For Those Who Are Decidedly Decided

Student Lounge College Life
1

<p>Every day I see lots and lots of posts about "Oh Noes, I have no idea what I want to major in/do with my life/eat for dinner". </p>

<p>Here's something new.</p>

<p>Any upcoming 4th (or 3rd or 5th) years just so totally ready to graduate and get on with real life? I've still got two months until school starts but it's already getting hard to deal with the notion of scrambling to accumulate units and sit through superfluous courses (Nonverbal Communication of Architecture, anyone?) when I'm really ready to just peace out. </p>

<p>I have a real-life, well paying careerish job doing things I love at a company that I adore waiting for me in June, and oh God, this is going to be the Longest. Year. Ever. It's a big year- important learning to do at work, turning 21, etc- so I'm sure it'll go fast, but just...yeah. I fully intend to make the best of every minute of it, but I can't say that I'm stoked about sitting in tons of classes and doing lots of busy work when I could be making real money (and professional progress) with that time. </p>

<p>I was really all ready to face 2 more years in Grad school right away, but then my career focus shifted. I realized that an MA in something silly is not going to help me in advertising and I've had to adjust to the notion that I probably won't be going back for my MBA until I'm 23 (which is still young, but really, I was planning to be DONE with my MA by then, so this took a while). Now, I cannot WAIT to get out. I heart my school very, very much and I really love my major, but I know what I want to do with my life and I just want my degree so I can go and do it already. </p>

<p>It's not helping that I'm apparently the ONLY one of my friends who feels this way. In fact, I have friends who are so not ready to move on that they're deliberately accumulating 20k in extra debt so they can chill for another year, grabbing random extra minors so that they can avoid thinking about real life for 9 more months. These people are also putting off internships and work experience and such so they can further avoid thinking about life after UCLA.</p>

<p>This does not compute. </p>

<p>And so I ask: is ANYONE else just done with school? Anxious? Impatient? </p>

<p>Really, seriously, no RLY, READY to graduate?</p>

2

<p>i am scared of the real world. i still don't know what i want to do so i'm racking up internships but i'd rather be in college than think about getting a job, life ater school etc... the job i have right now has really given me motivation to get my s. h. it together because i realize that i'm not the type of person that can do the same crap day after day.i need to be challenged in order to be satisfied. i'm glad that i have spring admission to my school of choice because it gives me time to think things through and figure it out.</p>

3

<p>Hmm. </p>

<p>What year are you, out of curiosity?</p>

<p>And really, at least you're doing internships. That's what they're for- to figure out what you do and don't like to do. I just don't get my friends who refuse to even take that step.</p>

4

<p>i'm goign to be a junior but since i have spring admission i might take a little longer to graduate.</p>

<p>i'm not in a hurry because i really want to enjoy the last few years of freedom. Think about it, its the last time you can sleep until whenever you want. Where you can spend days with your friends without having to worry about getting up for work. College is the last time you can live life without a routine.</p>

<p>and so far, the internships have helped me figure out what i don't want to do.
but don't worry about your friends, they just want to enjoy the last years of their youth because once work kicks in it'll be totally different.</p>

5

<p>See I disagree. I think balancing four classes plus work/internship plus ECs plus social stuff makes me much less free than showing up to my office 5 days a week and then doing whatever else on my own time. I get your view, and I shared it not too long ago, but going into this year and having to pile a lot of things on top of eachother to make stuff work is difficult and not very exciting. Being able to sleep til noon once in a while just so isn't worth it anymore.</p>

<p>And eh, I don't worry about them, I just wonder. I don't really think that graduating automatically puts an end to one's youth. I'm still going to be barely 21 and fun and having a life come next July, I'll just be making a LOT more money doing it. If anything, I feel like working full time is going to enable me to be happier and generally more comfortable in my life because I'll have more financial freedom and more satisfaction with what I'm doing (no more time-eating classes just to fulfill unit requirements). </p>

<p>I think people, like my friends, aren't so much hanging onto what they see as their youths as much as I think they're wary of responsibility. Which, yknow, to each their own I guess. But everyone has to grow up sometime. I already have rent + ccs + utilties to deal with, so really the only difference (besides the inability to manipulate my schedule) will be the ability to manage that stuff more easily. </p>

