What did you do after graduating high school/turning 18?

[Rome96]

I like reading about peoples' experiences when they were my age. It's especially interesting when people don't choose the conventional route and do their own thing.

Just watched the movie "Into the Wild". Kind of feel like fucking it all and just running away now that college is approaching. Might be too much of a coward for that though . I think it'd be fun, for a few months at least.

Anyways, share your story.

 

[Hawkeye]

Went back into education for 10 years.

Eternal student

 

[Affinity]

I flipped out not knowing what I wanted to do with my life. Partied hard and met a lot of people. Got kicked out of the house. Then eventually went to college.

If you're planning on doing something crazy, I say now is the time to do it. I'm 26 now and feel too imprisoned by my responsibilities but yet I still have that desire to just say fuck it, go explore the world and go on an adventure.

If you are curious as to how you can travel on a limited budget, check these out...
https://www.couchsurfing.org
http://www.wwoof.net

There was another work exchange site that I recalled similar to wwoof but geared more towards working at a bed and breakfast, I can't seem to find it however. Anyways, hope you go do something cool!

 

[TimeAsylums]

My father and mother have been in the US military for 20 and 21 years, respectively.

I have known them both for less than ~8 discontinuous years each of my current 20 year life span.

After I turned 18/high-school graduation, my father took me on both a bailk-bayan (filipino for "return to country"), and a trip around the world (lol, SE / E Asia). (I am Filipino and Nicaraguan).

Thus, we traveled to Thailand, The Philippines, Malaysia, Japan, Cambodia, and South Korea in a time span of two months during the summer after I graduated.


In two months time, I had never had the ability to feel so ... "lost."

I saw some realities of ?third?/?second? world countries e.g., skin-and-bones people, but more importantly, skin-and-bones babies crawling on concrete streets and a lot of people either begging or attempting to scam you (We didn't just stay in the metropolises or tourist areas), seeing babies and children crawling around on the fucking street near dangerous things (roads, cars, etc) made me fucking sick to my stomach and I think I (subconsciously) refused to eat anything for ~2 weeks, I lost 15lbs because I was sick to my stomach.

Yeah, you can easily imagine third world realities in your head, our watch youtube videos, or some shit, but being right fucking there, in the flesh, it fucking disgusts you infinitely more.

However, that was only one part of the trip, the other of course, the "lost" part was fun.

In the Phillipines I met relatives from generation(s) past, ~30 people living in a single concrete house etc.

In the Phillipines + the other countries, traveling was cool as fuck yo. Both the touristy and non touristy.

No fuckin cell phone or technology for 2 months was...awesome. Just fucking...there.


It should be noted that I have never-ever-ever felt "culture-shock," ( I chock it up the the meta-realization of diff cultures/environments)



Edit: Oh, I live in CO, USA currently, slightly relevant to the traveling

 

[Pyropyro]

Studied a lot and prayed a lot then took the entrance exams for the most prestigious universities in the country. Fortunately, I was accepted in one of them.

After I turned 18/high-school graduation, my father took me on both a bailk-bayan (filipino for "return to country"), and a trip around the world (lol, SE / E Asia). (I am Filipino and Nicaraguan).

Really? I can never guess that.

In two months time, I had never had the ability to feel so ... "lost."

I saw some realities of third world countries e.g., skin-and-bones people, but more importantly, skin-and-bones babies crawling on concrete streets and a lot of people either begging or attempting to scam you (We didn't just stay in the metropolises or tourist areas), seeing babies and children crawling around on the fucking street near dangerous things (roads, cars, etc) made me fucking sick to my stomach and I think I (subconsciously) refused to eat anything for ~2 weeks, I lost 15lbs because I was sick to my stomach.

Yeah, you can easily imagine third world realities in your head, our watch youtube videos, or some shit, but being right fucking there, in the flesh, it fucking disgusts you infinitely more.

Welcome to my world

In the Phillipines I met relatives from generation(s) past, ~30 people living in a single concrete house etc.

That's rather common even in more well-off families. Usually, the leaders of the household are the parents, the eldest child (probably) and the grandparents. Should they have adult children, it is not unusual for such children's family to stay in the family house. They may separate and start their own houses though once they're more financially able.

Honestly, this is probably why I find it odd that you guys find it dishonorable for adult children to stay on their parent's homes unless of course they are not pulling their own weight.

