"A genius stays in school long enough to gain the confidence to succeed in the world"
~~carefulcarpenter

I agree

Since college I have been self-employed most of the time, often working 70-100 hours per week, both doing my own projects and working full-time for other companies.  Many successful and educated people have told that I was smarter than the rest of the engineering students I went to school with; but I didn't see that in myself when I was drenched in academia.  I was still trying to prove to my parents and peers that I was smart and could achieve my goals.

I think the best work I have had in my life has been of the "temporary" nature.  I now go door-to-door when I need work.  Networks are for those with credentials it seems; I have ambition, talent, and self-motivation.  These are the qualities that most parents want their children to learn, and will subsidize them for years in college for them to learn them. The more money, the more subsidy.  You've heard of the "professional student"?  This is a well-focused individual that perceives great personal gains for their eventual achievement, but in the meantime academics is a proving ground to them that they are going to be somebody in life.  We are all born somebody if we could only see beyond the illusions that society creates for our sense of security.  Going door-to-door, whether house-to-house or office-to-office, it all comes down to whether you believe in yourself enough to risk being yourself.

One day I knocked on the door at the home of an exucutive head-hunter. Within a minute i sensed I had a job rebuilding his front porch.  He called me that night to confirm his desire to hire me. How did I know he was going to do that?  Intuition!  You can't teach that at uni.  Near the end of the two week project I had landed another job from a neighbor who stopped over to talk with me.  He had also been an executive for a major local company; now I had two more weeks worth of work.  Since that time I have seldom been out of work doing what I love doing--serving others and receiving fair compensation AND respect.  They both respect a motivated person who can get a job done independent of their supervision. Yet at their work they depend on people who will stay for years on end BECAUSE they need structure and guidance.  The employment exec complimented me by telling me about a common occurance for him; he said that he makes around $20,000 to find an executive level person a job BECAUSE they can't do what I essentially CAN--"knock on doors".

I'm glad for the time I spent in college, so for me: I'd give it a try sometime before circumstances takes control and gets one on the train to a life achieved by "default". There are different paths for different people--remember that! I've taken the "North Face of Life".

"A genius stays in school long enough to gain the confidence to succeed in the world"
~~carefulcarpenter

Before you go to sleep at night, ask the question to the dream world. And when you awake, write down your dreams. Keep writing them down, every day, the answer will be there. But make sure you write them down. I have found that the dream that contains the message is not always part of the dream (s) that we remember apon awakening. The unremembered dream may be seperate from the unconsious mind. It possibly exists at a different level. But writing down the other dreams trigger your memory of the higher dream that contains the answer.

For example, about a week ago I was writing down a dream when I awoke - which triggered the memory of another dream that I dreamt - that happened AFTER the experience of the dream i was writing down. And it had the answer I was looking for! But I couldn't remember it when I awoke in the morning even though it was the last experience I had while in the dream world that night/morning. It was too "high," I guess, maybe.

Also, as you awake every day, pose your question to the universe and then pay attention throughout the day. Waking reality is symoblic and metaphorical and miraculous!   

personally, I don't think you should let the fear of debt stop you if you really want to go. 

aNDRE dILOn

Thanks for your comments. Honestly I'm no closer to knowing whether or not going to uni is the right thing for me to do - and I probably won't know until I get there, or even until I've finished there, with hindsight - but it's always helpful to hear the perspectives of people who are more like me, rather than "mainstream" people like parents or teachers.

Well, you can always try and then if you decide you can't take it anymore, you can leave.  Then if you change your mind later, go back.  Sometimes kids need to have a break after highschool, go out and live life, work and see the world for a bit, instead of launching straight into college. 

Amen to that!     I just remembered something actually.................................When I was 15 is when I decided "I'm not going to college."  Up til that point it had been assumed I was going...by my parents. Not me.  I mean, to the point where my mom was even telling me with her bugged out crazy eyes and frozen stoney face, "You're going to college!  And you'l be an ENGLISH MAJOR!!!!"

Uh, yeah, okay there crazy.  Whatever.   By 15, almost 16, I started fighting back and declaring, NO, I'm NOT going to college.   I mean, what the hell...it's not like they could afford to put me through school anyway.  They were lower middle class people living on a moderate income, going through a divorce on top of it.  Where is this college money coming from??   ????    (My parents had a repeating habit of not thinking about things....they just made blind bad choice after blind bad choice, with no planning or real forthought involved.  This was another one of those fly-by-the-seat-of-your pants ideas that sounded good, but which had no real foundation to prop it up.  Their typical repeating method of operation.)   

