College Goals

originally created on 2024-07-22

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Hi. Bryan here.

So as I said in my last blog, I want to be able to air my (mostly) unfiltered thoughts in this blog. It's almost like a diary of some kind. While I do find it cool that other people might read this stuff, I think that the main benefit of documenting thoughts like these is that I can reflect on my own thinking.

So let's get to the point. My endeavors and goals have changed significantly over the last decade. Recently, I've been thinking over what I wanted to do over the next five years or so. These thoughts are important to me right now specifically because my college situation is a little abnormal; I'll be graduating a little bit early. I have to be able to make a decision of whether or not to enter the job market with my experience (which is...lacking compared to my peers) or stay in school for another year or two to get a master's degree. However, the things that I'm doing right now are completely different from the things that I thought I would be doing when I was a little kid. I wanted to take a moment to recognize that.

History

When I turned ten, I thought that I would pursue a career in music. At that point, I had played the piano for almost six years, and I had developed a talent for it. My entire "resume" at that point was just winning piano competitions, reaching a high level of music theory and excelling in auditions (NJMEA type beat). I didn't think about much more than that. However, everything changed when I encountered video games. Games were one of the biggest reasons that I stopped playing the piano, and I regret my bad choices to this day. However, this was also the beginning of my computer science career. Was this a blessing or a curse? I have no idea.

When I turned thirteen, I thought that I would pursue a career in tennis. I fell in love with the sport pretty early on, and I had played for a couple years at that point. I had some very strict but strong coaches, and I was beginning to play in "small tournaments" at my local tennis club. I had reached an intermediate level in the sport, and I'm sure that I could've been a good tennis player if I had put my all into it. Of course, I still play the sport today, but I am undoubtedly much worse than before.

When I turned sixteen, I thought that I would be a video game developer. At this point, I had been in my high school for two years, and I was pretty dead set on pursuing something in the computer science area. I had been programming small video games (although none of the projects were ever finished) and I loved playing video games as well. Most of my school's curriculum at this point was on microprocessors and programmable logic devices, and we were preparing for our senior design projects. However, I didn't go all in to this idea since I realized that most video game devs never make enough money to...well, live.

Now that I've turned twenty, I realize that I don't know what I really want to do. I have so many things that I could have been. I still play the piano, but I only play casually. I still play tennis, but I only play casually. I still want to make video games, but I can never find enough "time". On one hand, this seems depressing. Who knows what they're supposed to be doing? Technically, I've "wasted" all these years of my life since I haven't made a career (or money) out of anything that I've done so far. However, on the other hand, is that how we are supposed to think of life? I mean, I still enjoy the things that I've learned, and I've definitely made many friends through these now-hobbies. Sure, I didn't ever go professional, but I enjoyed the experience. Is that so wrong?

What Are My Dreams Now?

Now that I'm officially "an adult" and know a bit more about the world, I have a more realistic idea of things that I can achieve in reality. At this moment, I do want to get a job in computer science. I want to continue doing my hobbies. Maybe I'll pick up some new skills. However, in the back of my mind, there's still so many wild dreams.

Most of these dreams are - realistically - completely impossible. I'm too old to start training to be a semi-professional badminton player at this point, and I don't think I'll ever get enough money to own a badminton club. I don't have the talent to be a top osu player, and I'd have to sacrifice way too much at this point in time to permanently move to a different country. That being said, does that mean I should not pursue these dreams? I don't think so.

So Bryan, What's Your Point?

To be honest, this post is kind of a ramble. There's no clean conclusion, but...life has no clean conclusion, so whatever. I mainly wanted to record my goals for when I'm older (see above) since they change so frequently. However, if there's something you really want to take from this post...

Because of my past "non-professional hobbies", I frequently think that I'm wasting my time whenever I'm not chasing something that results in "the progression of life", whether that be money, fame, a career or anything else. I wanted to write this out to remind myself that it's okay to just accept your stupidity and chase your dreams anyway. Even if the results aren't made in the end, it's still worth trying. I have fun doing these things, and I make good friends and good memories. That's probably worth more in my life than anything else anyway.