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Hit $50k in savings two years after dropping out and it messed with my head
I left school after my sophomore year because the debt was piling up and I just couldn't see the point anymore. Ended up working in a warehouse in Columbus, stacking boxes at night and learning inventory management on the side. When I hit $50k in savings last month, I sat there staring at my online banking app for like ten minutes because I never thought I'd have that kind of money without a degree. Did anyone else hit a financial milestone that made them question their decision to leave college?
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miab165d ago
...and that's the thing that messes with your head more than anything else, right? I remember when I hit my first real nest egg, not quite that much, but close. I was maybe three years out of a trade school I almost didn't finish and I just sat there in my truck, staring at the numbers. The whole point of college was supposed to be getting you to that point and here I was, doing it without the degree. Made me wonder if I'd wasted all that time and money on something I didn't need. But then I thought about the jobs I could have had if I'd stayed in school, the connections, the doors that open in a different way. It's not as simple as saying one path is better than the other. You found a way that worked for you, and that's the part that gets you in the gut. You start second-guessing every decision you made before.
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davidh885d ago
Yeah, that second-guessing thing is brutal. I think what gets me is how much of it is just timing and luck, not even skill. Like, you could make the same exact choices but be a year off and end up in a totally different spot. I've got buddies who went the college route and are still paying off loans, and others who skipped it and are doing fine. But then there's also the guy I know who dropped out and now can't get a steady job because he doesn't have that paper. It's like, you can't ever really know if you made the right call until years later, and even then you're just guessing based on how things turned out for you.
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