Introducing--- The Female Settler!

In 2018, I left my comfortable job as a Financial Aid Advisor to search for meaning in my life. I was by that time still a new immigrant (2 years after I got my PR). I didn't really know what I wanted to do in my life. All I knew is that I wanted to impact my community or work towards International Development. I previously got a three-year degree, and I realized I did not want to pursue law school anymore. So I went back to school and finish my four-year degree. I thought I needed a postgraduate degree to make an impact and get the right type of job. So I applied and got into an International Affairs graduate program in August 2019; and moved my life from Edmonton to Ottawa hoping I would have an amazing career waiting once I was done with school.

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Boy, was I wrong! Fast forward to March 2021, COVID-19 had taken over the entire world. I was in the last semester of my program, and I had a co-op job as a policy analyst with the Federal Government and the possibility of a permanent position. I hated it! It was a boring, crappy job. I had no control over what I was doing, and I wasn't making any direct impact on my community. I realized that although I had almost completed my master's degree, I still had no clue what I wanted to do. So I decided not to return to the co-op and started job hunting. But even with my degree, I could not land any promising offers.

One night, while thinking about my future, I realized I was great at my previous job. I loved helping people find their education path and advocate for funding resources. I also ruminated on something my spouse said a few years ago: "I wish my mother had you as a friend when she immigrated to Canada, she would have been in a better place by now". I decided to explore what he meant.

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I have been in Canada for over 12 years now and I am still navigating my life in this vast region, yet I have accomplished a lot since I moved here. I have moved across provinces to find better-paying jobs, accessed many resources, scholarships, bursaries, and awards as I could when I was a student, accessed financial literacy opportunities and built wealth as soon as I got my first serious job, introduced my spouse to investment opportunities, accessed different communities to advance my career and advised countless friends when they were going back for their post-secondary education. I realized I can offer different outcomes for newcomers in Canada. I can bring the experiences, resources, information, and contacts that I have to help other women immigrants who are trying to navigate the treacherous waters of Canada's personal, financial and career environment. Armed with my new purpose, I created "The Female Settler"!

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