About-to-be HS Sophmore here, and I'm not sure what I want to do in life.
Right now, my main interest is in netsec/infosec, has been for the past 2 years. Yeah, I'm interested and all that, but there's definitely doubt lurking about it. I like it, sure, but I'm not really sure if it's something I'll want to keep doing after 20+ years doing it. I've never really felt passionate about something in the way I think that I could spend my whole life doing it (although what I'm interested in now is the closest it's come to). Along with the seemingly constant questioning starting from 7th grade to choose what you want to do as a career, it feels like there'll never be enough time to decide what you really want.
First step. Read these. The advice in here is expansive and awesome: edit: here's a post list w/ a few more. Step 2: Never take a single word of advice. Take it all in. Let it simmer and stew and marinate in that brain / heart of yours and make decisions based on what you think and feel. Your decisions will be influenced by the mountains of advice but the decisions will be yours and yours alone. Step 3: Don't make any big decisions you don't have to. Make little ones and enjoy the journey. I planned on working in television (like I did in high school) instead of going to college. I figured I would figure it out. I hated school and spent more time trying to figure out how to not go to school and keep my valedictorian status than actually going to school. Then I got into NYU Film unexpectedly. Then I dropped out of NYU film two years in because I lost my passion. Then I worked nights editing shitty movies and TV shows for next to nothing (maybe like $50/night). Then I took off to Australia for three months with some Aussies I had met at a bar while doing cocaine one night (no joke). Then I got back home, moved in with my parents, and accepted a job at $13.25/hr editing product videos. Then I taught myself web development. Then I quit my job and started my own business creating websites for people. And here I am. I just turned 25. If you had asked me where I would be at 25 when I was 16, I would have said, "Doing cocaine and producing indie films and living a rockstar lifestyle." I don't produce films (although I occasionally get a corporate video bullshit gig) and I don't do cocaine anymore. I also make websites. WTF? How did that happen? Life changes and it changes fast. The best thing you can do is roll with the punches and make sure whatever you are doing, you are passionate about. You are never too old or too young to do something big or change the direction you are headed. There is a big difference in being non-committal and giving up, and changing directions though. I was 100% passionate about film until I wasn't. I tried really hard to find that passion again and spent a lot of time thinking there was something terribly wrong with me and that I had some lack-of-motivation disease (there's a motivation/passion enzyme in your thyroid right?) It turns out I was just over it. I sobbed to my parents for literally an hour straight, sitting on a grimmy NYC curb, before the words, "I want to drop out of college" left my lips. Then I sobbed and tried to catch my breath for another 4 hours or so. If you don't have passion for something right now, do what you like best and explore the surrounding areas. Eventually you will find something. You are young as shit. I have friends pushing 30 who are still running away to foreign lands and snorting coke and haven't even tried to figure out what they want to do with their life / what their passion is. Learn as much as you can now though. Real life is not conducive to picking up new skills, FYI. Go learn to solder or some shit. I don't know. I wish I had the time to learn that right now.
I never, ever forget how awesome you are insom... but once in a while you more than remind me anyways. Great reply, I just shared this post so that others might see your reply. I think it's a good one to reference any time a question like this comes up, which is often. Not judging the question, it's part of the human experience, but your answer and the links provided are pretty damn comprehensive. Nice.
Thanks other Steve! I think I should make a list of all these posts. I am sure there are more out there too that I simply didn't find. edit: I made it
Live it up, Steve. Learn to solder or something. LOL! The cool thing about kids is you now have an excuse to do semi-ridiculous things and say it is "for them." I remember when I was 6, "Santa" got us these little toy robot things. They were basically pick and place machines with a joystick and made of plastic with fun colors. They gave you some blocks and a ball and stuff to "build" Two days later my father had two more of the robot things sitting on his workbench. My brother and I were confused (how did Santa get my Dad the toy?!) but it wore off when we got to take the actual toy apart (without breaking it!) to see how it works. This was all for "our benefit" of course. My dad didn't merely want to take some kids toy apart for fun and out of curiousity. I'm sure my mother saw right through that excuse. Oh man. I found the toy. I think ours was the 90s version of this. It's nearly identical but the colors and graphics were just slightly different, in my memory. I remember the first thing you had to do was put the stickers on! It was terrible. Stickers suck and you can never get them on perfectly straight, or without bubble, especially when there is a fat joystick in the middle! My other absolute favorite toy as a kid (which I still have) was this wooden marble maze. My brother played with this beast for days and days on end. Probably from the time we were 3 or 4 all the way through 9 or 10 year old. We would put out hotwheels set through the middle of it. When people wonder why I'm all engineer-y even though I'm naturally creative, this is why. Sorry. I got off track. Learn to solder or something Steve!