So then one night we were having an all out argument about this.  I remember standing in my room, I don't know how it started or why my parents were even in my room - normally we all just stayed away from each other by that point and did our own thing  - but nevertheless, somehow they were both in my room tag teaming me, taking turns yelling and lecturing that I was GOING to go to college!  No I'm not.  Yes you ARE!   No, I'm NOT.  Yes, you ARE!   Back and forth..........finally there was silence and my dad just looked at me with this hateful look and sneered at me,

"What are you gonna do?  Become a WAITRESS?"

It was the hate that drove it - and the knowing sneer that made me just gaze at him blankly, like, Huh.  Interesting.   My dad had a bit of psychic in him and saw bits and blurbs of future happenings.  Whether they were valid or not, I don't know, (I tend to think that mostly they were inaccurate...) but I got the impression that he knew more then he was letting on.  Hence the knowing sneer and tone.   Enough so that I figured, Well, I guess that's what I end up doing in the future.  !  And it sounded perfectly okay by me.  I didn't see what the big deal was with being a waitress.

And you know what?  That's exactly what I ended up doing.     In highschool I was already working in restaurants as a hostess/cashier, and my big goal was to move up to server.  Woohoo!   And I did.  And over time I became damn good at what I did, too many compliments to count, getting 25, 30, 40, sometimes even 50 (!) percent tips.  Point being, there was this material/status/respect thing driving their decision on my behalf that I was GOING to go to college.....and the accompanying disdain at the idea of being a "lowly" waitress.  And just like you noted, they were EXTREMELY EXTREMELY spiritually dead and EXTREMELY EXTREMELY unhappy with themselves and their lives.  Exactly like you noticed.  Very spot on insight.   They both hated themselves, each other, they hated my brother and I, everybody around them and life in general.   

Well.......how about classes at a community college geared specifically towards learning about business?   Stuff that would pertain to how to run your own shop?   You could eliminate all the unnecessary subjects that are worthless, focus on what is actually relevent to what you want to do, and additionally, start finding small business owners to talk to, to find out what they did and how they did it.  Get advise and pointers.  Everybody does things differently, so compile together a group of small business people to find out their unique ways of going about things.   It's a good compromise!   

If I could choose any job, I think I'd like to either run a health food store or be some kind of spiritual/holistic counsellor. I wouldn't know where to start with either of those things though. I'm not a very enterprising or go-getting kind of person, so the thought of going out into the big wide world all on my own and setting up a business sounds pretty daunting to me!

If those ideas appeal to you then probably the best thing you can do is try and find work in those places. Setting up a business on your own without any experience is probably not a great idea, particularly if you're not entirely sure if you'll enjoy it. So, why not contact all the health food stores within a 5-10 mile radius from where you live, and ask them if they can give you a job or if they'll keep your name on file if a job becomes available in the near future.

Also try natural health centres, perhaps as admin/receptionist initially, which may be a bit boring but at least you'd come into contact with a lot of therapists/counsellors so you can get to know them and learn how they operate.

I know quite a lot about the holistic/natural health industry, particularly here in the UK if that's where you are, so you're welcome to email me privately if you need more specific information or contacts. I also run www.holisticlocal.co.uk which is a good place to network with thousands of people who are running holistic/ethical businesses.

Andy

Firstly, I'd like to echo Lyra's sentiment about not needing respect from society. In fact I'd rather it didn't respect me at all than only respect me for something as shallow as my qualifications, what do they count for anyway in the grand scheme of things? It's actually really irritated me in the past, the feeling that my family only approve of me because I did well at school or because I got however many A-grades in my exams. I hate this culture of needing to achieve certain things or earn a certain amount of money or get a high-powered job to prove that you ARE somebody. In my experience, people who have the most material success are often spiritually dead and not even that content with their lives.

If I could choose any job, I think I'd like to either run a health food store or be some kind of spiritual/holistic counsellor. I wouldn't know where to start with either of those things though. I'm not a very enterprising or go-getting kind of person, so the thought of going out into the big wide world all on my own and setting up a business sounds pretty daunting to me!

I've also thought about joining a monastery (do women join monasteries?!) or some kind of spiritual institution because I really have no desire to be a part of mainstream society and all that that involves, ie. earning money, paying bills, going shopping, getting married, having kids, etc. etc. On the other hand, a spiritual community might not be right for me either as I'm a very independent person and don't like having beliefs & rules imposed on me. But this is a whole other matter, so let's get back on track...

I was enrolled in university for two years, and ended up attending about 3-6 weeks of classes total.  The environment is pretty cool, if you're into the whole scene.  It wasn't for me though.  I've learned more away from school than I ever did and will in school.  And now I can say that I feel free, and am closer to being than I've ever been in a long time.

