Happy New Year Mr Glines! I'm a long time reader, first time caller...erm...commenter who's hoping to get some long term broad-stroke life advice.
I have yet to decide what to do after I graduate. Everyone I don't hate has told me to 'find something I enjoy' but they've not made suggestions. It may seem like they want me to decide for myself, but I've already seen what most've done to others (or said about them) when they were trying to find things out for themselves and then failed. I can't promise I'll follow your advice, but I definitely will consider it.
Seriously,
Andrea
Andrea,
Let me begin by explaining everyone-you-don't-hate's rationale. E-y-d-h is only familiar with the meandering route their path took them to get where they are today. If they dislike where they are (or how they got there) they may be unwilling to offer advice—even of the broad-stroke kind—in fear that you might repeat their mistakes. Just because e-y-d-h appears to be (or says they are) happy, does not mean they are or were. Accomplishing a steady-state of being happy should be everyone's ultimate goal. Most of e-y-d-h never mention it because they either think it "goes without saying" or they survived their entire lives without experiencing it in sufficient quality or quantity and think it "doesn't actually exist".
My first recommendation (no matter your age, personality, or life situation) is: Teach yourself how to love and be loved by a pet of your choosing. The last phrase—of your choosing—is the most important. Devote quality hours out of your day (every day, without exception) to playing, cuddling, grooming, training, pampering, and just spending time with your chosen pet. If you think you love your pet, and they love you, but you might allow a situation, person, or circumstance to come between or separate you? You still have much to learn about basic friendship. You can't really love until you are best of friends; and true friendship trusts nothing could come between them. Once comfortably devoted to a pet, try platonic adult friendship with a human(⁰).
Secondly, you need to teach yourself how to set achievable goals for yourself. The key word in that sentence is achievable. Anyone and everyone can set unrealistic goals; others do it every year when making New Year resolutions(¹). Set a small goal. Something like: run a mile without stopping; or join a local group; or learn to play an instrument (et cetera). The only way to determine if your goal was an achievable one? When you are able to set another one, which expands on the first. Like: run two nonstop miles; or fully participate in an activity decided by that group; or play an entire song of your choosing (et cetera).
Determine what level of importance you desire to place on your long-term financial wealth. It takes a specific mindset to value the accumulation of wealth for its own sake(²). If you determine that you desire wealth more than other qualities, a college education in a money-making field should become your immediate short-term goal.
Measure your future life in twenty-year potentialities. Your second twenty years(³) is when you refine yourself and make yourself better at what you've begun. Your third twenty years is when you either rebuild yourself from your mistakes, continue to make bigger mistakes, or strive to teach yourself how to set, and efficiently accomplish, harder goals. Your last twenty years is for teaching others what you learned and preparing your happy-content self for the inevitable aging and death.
Learn how to determine when you are satisfied with what you've attained. No one strives to be unhappy. No one who is absolutely happy is constantly stressed. Constantly striving, without being aware what constitutes a sufficient amount to be comfortable(⁴), will always result in an ever-escalating amount of stress. That "treadmill loop" is the saddest way to kill yourself.
Respectfully,
Veach
(⁴) This "sufficiency" can-and-should-be adjusted as your life circumstances expand and contract. It's important to be aware of your comfort in a studio apartment, but essential to know when a two-bedroom becomes the new "sufficient amount." And, most of all, it is crucial to remain alert to when returning to the studio will reduce stress (and make you more comfortable).
(³) Your second twenty years will begin once you are adulting full-time, independent of the calendar, living conditions, or family relationships. Some "old people" learn (decades too late) that they are still not able to refine themselves on their own terms; while some "teenagers" discover they have been refining themselves on their own terms for years.
(²) "For its own sake" is a red-flag phrase. It is equivalent to "for no reason." You should do everything (which takes some significant amount of time and effort to accomplish) for clearly identifiable-to-you and clearly important-to-you reasons. Getting more money for money's sake is hording. Gaining knowledge for knowledge's sake is time wasting. The only exception is being happy for happiness's sake.
(¹) Never "play with" making goals. Your subconscious remembers every time you fail-to-achieve and it uses guilt and shame to try to encourage you to succeed; even if you thought you were only half-heartily joking when you said, "I'm, finally, going to write that novel this year!"—your subconscious heard you planning a goal and now it (you) will make you feel bad when you don't do it.
(⁰) Another adult human who also loves pets. This advice is my first, because it is the most important. People who don't like pets should only become friends with others of their ilk.
for other Andrea's:
talking about others 'behind their back'
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