Quarter Life Crisis

[LiberatedMonkey]

I’m going through quite the crisis right now in my life at the age of 19. It all started when I realized I may not want to be an engineering major (computer engineering) anymore due to not liking a project I was a part of and seeing that technical aspects of doing the project sparked little to no interest. I’m at a point in college (start of my 3rd year) that I need to decide now what I want to do with my life because once classes start I’m going to go past the point of no return and not being able to change majors all that much, which is in about a week or two. My two options at this point that seem reasonable are either stay in engineering (maybe I’ll still like it) or switch to computer science which I have some interest in because I took some classes in it but my gut feeling says that’s not the right choice.

I’m near the end of Leo’s  life purpose course and came up with the life purpose “Pervade personal development/spiritual topics using my creativity to create a more conscious society.” I would like to do this by creating a website or some other way, but I was kind of concerned that I might just be copying Leo and that this might be unauthentic. However, I’ve always been intrigued by personal development and spirituality due to actualized.org and have been watching Leo's content since high school. I feel as if people around me and my peers need to become aware of their potential in these areas of their life and I would want to convey that and guide them.

I was thinking that I could major in computer science in order to build a website for myself with my purpose in mind and have job security by having this degree if things don’t go well. I also have an interest in becoming a life coach, however, I'm nowhere near qualified to be one. 

I never expected to experience such emotional turmoil and sleepless nights. I realize Leo calls this the hero's calling in which I have to make a decision for the better of my potential. Is there some advice/wisdom y'all could share with me because this is borderline a nightmare.

Edited August 13, 2021 by LiberatedMonkey

[Sahil Pandit]

@LiberatedMonkey The good thing is, Engineering and C.S. both pay well.

Either way you go, you will be able to make an income that will be able to sustain your needs.

This is a good start.

From there, you could implement what you've been learning from Leo's LP course on the side, maybe after work/weekends, to build that website you're speaking about.

I say this because having a steady income to work on your LP with is a huge advantage.

Plus you're only 19... you're just getting started my guy.

You got this. 

[LiberatedMonkey]

@Sahil Pandit I talked to a couple of people about it and they say something similar. Thanks for putting things in perspective. However, I still feel a ton of emotional turmoil, like a burning hole in my stomach because of the choice I got to make between both majors.

[PepperBlossoms]

imagine you have the computer science job or software engineering job and it is 8 am and you have to work till 5 pm with a 1 hour lunch break and a list of tasks that need to get done as well as some emails with more information about new tasks you don't know about any maybe 2 one hour meetings to discuss the projects.  you have various deadlines to meet and are waiting on someone to get back with you in a few task areas for their part. you are sitting at a computer but your mind is working on the task you picked from your list to work on.  some of the items on your list can be done fairly quick and you do well and some will take awhile and some you have never done before and don't currently know how to do and some you may be putting off on the backburner. 

the technical is a guide for what to do and the more you understand the technical, the more you can do.

[aurum]

8 hours ago, LiberatedMonkey said:

I was thinking that I could major in computer science in order to build a website for myself with my purpose in mind and have job security by having this degree if things don’t go well.

You don’t need a CS degree for this man. Websites are just getting easier and easier to create these days.

1 hour ago, LiberatedMonkey said:

However, I still feel a ton of emotional turmoil, like a burning hole in my stomach because of the choice I got to make between both majors.

Feel and introspect on this emotion. What are you afraid of? What will happen if you make the wrong choice? Can you make a wrong choice?

Get very specific.

To your dilemma, it sounds to me like you should stick with engineering. But the reality is this decision is likely not nearly as significant as you feel it may be. You could graduate with an engineering degree at 21 and then decide to spend the next decade of your life becoming a poet. And you’d only still be 30.

You simply don’t have to have all the answers at this point. 

It can be overwhelming having this many choices as far as what you should do with your career. So don’t get sucked into that if you can.

[PepperBlossoms]

If you could take some computer science and some computer engineering courses and see which you like better...

write a pros/cons list for both

look at job openings/opportunities/growth for both for employability

ask why you want to do each one

[LiberatedMonkey]

I have decided that I am going to switch to computer science as of right now and feel like this is the right choice. 

2 hours ago, aurum said:

To your dilemma, it sounds to me like you should stick with engineering. But the reality is this decision is likely not nearly as significant as you feel it may be. You could graduate with an engineering degree at 21 and then decide to spend the next decade of your life becoming a poet. And you’d only still be 30.

You simply don’t have to have all the answers at this point. 

It can be overwhelming having this many choices as far as what you should do with your career. So don’t get sucked into that if you can.

@aurum I definitely overwhelmed myself a little too far with this decision, but this experience has made me very aware of how serious I have to be about my career/life purpose. Sort of like a wake-up call.