 

[TimeAsylums]

Honestly, this is probably why I find it odd that you guys find it dishonorable for adult children to stay on their parent's homes unless of course they are not pulling their own weight.

Economics man...economics...

 

[Lot]

I started going to community college. Ended up failing some classes. Met the leader of the cult I joined a few years later. After getting my Associates degree, I stopped my schooling.

Really wish I would have spent some time living life, back then. World of Warcraft, and being scared of girls, sorta ruined my fun.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

Pissed away two years of college on a major that didn't really fit me, now I'm trying again with a little more discipline. I feel like I'm wasting my youth but I'm slowly starting to take advantage of being over the age of majority.

 

[deadpixel]

Was worried about finding a girl I could settle down with and starting a family. After none of that worked out the way it should have I started partying, goofing around a lot, and being immature. My life finally started only becoming stable only at age 25(ill be 28 in july)

 

[PhoenixRising]

Just watched the movie "Into the Wild". Kind of feel like fucking it all and just running away now that college is approaching.

This made me smile when I read it. Reminds me so much of when I was 18 the summer after high school graduation ^^

I took my first college course that summer, and we happened to read "Into The Wild". I was so enamored with Chris McCandless' story that I nearly dropped out to pursue a nomadic life. I regret so much not following that adventurous impulse - I think I could have grown so much more as a person if I had taken the time to experience the world and find my self.

My advice.. Do it! Just go =D Experience the world before society weighs you down, and your whole life passes by without you even noticing it.

 

[doncarlzone]

I went abroad to work for a company and after a year they persuaded to stay by giving me a promotion. Two years later they gave me another promotion which was based in another country - now five years later I have returned to my native country and will be going to college.

That's the short version. I suppose that's a bit unconventional. At least the government in our country does everything they can to prevent people from doing what I did. They want people to go straight to college, however, looking back now, I probably would have picked the wrong course and only realized that years later.

By the way, my intention was only to stay abroad one year and I didn't really stay for the work, but for the interesting personal life I was suddenly experiencing.

Good luck.

 

[Polaris]

Disillusioned and bored, I moved out of home ASAP and enrolled in a useless university course which I didn't even complete because I was busy getting distracted by other things like philosophy, psychology and delving headlong into the world of occultism. This was a reaction to the extremely rational/pragmatic/restrained upbringing I received by my parents (mainly my ESTJ mother) -- I even picked up cigarette smoking, shock-horror. I started dressing in black and cut my hear ultra-short because every female in my class were loud and aggressive high-school cheerleader types who liked to congregate in gossiping groups like gaggles of geese.

I never completed my exams and took off to the Arctic and then back down south, doing various jobs in hotels, ski resorts and bars.

I bummed around for another year and then got sick of the sensory lifestyle -- so I applied to uni while wintering over at an Arctic Archipelago. Got back to the mainland all stunned and marked by my experiences in the extreme wilderness and threw myself headlong into possibly the worst choice of course I could have dreamed up. Completed it in a sort of trance and ended up in the Arctic again three years later where I did absolutely nothing related to my degree for two years. But I managed to pay off my student loan doing various jobs.

Then I moved to Australia. Still here. The nomadic lifestyle has marked me for good - I'm feeling restless again....

 

[PmjPmj]

Enrolled on an NVQ course for business administration (ever the directionless soul) and enjoyed pissing my savings up a wall by going out drinking with friends every Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

It was brief, however; at age 19, World of Warcraft was released... that was pretty much my social life over for the next 6 years

I've tried going back into education to no avail. For multiple reasons I can't be bothered listing right now, the education system / academia in general does not sit well with me; I shall carve my own path to success.

 

[deadpixel]

This was a reaction to the extremely rational/pragmatic/restrained upbringing I received by my parents (mainly my ESTJ mother)

My mother was an ESTJ and she was anything but rational, she was more worried about being right even if it meant being wrong than the truth. She was also a control freak, none of her rules/the way she wanted things to be made any sense to me, and had a hard time accepting that children eventually grow up. She loved talking crap about people unless it was one of her friends or clients and didnt listen to anybody's opinion but their own and maybe the few people that they "respect".

