Maybe You Can’t do Everything You Set Your Mind to
College is where most people tend to experience an identity crisis. I know I’ve been experiencing one for awhile. Right now most people are labeled by their majors and in turn labeled by how well people think you’re going to do after college. I’m an Integrated Marketing Communications and Digital Information Design double major. They’re both fairly new and often times have been called “bullshit majors” to my face. I don’t think they’re bullshit, I know it’s something I had to go to college for. Advertising, Public Relations, Webdesign, Graphic design, programming? I had to go to college for that. I need a degree to go any farther.
Now, here’s where we get to the point. All your life up to this point (college) you’re told you can do anything you set your mind to. And yeah, that’s true for the few determined and cut-throat people you probably made fun of. It is not true for every single person and it’s definitely not true in college. This is the place where you’re going to get jerked around, you’re going to get depressed, you’re going to have an extreme lack of sleep and all while trying to maintain a perfect grade point average, work and go to every single class.
So this is where things get heavy. There’s a lot of majors out there where you need to ask yourself: “Is college really the right choice for me?” These are things like the fine arts, dance, singing, performance, etc. And yeah I’m sure so many people have been down on your for picking that major, but think about it. You’ve already got the talent to think you can major in it at a school. So unless you want to teach it (which sadly you need a degree for), then why not just hire a private tutor and try to go out and get jobs? Your dreams are going to die here, you know. You’re going to be so discouraged coming to a “liberal arts” college because you honestly don’t learn anything you don’t already know. So save yourself the pain and try to make some money.
I’m not saying the people in performance shouldn’t come to college, especially if you’re on the fence about what you want to do and that was just something you picked at the drop of a hat. By all means, come out here and figure out what you want to do with your life. But, if you’re a dedicated performance/fine arts major then do yourself a favor and go out there and try to figure out your life. You’ve got the talent already, why the hell do you need to waste time going to school? It’ll actually end up saving you a pretty penny, especially if you make it big because out there in your field, they don’t care about your degree…they just care about your talent.
And as sort of an after thought: if you’re worried about the connection opportunities you might miss in college because of sororities and professors and clubs, don’t be. It’s easy to still make connections with professors and clubs on a local campus even if you don’t go there. Hell, you’re already at an advantage anyways, you’re out in the world making it while those people are wasting their time with four years of school just to get out and feel discouraged when they have to work at McDonald’s.
Four years of formal training will get you nothing but minimum wage and a broken spirit. So do yourself a favor and believe in yourself.