I’m currently at this juncture and trying to decide whether to go back to school and start entirely fresh or to hold out for another year or two to see how things go. The anxiety of what the future may or may not hold is real and I’m just standing here, watching the distances shorten faster and faster while still not knowing.
What’s your take, Beeple?
Yeah, I’ve had similar anxiety recently choosing a new place for my family to live. I think keep in mind that if both choices seem like good options you’re likely to get some good outcomes either way. My wife put it like this,
What’s nice is the way the human brain works, down the road we’ll be thinking, “I’m glad we made this choice because then X happened.”
hallettj, I really like your wife’s take!
OP these two pieces of advice from an old college professor might help:
- If you can’t choose between two things, make a list of all the pros and cons of the first thing, then a list for the second thing, place them side by side, and make an emotional decision.
- Always have a Plan B.
About 15 years ago I left the career path I’d started to move cross country and go to graduate school. I thought I might want to do research. Some wonderful things and some terrible times came out of that. I learned and grew greatly. Strangely I ended back on a similar career path, not as far along as I might have been but not back at the beginning either. Nothing’s a mistake as long as you learn from it. Whichever path you take, check in with yourself sometimes to see if it’s still working for you. If not, ask yourself what you can learn from that info.
If you have any questions about specifics I’m happy to try and answer.
TL:DR; Been there. Ask yourself what it is you really want out of this struggle. If obtaining it would make it worth it and $ isn’t a pressing issue, go for it.
How have you felt so far? How close do you feel, any closer in any way than when you first finished school (or whatever marked the start of your journey) looking for the next opportunity? How are your finances?
Do you still in your heart believe that this is the direction you would want to go? If you manage to obtain it before the end of the year or next year, would you look back and say to yourself, the struggle and the wait was worth it for this?
If you feel like you’re going through what you’re doing just because of sunk-cost, probably be a good idea to change your course. If your desire to take this path, even if it wavers a little, and the passion you had going into this journey remains, then keep going and keep trying.
I’d consider myself fortunate in the circumstances of my life, but I’ve been there a couple times, where as I finish the program I’ve been doing, the railroad track I’ve been following in my life seems to disappear in a dense fog of unknown, quickly approaching and it sometimes appearing like a cliff.
You never know what the future will hold, trying to predict every single possibility before deciding will only make your head spin (it did mine). What will happen will happen, but what you have control over is what you yourself would do about it. No matter what path you take, acknowledge ‘possibility’ but focus less on the unknown and focus more on how you can best prepare to reach your goal.
I feel for you. This is something I always dread, big decisions that can have a huge impact on your life. All kinds of obstacles seem to pop up, things that could go wrong. I tend to agonize over them, letting those obstacles grow bigger with every thought. But, looking back, I don’t think I’ve ever regretted one of those decisions in the end.
Anyway, in the end I take a devil-may-care attitude (something very unlike me) and just go for the choice that put me in those crossroads in the first place. I tell myself that I’ll deal with the consequences when they get there.
Thankfully, it turns out I’m much harder on myself than reality really is :)Figure out your deepest, ground-level goal/motivation.
Let’s pretend your most profound goal is “stability.” That may mean staying where you are, or it could mean taking the risk on school for the greater stability it offers in the future.
Identify your life’s motivation and then apply it to your options. Simplify to one word if you can. Bare bones.
Damn I’m basically at the same spot as you
