Giving up on school? Not sure.

[Stanley Rockafella]

I'll tell you what a professor told me when he observed my low score on an exam:
"Clearly, you need to grow up".

Either grow a pair or get out. If you desperately feel like you want work on cars instead, then so be it. After a while you'll discover you don't like this line of work and return to school as a mature student on you own dime, or you'll decide on something completely different.

The choice is yours.

[Das Delfin]

Before I saw your location I was going to suggest winter blues. After I saw your location I immediately thought how much it sucks to live in SJ. Take it from someone who grew up there and watched the culture fall apart as people from around the world moved in. Gentrification has been great for places like NYC and Washington DC, but terrible for the bay area that had already established a rich heritage.

That being said, I understand why you're demotivated - the bay is extremely competitive and not very rewarding. It's easy to say fuck it. That's what I did..

Talk to a therapist. There are people who have gone to school and are paid to help you with your problems.

I almost guarantee it's the California in you giving you this lazy vibe. You have to fight through it. Even though I had plenty of valid reasons to quit school and try other things, damn if I don't regret it.

Hell, you could always move to Mendocino county and grow weed like everyone else...

Take highway 9 or 17 over the hill and visit Santa Cruz this weekend. Or tomorrow. Drive up highway 1 and clear your mind. Once you get out of SJ, you'll feel much better about yourself and life in general. Take the pacific coast highway all the way up to SF with the windows down for the true California experience.

[ScottSneed]

I used to feel like that all the time. After I cut back on weed and applied myself, things turned out much better.

[flyboyx]

I think it sounds like a good deal of the problem is that you are trying to study for a major you aren't interested in. why do you feel like you need a Batchelor's of business? did you pick this because you think its the easiest? is there anything else you could study that would pique your interest better? how far along are you? is this your first or second semester? what were your grades if you have been at this a while? I am guessing this is your freshman year?

maybe a slightly different perspective could help you. getting a 4 year degree is a monumental task-especially if you look at it as a whole. I think of it along the lines of renovating or building a house(of which I have done more than a handful). keep in mind that you can't step back and look at it as if it were a big picture. it will seem too big and too far away. just concentrate on the smaller tasks in front of you one at a time. when a task is finished, you move on to the next. before you know it, progress is made and eventually you will finish a semester. then another. this followed by a year and so forth.

are drugs/weed an issue? maybe you have ADD and have trouble concentrating? by the way your posting is written, you do sound like you are suffering from clinical depression. I think it would be a good idea to start by talking to someone about that if this is indeed the case.

I studied aviation in college. I chose it because flying airplanes was the only thing I ever wanted to do with my life since I was probably 3 feet tall. just because that was my area of interest doesn't mean that my curriculum was easy. a lot of classes were in fact really difficult, but I knew I needed to drudge through them to see the light at the end of the tunnel and not spend the rest of my life in a back alley jerking off dudes behind a dumpster.

one last thing....if you do decide to get yourself back on track, don't do it for your parents or whoever in your life may be influencing you to be something you are not. do it for you and you alone. you have to make the decision that this is something you want. if it is something that someone else wants, I can tell by what you have written so far, that this will never in a million years work.

good luck.

you can PM me if you want to talk about anything you prefer to keep off a public forum.

Brian

[Vivek]

Take highway 9 or 17 over the hill and visit Santa Cruz this weekend. Or tomorrow. Drive up highway 1 and clear your mind. Once you get out of SJ, you'll feel much better about yourself and life in general. Take the pacific coast highway all the way up to SF with the windows down for the true California experience.

You just described exactly, word for word, how I stay sane when I'm in the South Bay for a while. The reminder of the 80/20 rule in the second reply takes me back to some of my dad's advice (and makes me feel better about my test coming up on Thursday).

OP--I felt the same way last semester. Business major as well. Power through it, drop a class or two if you need to and save the ones you can. If you're at SJSU I recommend Marketing in New Ventures

[Northern]

I don't know if this will help, but I also have had terrible motivation issues this year. This fall, after being full time all summer, I scraped by all but one of my classes with zero effort, and my GPA is tanking.
This term was going the same way - I've done maybe one assignment combined over every class, and midterms start today and are going to kill me.

I have real problems motivating myself at night to do anything school related, and usually just do other things or go to bed early. If I do manage to start working on an assignment, I find that I just find distractions/snack/think about bed the whole time.

