After many months of deep-breathing exercises, long talks with my mother about my interests and future goals, and struggling to get rid a serious indecision habit, I finally made up my mind. Walking through the halls of Carswell on my way to my noon class, I stopped in at the office on the third floor. “Excuse me, ma’am, I’d like to declare a major in Communication. How do I do that?” At this point I’m assuming that there will be an aptitude test, one of those super inaccurate “What Career Is Right for You?” tests (for the last time, I am not destined to pick up trash – I just can’t be!), a lie detector test, and a divine stamp on the slip of paper that the office sends to the people in charge. Turns out there are no bubble sheets involved and I actually just put my name and ID number on a Survey Monkey page. So that was uneventful.
To be fair, no one warned me that the process of declaring was actually not a big deal at all. Upperclassmen seem to conveniently forget to mention that.
Despite the actual process of declaring being all-around anticlimactic, a proverbial weight has been lifted off my shoulders. As someone who went through at least five potential majors before settling on Communication, declaring meant finally finding some sense of direction for the rest of college. Sure, declaring my major was not hinged on acceptance to Calloway (I probably would have actually come unhinged), but then again, Calloway requires a plan. You have to know if you want to go into Business. I spent a majority of freshman year flopping around like a fish out of water, plan-less and scared. Now that I’m in my element, I am so relieved.
Upon reflection, I now believe that the past year and half of floundering has actually been a blessing. I didn’t have a set idea of what I wanted to do when I came into college; when I finally found a major, I think I actually found out a little more about myself. Sure, I have always known that I completely lack a right side of the brain, making math and science pretty much impossible, but I didn’t know that I had such an interest in Advanced Mass Communication Theory or film. Turns out, all those pesky divisional classes actually serve a purpose – like how I thought I would L – O –V – E love archaeology, when I actually hate bones with the fires of my soul.
Freshman, enjoy the process of finding what you like! Take the classes that sound interesting because those are how you narrow down what you actually like, and what you just like to watch on television (again, I repeat, actual bones and Bones the show are very different). Sophomores, we now get to revel in the glory that is finding a future – or at least a part of our future. While the actual process of declaring was uneventful, we did do something sort of important: we declared what we want to be a major part of our individual college experience. So to those who, like me, finally have some semblance of a plan: congratulations!