 

[Base groove]

I had already completed my first year of uni when I turned 18. I went to school for 3 more years after that and dropped out after a miserable 4th year where I was distracted and not caring. I didn't even care that I had 117/120 credits (and my school wanted me to show a truckload of commitment to make up the lost ground). Then I got a job as a manager at a restaurant, began probing one of the waitresses, promptly quit, briefly experimented with multi-level-marketing, lost all my savings, and got a job in blue collar trade work 2 days before my 22nd birthday. It's been almost four years since then and I've probably had almost 100 jobs in my trade alone. It sucks, but, now I'm good at it. The standards to learn a trade completely are 4 years (work plus school) in my country however my trade doesn't require any certification, so most people don't bother. I learned it in just under 2 years and then spent the next two years convincing people I deserved more $$ (not because I was faster but because I was better. Try explaining that to ST types. :S)

Things are better now. I tend to think if I would have gone for Engineering instead of a BS in Psych. I might have been able to graduate as I was quite talented at math at the time and might have been more interested in the course material.

My mother was an ESTJ and she was anything but rational, she was more worried about being right even if it meant being wrong than the truth. She was also a control freak, none of her rules/the way she wanted things to be made any sense to me, and had a hard time accepting that children eventually grow up. She loved talking crap about people unless it was one of her friends or clients and didnt listen to anybody's opinion but their own and maybe the few people that they "respect".

Maybe your mother is an ESFJ. I thought my mother was ESTJ for a while and had a pretty similar description of her personality...

 

[Polaris]

^You have my deepest sympathies.

My mother is an ardent skeptic, which was the result of losing her faith in the church at a young age after witnessing hypocricy in a catholic children's home she had to live in while her mother was ill. The funny thing is, she never lost her faith in God as such, or so she tried to convince me - however, I always thought she was grasping at straws for lack of anything to believe in as she is such a hard-nosed rationalist at heart. I therefore never bought into the religious thing as it didn't seem to me to be anything other than poorly masked disillusionment on her part.

Oddly enough, my father (INFP/INTP?) was open to everything, but he was anything but religious. He had numerous religious texts on everything from Hinduism to the Book of Mormons and even Mao's Little Red- which led me to a great deal of pondering on the nature of religion/beliefs. (Yeah, I compared communism to religion after reading Mao).

I felt lost. Still do, but when you are that young it feels like being adrift at sea. You become aimless and motivation is a distant shore out of sight.

So I threw myself into the more esoteric things because I wanted to find out - and I found nothing. My mother was right, or so I bitterly conceded.

I often wished that I didn't have this inherent skepticism. I would have liked to believe in something.

But yeah, my mother did display those tendencies you mentioned - a need to be correct, no matter what. And this utalitarian approach to everything. Her pride often got the better of her rational side, which made me even more rebellious.

Edit: that was directed at cooper, btw.

 

[Architect]

I felt lost. Still do, but when you are that young it feels like being adrift at sea. You become aimless and motivation is a distant shore out of sight.

So I threw myself into the more esoteric things because I wanted to find out - and I found nothing. My mother was right, or so I bitterly conceded.

I often wished that I didn't have this inherent skepticism. I would have liked to believe in something.

There's plenty to believe in, all around you! We're creating a literal Heaven on Earth every day. Imagine showing how you live to somebody from 2,000 years ago. You have clean food, clean water, health care, dental care, can easily find challenging, intellectual work, the system of law is rational and not arbitrary and have the knowledge of mankind at your finger tips. Why not believe in man's ability to make things better?

Present day America is like a more interesting Heaven without the judging overseer.

To OP, I took a conventional route. Went to a year of music school, dropped out and did a retread into science, then eventually went into Engineering. Best thing I could have done, I'm glad I didn't do anything unconventional, as it turned out.

 

[deadpixel]

^You have my deepest sympathies.

My mother is an ardent skeptic, which was the result of losing her faith in the church at a young age after witnessing hypocricy in a catholic children's home she had to live in while her mother was ill. The funny thing is, she never lost her faith in God as such, or so she tried to convince me - however, I always thought she was grasping at straws for lack of anything to believe in as she is such a hard-nosed rationalist at heart. I therefore never bought into the religious thing as it didn't seem to me to be anything other than poorly masked disillusionment on her part.

Oddly enough, my father (INFP/INTP?) was open to everything, but he was anything but religious. He had numerous religious texts on everything from Hinduism to the Book of Mormons and even Mao's Little Red- which led me to a great deal of pondering on the nature of religion/beliefs. (Yeah, I compared communism to religion after reading Mao).

