re: #326 Obdicut

Both of my brothers and I didn’t really find what we loved and excelled at until our late twenties. College wasn’t that useful to me— or rather, I wasn’t smart or mature enough back in college to properly take advantage of it. But after a few years of noodling around, I was able to start building a really good career for myself.

One of my brothers, now that I think of it, was a history major. He went back to school to learn animal wildlife management, and now he does cool stuff like crawling into the dens of mother bears to traquilize them and gather data. He’s publishing like mad and happy as a clam.

My other brother did philosophy, I think, and then in his late twenties went back to school, got a teaching certificate, and became an awesome third-and-fourth grade teacher.

We all feel kind of dumb for wasting so much time, but I think for some people that’s how it’s got to be. We were pretty naive, and needed to knock around in the world a bit before we could become serious people.

I hope your son finds something serious he can get excited about. He’s lucky to have a dad that cares, like you.

That sounds similar to me. I went to Uni right after to highschool like I was supposed too. Did alright but nothing was really clicking. After two years in an opportunity presented itself and I dropped out. Long story short I ended up full filling a dream of mine and did some really interesting things along the way. I got a couple of diplomas and certificates in few different things such a paliative care and worked in a variety of fields. I started two small businesses which I ended up selling and just generally led an eclectic life during my twenties. As thirty approach I was offered a cool full time job which would have set me up really well. I turned that down because I decided that now I was ready to go back to school because now I really knew what I wanted to study. The difference between Uni at 18 and 30 was night and day. I was more a partner in my education rather then a passive participant that sat there regurgitating information for marks.

I don’t consider myself dumb for wasting time. My life would have been quite different if I had stayed in Uni and finished in my early twenties but I wouldn’t have gotten as much out of as I did when older. It really would have just been a piece of paper with little relevance to what I’m doing now. I’m glad I trusted my gut enough to follow a more round about route. I’m still in contact with a few people from HS who did follow the 4 year degree and a masters path. Only one is really happy. The other say that by the time they figured out what they really wanted to do it was too late in terms of time and investment in there degrees to turn back so they just sucked it up and completed them.