whatcouldbereal:

silvery-tears:

aphotovici:

okcupidescapades:

okcupidescapades:

i feel like the most important piece of wisdom i can impart on teenagers is that no one–no one–knows what the fuck they’re doing

my brother is 26 years old, makes $200k a year, and just bought a house with his fiance. he’s the success story you hear about but never actually meet in person, but it all happened by accident. he wanted to go to college for clarinet performance, but he got rejected from all the top schools. so he decided to major in physics instead, and then went on to get a doctorate to put off being an adult for a few more years. but then he ended up dropping out halfway through the program and accepting a job with google as a software engineer. so to reiterate: my brother majored in something he was not interested in, and then he got a job that had nothing to do with his degree. 

he isn’t successful because he had some master plan he followed, he just stumbled around blindly until something worked out. and that’s what we’re all doing–i majored in political science and now i do customer service for a company that makes industrial-sized gas detection monitors. the marketing director at my company has a degree in biology, and my mom has an MBA and works at a middle school.  no one knows what they’re doing, we’re all just trying different things until something works out.

so if you don’t have a plan, that’s fine. most of us don’t. and even those of us who do, don’t usually end up doing the thing they thought they would. it’s okay to relax and let life carry you wherever it’s gonna carry you. because even though a lot of us don’t end up doing the thing we wanted, most of us end up happy anyway.

I’ve been thinking about this post since I made it a few hours ago, and I realized that I literally don’t know anyone who’s doing what they thought they’d be doing at this point in their life.
I know a girl that has a degree in neuroscience and works in a restaurant (and makes quite a bit more money than I do, might I add), and a guy who wanted to be a parole officer but is now a security guard. I know people who wanted to be lawyers but ended up not having the grades for law school. I have a friend who’s 24 and just finished her bachelor’s, and two friends who decided to go to grad school because the idea of joining the adult world terrified them.

When I was seventeen, I was 100% sure that I was going to get a job as a bureaucrat and save the world. When I was a 21-year-old recent college grad, I found out that it’s impossible to get a government job unless you know someone. So I gave up and found something else. I know my teenage self would be disappointed if she could see where I’m at, but you know what? I don’t care. Because teenage me was an idiot. She didn’t know anything about the world or how it worked, and she couldn’t have possibly predicted the curveballs that life would throw at her. And because I don’t know a single person who’s doing the thing they wanted to do when they were teenagers.

I know a thousand people who aren’t where they thought they’d be, and zero people who are following the path they set out for themselves. All of us are confused and all of us are scared, and it’s okay if you are too.

Honestly thank u, i needed to hear this again

You can’t plan life

I always planned on a career in biology. Like from the time I was 6 I wanted to be a biologist. I got all the way to college before it really hit me that I didn’t actually know what I wanted to do with my degree. I pondered that for a while until I got to classes that I just couldn’t pass. I didn’t understand what was happening and it wasn’t for a lack of trying. Around this time my mental health took a bad turn and I spent a semester in treatment. After that I decided that the mental health field is broken and needs fixing. Who better to help that than someone who’s been through the system? So I switched majors and am now in the process of getting my psychology degree. After I get that I plan to get certified as a social worker and work in a psych ward. Right now I’m pursuing a career that 17 year old me had never heard of and would have been terrified of. But I’m happy with it now and that’s what matters. Maybe something else will come along and change my path again. Who knows?

My other friend went to a writing school. Then she wanted to be a teacher. Then she had to drop out due to finances. Since then she accidentally ran into an old friend, started dating him, got engaged, had a kid, moved to a new state, completely changed her life. Now she’s going back to school for forensic science. Is she where she planned to be? Absolutely not. But she’s happier now than I’ve ever seen her. She’s got a loving fiancé, a darling baby girl, a wonderful and well paying job. And all of it was by accident.

It’s always nice to have a plan and goals. But don’t beat yourself up if life makes you change them. If you don’t have a plan that’s ok, most people don’t. Make the best decisions you can with the info you have. That’s all any of us can do.

(via castielshotgirlsummer)

Posted 2 years ago × 90,215 notes