Unmoving Lifestyle

[iMatt]

Hey,

Been awhile since I've posted, but I think I could use a little more advice at this point in time.

The basic situation as it stands is I'm going on three years unemployment (still actively searching) living with my parents. My job background looks bad due to a back injury I sustained forcing me to quit a few days after starting. Due to my parents tax issues I am not offered financial aid of any kind to continue college. No funding/loans are available to me of any kind. I've explored these to the upmost extent in the past years.

(If you wish to skip the backstory, go to the bottom)

What's bothering me is watching friends, family, and even old acquaintances succeed in everything they do. Things like seeing my brother get a fantastic job, my father getting a solid business running (all of his funds get poured back into paying off loans for my brother's college ). Friends who're graduating with degrees, gaining jobs, or simply getting somewhere.

Even my own girlfriend (who's wonderfully supportive) is about ready to hop into grad-school.

It may seem selfish, but with my injury/families financial fallout, I feel I got left behind and slapped with a permanent handicap. To see how easy everyone else gets by is painful to watch. It physically hurts knowing that I was on the path for doing very well (was done with a 2 year degree a year out of high school and on scholarships too) and now that I'm stuck in a cycle.

The worst part about the cycle is that the only answer to getting through it is landing a job and gaining some money to actually do something. I live in small town where jobs are insanely scarce.

Lately it's been hitting me like a bomb. What's worse is I feel selfish for feeling like a failure. Every effort I've put forth into getting somewhere cycles back into an economic flowchart.

Goal: Get back into college to increase the potential of getting a job which in turn might get me somewhere and open potential doors.

I need to get money to go to college. I can't get financial aid due to the financial fiasco. Then get a job. I've been looking for years with the best resume my job history could offer. I can't get a job due to one bad employment termination due to something that almost paralyzed me. Since it was termination, I do not gain unemployment benefits. I don't qualify for loans since nobody in my family qualifies as a co-signer and I have no credit history.

Since June I've had around 7-8 interviews. All of which go great, I get fantastic interview feedback from interviewers and they even say they'd recommend me. However they've all rejected me after doing a background check.

Completely clean criminal record. Never been pulled over.

In the off time of job hunting, I spend most of it reading news, learning new hobbies, or teaching myself new info (programming or w/e seems interesting)

However....

My mind is in the place of not knowing how to handle things. There are no areas which I can actively say I can improve, work harder at, or step towards a goal. When 100% isn't good enough, when do you throw in the towel? I'm falling back into depressive territories and the effects that hormone imbalances bring never lead to anything good.

the TL;DR version.

I'm accepting that life has passed me by and where do I go from here?