I realised I don't want to do law anymore....

I always knew I didn't and that I went into it for the wrong reasons. But I've decided to leave the class. I do feel so much better, because I was interested, but not enough to go to law school for 8 years and get into debt by £40,000. What I'd love to do is own my own little American shop in Hull, since there's nothing like it around here. Either that or interior design.


Has anyone else gone into something they really didn't want to do? What did you do?

Hiya!

It always makes sense to do what you are interested in or have a strong passion for - so go for what you've listed - own a shop and/or interior design.

I understand the financial aspect you put in, £40K is almost like a 'mortgage' sized debt, however I couldn't help but thinking, that £40K within 4-5 years on a 'moving up the scale' lawyer's payscale' could be relatively easy to pay off - and the really excellent money coming through just a few years or so later! (The UK's 2 industries which hold the country up are Law & Financials) - if the only reason you want to leave law is the fee's of the total course, I'd urge you to re-consider.

Research as much as you can into the 2 things you feel you'd like to do and weigh up the pro's and con's !

I do know people who've gone into stuff they didn't want to, but the end result has been they've gone into more 'stable' financially in the long run kinda jobs/professions/businesses.

Good luck whichever way you go!

DtM! West London & Slough UK!

Has anyone else gone into something they really didn't want to do? What did you do?

I'm only 23 and I have already done this. When I was still in high school, I won a silver medal in a national competition for graphic design and won a $30,000 scholarship to any Art Institute in the country. I did my first semester in LA, hated it, and moved back to Phoenix where I finished my degree. As it was only a full scholarship for an Associate degree, and I started to realize I didn't want to do graphic design for a living, I almost quit part of the way through to enroll at ASU. Unfortunately, my parents would have none of that and essentially threatened to kick me out of their house if I didn't finish the degree, saying that "at least you will always have something to fall back on."

Well guess what? Since I hate doing graphic design work with a passion, I would rather work at McD's than design someone's logo. My hatred for the field is that deep. The teachers I had were all GD pro's, and they were all snobs with god complexes. Only the students were somewhat nice, and even then it was still very cutthroat and very "serious" all of the time. People would give you bad critiques on your pieces just to see the teacher rip it to shreds when you put it up on the board for group critiques. I once saw a teacher pull one off, tear it into pieces, and shout directly at the girl "DON'T EVER BRING THIS SH** TO MY CLASS AGAIN! GET OUT!" The girl ran out crying. The absolute worst part is that I never quit. I finished, got my degree, and now it is utterly worthless to me. None of it transfers to regular universities, and I won't put it on my resumes because someone almost sued me once because I tried to give them an estimate for what they wanted and they said I was blackmailing them (at 19 years old!) because they thought my price (1/3 of the industry standard cost) was way too high. And worst of all, now family members left and right want me to make their business cards, logos, websites, wedding invites, etc for free because "I can put it in my portfolio". If I say no, they are really offended.

I may have had a bad experience, but it really did taint my view of that industry. Now I'm starting school all over again for Art History and I am doing a smidge of design work for the family company I'm at, but both I and my family know I won't be here forever. I'm just happy that I have finally stepped into learning what I REALLY want to learn instead of what my parents thought I would make good money at.

All in all, I say that you shouldn't feel like you're "quitting." You've taken classes and found out that you have no interest in it. Better now than later, I say. Figure out just what it is that you want to do and go for it. You should always do what makes you happy, not what you think everyone wants you to do. Good luck!