I’ve just started college but I still don’t know what I want to do. 

From pros and cons lists to a favorite book, our elder has some ideas.

 

Dear EWC

I’ve just started going to college recently. I’ve never known what I wanted to do, even as a kid. I have interests: music/singing, history, science, social studies, video games, etc. But I can’t think of anything that I would want to do that involves any of those. I have a lot of passions and interests but for the life of me I just have no idea what I want to do when finding out soon is necessary. For a while I’ve been considering majoring in business because in my mind, the office setting seems like the setting for me. I’ve had an office job before, and I liked it. But I hate math. And I know not every office job would require math but I was leaning towards the finance side of business because I would love to be financially literate (e.g. stocks). But business as a whole would require pretty good math skills, which I don’t have. My main goal is to find something I enjoy. Something that would make me happy. Once I find that I will be fixated on success, I feel like. but I need to find it. Any advice on finding it?

 

Lawry replies

I would be happy to answer your letter. You are not alone. It is very common to struggle to find a career that we might like. I have some ideas to share with you.

An old book that I found very helpful and recently has been updated yearly is “What Color is Your Parachute” by Richard Nelson Bolles. You might find it at your local library. It is a wonderful tool when looking for a career.

One thing I did to help me figure out what I wanted to do with my life from a career standpoint was to take a career aptitude test and I found that to be a very helpful tool. Now, so much of that information is online and it could be very helpful to you. You can look up “career aptitude test,” “career test,” “career assessment,” for a few examples and you’ll find many tests/assessments that you can take for free online. This can help you to find the skills you have and to find something you would enjoy. I really think that doing this will allow you to clearly see a path to follow.

I also talked to friends and family. Others that might be helpful are someone from the religious organization to which you may belong and a teacher/counselor at your school. There’s a wealth of resources out there that we often forget about. Most people are happy to try and help.

One thing you can do if more than one thing appeals to you is make a list of pros and cons and see if that helps to sort things out for you. I have used that tool many times and it has always been very helpful. It’s important to be honest with yourself when you do this. If the results are too close, you can add a numerical value to each of your answers and that should help.

I hope that this has been helpful to you, and I wish you a great deal of luck as you move forward with your life. Think positive. I am a great believer in that. 

Article #: 482286

Category: Career