Insanity Descent

Questioning the Future

If there's any one thing I'm preoccupied with, it's DEFINITELY my future. The amount of scenarios I've played out in my head about my future are just... wow. From ending up homeless to ending up rich and famous, I've gone over so many possibile life scenarios I don't keep track of them anymore.

One constant through all those fantasies though is that unless I lost my job in my scenario, I'm a chemist.

Wanting to become a chemist when I grow up is one of the very few things that makes me feel like I have a purpose in life. It's one of the few things that gives me some kind of fulfillment, a reason to live for the future. Without that dream, I lead a pretty meaningless life and depression settles in really damn fast.

But dreams that powerful have a downside. What about if I actually achieve my goal? Will I just kind of... flop? Time and time I've seen it again where I spend thousands of hours working really hard towards something, and then when I finally achieve it I suddenly don't care about it anymore. I might work my way up the ranks in an admin team or simply master a hobby, but once I'm satisfied with my work, that's it. I always set the bar to the highest I ever want it to be, so when I finally get there I don't have anywhere else to go.

What if I should NEVER work towards being a chemist so I never lose that driving force in my life? What if I'm supposed to leave it as just a dream?

But... what if I end up regretting never making the decision to become a chemist knowing I had the full ability to? What if that makes me depressed and hate myself for not achieving a goal when it was fully possible for me? What if that's actually worse than the post-goal depression?

Plus, if I didn't become a chemist, what job am I supposed to get? I have nothing else in mind except for becoming a physicist or a mathematician.

But then I also wonder... what if I end up not actually having the full capacity to comprehend chemistry and I have to drop out? What if it turns out I'm not 'made' for chemistry and then by the time I realize it, it's too late? I'd be buried in student loan debts for the rest of my life! Plus, not to mention I'd be heartbroken if it turned out I was absolutely incapable of learning chemistry when I want to do it so badly. What if the "talent" I have in math and science is an illusion and I'm actually supposed to do something art related? I seem to have various artistic talents and pretty much all of my hobbies include doing some form of art.

But what if I'm super cut out for chemistry and I'm like some superhuman at the subject? What if I end up being so scarily smart that I make some new breakthrough discovery that I otherwise never would've discovered had I not followed my dream?

I wish worrying about the future wasn't so complicated...