What a Current Dream Made Me Realize

I don't know why but I like talking about my dreams. I'm a person who rarely has dreams or should I say I rarely remember them after I wake up so it's interesting to me when I do remember. This recent dream caused me to be wide awake at 8:30 am. I had a nightmare a couple of hours earlier and fell back asleep but couldn't do that after this dream.

I don't remember most of the details but I was with my mom. I don't know how the argument started but we were fighting about me going to university. She was pressuring me into going to college instead of university because it was cheaper and she claimed that I was going to waste away all her money if I went to university. I replied, "What am I supposed to do now? It's too late to change my mind." Then I began crying and added, "If I go to college I'll spend all my time learning one thing, what if I can't find a job? Then I'm screwed. If I go to university I can learn many things and I'll have way more options. I just don't feel like I can be happy if I go to college." Then I woke up from the dream.

This dream came at a weird time in my life because I'm confirmed to be attending university in the fall but I've been worrying lately whether or not I should have chosen college. I guess I've been feeling guilty since my family will be paying for my education and university is a lot more expensive than college. However, I never once thought of myself going to college in all of my life. Even when I wanted to be a dental hygienist I still wanted to study it at a university. I feel sort of selfish thinking this way. I know there is nothing wrong with college but going to university has always been my dream. I always wanted to be well educated and for my family to see me when I'm older and think to themselves how accomplished I became. It was the last thing I said in my dream that really hit me. I've been worrying so much about whether or not I made the wrong choice based on money that I didn't even consider my own happiness. It's true that I can't see myself being happy in college. University is my dream and looking forward to it is my biggest source of happiness right now. Maybe I don't have all the details mapped out yet and I don't know exactly what I'm aiming for at the end but I'm figuring things out.

If I could give advice to adults who know of someone who has just graduated high school, I would tell them to just support whatever that person wants to do instead of stressing them out with a million questions about their future. You didn't have an exact plan when you were eighteen so why would current eighteen-year-olds be any different? We are still trying to work things out, just cut us some slack.