My entire life I have always did what others wanted me to do because it felt right. Each action, whether it was taking ballroom dancing which my parents loved or pursuing a graduate degree because "I would never get anywhere in life without it", felt noble and right but it was ultimately not what I wanted. The reason I did all of this is because each action actually helped me improve my life but these actions still steered hatred and frustration with my life. Not making my own decisions has given me low self-esteem/ self-respect and frustration with my life. Now in my late twenties, I have very little self worth, my parents don't respect my wishes, my friends use me when they need me but kick me to the curb when I need something from them. Girls would always friend zone me and disrespect me.
Right now I am pursuing my doctoral degree which I hate. Too much work for little pay and no guaranteed job. And yet I stick with because it feels like a noble cause. I am jealous of my peers because they are passionate about what they do and always go the extra mile. Meanwhile, I do the required things but almost never the extra things. I am strange in the way that I don't like my sphere of work but I wish I would and I try to adjust my lifestyle to love what I hate. I act the way so that people like more. For example, my hobbies including cars, EDM and video games. If I don't like deep philosophical things, I am seen as vulgar and barbaric and ultimately mediocre than my peers.
The fact that I come from a second world country/ lower middle class family and have won numerous scholarships to American universities to get my education without debt was something I was very proud about but yet it was not seen as something important for my peers who came from privileged families. So I dropped those hobbies, perceptions and took on others that felt more intellectual or noble (painting, etc). And yet I still felt unhappy.
And who is to blame for it? I used to blame others for my life but now I finally realized that the only person to blame for all of this is myself. So I decided to start changing thing in my life. Trust it's not easy to against your preprogrammed view of life but with some work it can be done.
1. Work is a large part of our lives. Professional satisfaction heavily affects our personal happiness and affects our private and social lives. After years of doing what I dislike, I finally decided to change my occupation to something that I am passionate about even if it is not noble or gives me a lot of income. When you are passionate about something, you will go above and beyond for it, and therefore it will make you happy and in end actually bring you more money than jobs that you perform on a so-so level.
2. Accept yourself because faking it will eventually destroy you and others will see that you are faking it. While noble hobbies that I pursued so that my peers would like me more, I was still unhappy. So I decided to be proud of my passion for cars, racing and mechanical work. I started to listen to my favorite artists even though it might be considered to be drug music to my peers. I reconnected with my true friends whom I lost touch due to my work. I finally decided my parents that I won't pursue anything I hate. Some discomfort is okay but when it is killing you daily, something needs to change.
Everything I wrote above can be summed up with the below picture:
This is a fairly short post but I just wanted to get it off my shoulders.
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