Entrepreneurship VS College
Let me start off with my background. I have a B.S., an M.S., and a graduate certificate. My first employer spent upwards of 75k on my education. This education has helped me get to where I am in my career today. To say that I’m not thankful would be wrong. I’m extremely grateful for the opportunities that have been presented to me. The next part here is a bit controversial. I believe that it’s controversial in my family at least because my family was taught that if you worked really hard, you could get a good job. If you did well in that job, you could retire with a modest income and life would be good. I was taught to do well enough school so that I could get a good paying job. My family wasn’t wrong. I’m a first born college graduate and I’ve accomplished A LOT in my life. But here’s the controversial part. If I had a choice of doing it all over again or starting my own business, I would forgo all the education I have and just straight into creating my own business.
I have a very steady and somewhat stable job. But every day I wake up miserable. Don’t get me wrong, I love my job, but I would love to be my own boss. Every day, I think of a story that goes something like this: A man is outside his office and sees his boss pull up in a very expensive car. He compliments him on his car and the boss tells him, if you work twice as hard and put in double the effort, I’ll get the new model next year. That right there is what makes me miserable. The thought that your gains are capped out based on what someone else thinks you are worth. For this reason, I would love to forgo all my education and instead try my hand at entrepreneurship.
I typically tell young people to not go school and instead hustle hard and build something. I typically get in trouble by the parents because almost everyone would tell you that it’s safer to go to college. While that is sound advice, knowing what I know now, I would encourage every senior in high school to rethink the college route. I know it’s easy for me to say because I have college degrees and a great job, but there isn’t a day I don’t imagine what it would be like to be my own boss. Entrepreneurship is hard and extremely challenging. But so is college. You risk everything to pursue the things you are passionate about. You risk everything to create things you want to create. And that to me is worth it. Every day I show up to work, I’m creating something for someone else’s dreams. Think about that. What camp are you in?