I attempted university twice and left both times because I was far more interested in life than what went on in school. I was already naturally intelligent (most of us are; the trick is to know this about ourselves, and trust it), self-governed and a self-starter with creative talent, which amounted to an inability to be treated the way students typically are by the system. I found the university environment stifling and controlling in ways that did not serve me, but certainly served something... an agenda I didn't condone.

I also temped quite a bit until I segued that work into a business of my own, which I enjoyed a whole lot. I was never a very good follower of anything, including other people's company policies and business practices. So when I started my own business, I got to own my integrity, dictate how my business life was conducted, with whom, how often and for how much, etc. Much more my style. And I had no issues at all with not having a degree of higher education. I can't really explain that except perhaps my natural intelligence and demeanor? It never came up for most situations to begin with, and when it did just about anyone was genuinely surprised to discover I had no degrees, and it often equated to them having more respect for me, not less. I never lacked for clients or work, and when you care about your product (yourself, pretty much, in entrepreneurship), it shows... my reputation and word of mouth kept me in business more than anything else (I no longer have a business-oriented occupation, btw. Life took me elsewhere after a while).

If you already know how to think for yourself and learn, explore and discover what interests you, you may not need the structure of university to launch yourself in the world, somehow. Temping, again, is a wonderful "captain of your own ship" way of being in that world but not of it, frankly. And it can easily provide openings and opportunities for you to carve out something for yourself, eventually. Find a need and fill it, kind of thing. That's pretty much what I did, and it has served me well.

Best to you in making your decision! Remember nothing's ever really set in stone. You can try something just to find out if it's for you or not... and then make a different choice, and another one, and another one...

~ Sowelu

At this point I'm quite happy with what I'm doing.  Temping in offices is not for everybody, and I'm not making $75,000 a year.........but I'm not willing to go through what others go through in order to make $75K a year.   I can't, it'll kill my soul.   I can not sit there and learn subjects I'm not interested in.  I tried twice, and left college twice because of that.   I can't can't can't do it.  I had this biology class and lab at Saddleback Valley Community college in Mission Viejo CA back in '94 with a teacher that droned on and on and on in this monotone way, soulless and bland, and I couldn't sit still.  I kept getting up to leave to go to the rest room and walk around outside aimlessly as an excuse to just to get away.   I felt like I was wasting my life and my money.  It was pointless.   And the architecture of that place, especially the library...........it was like prison.   Big fortress looking place with minimal windows.   We talked about that before here at NR, how so many of these community/technical/art etc. colleges are designed like prisons.  And so I finally left.  (I was 20 at the time.  Now I'm 32.)  I never regretted my decision.   The weird part was, grade-wise I was doing fine.  I was taking Algebra, Humanities, Biology, script writing, and other assorted general ed classes and getting A's, with a B in algebra.   But sitting through those classes....doing work I didn't enjoy, forced to read books I didn't give two craps about, learning subjects that I don't like, listening to teachers with bad presentations.........and the Humanities class.............she wanted us to pair up in these little groups and do these little group projects...........just like we were in highschool.  There was no difference.   It was highschool for "adults."

And that's the most important thing to note.  Can one endure what's expected of college?   It has its pros as some have outlined, but it also has its cons, including having to take courses you don't enjoy and can't stomach, with no choice in the matter because it's a stipulation of getting your degree.  There's also the strenuous workload, late nights writing papers, cramming for tests (again, often times on subjects that are of no interest to you or stuff you may even outright disagree with..)  all of which does drain people.   People come out of college different from how they were when they went in, and it's not always for the better.   They often seem flattened, deadened.   I have personal experience with people who had the life sucked out of them at school.  It wasn't pretty!   

When we're out and about here in town we see college kids all over the place, studying at cafes and coffeeshops, since there's the University of Virginia here.   Each and every time I have a personal shudder and feel so thankful that I'm not them.   I don't envy them hunched over books, looking miserable.   And they usually always look pretty miserable.    I feel like I'm free.  I temp in offices, I make what I need to survive with money left over to save...............I have no college debts and student loans to pay off.  I'm free.  They're not.   

Society pummels us with programming that we can't make it in this world without a college degree.  Well, I did.  And I'm doing better than many college grads are, actually.   Ratio-wise, I seem to actually be on par with what they're making many times......if not more so.  Because they have loans and debts they have to pay off, mortgages and car payments, credit cards and sometimes even kids.  All this stuff I don't have.   So I make less......but yet I may actually be making more than they are in life after you figure in all their expenses they have to pay for that I don't have.  They followed society's programming and look where it got them.   Even worse.........often times they're competing with people like me for jobs.    Now what's THAT all about?  !!   Isn't a college degree supposed to net you higher range jobs?   Not anymore, apparently.  People graduate school and find themselves competing with people like me, or taking jobs they hate that have nothing at all to do with their majors, just so they can HAVE a job.   That's not what having a degree is supposed to do.  Isn't having a degree supposed to pretty much guarantee well paying jobs in your chosen major?     

