The Pressure to Succeed After University

I graduated from university over the summer with a Politics and International Relations degree. I loved my degree and have always had hopes of entering the world of politics. Side note: just because I studied politics does not mean I want to be a politician or the next Prime Minister. It’s easy to put your future career to the back of your mind when focusing on university, and by the time I submitted my final assignment, I felt a sense of dread... what now? I'm leaving the structured university environment and entering the big, scary, real world.
I have always been a big procrastinator with work. Have an essay due tomorrow at 2pm? Aye, I’ll start it the night before. Thankfully, this has somewhat worked out alright for me so far. Although I do not recommend it. But... this procrastination also manifests when I think about my future. I find it scary to think about what the next step is, so I just don’t. This was incredibly unhelpful when it came to leaving university and having zero plans on what to do next. I felt even more unprepared after finding out that some of my peers had been taking steps towards their careers throughout university - through placements, internships, etc... But how much could I prepare if, by the time I’d left university, I had no clear idea what path I wanted to go down? Sure, I knew it would be something in politics - but that is a massively broad career area with countless options to go down.
There is so much pressure on young people to know exactly what career path they are gonna go down and how they're gonna achieve this and be successful. Career success becomes a race, and the earlier you get your foot in the door, the better. This is unrealistic for those who don’t have a clear idea of their career path. It is also unrealistic for certain, more competitive jobs which are harder to break into - this pressure is intense. Before getting my current job (which has absolutely nothing to do with my degree, but I enjoy it so who cares?), I would wake up with a sinking feeling in my stomach. What am I doing with my life? Why am I not already on my way to getting a great job? What if I end up hating my job? This anxiety around career success is so overwhelming and we don't talk to each other about it enough.
Also, this focus on ‘joining the rat race’ encourages us to become the classic 'cogs in the capitalist machine'. Do well in school and university, kids, so you can thrive in your 9 to 5 office jobs until you retire and die! This is an overtly bleak and pessimistic view of work, but the thought of it genuinely depresses me. In a society that places so much emphasis on success, being how much money and assets we have... we have to be okay with the possibility that we won’t enjoy work. It’s just something we have to do.
This pressure on young people is nothing new. But... when older generations compare their lives at 22 to the average 22-year-old now, enter: “When I was your age, I was already married with a 9 to 5 job and a mortgage”. They fail to understand that the world is a different place now. It’s harder to find jobs, the economy is fucked, and we can barely afford to rent a room in a shared house, let alone buy a house. This constant pressure to live up to - not only our expectations for ourselves but also our parents’ and grandparents’ expectations is difficult to handle.
Add to this the constant feeling of inadequacy when seeing people posting their lives online. People moving to new cities, working high-paying jobs and living seemingly luxurious lives. It’s easy to think that they have it all sorted out, and you are much further behind. It’s also now easier than ever to know what your friends and peers are up to, and if they aren’t directly posting about it, you can probably find them on LinkedIn. But remember - this is just what we are being shown. We have no idea what many of these people’s lives are actually like or if they are genuinely happy in their jobs. Their posts are simply highlights of their lives that they choose to share with the world.
Overall, I just want to stress that it is fine for you not to have your whole life sorted out straight out of university. We need to give ourselves some grace and allow ourselves the time to figure out what we are doing with our lives. If that means working a job that has no relation to your degree or career path, so be it. It’s not a race to see who can be the most successful outside of university, and there is no timeline for this success.
My anxieties surrounding my future career have since subsided - I enjoy the work I’m doing now and it’s getting me by financially so I am succeeding in some ways. I think it’s important to take pride in whatever work you do, whether it’s what you would deem ‘successful’ or not. If you are already in your dream job, I am incredibly happy for you and wish you the best of luck. If not - you have time so don’t let the pressure to succeed become all-consuming.