I’m feeling very lost as a 17 year old and I was wondering how you guys did it.

18 comments

  1. It really helped me to have the absolute idiotic delusion that university was where I belong, provides a good education, is more value than cost, and isn’t more and more devalues by cultural perception every year. Really helped not to notice that college movies always focus on fun and advertising materials and never knowledge. Really helped to not know what generic cliche shit I was learning and how nobody would ever be impressed by it. Had I noticed any of that, I would’ve dropped out and done something more productive with my 4 years.

  2. If you haven’t locked in a major, do so early. The last thing you want is extra debt for Gen-Ed classes you didn’t need because you procrastinated. If you don’t know, pick business — it’s a solid default option that can get you a job in a lot of different things not necessarily related to business.

    I also recommend pursuing a major you’re “good at” over one you’re “passionate about”. Being good at your job makes your life easier, and it’s easy to learn to be passionate about something you’re already good at (much easier than trying to get good at your passion and risking losing the passion altogether when it actually becomes work)

    Budget your time and don’t procrastinate. Do your work as early as possible and try to stay as far ahead as you can (in the beginning I’d try to stay 2 weeks ahead, but it dropped to 3ish days ahead by the end as workload grew

    Coming from someone with a 3.98 undergrad and 4.0 masters: don’t bother with straight A’s. A mix of A’s and B’s will save you hours of unnecessary stress with no real drawback

  3. also felt lost. find an org that is related to the job you are aiming for and join it. do the best that you can at school work. try to find neat opportunities like study abroad or internships. apply for things even if you feel like you won’t get them. talk to the person that you can’t take your eyes off of. when you can afford to, take a class or two outside of your major on something you’ve always wanted to try or learn about. be open to being wrong and being corrected. the friends you start out with may not be the friends you finish with, and this is okay. making friends at all is extremely difficult. you have a lot more control over your life than you are used to. if you feel like you are struggling, you are doing it correctly. just about everyone has some degree of loneliness there. don’t let the fear of making a fool of yourself prevent you from trying something that may be difficult. be open to being pleasantly surprised. be open to the happiness that will inevitably come your way. there will always be someone that makes you feel like you aren’t doing enough.

  4. Felt extremely lost as well. Looking back now, I was in no way ready to attend college directly after high school. Be sure, above everything else you focus primarily on studying and doing well in your classes. You will still have free time but don’t let your fun distract you from your goal. You’re only there temporarily and the outcome of college can drastically impact your future.

    You may decide to change your major in college. The overwhelming majority of people will change it multiple times which is perfectly ok because as we mature we also learn more about what we are interested in.

    You’re going to do great! Being worried about it enough to ask people advice on your situation on its own shows that you do care about it and will be passionate in whatever you pursue.

    Lastly, do not be afraid to ask your college about any questions you have. They have endless amounts of events and resources to assist you in adapting to such a sudden change. My advisor and the tudors up at the college were my best friends!

  7. I’m currently finishing up my last 2 years of college after a 3 year break.

    What helped me when I was your age: the excitement of being independent and studying something I was interested in as well as the opportunities (clubs & etc) I had to expand my own skills as well as exploring a new environment with different mindsets.

    What helps me now as a 22 year old: the responsibility of being a provider for my future family, being tired of a dead-end 9 to 5 & expanding on talents I’ve found I’m really good at through these 9-5’s so I can get what I deserved to get paid for them.

  8. Helped me what? I went to university. Did what I had to do. And then graduated. What was there to have “help” with?

  10. Pick a major that has a barrier to entry. For instance, you cant be a lawyer, nurse, accountant, doctor, etc without a degree. That severely limits your competition pool.

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    Degrees like art, business, history etc don’t have that barrier to entry, so you will be competing with a lot of nepotism and people who work their way up the company.

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    You need a degree that facilitates some sort of license.

  11. Choosing a degree that actually makes money. I went to medical school and now make close to 40k a month. I have friends who got bachelor’s or graduate degrees in dumb stuff and now have a bunch of student loans they will never pay off.

  12. Passed classes.

    Joined sports, greek life, worked part time, volunteered.

    Its a lot but you can do it fam

  14. thankfully I was in the army while I was at the UNI huge help….not just financially but very disciplined…helped immensely

  15. Finding a major that I loved and finding a group of friends who I felt comfortable being myself around. I did make the mistake of going off at first for a major I felt pressured into and it backfired badly. Like kicked out and wasted $15k because of it. If you don’t know what tou want to do that’s ok! Take some gen-eds at your community college first, that way you have more time to decide/declare your major and you won’t be paying university level prices for classes that, at least in my experience, were just as good (if not better) than my classes at university.

    Also, when I went back I rushed and burned myself out taking thr max amount of credits each term and never taking summer or winters off. So while I technically finished 2 bachelors and a minor (secondary ed., history, minor in poli sci) in 3 years, it destroyed me mentally

  16. I just realized I had to do it. Took it one assignment at a time and dedicated myself to learning. My dad was great and helped me cope the few times I needed it.

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