Green Jelly [nicola]
options I have in front of me right now..
Scenario 1: Stick it out with this science degree, taking one semester at a time and seeing where I end up. Who knows, I could be teaching science at my old high school, or accepting a Nobel prize?
Scenario 2: Quit uni now or after mid-year exams and become a missionary in north korea, not before fulfilling a have-to-do-this-before-I-die goal of becoming a waitress. (I’m being serious!)
Scenario 3: eat my body weight in chocolate and then run away and never return, perhaps buying that $9000 trench coat along the way.
Scenario 4: Keep going for the year and change next year for an International business course (meaning i’ll have to change uni’s) But Melb uni is so beautiful! Or perhaps commerce at Melb.. who knows?
So ladies and gentlemen, the choices are before you. What should go? What should stay? Tune in next week to find out which scenario was evicted…
Ciao!
P.S: This week I’ve gotten fired – $0. Gotten another (better) job – $2000. Realising that you don’t have enough time to study and thereby failing? Priceless.
P.P.S: (is that even right? or is it P.S.S?) anywho… this is a rather self centered blog, but peoples, its just an encouragement to anyone out there thinking that they must know what they wanna do. Cause I most certainly don’t. And thank you for your amazingly therapeutic listening skills.
I think its PPS, cos PS means “post script”, so then PPS must be post, post sript. Also, I think i like the chocolate idea the most, because you could earn money in eating competitions whilst gourging youself on chocolate. As for me, I have a fairly similar list of complicated ideas for possible post graduate endeavours I should undertake. But for now, I’m fairly happy with sticking to science and seeing where I go…? 😛
Excuse my ignorance, but I’m trying to reconcile the significance of Green Jelly…am I missing something?
Some combination taking elements from both #2 and #3 sounds promising, substituting the $9000 trenchcoat for a plane ticket to Europe, beaten up Kombi and a couple of months’ rations.
On number 4, it depends on your motivation. I can’t speak for international business but as someone who’s done it – Commerce at Melbourne is a strange beast. The degree is looked upon favourably and there are a few very stimulating subjects, and some passionate lecturers. On the flipside, there is a lot of mandatory stuff that is drier than Saudi Arabia. Quantitative Methods being particularly painful (personal observation). There’s also a lot to be said for the applicability of the content to the real world. It’s great because it teaches you the theory behind how things ‘should’ be, but unlike Science, you get this massive digression from Practice. It’s a horrible thing to say but I gained more usable knowledge in a few months on the job than I did in three years at Uni.
Rambling, but the only thing I wanted to accomplish before getting sidetracked was to ask a small favour – send me a postcard of Kim Jong.
PXW
As a pragmatist I would suggest you do not quit uni. Statistics show that people who quit uni only have a very small chance of ever returning.
Firstly I would ask – why science in the first place? why are you not enjoying it right now. Sometimes a degree and university life takes time to settle into…sometimes expectations have to be re-adjusted. Sometimes one will never truly “enjoy” their degree. It’s a means to an end.
Where do you want to be once you finish uni? What kind of life do you want to lead? These are questions you need to ask yourself.
Business/Commerce degrees are very practical. I believe it is a degree that offers two key things: many options and the ability to make a lot of money. I often hate hearing that people are doing Commerce just because they don’t know what they want to do with their lives…but the honesty is that it is the perfect degree for those kinds of people. You can do almost anything with it.
Why International Business though?
Personally I am one to say if you’re going to do Commerce, your life will be easier if you do it at either Melbourne or Monash. Prestige does matter in the business community. Again, it’s just about creating more options for yourself.
Overall, based on the very limited data provided, I would suggest whatever degree you end up in, try to make it something you know actually leads to a meaningful end. That helps a lot with motivation.
Secondly, I would suggest if you have the money, maybe you should head over to Europe for a few weeks either during the mid-semester break or at the end of the year; it may open your eyes a bit and give you a more worldly perspective.
