How To Choose Your Major


Picking a major is such a daunting decision that college students often wait until the last minute (as we tend to do with everything) to put our foot down and commit to one. Unfortunately, even then we often only take two factors seriously — money and job prospects. While these two attributes are undoubtedly important, eventually the superficiality of both will catch up to a person. No matter how much you like doing something or how much money you make every day, eventually you’ll get tired of what you’re doing.

It’s unrealistic to assume that we’ll find one major in our undergraduate career that will emotionally satisfy us forever. Picking up hobbies along the way may sound like a viable solution, but let’s face it — most hobbies worth attaining like learning a similar language or working out actually takes some considerable effort. And if we’re not forced or obligated to do it for any other reason than to make ourselves happier, then we’ll probably end up abandoning the thought of even trying. Then we’ll go waste time by binge watching Netflix or binge drinking to tuck away in the back of our minds the daily realization there’s no motivation in life to improve ourselves.

Have you ever noticed that at award ceremonies or any other instance where somebody is accepting recognition for a difficult feat, the majority of the time they say they didn’t do it for themselves? This mindset of working for others is the key to achieving a difficult feat because only by caring about something or somebody else more than yourself. You overcome extreme, otherwise impossible hardships. Steve Jobs, Muhammad Ali and the other people that made or currently make up the 1 percent of the population reached their level because they cared about whatever they were doing so much they were willing to embrace the hardships that accompanied them all the way to the top. Their vision superseded focusing only on making money and enjoyment at times to attain an endless array of other useful skills and habits. That’s why people who change the world aren’t one-dimensional and see every day as an opportunity to improve themselves by learning, which in turn can go towards whatever cause they’re passionate about.

So to wrap it up, don’t neglect how much money or how much fun you’ll be having because those are both extremely important things to consider when choosing a major. But also don’t overthink them because eventually we’ll all get bored with what we’re doing, just some sooner than others. Begin to think about what you can do with the skills you’ll be learning in your major to contribute to a meaningful cause, and then expand on other skills along the way. Otherwise, you’ll end up having a midlife crisis, and wake up one day realizing that if you died today, nothing would change.