There are exceptions to every rule and there are college grads who have fulfilling careers making $100-200K a year, with the "respect" that goes with it, but I still wouldn't trade places with them.   I don't need society's respect - it wants to look down on me because I don't have a degree?   Shrug.  That's their problem, not mine.  They have a lot to learn.   Also their lives have stress that I don't have.  They paid a price in my opinion.   Do they have all this free time to just lay around, knitting, going for walks in the woods, sipping tea, reading, writing, etc.?  No.  People are always running around stressed in this life wishing they had time to do the things I do.   So I don't envy them.   I dress way nicer than a lot of these college grads who are supposed to be making more money than me, I have more free time and less stress overall.    But society said that the route I took was the wrong way to go.  That I'd fail in life.     My highschool teacher warned us so many times, "If you don't go to college you'll wind up driving the Hostess HoHo's truck!!!!!!!!!!!!!"   (good ol' Mrs. Marietta...what a character!  )  Well, I didn't go to collge...and I'm not driving the HoHos truck. 

I carved out a nice little niche for myself in life with office work, which isn't for everybody.  So my only recommendation for somebody who's considering not going to school is to think of what you'd be doing instead.  I accidentally fell into the things I'm doing, living an accidental life, but it all worked out.  So, what about you?  What would you be doing instead?

(Hmm... thinking about what i just said, i think what i meant to say is that i wouldn't pander to societies expectations of me, if it hindered my spiritual development. Society and even our parents can be part of the STS system, so conforming is not the way to evolve, it really wouldn't be helping others, if you reinforced their STS behaviours, by not doing what they say, it may shake them into having more intropection/extrospection, when they realise you're way(potensially) worked better and is soemthing they want.)

Universities and most education systems are really just deisgned to keep ones consciouness low, see how alot of supposedly educted people, don't really seem all that bright, surelye alot aren't bery objective.

The systems been design for the predators above to take advantage of, you'd kind of be submitting yourself to the PTB.

Time spent is classrooms that may dull imagination and inspiration, even if it's something you enjoy, doesn;t sound all that appealing and not all that condusive to education and mental growth.

You could easily learn anything and everything that's taught in uni's in a way that suits is inspiring and fulfilling, from self education, this without the stressof classes and exams(although again this may not be stress or un fun, could be quite the opposite) at the price of real quilaifications, but as you mentioned your not the drone office worker type.

Learning by yourself, growing mentally, doing soemthing you enjoy and is fulfilling would surely please you're parents more, when they see you're joy and well developed character and personaility.

If they are good people i'm sure they would treasure this far more than having a repressed but well(subjective) educated daughter...

If that isn't want they want for you then they are part of a system of things that may not be condusive to your spiritual growth...

Another note is that blokes(and women) are predators, times have change since maybe others have been to Uni's and all uni's are different also, but we're in a predatory system in the height of it's current time cycle.

Maye you should try going for a while, then make up your mind?

Just a few thoughts that came to me,

Miles.

I’m actually at uni at the moment in my second year studying commerce. My degree is three years so I finish next year but I can do another Honours year if I wanted to. Looking back, I’ve wondered if studying this was the optimal thing to do at this stage in my life. In my last year of high school I despised what I’m actually doing now but now I don’t actually mind it. Maybe I’ve been numbed by the experience.

I had a lot of degree options to choose from and I couldn’t decide which way was the best way to go. I thought maybe an Arts/Science degree with a major in philosophy and maths would be a generalist approach. I could have got a double degree with Law if I pursued it enough. However I ended up with Commerce. I studied the maths/science subjects in high school so I had no idea about business, the economy or what the hell an interest rate was. Now, I’m learning about micro and macro economics, a little accounting, finance, some scientific programming, a lot of pure and applied maths, probability and statistics, a management subject, and financial maths. I majored early with my major called Actuarial studies – pretty dry to say the least. However I’ve learnt a lot about the business world and I’m actually glad I learnt all that stuff.

After I graduate I might work in a corporate environment (!!!) because that’s where the money is! Although I will be self-employed on the side, implementing whatever ideas I have. Working for someone else just isn’t sustainable in this society at this present time. Once you are able to take care of yourself and are street smart, work for yourself.