When I lost the job that I thought was the stepping stone towards the career I wanted, then was laid up for several months after having surgery, and realized the path my life was on was NOT a path I wanted to be on, and the future it was leading to, I didn't like. Hit a dark spot. Did some thinking as a result of the aforementioned, made some 1, 2, 5, 10 year plans, and realized that the future I'd always fantasized about could actually happen. A future that does not involve an ambitious career and making lots of money, but means finding a plot of land where there are forests, waterfalls, trees and seasons, making my cabin, and living off the land. And I am left alone. I just need a job in the real world in the interim to continue with that plan. A strange thing. I could swear there were times past when a person could make the decision I made, and just head out into the unknown with a knapsack and make it happen.
Do you know Jamie Mantzel? He's a pretty eccentric guy that was living in the forest building a giant spider robot and now he's living on some island somewhere building solar powered boats and whatnot. He does youtube videos about all that: https://www.youtube.com/user/JMEMantzel There is basically no production value but the videos are so genuine is does not even matter. He's been doing that for many years so watching it all is unrealistic but it's nice to see glimpses of a person's life that made this kind of decision and stuck with it. He's also really mechanically enclined and it's amazing how he figures out problems.
Haven't found out yet. School keeps telling you to do so - but 12 years isn't enough to figure out what to do with ~60 years.
I'm close to getting my PhD in chemistry. Still not sure what I want. For me, the past couple years have been realizing that I what I want are the things outside of my career and life goals. Hobbies, weekends, financial security, my own house, a yard to work with, a garage to turn into a practice studio, etc. I just want something that enables those things, and that I can have some satisfaction in doing. Until now I've been trying hard to be on the up-and-up, being a top contender in my class and so on, and I've done pretty well at it so far, but I know now that isn't something I want to keep doing. I get more satisfaction from making making things, my band, or my other hobbies than I do at work.
Strangely enough it was a random encounter with a police officer where we were both in the wrong. My parents were very active in the 60s civil rights movement and so constitutional rights and "freedom","equality" and "the rule of law" were always concepts I was exposed to and took seriously from a young age. When I was 18 I showed up at the end of a high school dance with a case of beer and an oz of weed in my car trunk for the after party. I had my stereo going and attracted the attention of a cop. He wrestled the keys out of the ignition and opened my trunk and seized the beer without any citation or documentation. So all I had for the rest of the night was the oz of green. lol. I filed a protest the next day and it turned out he did no paperwork and did not turn in the beer. I was incredibly offended that he would assault me in my vehicle and seize my property and he was disciplined for it with a mere slap on the wrist. So I knew I wanted to go to law school then. I am a white dude but come from a multi-racial family and had seen the shit that had happened to my brown family members and it was shameful. But only when it happened to me did it click. Sad but true. I thought I would be a lawyer to fight such injustice. But then once you get into law school, social justice projects are not favored. Good lawyers do corporate work. And over a course of years I forgot about that angle. I still think working for the ACLU or EFF would be amazing but I have never done anything like that. :( At the same time I am glad I made that choice. It may not have been the best career path for me but at least it is fairly lucrative and intellectually challenging if you want it to be, I get to help entrepreneurs who are into the same stuff I am into and I really enjoy that.
It's a seriously scary question, especially for someone in your age bracket. I know for me it seemed (still does actually) that there are so many tangents my life could run into; how do I know which is the right one? I came to the conclusion that there isn't one. I know, that answer sucks. I'm firmly on the fence as to what I want to do and how to go about it. But my position has become clearer and further backed by experience as I last longer in life. I went to University right out of high school, knowing I wanted to study Psychology. I did that, graduated pretty easily and immediately began working. For a Telco. Selling phones. I did this for like three years? Thinking, yeah technology is awesome. Before I realized how little time I had left to move upwards in my career, at least within Telcos. I discovered that in my country at least, everything had become so cheap and efficient that the last bastion of money making potential for us was Data and that's on the way out as it's becoming more of a utility than a luxury. Point being is that by now I tried two different ventures and neither led me anywhere outside of being more experienced. I went to Australia in an attempt to join the Police, failed the eyesight exam and as I can't wear contacts, failed in my attempt altogether. I came back home, and now work for the government. Making more money than I thought I would ever manage and the chance to grow and develop ever present. I realize none of this may actually be helpful to you. It's interesting to note though, that all the things I set my sights on, didn't work out as I planned, and the things I fell into have given me the biggest boost in my life thus far. So my advice would be to get involved with everything you can, try it all and see what sticks. When I graduated high school 8 years ago, if you had told me I would be working for the government, be a decidedly amateur bodybuilder, had almost cracked a professional sports contract at 19, would break up with the girlfriend and meet many more, would have gone to another country, battled depression, did not use my degree for it's intended purpose and still be really, really happy with how things are? I'd be all like "You fuckin' what?" And I've discovered that being all like "You fuckin' what?" Isn't too bad. I've never felt more alive than when I didn't have a concrete end goal - it's awesome to see where things take you. If you feel like you're scared you're wasting time pursuing something you might not be doing the rest of your life; try your best not to worry about it, you likely won't be doing what you planned on and be chuffed as chips about it. Good luck friend!