What the hell should I do with my life?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’m thinking of any ideas as to what sort of career I can get into. These ideas (should I choose one) will decide what courses I’ll take in college/as a senior in HS. I’m looking for something lucrative (“yeah right”, says my mother) and relatively fun to do (compared to sitting in an office doing paperwork). I’m probably being stupid and naive.

Anyway, I’m into:

Computer art and drawing: (I’m pretty alright at Flash and am learning Photoshop.)

Geology: (My Earth Science teacher taught me how cool this field is.)

Music. (I’m intermediate at piano/keyboard and I started playing the bass a year ago and am in a band.)

Perhaps some Doper can point me in the right direction? Note that I’m not asking you to decide what I should do, but to suggest some fields I may be able to go into. I don’t really like talking to the guidance counselor.

2

Geology could be good. Field geologists get to go outside, if you like going outside. They still have to sit in an office and write stuff from time to time, though, but often it includes pictures.

No advice whatsoever for you there.
Generic advice: it sounds like you have some likes and dislikes. So my generic advice, if it can be done in your situation, is to get AP credit while in high school, or credit for college courses through some dual enrollment program (i.e., for first period history, it’s actually a community college course that’s beamed into your school and you get college credit for it too).

This is so when you get to college, you don’t have to waste your time taking required courses that you have no interest in.

3

Yeah, I’m currently in AP European History.

4

Dictator of the World? That’d be a cool job.

Last year, I too did not know what I wanted to do with my life, so I joined the Air Force. I’m not going to stay in for more than for years, but at least now I know what I want to do.

5

You seem to enjoy the arts enough. I’m wary in advising anyone to pursue a career in the arts department since I think there may be a lot of uncertainty in such gigs, but try looking for a safe, lucrative job you’d enjoy that would blend well with whatever it is you enjoy creating. For example: I would like to write*, and intent to find a career that involves travelling. Preferable a job in commercial aviation flying supplies into Alaska. If everything pans out ok, my job will add fuel to my creativity and I’ll be making a mint. The mint may be a tic tac, but so long as it’s enough to support me and my hobbies, I’ll be content.

Of course, writing and designing/drawing are apples and oranges. I have nary a clue what I’m talking about really when it comes to career choices in your feild of interest, but don’t think you have to give anything up. If you have any suspicions you’re not ready to make a living out of your current interests, make a hobby of it untill your skills improve. Keep the virtuoso alive. This will be hard or easy depending on what money making career you choose for yourself.

  • Yeah yeah, I know. My writing here is almost always drek. But then, I’m usually in a hurry. As soon as I click the “submit” button on this diddy here, I’m heading to a friend’s house one hour away; case in point.
6

As a founding member and current Vice President of my college’s Pre-Pharmacy Club, I would recommend looking into the field of pharmacy. Two years pre-requisites, four years of Pharmacy school, $60K-$80K per year right out of school (and some places will even pay off some or all of your school debt). Advancement opportunities to $100K+/yr are available, and there is a nationwide shortage of Pharmacists meaning good jobs are available in literally every city in the nation. As our nation’s population ages, the number of prescriptions needing to be filled is expected to increase dramatically and the future of the profession of Pharmacy looks quite bright.

The field of pharmacy is more than “behind the counter” type stuff. Although that does account for many of the available jobs, there are many other career paths in pharmacy including research, hospital/hospice care, nuclear pharmacy (for radiation therapy in cancer patients, among other things), pharmacy law (requires law degree, but can be very lucrative), and careers in many other areas/aspects of medicine. A very good (free, PDF) guide is available at the Pfizer website that provides more information.

Even “behind the counter” work has appeal. Pharmacists represent a safety-net for others in the health community, as they are obligated to check a patient’s prescriptions for any adverse interactions, and take action accordingly. Pharmacists save lives. As well, a Pharmacist who practices her/his profession will tend to REDUCE the number of prescriptions the average patient is on. Pharmacists are medicine and dosage specialists, and are often more knowledgeable about the proper dosages and combinations of medicines than are a patient’s Physicians is.

I am actually from a Computer Graphics background, and am going back to school with the goal of studying Pharmacy for a few reasons. First, in my experience, it has been difficult to find a good Graphic Design job. Competition is heavy for jobs that don’t pay that well (YMMV). Second, the jobs I was doing weren’t necessarily very fulfilling. I would think to myself, “What, exactly, am I contributing to society by designing this piece of Junk Mail?”. Third, I didn’t feel very challenged intellectually. I had a hunger for knowledge, especially for science. It turned out that my Graphic Design degree was almost worthless in pursuing anything science related, as I had not been required to take any science classes (in other words, pre-requisites for Pharmacy school:)).