I felt lost. Still do, but when you are that young it feels like being adrift at sea. You become aimless and motivation is a distant shore out of sight.

So I threw myself into the more esoteric things because I wanted to find out - and I found nothing. My mother was right, or so I bitterly conceded.

I often wished that I didn't have this inherent skepticism. I would have liked to believe in something.

But yeah, my mother did display those tendencies you mentioned - a need to be correct, no matter what. And this utalitarian approach to everything. Her pride often got the better of her rational side, which made me even more rebellious.

Edit: that was directed at cooper, btw.

WOW I can totally relate to that completely, my mom is an ESTJ and my dad is an INTP.... not the best combination. My mom is from vietnam and has very traditional values and while my dad is american(german/french/italian), My mom is very strict and if it weren't for my dad I probably would have gone crazy.

I was born roman catholic and went to private catholic schools my whole life and once I hit the 6th grade I would annoy my religeon teacher with questions they wouldn't know how to answer and they would always just end up with "You just need to have faith" as the answer.

As far as religion goes, There are two ways of looking at the world, Through faith and superstition. Or, through the rigors of LOGIC, OBSERVATION, and EVIDENCE. As an INTP my natural instincts only allow me to go with option 2, Christianity is nothing more than a adaptation of PAGAN beliefs, thats all that it ever was and all it ever will be.

 

[deadpixel]

Maybe your mother is an ESFJ. I thought my mother was ESTJ for a while and had a pretty similar description of her personality...

Its something ive considered, but her F is close to non existent and she does think but not in the way that we do, its not contemplative thinking.

 

[Base groove]

Its something ive considered, but her F is close to non existent and she does think but not in the way that we do, its not contemplative thinking.

Interesting. Non existent F is strong indication of dominant T.

 

[deadpixel]

Interesting. Non existent F is strong indication of dominant T.

Its hard to explain her way of thinking, its really strange. She is good at things like math but she isnt good with new ideas, theory, or philosophy.

 

[deadpixel]

I guess to her things like ideas and theories dont matter because she already has an idea of the way things should be so that is irrelevant to her.

 

[Ex-User (9086)]

I went to the demanding engineering course, dropped out, worked half a year with the intention of returning and finishing my engineering degree. Later at the age of 19 I decided that I want to focus more on the programming and ignore the electric circuits and physics, so I gave up on what I was studying again. In the meantime I started working as a freelancer and wonderfully enough I got some big requests that helped me prove my ESTJ mother that I can do something on my own to sustain myself, it seems that there are many ESTJ mothers out there.

I can agree on most of the points, I also see how my mother is a non-practicing catholic and she doesn't go to the church using the excuse that she is divorced and as such will not be accepted in the community, which is convenient for her. She has some great qualities, she can perform on the responsible and managment positions and climbs the career path pretty well, but she lacks feeling and her attempts at understanding why I have rejected what she did with her life at my age usually make her depressed or passive-aggressive. She is proud, she refuses to accept or listen to the negative information and hates any form of discussion often reducing it to the ridicule of the philosophical aspects.

Currently (20 yo) I enrolled on the extramural CS course, mostly to get the proficiency-confirming paper, I have 5 free days in a week when I work on freelancing or study and expand things from my list.

 

[Analyzer]

Went to college planning a medical career - dropped that after 2 years.

 

[Variform]

I didn't know what to do with my life. I never figured it out. So I started what you would do after high school. College, administrative-economic education. I failed so miserably, I didn't even got the chance to retry the next year.

Again I didn't know what to choose. So I stayed at the same school and did a 3-year education there but wasn't motivated at all. Did it in 6 years. I was pretty depressed at times. Didn't study much. Barely did the minimum.

Never did work based on that education. It wasn't me.

Interesting question, making me think what I would be doing now had I known what to do with my life.

 

[kvothe27]

-For a year after high school, I worked graveyard stocking shelves and existing in blissful solitude

- I then started community college, got an academic scholarship to university, transferred to that university, graduated with a double major at 23 years old

- I then slacked off for several years, delivering pizzas, getting high, traveling, reading numerous books, and playing video games

- Went back to school for another degree in computer science at 25 years old

- Had a mental breakdown my senior year at 27 years old, took a leave of absence, been slacking off ever since, and I'm wondering if I'll ever grow up (probably won't)


I tend to do really well when I apply myself, but applying myself is very stressful. So, I usually end up becoming a slacker again. My life is characterized by periods of high productivity, followed by periods of being a bum

 

[ElectromagneticRadiation]

I did a lot of drugs after I graduated high school. Granted, I also did some while I was in high school too, but it got way worse and went on for a couple years after graduating. Went to a community college, changed my major like 3 or 4 times and subsequently dropped out. I'm pretty sure all the partying and shit I was going to do in my entire life has already happened. I went back to school after I stopped playing games and now things are relatively better.

