two steps forward.

Do you ever feel like your life is beginning so quickly that you want to recede into the profession of academia and never leave school, living your life in a state of perpetual self-development? This would, of course, necessitate a shrinking away from traditional career paths and, instead, a favoring of a path of selfish intellectual pursuits.

I do think that academia, like law, is a very self-serving and arrogant profession. It requires the belief that your ideas are better than other people's. For this reason alone, I have the utmost respect for it. It is difficult to always know you're right.

At the same time, wouldn't it be so easy to live inside your own mind? To contribute to a constant debate in a field that drives you?

I am so scared of not having this in my life. I think most people my age, readying themselves for graduation in a possible recession, are afraid of this. That's why graduate schools like law school and PhD programs become so bloated in hard times.

Ugh. I don't know where I'm going with this. I just know that, for the last 3 months, all I have wanted is to know what I want and all I end up with are paved paths that someone else created. I want my own desires, my own thoughts, my own ideas. I want to feel like my intelligence means something to someone, anyone at all.