At any rate, take at least a year’s worth of college-level classes in Physics, Chemistry, and Biology regardless of what your major is. It will be much easier to fall back on those classes if you change your mind at some future point. Can I just TELL you how useless my Color Theory class it to me right now :mad: .

7

You don’t need to pick a specific career path to take classes in areas that you’re interested in. Don’t limit yourself by choosing a career and basing your courses in that area, explore different areas and then pick which one you’d like to have a career in.

As for the courses/careers you mentioned, the only one I know anything about is music. It’s not the best career since there are only a limited number of things you can do (teach, perform, compose are the main ones that I can think of right now) and with the exception of teaching it’s very hard to succeed unless you are very, very good and very, very dedicated. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t study it(in fact, I highly recommend it: some of the best classes I’ve taken were on music theory), but don’t think that you need to pursue music as a career to take classes on it.

And beware APs, they can be a harsh mistress. Depending on the college, they may let you skip into a higher level course but not give you any credits, or they may not accept them at all.

8

Don’t worry about it yet. Don’t talk to your guidance counselor if you don’t want to. Take the hardest classes you can get into (math, science, English particularly) and do the best you can in them. Get into a good college, and continue to take hard classes. This will keep your options open for later. Begin to worry about what you’re going to do after college about your sophomore year in college.

And what do you mean by “lucrative”? Before I went to graduate school, I had a great job. My hours were great, I loved what I did, I worked with a great group of people, and had a really fun time. I made an income that can best be classed as barely above poverty level. But it was a wonderful job.

Instead of asking what you should do with your life, you could ask how many Dopers are on second (or third or fourth) careers. I think the answers might surprise you, and also might tell you that you don’t need to worry right now about what to do with your life, because odds are, you won’t end up in the same industry in which you start.

9

This gets my vote. I’m in my second year as a geology major and it is only getting more fascinating. Out of all my classes (I’m also taking a lot of gen ed stuff) my geology classes are my favorites by far. We go on lots of field trips, too. At my university the geology classes are small, and I think the geology professors are the niceset and coolest of them all. There are so many interesting fields you can go into - oceanography, paleontology, hydrogeology, mineral exploration…and so on. I have always liked rocks, but before I started studying them I never realized they could be so interesting or tell so many stories of the past. You can also use your computer and art skills here - we draw lots of stuff like stratigraphic columns and cross sections and I know 3D modeling is a big thing.

I don’t know about the lucrative thing - I’ll admit I would rather have an enjoyable career than a big-money making one. Petroleum/oil industry geologists have the potential to make lots of dough.

So I’ll echo the advice of others - take chemistry, physics, biology, and as much math as you can. I’ll say English/technical writing too, as we do write a lot of papers and they need to be scientific.

10

Do not consider a career in music unless you are prepared to be very poor throughout your life. That is not to say that you will be, of course, but unless you have such a dedication and love of music that is truly is “its own reward”, it’s probably best to just enjoy it as a hobby. I occasionally get paid to play a guitar, but for it to become my livelihood would require a definite financial risk on my part.

11

Hell, I’m 48 years old, and I still haven’t made up my mind what I want to be when I grow up . . .

12

I work for our state’s environmental agency and we have a bunch of geologists and hydrogeologists. They range from folks who used to do tons of field work (and still occasionally go out and observe field work or do sampling) to folks who haven’t been in the field since the last required field trip in college. Our agency has geologists working in every program (except maybe Air Quality). We also work with geologists in the private sector.

As long as we live on a planet and have water, we’ll need geologists and hydrogeologists so there’s job security. You can work in either the private or public sector so there’s flexibility and a greater chance of finding a work culture you are happy in.

The pay isn’t too bad–Washington recently enacted licensure requirements that help ensure that not just anyone can hang up their geologist shingle; there are state laws that require licensed geologists to do certain work and according to the folks who supported the requirements, it should help with pay parity for professional geology staff.

On the other hand, like Eve, I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up (if I ever grow up–I’m 38).

13

And I do not post from work! I’m off today, so if you are a citizen of the state of Washington:

I am not on work time, I am not posting from work, I actually do the job you pay me to do, please do not make jokes about state *employees * vs. state workers. :eek: :wink: :stuck_out_tongue:

14

Since you’re still in HS, I really don’t think you need to make up your mind for at least a few more years. The best strategy for now is to get a taste of a lot of different areas that might interest you. You do this by taking courses, doing volunteer work, taking part-time jobs, participating in clubs, etc. With the interests that you’ve listed, besides geology, you might consider computer science, informatics, meteorology, astronomy, medicine. These are all heavy on science and you will have to learn quite a bit of math along the way. Did you say “lucrative”? Who knows?! A lot depends on whether your employer is government, industry, or academia. I’d say go as far as you can in school, get into something you enjoy, work your ass off, and the money will come, maybe not lucratively, but you’ll do ok.