I'll just say this. At 18 I thought I knew everything. Nope. Not even close.

 

[Happy]

I slaughtered cattle for a year and then I did 2 university degrees. Plot twist

 

[Brontosaurie]

tried an engineering degree, but just fell asleep with my face in the book and thought everyone was a pretentious asshole. i remember some girls (more like cows who had accidentally acquired language) studying together enthusiastically going all "then tonight we can drink some wine to free our spirits so we can study better" and i thought "fuck you try LSD then talk about freeing spirits fuckface" and then i also thought "who are you trying to fool, sounding like studying within the stifling confines of academia is something anyone ever really wants to do". needless to say i dropped out and became unemployed.

then did nothing for two months. then my father yelled at me "YOU MUST DECIDE!!! YOUR LIFE!!!" blablabla and gave me a legit panic attack. then i did nothing a bit more before trying some humanistic degree which was also mind numbingly boring. i quit when i had to write an essay/report rather than just exams. then i studied some more separate courses and then used up all my saved money and lived on popcorn, peanuts, oats and garbanzos for a while. then moved back home and here i am still, 2.5 years later.

i hope you can extract some modicum of wisdom from my story. lol.

 

[pjoa09]

Graduated from High School.
Worked at my parent's office for four years.
Went to university, working on an undergraduate in Computer Science. #yolo

I only feel as young as I want to be really. I felt like I was 40 at my job but I feel like I am 20 at university. I am 22 though.

 

[The Gopher]

Well I did an IT Degree fell asleep and realised while I was ok at it I disliked 90% of it and discovered I was an INFP(or not an intp). But ENTJ dad and ESFJ mother soooo I finished it anyway and now I'm here!

I have no job, little experience and a degree which while useful to an extent is probably too general to be of much use and my desire for an IT job is low. My parents while not "pressuring me" are pressuring me... and while they would never kick me out of home as I have a good relationship I dislike relying on them and will leave at the end of the year if I have no job or if I get a job a year after getting it. (to build up money incase something happens)

Despite all this I am exceedingly happy right now for no real reason. (maybe finishing IT had something to do with it) I'm exercising again for the first few months in 4 years (chain sickness) studying psychology and listening to podcasts online and wondering if I could take up busking... I might become a professional homeless weirdo with a unicycle, ukulele and uzi. (requires moving to gun happy location) That or I could marry quickly and be a stay at home dad taking care of kids.

 

[Cherry Cola]

Edit: fuck wrote too much sorry for wall of text dont get why the box you write in is so small you dont see the length of your post while typing its silly

Whatever you do, do stuff.

I can't pin down what happened what year exactly, but I remember that when I graduated was just the economy had gotten fucked and it was record hard to get a job which I didn't want to nor dared to anyway, being a spoiled brat and socially anxious. All the job applications said "we wants social skilled people person who is very positive and loves life and has experience even though this is job will have you working as a janitor/at daycare center/mcdonalds/dishwasher etc etc.

I thought it would be liberating to do nothing and that's what I wanted to do so I did that for half a year. Turns out it was not liberating at all. So I tried to get a job anyway which failed so then I went took a course at university about history and philosophy and anthropology combined sort of. It had seemed interesting and it was; however, I didn't make a single friend and remained a social fuck up and didn't finish the course and stopped going there by the end because I felt horrible doing it. Then summer came and I asked my dad if he could get me a job in construction which he did so I worked construction which was draining but okay in ways. The problem was I was horrible at the job despite trying my best, my add started becoming apparent because I just couldn't remember instructions and kept forgetting the names of the tools I was supposed to use. Then things progressed similarly and I did some drugs and shit. I was also a bit fat, not really fat fat, but still overweight enough to reach fat, which for some reason I was very ashamed of being. Eventually I decided to eat barely anything and would purge post dinner, this had the result of me dropping 20kgs of weight which was awesome, social anxiety lessened greatly, I worked construction again, and still sucked at it unfortunately. I began to realize that it would take me like 4 years to become a somewhat decent one at least.

