Dear Ask Anything,

As a senior expecting to graduate soon, I keep hearing the same terrifying questions: what do you want to do when you graduate? How do you expect to find a job with that major? What are your plans?

Well, quite frankly, I have no plans, and I’m quite sick of attempting to answer these questions! Do you have any strategies for surviving this awkward topic and cutting the conversation short? Any advice would be appreciated.

Sincerely,
Exhausted and Uncertain

First, you’re not in the wrong for not knowing what to do with your life. I would actually be more concerned if you followed a four-year plan to the dot, so it’s okay.

Now, let’s look at your options.

You could lie and say something extravagant. For example, you could say you’re currently being trained by NASA for the new Mars mission or a geologist packing for Alaska where you’ll study glacier patterns.

Or, you could lie and say something terrible. Hopefully, the sarcasm with be so abrasive that they’ll be forced to shuffle away. As a side note, if you actually want to do those things, it would certainly cut the conversation short.

There are many, many options that are mostly lies. The problem with lying, obviously, is the dreaded follow-up question. You’ll have to do so much research to get your back-story straight that you might as well go into those fields as a profession. Problem solved.

But if that’s not good enough, there’s also the truth.

Hopefully the folks you tell are close enough and supportive enough that they’ll help you out no matter what you choose. But if they’re not, you’ve got a lot more explaining to do. So maybe, in this one instance, the truth isn’t necessarily the right way to go.

As for my advice, unless they ask specifically what job you hope to do, don’t tell them anything. Just say you’re going to hit the road with a couple friends and have the time of your life. In fact, after graduating, you may actually want to hit the road with a couple friends and have the time of your life.

That way, you won’t have to lie, you’ll be able to tell whoever is asking how excited you are, and the conversation will shift towards that until you can casually, nonchalantly sneak away. They will respect your sense of adventure enough to not bother you about it again. Plus, you’ll have time to figure out the rest after your head is clear.

Then hopefully you’ll never see any of these goons again for the rest of your uncertain life.