My undergrad education is rapidly coming to an end. I’m just a little over a semester away from graduating and I still don’t know what I’m doing with my life.
I’m a little uneasy about it.
I’ll be graduating with a BS in psychology. When you tell people you are getting a degree in psychology, you get quite a few predictable reactions. I’ve outlined these elsewhere (here) so I won’t go into them. One thing I didn’t mention is just the sheer number of people who assume you are going to go into counseling. There’s always that person who goes, “oh, so you want to be a therapist or something, huh?” I’ll admit that I considered that as an option for a while, but then I realized it wasn’t the option for me.
I know that counseling is not the only occupation in psychology out there; There’s always research. The problem is, I’m terrible at research. It’s a miracle I got through my research methods class. There are variables to control and manipulate or questionnaires to design and frankly, that’s not my forte. Even worse is the use of statistics. Surviving statistics class is still (at least in my mind) one of the most impressive and confusing accomplishments of my life. Not sure how I did it because I’m still not sure how to use a regression or ANOVA, but I somehow did it and I’m not complaining.
I’ve got the whole newspaper thing going for me and I’ve enjoyed that. Over the past few years, it has provided me with a writing outlet other than classes. I don’t think I would do well as a full-time journalist, though. I’m about as good at conducting interviews as giraffes are at doing the limbo.
It’s awkward every time.
Just to add more confusion, I added a philosophy minor this year and have been taking random writing classes. I’m all over the place.
Sure, I know an undergrad degree is not a huge deciding factor. My advisor continues to remind me that have a degree is the main thing. But i really wish that I could have been like other people and had my major help me better decide what I’m doing with my life. That would have been great!
It just seems like I have more questions than answers.
Should I go to grad school? If so, for what?
Should I take a gap year? What will I do during that time?
Should I just enter the workforce?
Frankly, I thought I would have these questions answered by now.
I keep waiting for a sign to show up to give me a clue. I’m not asking for a burning bush, I just want something.
I’d even take that if it gave me direction.
Blowing a Bit of Smoke 