"Worthless: The Young Person's Indispensable Guide to Choosing the Right Major" by Aaron Clarey (Author) & Davis M.J. Aurini (Voice Actor): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1467978302/ My novel: http://www.amazon.com/Walk-These-Broken-Roads-ebook/dp/B009RZYO2O/ My blog: http://www.staresattheworld.com/ My Twitter: http://twitter.com/Aurini
| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| CHAPTER 1 LUCKY You I don't care about your feelings, I care about you You are lucky. | |
| And the reason you are lucky is because somebody cares enough about you and your future to have given you this book. | |
| Oh sure, at first it may not seem like a huge or caring gesture. | |
| A book, yippee, just what I always wanted. | |
| But what you don't realize is the courage it took for that person to buy you this book. | |
| This book isn't a touchy feely good book. | |
| It isn't a book about finding yourself. | |
| It's not a romance book where vampires protect their human female love interests from Ebola infected wolfmen. | |
| And it's not one of those lame self-help books like Find Your Inner You or Yeah for us, we're all winners. | |
| It's a cold, harsh, blunt book that delivers the strongest belt of reality you'll ever have, a much needed belt of reality, a belt of reality so harsh and blunt that it may even offend you and make you upset at the person who bought you this book. | |
| However, that's precisely why you must appreciate that person. | |
| Understand, it takes nothing to say nice things to nice people. | |
| The average person could go all day paying compliments and platitudes, giving everybody warm fuzzies in their stomach. | |
| There's no risk and there's no immediate drawback. | |
| But what takes real guts and real tough, fatherly love is to tell somebody the truth, no matter how much they don't want to hear it, no matter how much it may hurt their feelings, and no matter how much it may risk their friendship or relationship. | |
| Telling the truth is the ultimate sign of somebody who genuinely cares about you because frankly, the truth is not optional. | |
| Understand, no matter how much you may not like the truth, the truth is the truth. | |
| It's reality. | |
| It cannot be avoided. | |
| Oh, sure, you can lie to yourself and tell yourself what you want to hear. | |
| And oh, sure, you can rationalize reality away with warped and unrealistic thinking, and oh, sure, there's no limit to the number of people who will gladly tell you what you want to hear because they'll profit from it at your expense. | |
| You can live in la la land for quite some time. | |
| But ultimately, in the end, reality wins. | |
| And if you've lived your life ignoring reality because you simply didn't like it, or because your environment was programmed to tell you what you wanted to hear, you will suffer great and unimaginable consequences. | |
| Conversely, if you lived in reality and made your decisions based in the real world, you will reap great and unimaginable benefits. | |
| And that is the aim of this book. | |
| To make sure you make one of the most important decisions in your life based in reality, not your feelings. | |
| 1 Hell of a Decision You are about to make a decision that will affect your future more significantly than any other decisions you will have made thus far. | |
| It will determine how much money you make, what kind of standard of living you will enjoy, how healthy you will be, how healthy your children will be, and what you will do with the majority of your adult time. | |
| You will inevitably work eight hours a day for 30 to 40 years. | |
| This will be hands down the singest biggest plurality of your conscious time on this planet. | |
| It will not be spent with your loving husband or wife. | |
| It will not be spent with your future children or dogs. | |
| It will not be spent drinking margaritas on a beach or playing video games. | |
| It will be spent working for somebody else. | |
| How enjoyable and rewarding all of this will be boils down to one simple decision. | |
| What are you going to major in? | |
| Naturally such a decision should not be made lightly, nor should it be made in haste. | |
| You should spend a lot of time thinking about it, studying and researching various majors, and doing whatever you can to come to a wise decision. | |
| But for all the importance associated with this decision and the huge effect it will have on your life, the truth is, most young people receive little to no help or guidance in making this decision from their elders. | |
| It is the epitome of irony that you have this monstrously huge and important decision to make, and yet nobody, be it your parents, your guidance counselors, or your teachers, can provide you with any real, concrete help and insight as to what you should choose as your future profession. | |
| This relegates most young people to make this decision on their own, who do not have the experience, background, or wisdom to choose a major wisely. | |
| Making matters worse, there are adults out there who have no problem taking advantage of young people like you and your situation. | |
| They'll tell you what you want to hear, cajole or convince you to attend a certain school or pursue a certain study simply because they will profit from it. | |
| There are entire industries based on convincing you to spend your education dollars on them while effectively offering nothing in return. | |
| And perhaps most despicably, there are politicians, special interest groups, unions, and lobbyists who have no moral qualms about using you and other fellow innocent youths as pawns to advance their political aims and agendas. | |
| Thus the reason for this book. | |
| Worthless will help you navigate this minefield and choose the major that is right for you. | |
| It will explain to you how the labor market works, why some professions make more than others, review starting salaries, and explore different options when it comes to undergrad and grad school. | |
| It will also show you how different people in society prey upon youth, such as yourself, and take advantage of you for their own personal gain, so that you can identify these threats and avoid them. |