finding ways to shove myself, my tasty thighs, my college-ego, my giant boobs, my reputation, my GPA, into a compact space.  That’s a lot of bullsh*t to squeeze inside something that is eventually going to catapult me into the real world unprepared.  Thanks a million, life cannon.

After being shot into the real world, I picked up a dirty habit. While being thrown into something I was totally unprepared for (ehem, hey real world!  It’s a pleasure!) it became nearly impossible to find any satisfaction in my life.  I was so overwhelmed with emotions and goals, I became an angry, judgmental girl. And who saw the brunt of all that negativity?

Me.

Lately, I have become increasingly hard on myself.  I never acquired this nasty habit while I was in college – I was completely self-involved with surviving day by day, enjoying every moment, and not giving a shitake mushroom about what people thought of my sexy time hair while I walked past church service on Sunday morning.  Did I just give a shitake mushroom shout-out in this post? Read More »

Whether you’re graduating this spring or you’re hunting for a summer internship, you’re probably stressed about acing your interviews. To help alleviate some of that stress, we reached out to the experts from Excelle and asked them for their tips on making a great first impression. Check back every Thursday for more helpful career tips and articles!

You may look good on paper or in your suit, but if you’re looking to nail your big interview, looks aren’t everything. How you sound is often more important. But many job seekers let careless speech habits sink their chances of landing that plum job.

The Bottom Line: You don’t have to study elocution to speak well. Simply slow down, take time to pronounce all the syllables, and leave slang at home.

Companies want job candidates who are well-spoken and articulate, and recruiters won’t represent a job candidate if they don’t match the client’s profile. According to Lori Zelman, vice president of human resources at Strategic Workforce Solutions in New York City, “The people most highly sought after are the ones who are succinct in the explanation of their work experience.”

Here are six common language mistakes and how to keep them from sabotaging your interview or meetings with clients.

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[Life after college is different for every single grad. While some might be going to grad school, others enter the real world in attempts to make their dreams come true pay off their student loans. We've been following Charlsie on her post-grad journey since September, but now it's time to check see what someone else's post-grad life brings.  (But don't worry - Charlsie will still be writing!) So ladies, allow me to introduce you to Brittany and her tumultuous life after college.]

I have a strong belief that this column is about being extremely honest – even if my reputation as a stable human being is on the line. So, you wanna hear a depressing story? (Note: I think the following confession may have something to do with having to listen to Fergie squak for a ten-minute halftime show on Sunday.)

I woke up this morning at a ripe 6AM to put on my face and go to work. I felt like someone had poked me in between the eyes with a two-by-four and sat on my face the entire night.  I really need to stop assuming I’ll have the energy of a type A spider monkey after going to bed at 12AM.

Anyways, I slowly slithered into the shower, let the beads of hot water run down my face and….cried. I started crying in the shower. Good. Lord. (And no, that’s not me in the pic. I didn’t invite someone in to take pictures of this most lowest of lows.)

Contrary to popular belief, I’m not depressed. Although it may seem that way since I was crying in the shower on a Monday morning, it’s nothing like that. I’m very happy with my life. I’m a very lucky person and to top it off, I’m young and have great hair. Read More »

When I was little, I wanted to be a ballerina, a doctor, a lawyer, a novelist, a teacher, an Academy Award winning actress, a painter, and pretty much every other profession under the sun. In high school and college, I wanted to be a social media expert, a children’s literature publishing guru, a writer, and of course, a lawyer.

I think it’s interesting how when you are younger people tell you that you can be anything you want to be, or anything that you will set your mind to. Although we all wish this was true, that’s not always the case. Come adulthood, people get caught up in stereotypes and expectations. Salaries and “good” jobs. What (they think) you should be.

And quite frankly, I’m sick of it.

Since becoming a post-grad, I have heard so many people question my aspirations. I’ve seen it happen to my friends too. Parents, professors, friends, significant others, and just about every extended family members start with questions: “Why do you want to go abroad and live in South Africa after graduation?” “Why do you want to go to school at that school?” “You got your degree in economics, so you should go to grad school for that — or else you wasted four years.” In my case, I’ve heard a lot of “Why did you major in English if you don’t want to be a journalist?” and then “You were born a writer — you shouldn’t pursue law school.”

Um, while I appreciate the input, I just can’t help but find myself irked when statements like that are made. Unless I’m asking for career advice or making a life-altering decision, there is no reason why the things that I want to do should be in question. It feels like I can’t make my own decisions, or that people aren’t 100% with me. Or that, oh the horror, I’m making a terrible decision that I will regret for the rest of my life and I should just start over from scratch. Seriously, people, I’m fragile right now; I need support, not someone to question my choices! Read More »

When you left for college freshman year, did you ever try picturing your life after graduation?  Did you try to imagine how radically different things would be in just four short years?  You’d have the job of your dreams, for sure- the big desk, the sleek office, even the requisite evil boss a la Meryl Streep in the Devil Wears Prada.  Sure, she’d hate you at first, but you’d prove yourself to her over time, earning a reputation as a cunning, hard-as-nails employee.  One day Meryl would offer you the keys to the kingdom, and unlike that saintly Anne Hathaway, you’d grab them and run.  Three words ring in your head as the mental image fades in a cloud of pink: World’s Youngest CEO.

Wake up, babe.  This isn’t dreamland.

The “real world,” as some of you may have found out, doesn’t really care if you want a career or a steady salary.  It doesn’t matter if you went to Harvard or Podunk Community College- record numbers of graduates are finding themselves jobless these days.  If you want to throw a statistic out at mom and dad (because of course you moved home after school) tell them this:  Not only are you competing against 1.6 million other degree-toting candidates, but the Huffington Post says the youth unemployment rate is at 19.6%, the lowest on record since 1948.

Take my friend Matt Grant.  Okay, he’s not really my friend but aren’t we all brought together by hard times?  Anyway, Matt went to Ohio State University, graduated in 2009.  He was a chemical engineering major and scored three internships as an undergrad.  Basically, Mr. Grant’s a smart guy.  Please, ask me what he’s doing now.  Go ahead, ask me.

He is a waiter at a Clarion Inn.  And that’s the best job he could find after a year of searching! Read More »