Being famous isn’t prety,
That doesn’t elevate us up,
No need to start an archive,
To shake over your writings.
Aim of creating is to give one-self,
Not ruckus, not success,
The shame of being worthless
While praised by everyone as best.
— Boris Pasternak, My Sister – Life
How to pick one.
Double major or minor.
What to do if you feel you need to switch.
My phone rang at nine am on a Tuesday morning, rousing me from my sleep. It was my friend and business partner’s distressed mother asking me if I could speak to her younger son. He was starting his second year of college and had no idea what he wanted to do. He called me a week later and explained that he is considering physics but wasn’t sure if he would make money at it. To me that signaled like a path of mediocrity. I asked him: what is it that you want to do? He really didn’t know, he just knew he wanted to work with other people. I gave him some suggestions of how a technical degree could come in handy and how he could do something with other people with that degree. But essentially I said “find something that you love and pursue that, you will make far more money doing something you love than doing something you tolerate.”
How to pick one.
There are few who know who they are and what they want to be as they enter college. They are lucky but they also don’t necessarily stick to that. Remember that many artists, become writers, that many singers, become actors, lawyers, become sky diving instructors and engineers become motorcycle teachers. Without a lifetime goal, we become bored and move on to another calling. If you grew up with many interests, it may be difficult to decide on what you want as you enter college. But as I told Aaron, follow your passion and then find a way to make money at it.
When I entered college I had no idea what I wanted to be. I figured that an engineering major would give me options, that if I wanted to switch to something else, it would give me the necessary pre-requisites. However, what I didn’t realize, is that once you start on a path, it can be very difficult to quit. The more time and effort you put into something, and especially as people believe or doubt your abilities to follow through, it may no longer be about your passion for that field, but a matter of pride. This has to be identified early on because regretting and resenting a decision ten years into a career is no way to live.
When one major isn’t enough.
Once you have your passion, look around for professions and requirements for those. They should direct you towards the best major. Sometimes, for some people, the major may not be a good fit because you may feel that your skills are more than adequate without further education. This is very rare, it is probably not you and you probably know it. For those individuals a complementary major maybe good. For others a double major can be a good idea, provided that it doesn’t leave you too much in debt.
That’s when it is good to look at just taking a minor instead. It’s faster and you can get two or three for the same time and fee as a major.
For instance business is a great major to add to engineering, so is physics. For doctors, maybe a second language. For photographers, art or writing. A more broad engineering is going to open your horizons, push you academically and make you better at whatever you do.
How to know if you should stick to it or not.
Sticking with your major can be hard, and that may be a sign that it isn’t not for you. If what you think you will do in the end, if your most creative classes do not give you the satisfaction and pride in work. Then yes, I advise that you leave. If what motivates you are the good grades and praise from instructors and not the art project or lab or skills you aquire, move on. However, if you are not doing well grade wise, but you love to do what you do, and you spend many hours just to receive a bad grade for what you feel is good and pleasant work, especially in art classes, do not quit, keep going. You have found a passion that you should not give up on because even if you think you’re no good, you should continue. After all, at one point, we were all bad shoe-tiers, didn’t mean we should have quit.
seven year degree 