College and Your Future: Why It’s OK to Not Know What You’re Doing

If you’ve ever been at a family event and started a conversation with your extended family whose names you low-key forgot, you’ve probably been asked The Question: “So… what are you doing after high school?” And if you don’t have a perfectly packaged answer involving a specific major, a specific college, and a 10-year plan as the pretty bow to tie it all together, it’s easy to fall behind and feel stressed out. But, here’s the truth: not having everything figured out right now is totally normal, and honestly more common than you might be thinking. 

“I didn’t even pick my major until the end of my freshman year,” said Ella Rodriguez, a current UNLV student and former Coronado graduate. “Everyone around me acted like they had it all figured out. But when I actually got to college, I realized that was kind of a facade, and many people actually did not.”

High school creates this weird, pressuring environment where adults and teachers make students feel as though they are supposed to know exactly what they want to do career-wise, and have their entire futures mapped out by the time they are 18. However, experts say adolescence is literally the stage where people are supposed to be exploring. Interests change, and goals shift. Sometimes even what you thought was your lifelong dream job morphs into your worst nightmare by senior year—and it’s important to understand that that’s A-OK. 

“Teenagers become more exploratory in their behaviors with age,” an NYU study from 2022 states. 

It is totally normal for you to keep your options open and not know what to do. Don’t worry about having everything all figured out right away; there is plenty of time ahead. 

So, if you don’t know what you’d like to major in, where you want to go to college (if you even want to go!), or where you’re supposed to be in 10 years, take a breath. Try not to view high school as a deadline, but instead a starting point. It doesn’t matter if you change your major four times or discover a new passion or spend lots of time on what you thought you wanted to do, because it’s never too late to start. Your future is yours and yours only to build, and it is absolutely alright if you are still designing the blueprint.

Anxious and Confused//Stressing out, many high school students are bombarded with daily activities, work, relationships, and the heaviness of trying to sort out college and their futures. Teachers and counselors apply pressure on the so-called importance of having this figured out—but is that really necessary? (Photo by Audrey Hamatake)