TL;DR: Academia > Career > Fun

Main body

As a college aged male I feel like I am torn between three avenues academia, career and social life. Upon looking to both my brother and my cousins boyfriend I have learned some vital information that I would quite like to share with any younger readers (in particular the college aged young men).

The experiment revolves around a bag of candy and a group of young children. The child is placed into a room and offered a price of candy there and then, or a bag of candy in ten minutes. The adult leaves the room and most children have eaten the candy, those who did not receive a far larger reward of a whole bag. The clever children who waited will more often than not, go on to be higher achievers and earners.

So, how does this apply to you? Well while it may provide some small manner of satisfaction to work hard and spend your money out at the club or wherever, you ought to spend your time working on self improvement for a larger payoff in later life. I mentioned my elder brother who has an MSc in geology, a semi useful feild and one quite sought after in the oil and gas industry. However during University he became far to invested in his part time job and his degree has essentially a mounted to five wasted years. My cousins boyfriend "Ryan" on the other hand, spent far more effort on his academic achievement and hunting for a job. He drives a merc and lives in a large home, needless to say he is doing quite well for himself.

Lessons learned

Part time work is a means to feed yourself nothing more, under no circumstances should you ever consider making a career out of it. Furthermore do not get caught up in the idea that you need job experince. Do you honestly believe that for a second that any law firm or engineering company would give a frogs toss about any work you did in McDonnalds?

The CEO of whatever company you currently work for wants you to fail. Think about it for a second, how would your success benefit him? You would be far more valuable to him as yet another wageslave, than as an accountant or an engineer. It would cost money to rehire and replace and employee as opposed to keep one on.

Summary

This all being said, take a moment to taste the bitterness of a dead end job and soak up the sadness and shattered dream. For this is what awaits you lest you fail.