By Colleen Kay Watson

When walking through the forest one can see many beautiful tall trees standing majestically reaching toward the sky. Here and there are fallen and rotting logs that barely resemble their former selves. One would think the great winds that occasionally rock the forest must be to blame for this carnage of plant life. Awesome as the wind can be, the real culprits are the beetles that get under the bark. Slowly, steadily, the tree is eaten from the inside out. Death is a certainty.

It is the little things that can also kill your job search; they come from the inside and impact your outside life. Negative ideas are the infestations that can destroy your job search.

Yes, college students today are facing a tough job market. This year will be one of the toughest in almost a decade, BUT there are jobs for those who don’t give up on the search. Too many students are saying, “Why look for an opening, when there are none.” They are sitting at home waiting for a change in the job market before even going out to look. It reminds me of a fable I heard as a girl. It goes something like this...

Satan was having a sale and he was selling his tools of the trade: the rapier of jealousy the dagger of fear and the strangling noose of hatred. Each had its own high price but by itself was a wedge gleaming dully in the light. Satan would not sell that wedge for any price. For with that wedge, Satan could stay in business alone. That wedge was the wedge of discouragement. A person facing jealously, fear or hatred will react by doing something like fighting or fleeing. No matter who you are, when facing discouragement, you will most likely want to sit down and do nothing. That is when you have a pity party for yourself, and that is the worst type of party to attend.

The moral of this story is DO SOMETHING. Get out there and get your name in front of some decision makers. Yes, you do run the risk of receiving some rejection letters, but that only means you are that much closer to an offer. The only ones that are really losing are those who are doing nothing. Don’t let the beetles get under your bark.