Job Searching Without Overwhelming

Your desk should not look like this

It is really true that the job search is just like having a job.  If I had been paid for all the time I spent on online job boards when I was unemployed, I probably could have made a pretty decent living for myself.  Unfortunately, that is not yet a career so we are stuck doing a rather unfun activity in the hope that we actually find a well paying non-profit job.  But just because you are treating your nonprofit job search like a job does not mean you should over do it.

This may sound like a bit of a contradiction to what I have said in the past, but it really isn't.  While it is true that you need to put a lot of effort into looking for work, there is such a thing as putting too much effort in.  Let me explain this to you by giving an example from my own experiences.  When I first got out of college, I spent almost all of my free time looking for work.  I would apply to almost every job I saw that interested me, and by the end of the day I was mentally exhausted from writing resumes and cover letters.  You should also keep in mind that this was at the height of the Great Recession, so to see all the hard work I put in not even lead to a single interview was even more deflating. 

So what I am saying here, basically, is that when your mind tells you "that's enough" you should listen.  Job seeking is annoying enough, and if you do it too much as to make yourself despise it, then it will make it that much harder to find a job at a not-for-profit.  I'm not saying that you will wake up every morning totally excited to hit the job sites and networking events, but it will make it a little easier if you are not overwhelming yourself with the work involved.  And really, that's how your non-profit job search should be.