I remember the summer before my senior year of high school as though it was yesterday. My best friend and I spent our days lifeguarding, and as soon as the first of August made headway and the common application opened it was the primary conversation topic for the next three months. I remember the friends of my best friend’s older brother asking what we planned on majoring in: we looked at each other and broke into laughter. We were seventeen, how were we supposed to know what we want to do for the rest of our lives?
My entire life my mom had supported every possible job: “You’re so good with kids — you would be the best teacher. You can argue so well — you would be the best lawyer. Don’t you want to follow Dad and work in business? And now all of a sudden I have to pick one that would define the rest of my life. It didn’t make sense.
As a person who struggles with change, at first I thought it was a personal obstacle. After going into college undecided, half way through my first semester I realized how it was actually the best decision and can be for so many other teenagers.
As I got involved in school organizations and met upperclassmen, almost half of the immediate responses about my major being undeclared was not to worry and that they had changed theirs. Foremost, I wasn’t worried. And they had declared a major and ended up changing it. While the people I encountered had changed their majors for an abundance of reasons, the most notable was that they realized that it was not actually what they wanted to do with their lives. They didn’t want to keep the same life plan that they declared at seventeen or eighteen years old.
By choosing to be undeclared, you give yourself time to decide on your major. It can prevent you from wasting time, money, and energy on classes in a major you’re not sure about. My first semester at a liberal arts college is spent with classes that I actually am interested in; I choose two classes where most of my peers are declared in that major, but being undeclared allowed me to seek a greater understanding in that course and see if I want to spend the rest of my life in that profession. For one class, I realized that it was definitely not what I wanted to do; The course itself is super interesting, but it opened my eyes to how much dedication is required for your major. Being undecided allows one to explore what they’re truly passionate about and if they want to pursue that field of study.
Going undecided is a source of exploration. It allows me to have time to discover what I am interested in at a level that is more advanced than when I was applying to college. Some people know what they want to do at seventeen years old, but many people don’t and feel pressured to decide. I know my strengths, weaknesses, and my passions; Now, at college I can explore those interests at a higher level of education to determine if I want to spend the rest of my life in pursuit of that one thing.