The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
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How do I decide if I simply have no talent in something? I had a 2.8/4( bad) gpa as a computer engineering freshman (not putting much work in), and really don't know if I should try to transfer to other majors. I enjoy reading and generally am better at language than math. I am currently taking some online courses on digital logic design and I suck, a lot. I know if I put more time on studying I would probably like it, but right now, I am just terrified I have no talent in engineering. I really want to migrate to other countries (eg Germany), and I figure engineers are in demand, but it seems that's the only reason I am still in engineering.
Thank you for all of your advice. I really haven't put a lot of work in, to be confident to say I hate engineering. I think I deserve one last chance, to give all I have, and try to excel. If I still don't get 3.0, or find myself in misery, I will switch. I probably will only be able to switch to some less popular majors, such as economics or sociology, but I guess at that point I have to take it.
I am very aware of self prophecy, and would try to encourage myself to learn before I deny myself any chance to study hard.
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what do you want to do? digital logic is just a more formal version of the logic that logic bros want everyone to use. it’s all and/or and if/then. you don’t lack talent for doing it, probably just practice. so if it’s the right path to lead to something you would enjoy then it’s worth it and you’ll get it with effort. the difficult part is to figure out what you would actually enjoy having not done those roles yet.
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Sounds like you might have the talent but not the motivation? Then the question is: why? I had a 3.0 my first semester (other STEM majors), because it took me that long to realize my "don't bother studying, just absorb the material instantly" strategy from high school but wasn't going to cut it in college. Fixing that fixed the problem.
And if this is the case, then you're gold. The only thing that would worry me is if the converse is true: "if I liked it I would put more time on studying". To some extent anything remunerative is going to involve hard and/or tedious work (because otherwise many people would be happy to do it for cheap and the demand would be filled), but ideally it should be work like conscientiously brushing and flossing teeth, not work like pulling teeth.
Unless you like pulling teeth, I mean. Dentistry pays well and has great job flexibility.
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I'll echo others here - unless you need to support family, kids, or some other circumstance where you desperately need to make a lot of money, don't go into a career you don't like! It will wear you down, make you a shell of a person over the years. It's not worth it.
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Try a different field, if you like; if the shit you have trouble with in compsci is logic design it's all logic design. There is nothing there but remembering symbols and designing logic.
You think compsci guys are in demand? Mechanical engineers, civic engineers, fuking DIRT GUYS (geotech dudes); all the boring stem fields are always hiring here and everywhere.
That said: all very math and remembering shit heavy.
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If you don’t enjoy engineering, I’d argue try doing something else. I think migrating to another country is a fine goal, but if engineering is just a means to an end, you may be setting yourself up for an unenjoyable four years of college and, even worse, an unenjoyable career. I chose engineering because I had a flair for math and thought computer programming was cool, but I found I both hated and wasn’t good at programming or circuits. I still work as an electrical engineer, but I’ve never much enjoyed the work, and always had a what if… feeling in the back of my head. I could do it over again, I would go back and stick with Political Science (or history) and have gone to law school.
To answer your question more directly, engineering is fucking hard. Even at the undergraduate level. Some people are more talented than others, but trust me, very few people find it easy. Regardless, it’s worth thinking long and hard on what you’re interested in (and good at) and weighing your future job prospects.
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I had a worse GPA and was working pretty hard. I am now a professional software developer making good money. Engineering seems like a good field, good enough that it might be worth pursuing even if you think another career might be a better match. But in the end you know yourself best.
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You won’t know until you put in the work.
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