So I applied for the teacher program, no longer overweight I made new friends, got good grades did great when they sent me out to get some real experience teaching at an upper secondary school but then I panicked realizing I didn't want to become a teacher at all and that my new friends were actually not interesting in the least, I had just been happy about the fact that I could actually make new friends with people. Depression had been looming over me since before I graduated, I never had any energy, which is no excuse for my shity inability to do anything with my life. In any case it got to the point where I had to get some help after a summer of construction work. I was offered more work, god knows why I was fucking horrible at it still, I guess my boss must've liked the fact that I was easy to get along with and never complained about anything. In any case I turned that down and my psychologist got me on antidepressesants which made me sort of manic causing me to search for another job relentlessly, going into stores all day asking for the manager. Only got a part time job anyway, for this I fucking blame Sweden because I applied for a fuckton this time around and really poured my manic drive into it. Those antidepressants and the mania they caused rid me of my remaining social anxiety, that was really good. They also suggested I be tested for ADD; now I have ADD.

In any case nowadays I work part time and still live at home, but I've at realized what I want to do which is become a psychologist, my grades aren't enough though. But if I did good enough on a general scholastic aptitude exam I took 2 days ago I'll get on with that soon.

Basically the years after graduating where filled with confusion and lethargy. My teachers had told me that I acted and thought like a grown up. But I wasn't a grown up at all. Right I remember now the first thing I did was actually apply for an art school but the fuckers turned me down even though when I dropped my portfolio I wasn't that impressed with quite a few of the other applicants who works were boring. My former art teachers had also said "you fucking good at drawing you get in this school no problem at all just do it!!", fucking idiots.

I also managed to try quite a few interesting drugs which broadened my horizons, I stayed away from addictive ones though, figuring I really did not have the willpower for them, so they would probably turn me from a failure into a an unmendable wreck. Unfortunately even hallucinogenic drugs have caused some drawbacks so one should be wary of them, I've got visual snow now, objects seem to move just ever so slightly when I look at them and straight lines bend a bit. Plus they can make you go insane if you have schizophrenic tendencies. Probably don't do drugs or stick to weed.

 

[kris]

We still had grade thirteen in Ontario when I was in high school, so I was completing my final year at eighteen years old.

At that time my fits of depression were approaching their peak, and I was pretty much shutting down by curling up into a ball of guilt, numbness, boredom, detachment and apathy. Also, I watched a lot of M.A.S.H. and WKRP reruns on television.

I had a lot of extra-curricular activities in and out of school, and a part time job at a climbing gym, so I had some stuff to keep busy, but given that I only went to two or three classes a week, I had a lot of time to myself.

I had lost interest and given up on academia. The following year I moved from Hamilton, On. to Ottawa to study photography. My depression deepened in first year, leading to many more skipped classes. Fortunately, the theory classes were easy, and the practical course work could be done in the middle of the night, when I preferred to be awake. Coasting was an option. With low tuition costs, help from my parents, and the money I made working with a renovation crew during summers, I didn't have to work or do much of anything really. It was nice, depression aside.

After school I moved to Toronto for a year. Did some freelance work, worked in warehouses for a very brief stint, worked in a restaurant as a subpar waiter, moced back to Hamilton where I worked at the climbing gym again. Actually got pretty strong with climbing, but started to feel trapped and futureless. Then a job opened up on the west coast, so close to my twenty-fourth birthday I conquered a small, little-known principality off the coast of Ecuador and have been ruling with an iron first ever since.

That or I took the job as a commercial photographer and have been doing that ever since. The depression faded over time, and while I'm not what you'd call a financial success, I at least have some ability to enjoy life and all that jazz. Took my first over-seas trip in fourteen years last year. I'll turn thirty-one in a couple of days, I think, and truth be told it's feeling a lot more like I thought eighteen would feel. Thirty-one isn't as old as I thought it was, and it finally feels like horizons are opening up for me a little.

 

[ENTP lurker]

Did compulsory military training (it was pure hell).
Studied lots of different sciences. Chemistry was always primary but did a lot of borderline modern physics stuff (physical chemistry). Settled with analytical flavor (big mistake, too much S-heavy, bunch of suprisingly well developed STJs as professors). It was pretty cool to see how much better I shined (highest grades) with abstract stuff than in normal dull school environment (medicore student). I want to go back and be Grandmaster at quantum chemistry.

