Discussion Anyone else ever feel like they chose a bad major/career/life choice?

[ThatStateOfMind]

This is partly caused by doomscrolling, but does anyone feel like they chose the wrong major? I do, I chose CS. I chose this because it seems like a lucrative major and I enjoyed coding. Now that I'm stressing about the more complex aspects (I have a computer architecture course, plus 4 other classes starting in less than a month), it seems less appealing than it did previously. Additionally, I'm not some natural problem solver or particularly passionate about coding. I see these people so excited about personal projects they're working on and I feel so out of place. I know this is probably a combination of a few things like doomscrolling, inexperience, and imposter syndrome, but I wanted to ask.

Anyways, anyone else feel like this?

EDIT: Also if you feel made a poor career/life choice, so this thread can be more inclusive

 

[locked*n*loaded]

I got my degree in mechanical engineering. If I had to do it over again, I definitely would have chosen something else, something more meaningful, more beneficial to people in general. I don't know if that would have been something in the sociology realm, possibly the psychology arena. I don't know. Something else, though. Something I could have felt was helping to make a difference. If not the forementioned, possibly something to do with animals. Even pursuing a law degree after my undergraduate degree, and then helping people, would have been more internally satisfying. All regrets for sure. I have a lot of them, though.

 

[emptyenvelopes]

Yes. I was told my whole childhood that I'm bad at math because it runs in the family so I avoided all math career paths. Turns out I really love math and analyzing data, I just never thought I was smart enough to do it. If I could go back I would do something with math and ideally statistics.

 

[Iris Blue]

I can't really relate to choosing a major since I never did after I graduated, but I definitely would probably want to go back and have known what to look for and picked one then. I definitely feel like many things I wish I did in the past that I know now but to be honest I doubt it would've changed how I ended up or me not wanting to be alive. Maybe it would've made me feel better about what I did before I went but I'm not sure.

 

[brokeandbroken]

This is partly caused by doomscrolling, but does anyone feel like they chose the wrong major? I do, I chose CS. I chose this because it seems like a lucrative major and I enjoyed coding. Now that I'm stressing about the more complex aspects (I have a computer architecture course, plus 4 other classes starting in less than a month), it seems less appealing than it did previously. Additionally, I'm not some natural problem solver or particularly passionate about coding. I see these people so excited about personal projects they're working on and I feel so out of place. I know this is probably a combination of a few things like doomscrolling, inexperience, and imposter syndrome, but I wanted to ask.

Anyways, anyone else feel like this?

EDIT: Also if you feel made a poor career/life choice, so this thread can be more inclusive

I regret going into medicine. Not because of what happened I feel like I did the right thing and I'm a victim. I do regret it though because I think people are pretty awful and aren't worth it. I should've gone into something more self serving.

 

[KuriGohan&Kamehameha]

Yes. I was told my whole childhood that I'm bad at math because it runs in the family so I avoided all math career paths. Turns out I really love math and analyzing data, I just never thought I was smart enough to do it. If I could go back I would do something with math and ideally statistics.

Depending on where you are in the world, some countries will pay for you to get your maths education up to scratch or for a very low price. Might be worth looking into, if not for career reasons, for your own enjoyment and to see what you're capable of learning independently and what you might need guidance from a teacher/tutor for to fill in any gaps in knowledge.

To answer your question OP, I regret doing a Neuroscience degree. Even if you are basically studying the content of a medical course, you get no respect or qualifications for any professional sorts of careers, it isn't a terminal degree by any means. You won't be qualified on paper to do anything in healthcare, and academia is very brutal.

If you want to do research, you need to spend years doing a masters and PhD (with a very low chance you'll be researching what you're actually interested in for a very long time), or do post grad entry medicine. A lot of people who shouldn't be within 10 feet of a patient who were in my course went on to study medicine after.

Want to work in counseling/psychotherapy? If your neuroscience degree hasn't convinced you what a sham most of that field is by the end of your studies, you'll need to complete an expensive post grad course to become qualified to work in that industry, with clinical work placements that you likely won't be paid for at all. Want to work as a clinical lab scientist? You'll have to compete for a handful of lucrative training positions that last for years.

A neuroscience degree sounds impressive to some people, but they don't realize how competitive academia is and how many skilled and passionate people will inevitably burn out or be forced to quit, and work unrelated jobs that make them unhappy like corporate admin stuff, simply because the degree doesn't really qualify you to do anything in employer's eyes.

 

[-nobodyknows-]

Yeah. I picked what I picked because it seemed like would lead to a good, stable job, but I'm honestly not sure if that's what I want to be doing with my life. Especially considering the possibility that I'll end up single. If that's the case I really don't care about money.

 

[kyhoti]

I have a bachelor of science in biology; I loved the course of study and graduated with honors. Then, in my career, I rarely used my degree-based knowledge. I was hired for my military background. Now, I can't get a job with either. FML, you know?

 

[Forever Sleep]

Yes. My initial degree and career choice was incredibly difficult to sustain and I wasn't good enough to do that well in it. So- I did a second degree in my late twenties. Both degrees/careers were/are creative. Both are very difficult to sustain financially. Sometimes I wonder if I should have just learned a trade. But, then I'd probably still be unhappy- wondering if I could have made things work in a creative job. In my experience, creative people are unhappy when they aren't being creative.

So, like most other decisions I've made in life, I don't exactly regret them. They made sense at the time.

 

[Ceterum]

my life is just a series of wrongs and many of them I cant make right anymore.

the career stuff. I wasted 10 years by doing something I loathed and instead of quickly changing paths, I dragged myself along finding my only relief in depressive or suicidal friends and communities.

this led me to not getting a family started. Despite all trouble I was with two promising yound women but squandered it all by being myself and with all my deficits not being enough for them. I learnt and would be a different person by now - alas, it is too late.

So ... the final choice seems inevitable by now. The last thing I can do correctly.