It's Not A Competition

College is full of choices. We choose our living situations, our activities, our routines. Regarded as the most important choice, we choose a major, and more importantly, a career path.

A lot of us come into college knowing exactly what we want to do. And then, we change our minds a few times. Our classes, our professors, and our values can shift our perspectives and influence our decisions. We are given so many different options, and that can be a blessing and a challenge at the same time. Personally, I have always felt grateful for the vast and seemingly endless opportunities.

The most important thing that I was told growing up was that I could be anything I wanted; that I had support to choose my college experience, my major, my path. I'm lucky to have parents that gave me that choice. I was never pressured to pick the career with the highest salary, the best job placement, or the most impressive title. I was told to go with what would make me happiest, and that's what I'm set on doing.

I know not everyone is as lucky. Some people are under a lot of pressure to get the "most value" out of their tuition, to please their parents, and to make choices that fit other peoples' criteria for "success". We're all working towards something. I think the most important thing to keep in mind is that regardless of what you are working towards, you don't need to compete with people who are working towards something different, and there truly is no "best" major or "best" job out there. It's all relative to what you are passionate about.

College students compare themselves every day. We compare our grades, what we do on the weekends, the jobs we're searching for. It's completely normal in a sea of people to base our feelings and even some of our decisions on how we can stay up to date with the crowd. What I don't love about some of these comparisons is that we tend to validate the choices of some, and discredit the choices of others.

Judgment stems from insecurity. I think we tend to pass judgment on those that we don't understand or are envious of. What bothers me about judging what someone wants to do with their life is that there is a place for everyone and putting ourselves in boxes of "impressive majors" and "unimpressive majors" is not only condescending, but mostly, remarkably ignorant. The "majors game", as I call it, comes from the insecurities of those who feel as if they have to beat everyone out at graduation.

I understand that a lot of us are passionate about what we do -- and we should be. I talked a lot about this in my post about taking our work personally, but we don't need other people to tell us that what we're doing is worth it, we should believe it ourselves. I'm passionate about business. I'm passionate about consumer behavior, marketing, data, and lots of others things I hope to do in my job one day. I've never understood why anyone has ever had the nerve to tell me that my plan isn't worth pursuing, or that it must be so easy to be studying what I am. I don't pretend to understand the work associated with other majors, because I'm ignorant to it. I truly don't know much about it. For that reason, I would never tell someone that their major isn't as challenging or as valid as mine. Because it's not a competition. I hate myself for quoting this but as Kanye West said, "I'm just doing my thing, hope you're doing your thing too"

To sum it up, we're all paying tuition to receive the piece (or pieces) of paper that signify what we want to do with our lives. The entire point of receiving a higher education is immersing yourself in your field and enjoying the opportunity that so many people in this world do not have. We should be celebrating each others' diverse interests and abilities, not pigeon-holing the ones that we see as the most distinguished on a degree certificate.

xo Kate