expectations vs. reality

Do what you want to do. This is so easy to say and so many people say it. It's a life motto I've heard over and over again and have only been able to successfully accomplish it a period at a time. It's just kinda hard you know? Everyone around me seems to be doing computer science, economics, medicine, math, etc. Things that are deemed intrinsically more valuable in our society because they have tangible measures of growth and are applicable to today's technological community. What do I want to do?

Honestly... nothing. I'm not sure anymore. I came into college thinking that I wanted to do non-profit management. I haven't completely ruled it out yet but I am not exactly the most passionate about it right now. I've thought about sociology, anthropology, and government. They're all just lukewarm though. I'm not sure. God forgive me -- I even thought about computer science for a moment because I thought it'd be the most useful. Don't get me wrong -- CS is an amazing concentration and a beautiful passion if you truly love it. My problem is that I don't. It's not my passion and my journey. It's someone else's but for some reason I'm trying to force different paths into my itinerary and it's hurting me.

Do what you love, love what you do. It's beautiful and concise and memorable. But is it really so easy to follow as it is to say? We're surrounded by a society that marks your success as a contributing member of society by how busy you are. What if what you love is not being so busy? It's doing the work you want but also having time left over for family and friends? It's easy to say, "Don't mind what society thinks and says. Do what you want." But again, that's easier said than done. I now know that.

I was confident in the level of extracurriculars I had for about a week. And then I threw myself into an existential crisis. I just wasn't doing enough. I wasn't trying out enough things. I wasn't doing this or that and I was becoming more and more incompetent to myself. I was devaluing myself and putting myself in a box. I was telling myself that everyone else was perfect and that I was the only one struggling. What a lie. We're all struggling -- I just covered my eyes and my ears and refused to accept that. I refused to tell myself that we were all struggling in this imperfect world. We're freshmen! How are we supposed to know? We all just got really good at pretending to know what we want, which is also an important skill, just one that is very deceiving.

#college #teenageangst #personal #rantsession