I wanted to rock but my dad belittled me until I told him explicitly that “I wanna rock”, somehow saying those words made me spin in place and change into an adult glam rocker. The resulting explosion launched my father (a veteran) thru the roof. All my mother would do to help him was spray him with water.

He died from his injuries

Some people are born with purpose, but for the rest of us, don’t be afraid to try different entry level jobs before deciding. Work in retail, food service, trades, factories, sanitation, whatever! I learned a lot on every job I’ve had, and it helped show me what things I was good at, and what I was really bad at. Some things I thought I would enjoy were torture, and others were better than I expected.

I’m finally somewhere I think I’ll be happy for a long time, but it took all the contacts and experience from my other jobs to get me here.

Good luck, and don’t forget to have fun!

I like legos, so now I’m an engineer.

Don’t let yourself become a caricature of yourself, step outside your self expectations and find ways to face your fears. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do until my mid 20s. You don’t need to plan it all out from the outset, spend some time trying stuff and learning who you are and what you wouldn’t mind spending time on getting good at.

That’s a little too past tense for me, even in my 40s. I originally, as a kid, wanted to be a paleontologist or scientist of some description. That morphed into music education at some point. That went horribly when I realized I hated teaching people who didn’t want to be there and were just trying to get an easy credit. So, having played around with programming as a kid (and having parents in IT-related fields), I ended up switching to computer science. I (mostly) enjoy software engineering, but I also bought a farm last year and now have two jobs. Is this permanent? Is this all there is? I’m not sure that I can commit to answering that (even in the best case where retirement is something I might actually be able to do; being a US citizen abroad is full of annoying for investing in the future and Japanese IT salaries are mostly 1/3 or less of the US version except at big FAANG and the like).

A long string of momentary necessities

The short answer is, whatever you want.

For the longest time I too had no idea, though I knew what I didn’t want to do. I just didn’t want to deal with anyone else’s bullshit.

So i made enough money to have my own place and make my own choices.

For now I recommend you take a Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs approach. Secure the Physiological and Safety Needs and the rest will follow.

In order to do P and S in western society you need to make enough money to pay all your own bills.

I really hated highschool, so avoiding anything remotely like that has been my main guideline.

Still deciding tbh.

So many options:

On one hand, I could be a corrupt lawyer that works for the rich. Or a politician taking bribes.

Or I could consider becoming a drug dealer, and maybe eventually become a mob boss?

I always wonder what’s it like sailing the high seas, maybe visit Somalia to experience that a bit?

Maybe be a Corrupt CEO?

Revolutionary?

Maybe a bit of Terrorism?

Nuclear Dictator?

Hmm idk man…

Choices, choices… hard to decide… 🤔

I’m almost 50 and still don’t know. The best advice I can give is to try lots of things. Very few people just know, and even they didn’t know until they tried.

The only air conditioned room at my first duty station was a closet they called a server room… No one wanted to do the computer stuff when the cool toys were on the airstrip.

As for advice… Don’t be scared, every adult you meet is faking it to some extent and it took me a long time to realize it. Also, be wary of random advice on the internet lol.

I didn’t, I made a career choice early high school to become a lawyer, because it’s arguing with logic and is well paid, then I realized that not only is that quite a competitive field with lots of people going to law school, but I am also not a fan of the social part of it, so I pivoted to Software Engineering late high school and went to University for that, I have been doing that ever since, I enjoy it, it pays well.

As for the rest of my life, I have never really had plans, but I was always nihilistic and I also don’t want kids, so it’s kinda meh, but I have discovered some things I truly love doing, like going to techno parties and such, so I do that.

Then whatever happens will happen.

That’s the neat thing: as an adult, you dont have to decide. You have the rest of your life to figure it out.

Grandfather was a Firefighter. Older sister became an EMT. We watched lots of medical shows growing up. My favorite was a show called: Emergency. It’s about the beginning of the Paramedic program in California. (Not the original paramedic program).

I was hooked. I’ve been in EMS for 38 years. Army Medic '86-'89, EMT '89-'00, Paramedic '00- current. I’m still on the road. Trying to reach 50 years.

I realized I wanted to be a slave because I was born with no money.

It’s a really great life.

If I can ever save more than a few thousand I would love to stop paying half my income in rent and maybe one day own a home. Then I might be able to afford to take a little time off from work