Never been partier (disgusting) but I have always been quite a bit energetic talkative social buffoon around (right) people so this makes me an E.
Recently I have started to think that I could try a relationship. Never been interested in it before but my stance is currently changing.

I have also experienced mental breakdown but everything is clear at the moment

Currently no job

 

[Jennywocky]

Just watched the movie "Into the Wild". Kind of feel like fucking it all and just running away now that college is approaching. Might be too much of a coward for that though . I think it'd be fun, for a few months at least.

It was unfortunate I wasn't as brave + raised in a very conservative environment that criticized risk. My life was very conventional.

- Went to college + got a job after graduation.
- Got married
- Had and raised kids

My life was pretty boring and routine -- the curse of being surrounded by ISJs.

Then I got separated and my life became more interesting. Once I get rid of my debt and my kids are truly off doing their own thing, I might really pull out the stops.

I read about Chris some years back (I'm a fan of Jon Krakauer), and thought it pretty interesting not just because of his experience or that we'd basically be the same age if he were still around, but the fact we're probably related if I could trace the family tree back a bit (seven or eight generations, I suspect, or a few more... depends on when his lineage moved west), and we lived within a two-hour drive of each other. So I read the book avidly, he died probably within a week of when I got married. Talk about different lives. Why had his gone in that direction, compared to mine, especially if we had some similar ideas?

The person I am now is not the person I was when I was twenty, and I'd be far more apt to test my boundaries than I was back then.

 

[Cherry Cola]

I thought Chris was a pretty annoying individual in the film. Bitter, with a superiority complex and yet hopelessly naive in his undertaking

 

[Jennywocky]

I thought Chris was a pretty annoying individual in the film. Bitter, with a superiority complex and yet hopelessly naive in his undertaking

Well, ain't you too cool for school?

The movie Chris comes off more as INFP; the book Chris, INTJ. So if you found the movie Chris insufferable, I suppose you'd hate the actual documented book Chris.

Maybe I'm partial because my first exposure was through Krakauer, but I thought he made a convincing case for what happened in his revision. (UPDATE: Hmm, looks like further study showed some ODAP toxicity, which wouldn't affect a healthy person but could kill a weak one.) Sure, naive, but not in the ways people were saying; and mostly he made a few mistakes that anyone might have made regardless. Too bad he didn't know how close he was to getting out, and he tried to idealize/intellectualize a survival experience, which might make for some fascinating mind-over-matter experiences, but matter can still kill you.

In the end we spend our lives as we choose anyway, and twenty years or eighty looks the same at some point.

 

[scorpiomover]

First, I spent a few months doing nothing.

Then, I lived with a friend's family for a few weeks, and at the same time, got a job as a sales assistant in a food shop.

Then I went abroad and studied in a theological college full-time for 4.5 years on a scholarship, while I did simple chores like the washing up, and did cleaning in the holidays to supplement my income.

Then I spent a few months living in a room the size of a box.

Then I went to university, while I worked part time on a phone line. Also went inter-railing with my sister.

That takes me to about 26.

 

[Puffy]

I felt lost. Still do, but when you are that young it feels like being adrift at sea. You become aimless and motivation is a distant shore out of sight.

So I threw myself into the more esoteric things because I wanted to find out - and I found nothing. My mother was right, or so I bitterly conceded.

That's probably where I am now, just without the foresight to know what tangled braid of paths I'll go down.

It could be an Ni-thing, it could just be a me thing but I don't cope very well with aimlessness or being without motivation. Sherlock Holmes was either working on a case or lounging around in total mental ruin, as a friend pointed out; my life thus far has been a movement from this state of alienation (and subsequent escape in dreams and video-fantasies) to a slow process of identifying this internal lighthouse that provides me with case after case to keep me adrift. It can be couched in esoteric or exoteric terms, but really I'm only interested in finding means to strengthen and brighten the signal.

Maybe derail, but not really. I mean the main pattern the op is basically asking is: worked various administrative/ customer services roles in my hometown, went to university, back working various administrative roles in my hometown, but that's less relevant to me. Never liked academia (humanities), more the library and freedom, and never had a job I've felt very competent at; having the personal space & time to explore has been the most satisfying.
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