It really pains me to think about how I spent 6 years slaving away for a useless degree that I didn't even want. I faced tons of pressure to go to college right away by my family. My parents acted like I would forever be a worthless deadbeat if I didn't go to college, and I would get “too old” to go unless I went right after high school. I majored in urban planning because it was the only somewhat agreeable program my school provided. I felt no passion for it. I wanted to switch to something else but everybody kept telling me to stick with it and finish it. I became so unmotivated that I started flunking classes and had to spend like an entire year re-taking classes I flunked trying to keep my head above water. I took summer classes and 4-hour night classes working my ass off.
I finally graduated but then I discovered my degree is useless on the job market. Any entry-level urban planning job (or related job) requires some kind of civil engineering degree and 10 years experience. I spend hours applying to hundreds of jobs but never get any call backs. I've gotten a few interviews for jobs that seemed promising, but then during the interview I discovered they were base-pay construction jobs that involved really long and weird hours (overnight shifts, on-call shifts, 12 hour days, extensive labor, constant exposure to elements, lack of benefits, etc). Basically I'd have to give up all my freedom to be a slave for this company. It's been 2 years and the only job I successfully landed was a minimum-wage barista position at starbucks where I was treated like an indentured servant all day. This sucks.