<p>But yeah, I think thats what jobs and internships during college are for. Believe me, after 9 months at Starbucks I knew that I most definitely would never work there ever, ever again. Definitely motivated me to find out what I CAN see myself doing. I am very fortunate to have fallen into an internship in the field I suspected I loved which is really a job and then even luckier that they want to keep me.</p>

6

<p>See i was the opposite way. I really didn't want to be done with undergrad. As I was entering my senior year I was in the process of applying to med school, had turned 21 in the last week of class during the spring semester (so I had a summer at the bars but no "real" bar experience), and was gearing up for leading some big changes in the organizations I was in (in particular the one I was prez for as well as one that I was VP for). </p>

<p>The day I graduated was the saddest day of my life.</p>

<p>Also, as classes started that's when I started getting help from my parents with things like rent and food again (I had to pay all my costs during the summer) so all of a sudden I was flush with cash and was getting to actually use all the money I was earning at my job. </p>

<p>Finally, college was never about the classes I was taking. Yeah, I had some ones that sucked, but I always had so much else going on that class took a back seat most of the time. I focused on them when I needed to get the grade, do well on a test or finish a paper, of course, but I never looked at them like "ugh I have to sit through Ecology and Evolution MWF and three hours of History of Sociological Theory every wednesday." </p>

<p>As I rolled into second semester, getting those med school acceptances was the biggest concern I had, but I didn't have any interviews set up until the first two weeks of the semester so I couldn't even really worry about that yet. Then I got accepted in the first week of february to my two top schools and then nothing mattered anymore. After that I really stopped caring about classes b/c I was in and going some place in the fall. I ended up getting far and away my worse grades of college in that last semester (and I mean really poor). Perhaps this is the position you are in right now. You know where you are going, what you are doing, and you are excited for it. </p>

<p>If that's the case, my advice is for you to really enjoy the other aspects of college. Yeah, you have classes, but unless you are one of these people who will regret the fact that you graduated with a 3.5 instead of a 3.8 b/c you let everything slip in your last year, I don't see what the big dread of classes is. So go out and really get the full experience of your last year. Go to every single basketball game or go to the bars on tuesday night every week, b/c your classes are for the most part meaningless. Do enough to pass, but otherwise they aren't going to be that important. Your job waiting for you isn't likely to care and by the time you look for a new job, they won't care about your grades either, just what experience you have.</p>

7

<p>I'll be a senior in about two months. On one hand I'm looking forward to graduating, but on the other hand I'm kind of not. So I kind of just end up in a "meh" state in the middle.</p>

<p>I really don't like being dependent on my parents so I'm really looking forward to having a job and making enough money to live on my own, wherever in the country I want, getting a nice apartment that's not surrounded by drunken undergrads that play awful music all night while I'm trying to sleep, actually having time and money to do things on the weekend, etc. I'm not much of a typical college student and I'm tired of pretending to be one. I'm also tired of being treated like a 14 year old by my parents because they think that since they supply the money and the cosigner's signatures, I'm still their little baby and I have to listen to everything they say and go home frequently (because don't I miss being at home?).</p>

<p>On the other hand, I'm not particularly excited about the rest of my life in general, I guess you could say. I can't help but see it as anything other than get up, go to work, stay there for 8 hours, come home, go to sleep a few hours later, repeat until age 60. I'm never going to be one of those people who make their career the focal point of their whole life, so it's just kind of like....I don't know what I'm going to do with all of that time. I'm not entirely sure that I will find a job and if I do, I'm not entirely sure that I'm going to like the field that I'm in. I'm thinking I'll probably go to grad school at some point for something. I thought about doing it right afterwards to sort of avoid the drudgery of working, but I haven't got the money for it so that's not going to work.</p>

<p>I (used to) have a friend who's going to be one of those in school forever to avoid the big bad real world types. As of now she doesn't live in an apartment and doesn't even want to, hardly knows how to cook, doesn't own her own money for anything other than random dinners out and shoe purchases, and probably wouldn't know what the hell to do with herself if she suddenly DID have to live on her own. In her future for the next 10 years or so she basically sees a little school here, a little school there, maybe a few years of study abroad school in this country...all while supported by her parents. I just don't understand how someone could be so willingly detached from responsibility and being on their own in the world.</p>