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74 Posts
(WARNING: this is long and slightly rambly. I express my feelings. If you're willing, please bear with me and (hopefully) respond.)
20 y/o INFP here. I've been pretty discouraged lately. Hoping the sage wisdom of some of you who have navigated out of the fiery hell called young adulthood might be able to help.
STORY TIME. l've always struggled in school. I absolutely love learning and an academic environment, but I have quite severe ADD. To put it bluntly, most of the time I can hardly function without medication. I've been this way since I was a kid. Even with medication, I still had typical INFP struggles in school; most subjects simply could not keep me entertained enough to finish the work, and any work that I did had to be near perfect upon first execution or I wouldn't complete the task. (Or I might, and feel like a failure.) and where I would do much better learning large amounts of one or two subjects at a time, I'd have to be taking 8 or 9 classes at once, try to keep them all straight, and still care enough to not be overwhelmed and get my work done.
I graduated high school by the skin of my teeth, with a 2.3 GPA. I got admitted to an online program at a rigorous, private Christian college. I then discovered that online schooling is terrible for me. I failed out after one semester, devastated, with a 0.5 GPA. (Yes, that's correct.) I then decided to take some time off from school to work and pursue other avenues of interest.
Last fall-spring, I completed a basic missions training course and outreach through a missions organization. I fell in love with the atmosphere and the kind of work that we were doing. I fell so hard that, for the first time in my life, I not only cried, but I wept, when I had to say goodbye (outreach). Needless to say, I am sure that it's the kind of work I was made for.
Here's the catch: I can't expect others to take me seriously in my line of work if I don't get some kind of formal education, preferably something useful, such as education, psychology/counseling, community development, or medicine. And I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to get into a college, much less pay for one.
I'm taking the next year off from school to work and get more leadership experience in kid's ministry, and I'm afraid I'll just get stuck at home and never accomplish my goals/dreams.
So, INFPs:
- Did you struggle with formal education? How did you overcome those struggles? Advice?
- Do I even have a shot at getting into any tech school or university if I CLEP test out of some gen-ed courses?
- How do I get people to take me seriously if I choose a "non-traditional" route and get more training & experience through a missions org?
- Are things ever really as hopeless as they seem in your twenties?
- Best way to prevent hopeless ideas from becoming self-fulfilling prophecies?
Thanks for reading. XP
20 y/o INFP here. I've been pretty discouraged lately. Hoping the sage wisdom of some of you who have navigated out of the fiery hell called young adulthood might be able to help.
STORY TIME. l've always struggled in school. I absolutely love learning and an academic environment, but I have quite severe ADD. To put it bluntly, most of the time I can hardly function without medication. I've been this way since I was a kid. Even with medication, I still had typical INFP struggles in school; most subjects simply could not keep me entertained enough to finish the work, and any work that I did had to be near perfect upon first execution or I wouldn't complete the task. (Or I might, and feel like a failure.) and where I would do much better learning large amounts of one or two subjects at a time, I'd have to be taking 8 or 9 classes at once, try to keep them all straight, and still care enough to not be overwhelmed and get my work done.
I graduated high school by the skin of my teeth, with a 2.3 GPA. I got admitted to an online program at a rigorous, private Christian college. I then discovered that online schooling is terrible for me. I failed out after one semester, devastated, with a 0.5 GPA. (Yes, that's correct.) I then decided to take some time off from school to work and pursue other avenues of interest.
Last fall-spring, I completed a basic missions training course and outreach through a missions organization. I fell in love with the atmosphere and the kind of work that we were doing. I fell so hard that, for the first time in my life, I not only cried, but I wept, when I had to say goodbye (outreach). Needless to say, I am sure that it's the kind of work I was made for.
Here's the catch: I can't expect others to take me seriously in my line of work if I don't get some kind of formal education, preferably something useful, such as education, psychology/counseling, community development, or medicine. And I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to get into a college, much less pay for one.
I'm taking the next year off from school to work and get more leadership experience in kid's ministry, and I'm afraid I'll just get stuck at home and never accomplish my goals/dreams.
So, INFPs:
- Did you struggle with formal education? How did you overcome those struggles? Advice?
- Do I even have a shot at getting into any tech school or university if I CLEP test out of some gen-ed courses?
- How do I get people to take me seriously if I choose a "non-traditional" route and get more training & experience through a missions org?
- Are things ever really as hopeless as they seem in your twenties?
- Best way to prevent hopeless ideas from becoming self-fulfilling prophecies?
Thanks for reading. XP