Trying to find an alternative, I decided I'd go to bed early and get up at 5AM to put 2 hours into some work, and damnit it works. Getting yourself out of bed sucks, but throw on a pot of coffee and you can do work without group chats blowing up or other notifications. It's nice and quiet, so you can just chill and have a coffee and get shit done. Then the actual day feels better because you're not stressed about the studying you needed to do that night.

I'm sure it's not for everyone, but this really seems to be helping me this past week and I figured I'd share.

[Siebenthal]

I don't know if this will help, but I also have had terrible motivation issues this year. This fall, after being full time all summer, I scraped by all but one of my classes with zero effort, and my GPA is tanking.
This term was going the same way - I've done maybe one assignment combined over every class, and midterms start today and are going to kill me.

I have real problems motivating myself at night to do anything school related, and usually just do other things or go to bed early. If I do manage to start working on an assignment, I find that I just find distractions/snack/think about bed the whole time.

Thanks to everyone! Im trying to mix things up and get interested in school. I scheduled an appointment with the counselor - hopefully everything turns out well I guess! Gotta keep working hard!

[NEOe30]

Hey man, sounds like me. I'm a first year engineering student at a D1 school and I felt very similar to you last semester. Knowing you're smart enough but having no motivation, it sucks. Check out my thread, there's a ton of advice from forum members. This semester I am doing better but am still not where I know I should be. No matter what you need to think about what's best for you and what you need/want in the long run


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Powling]

Trust me - school can be bleak and feel useless when you're going through it, but you will get through it. Keep your head up, push through and it will all be worth it in the end.

I hated school. SO MUCH. But I also saw the people around me who gave up early and how they weren't going to amount to anything in life. 10 years later I was right, and all those people are now bitter they didn't push themselves harder earlier in life.

Just remember that you have the ability to do what you want in life. If you don't like something in your life, you have the ability to stand up, say "I need to change this" and act on it.

Things in life take time, I'm 30 years old and it took me until 28 to realize everything doesn't happen overnight. Take your time, work hard and don't give up.

YOU GOT THIS MAN!

[kickinindian]

I used to feel like that all the time. After I cut back on weed and applied myself, things turned out much better.

i wish i would have been smoking when i went to school i always freaked out and never got anything done. now since i have started smoking my work and learning have improved 10x. I'm also probably one of the few it helps tho.

[flyboyx]

^not sure, but I don't think its supposed to work that way?

[gwb72tii]

So don't go to college because it's something you think you should do, but rather do it because it'll put you where you want to be down the road.

I was on the 12 year plan. I was going to teach technical illustration but prop 13 in California killed tenure for new teachers. I dropped out and worked for a few years while trying to get an idea where i was headed in life.
Once i made a decision of where i wanted to be, going back to school was the easy part. Pretty much 4.0 for the last 2 years because the classes were relevant to a future career. I needed a straight A in my last class to graduate with a cumulative GPA of 3.0+.
The degree you eventually earn opens the door to inspiring someone to take a chance and hire you. That's it.

[gwb72tii]

You just described exactly, word for word, how I stay sane when I'm in the South Bay for a while. The reminder of the 80/20 rule in the second reply takes me back to some of my dad's advice (and makes me feel better about my test coming up on Thursday).

OP--I felt the same way last semester. Business major as well. Power through it, drop a class or two if you need to and save the ones you can. If you're at SJSU I recommend Marketing in New Ventures

grew up in Saratoga. Los Gatos is awesome.

[Siebenthal]

So, with exams coming up in two weeks, this quarter is a bust - my grades A, F, F

Its okay. I can live with that. My dad always said you reap what you sow and its true.

However, im gonna spend the next two weeks sorting myself out. Getting rid of the distractions, clearing a good path and a fresh start for the next quarter.

My future is really important. Thinking about swapping my major to global economics instead of just business.

[Mwishlist]

The one thing that no one really tells you when you are in college is that, while getting a degree is important; which one you get is not so much. Unless you are going into a very specific field like engineering where the degree dictates your career. College should be a time to take classes that actually interest you for the first year or so. Then those classes lead to other classes and other interests and then you start to get a feel for what you want to pursue long term.

Sure there are a ton of "I studied at Harvard, now I'm the CEO of a successful Fortune 500 blah blah blah". But there are just as many stories of people being successful from varied educational backgrounds. I have a business degree but while in college I managed a record store (the first time around you hipster bastards!) which lead to a totally different career path from there with no regrets. Having the degree helped immensely a few times, but not having a specific business degree.