From my experience here are a few benefits of learning business/commerce:
*You know what an economy is and how it works to an extent (economics)
*You can easily understand how to invest in shares for example (finance)
*You could start your own business (accounting)
*You can haggle and learn how to get the best deals for home loans, credit options etc (finance)
*Control over your financial life and being at ease and having clarity about where your money is going and how it’s going to help you. A key concept here would be that the first chunk of money you earn is going to be the hardest. After you have a certain amount of money, it’s easier to get more money because by then you would have financial investments/securities which make money for you. Money making money sounds divine doesn’t it. 

One piece of advice I’ve taken aboard is you can do more than one thing at a time. So if you are at uni, you might have other pursuits on the side. You could learn how to draw, learn to play an instrument, work, learn and practise spirituality. Going to college doesn’t mean you just go to college. As Aya said before he did a lot of self-learning while at college. I would recommend that highly if you desire to choose the college path. If you don’t, then it’s even more important ?. From my perspective, a lot of the stuff being taught in my degree isn’t too useful, but it has given me fresh perspectives on things that I wouldn’t normally come across on my own. I do recommend college for everything else it offers though: the people and the activities.

Some people have treated uni as a game. Steve Pavlina who is a personal development teacher is a good example. He completed a science degree majoring in maths and computer science in 3 semesters! I would love to do that but the beaurecracy here at my uni wouldn’t let anyone do that.
Another benefit of having a degree is the amount of recognition you get from others. Adama said above it acts like a ‘shield’ and I think it would. You might also have more self-respect if you completed a degree. If you treated it as a game and had a goal in mind of what you wanted to achieve in your degree and achieved it, then for me that is great. Keep in mind though, having a degree doesn’t mean anything to an employer. The employer only hires those who can do the job and do it well. That’s if you want to be employed in the first place. If you wanted to work for yourself, then you might need some business skills and ideas to implement. Most of this would come from self-learning I believe.

On the subject of money, although many people think that having the bare minimum amount of money is ok, it certainly isn’t comfortable. Money isn’t evil and it has its uses. Having a good grip on where you finances is integral to not only your physical but also psychological wellbeing. Having a couple million dollars in the bank does make you feel good. Here is a good list of why money is important and what it’s good for:

Money can buy pleasure, but it can’t buy happiness.
Money can buy knowledge, but it can’t buy culture.
Money can buy abundance, but it can’t buy contentment.
Money can buy entertainment, but it can’t buy wit.
Money can buy beauty, but it can’t buy true appreciation of beauty.
Money can buy comfort, but it can’t buy friendship.
Money can buy security and the remove the fear of want. It can’t buy serenity.

~quoted from Make Your Life Worth Living by Grenville Kleiser

I hope that helps!

Yang

It's a shame you're not interested in your course because I personally think Uni can be a worthwhile experience, not so much because of the education but just the whole general experience. It's a place where you can experience rapid growth as a person because you'll come into contact with a whole range of different people.

I had a fantastic three years at uni which I don't regret for a moment, but thankfully I did a really interesting course that actually gave me some useful skills I've been able to use out in the real world, doing work that I've mostly enjoyed.

Having said that, I don't think my actual degree ever played a role in getting me a job. I've only ever had one proper job since leaving university which was doing computer graphics, and I got that job because of what I was capable of doing (and most of that was stuff I taught myself in my spare time while at uni). Now that I'm self employed my qualification is simply not an issue anymore and not something I even mention to people.

If the whole uni experience doesn't appeal to you, and if all you're going for is the education then I'm not sure if I would bother going, particularly if it's a course that doesn't give you any real-world skills that might one day be useful to you.

Probably the best thing you can do right now is try to and figure out what you would like to do with your life (hard I know!!). Clearly you know what you don't want (ie office/corporate work). But if you can figure out what you DO want then you will put yourself in a very powerful position because then you can work out what you need to do to achieve that. It may be that you won't need to go to university at all, or it may mean that you need to switch to a different course (it's probably not too late for that).

It might be a good idea to take a gap year right now and spend a year figuring out what you want to do. There's no reason why you need to go straight to uni after leaving school and many people take a year out inbetween.

Clearly you're an intelligent person so I doubt you'll want to end up doing meaningless McJobs that pay you just enough money to survive on. Once you have an idea of what you want to do then it's very likely that you'll need to learn a skill, get work experience, or get some kind of qualification/higher education in order to do it. Chances are you won't need a university degree, but even if you do then at least you'll be doing it because you know it's what you want to do and the whole experience will become worthwhile.

Whatever you do, I strongly advise that you don't let your parents influence your desicion too much. If you go to uni simply to please them then you'll most likely have a miserable four years.

Hope that helps

Andy