Thirdly, get advice. Talk to as many people as possible before making a decision about your uni career. Ask QUALIFIED people. Lecturers, tutors, successful students.
Good luck!
First of all – don’t stress! I’ve met very few people in generic degrees (arts, commerce and science) that actually know what they want to do at the end of it.
If you’re not really not enjoying it I wouldn’t bother continuing after you’ve finished first year. Or at least deferring for a while.
But I reckon Sophie’s right, try to stick to something at uni, and better yet at Melbourne! But I am very biased because I love it so much.
Good luck deciding! And don’t worry too much, enjoy your time and hand out with friends etc. Live the good life while you can 🙂
I say do what you want to.
An extraordinarily large amount of people lead dull and pathetic lives and will continue to do so until they expire from misery. Many of them turned up, wide-eyed, at University, hoping to live the life. But that life is constricted.
If you hate what you’re doing with your life at the moment then reflect on what life really is: an experience of your own creation. You can only have a fulfilling life if you have purpose and inspiration. Money is an absurd goal; I have met affluent accountants in bars who hate the muddy trench they have gotten themselves into. Yet they can’t find the inspiration to escape. They spent the most physically active years of their lives holed away learning knowledge they admit they never even use on the job. Is this what you want to do? Waste your youth and vitality?
When I was at school we had someone come in and talk about gap years; they touted with absolute conviction that “you’ll never have to opportunity to do this kind of thing again!”. That’s the kind of thinking that leads to mounting debt, a mortgage, three kids in Blandville, Suburbia, and a shattering struggle for existance. I do not want to end up like that, and I sincerely hope you don’t either.
One of the most inspiring people I have met has been travelling the world for the last half a decade, living off savings. He is in his mid thirties and has had more experience and adventure than a lot of people have in several lifetimes (he likes to tell people “I’ve had girlfriends from 28 different countries”, and he has the pictures to prove it). This is the kind of life everyone should aspire to; not just rampant womanising, but travel, adventure, freedom, enlightenment. Note that this man is in no way rich, he is just wise with his money and doesn’t waste it on unimportant things like houses and cars and plasma televisions.
Oh, and Europe is not somewhere to go to open your eyes. It is like Australia only with different languages and prettier scenery. Places that are not the usual holiday destinations, like 3rd world countries away from the tourist trail, are the places to go for finding yourself. And not just on a two week beach holiday in India; I mean real international travel, for months and years, to places whos names you can’t even pronounce, to countries you never knew existed, unplanned, improvised travel where you do what you feel like and are infinitely rich in time.
Feeling compelled to stick to Uni when you dislike it because an abstract statistic means you *might* not return is narrow-minded and flippant. You can return to Uni whenever you want to. My mother is 50 and has just finished a Law Degree at Edinburgh University; she never got to go when she was younger so she went later on. Don’t follow the crowd, that’s what dull people do.
So I say: Go to Korea. Become a waitress. Do what you want to. Life’s too brief to tolerate crap.
(vagabonding.net is a good start)
I also find I am spending all my time thinking about escape. I made a poor decision that involved starting uni almost immediately after high school, it was stupid and I will be regret it for at least the next two months. If it helps, I am in science because I am impossibly curious. Perhaps you are impossibly curious as well?
I think what you should do is think about where you are going to be in ten years time. Researching in a science lab? Working for a multinational company? Giving lectures on science? or perhaps lectures on commerce? If you freeze with fear at the thought of spending the rest of your life over a test-tube and bunsen burner, then the choice is clear. Or vice versa, if you can’t stand the thought of working in a company where everything has to do with profits, then don’t go there. You may think you’ll be okay doing something you don’t like for the rest of your life, think again. You only get this one shot so make it count.
good luck and hope you’ll come to a decision soon!
Thanks for all your input! Your insights are certainly luciferous, its interesting to hear what people think. Thing is, I know what ultimately I want to do and what I’m living for… uni is just an intermediary step that requires me to make a decision, a skill in which I haven’t quite mastered.