The world is not in your books and maps, it’s out there – Gandalf
I had a college professor tell a story of two students that took a semester off from classes to drive across the country. He said, “There is only so much you can learn in a classroom, out there will teach you much more than I can in here. Sometimes you have to get out there and do it.” As someone who has always fantasized about throwing off the chains of society and walking my own path, hearing this stirred something inside of me. Coming from someone that I looked at as smart and successful, I realized following your own path doesn’t mean lowering your odds of success in the “real” world. In many cases not following the path everyone else takes gets your farther ahead than them.
Getting out there and doing it teaches you more than you could learn in a traditional setting. It doesn’t directly teach you how to be an accountant or carpenter, but you learn valuable life skills, like dealing with unpredictable challenges. You also learn about yourself.
Later that same year, I was asked to help answer questions for new student orientation for the environmental science program I was a part of. Many questions asked by the parents of new prospective students focused on the jobs after graduation. I was asked on two separate occasions what job I had lined up after I graduated. As I was a junior and had one year left, I didn’t have anything lined up, but, I was starting to feel the pressure that I should have one ready to go. At the time it felt like I needed to choose my exact career path right then. I felt the same way when I was coming up on high school graduation. Throughout my senior year of high school I was asked by anyone I saw what school I was going to, what I was majoring in, and what job I wanted. How was I supposed to know? I was an 18 year old kid who just rediscovered that you can go outside and have fun, and you didn’t need to be in front of a screen all day.
I originally went to a local community college for engineering, following the path two uncles had taken before me. Two years of community college and then three or four more years at a university to graduate with my masters in engineering. One semester of that and I was over it. The classes were so boring, I hardly went to class. I realized I couldn’t do that job for 40 years, no matter how much they paid me. Feeling lost and a little depressed, Covid hit. Everything was in lockdown and classes went online. During that time I played 14 hours of video games a day. Three weeks into it, after a particularly upsetting match where my friends and I were yelling at each other, I quit. Taking a step back and looking at my life objectively, I realized I wasn’t having any fun playing the games. They would make me angry and upset, ruining my mood for the whole day, and I was taking it out on other people. So I decided to go cold turkey and got a book from my local library.
That’s when I knew things needed to change. A few weeks after, a friends mom who worked at a local university suggested one of the programs there. After switching schools and majors, I had found something I truly enjoyed, environmental science. Classes were outside taking water quality samples or tree cores. I was getting outside more in my free time as well, but I had never thought what comes after college. The very intimidating mother who asked me what job I was going to have brought my happy, rose-colored reality to a halt. What was I going to do after college?
I had enjoyed exploring many different fields within environmental science and it was hard to pick just one. I felt that this decision would put me on one path for the rest of my life. How could I possible make that choice and know it was the right one? I didn’t even know what I wanted for dinner that night, let alone what I wanted for the rest of my life. After having what I call my “quarter life crisis”, realizing I hated engineering, I did a lot of work to look inward and learn about myself. Up until this point, I thought I knew pretty much everything about myself, but trying to figure out what I wanted to do after college made me realize I had just scratched the surface. I needed to figure out who I was to figure out what I wanted. This meant I needed time to think, away from the pressures of parents and professors.
I found this time on the Appalachian Trail in between my junior and senior year of college. My first extended period away from home, I learned to be self sufficient and gained confidence in myself. I tried to think on what I wanted to do with my life, but no answers were forthcoming. I finally decided on going to grad school. I thought, “I am a smart kid, I am sure I can handle it, and I’ve enjoyed school and doing research projects.” I chose that path because it was comfortable and I knew what to do. I chose that path out of fear of doing something new. Ultimately, I rejected the offer I got and did not end up attending grad school. Instead, I moved across the country with my girlfriend. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the happily ever after story we hoped it was and I have now moved back home (we’re still together, don’t worry). During that time, I came upon a realization, I don’t know what I want to do because it doesn’t exist.
How do I follow a path not yet created? By looking to others that have created paths that are almost what I want and taking bits and pieces from each, by learning more about myself and the things I am interested in pursuing, and by challenging my world view and most importantly, by doing it. There is no better way to learn than by doing. To be honesty, what I think I want to be doing changes all the time, but somethings are always the same: Starting my own business and working for myself, going on crazy adventures like biking from Alaska to Argentina or hiking from Mexico to Canada, and living a happy, fulfilling, simple life.
Well, that’s a bit of my story. I originally had planned to write about my time on the Appalachian Trail and how that impacted my life, but I really only touched on it. I will have to make another post about that at some point. The Trail definitely influenced me to forget about the status quo and pursue what I wanted. It gave me my first taste of freedom and the insatiable hunger for more.
