I Spent Two Years Panicking About My Future. Here's What I Actually Figured Out.
I remember the exact lecture where it hit me. Someone in my seminar mentioned AI was already doing the kind of work people in my field spent years training for. I didn't say anything. I just sat there nodding while internally I was completely losing it. That was the start of a solid six months of 2am doom-scrolling and refreshing LinkedIn to compare myself to people I didn't even like.
The embarrassing part is I kept asking the wrong question. I was so fixated on "will my degree even be worth anything?" that I never stopped to ask "okay but what do I actually want, and how do I get there?" Those are very different questions and I had no idea how to answer the second one. I muddled through it slowly, talked to a few people including a career coach at some point which helped a bit, but honestly the bigger shift was just letting myself sit with the uncertainty long enough to stop catastrophising. If you're currently refreshing your LinkedIn at midnight feeling like everyone else has it figured out except you, I really just want to tell you what I wish someone had texted me back then.
I asked myself the same thing. Here's what I actually found out.
Second year, I was in the library pretending to study while scrolling articles about how AI was replacing lawyers, accountants, coders, doctors... basically everyone. I was paying tuition, pulling all-nighters, and quietly losing it. Like, what is even the point? Am I building toward something real or just going through the motions of a system that's already being switched off? I went to a career fair that semester. Left within twenty minutes.
What AI takes over
- Routine tasks & data entry
- Standardised text generation
- Simple analysis & research
- Rule-based decisions
What stays with you
- Critical & contextual thinking
- Responsibility & ethical judgment
- Relationships & communication
- Creativity & problem-solving
Once I actually sat with that idea for a bit, I started seeing my degree differently. Not just as content to memorise before exams and forget two weeks later, but as something that was genuinely sharpening how I think. The seminars where we argued about stuff with no clean answer. The group projects that were a nightmare but somehow taught me more about communication than any workshop ever could. Even the reading I half-did at midnight the night before. It was all doing something, even when it didn't feel like it. I talked to a career coach at some point, which helped, but honestly the bigger shift was just letting myself actually think about what I was getting out of uni instead of just panicking about where I'd end up.
The real risk isn't studying. It's drifting through a degree without knowing why you chose it. Following habit, or what your parents wanted, or just the path of least resistance. And look, if that sounds familiar, I'm not judging. That was me for a while. I'd compare myself to people in my group chat who seemed to have everything sorted, internship lined up, LinkedIn optimised, five-year plan ready to go. They didn't, by the way. We've talked about it since. But it doesn't have to stay that way. If you're mid-degree and questioning everything, the answer probably isn't another article about the future of work. It's figuring out what you actually care about and finding the parts of your degree that connect to that. Sounds simple. Took me way longer than it should have to get there.
The Skills I Wish Someone Had Told Me to Build Earlier
Here's what I genuinely wish I'd figured out sooner.
What do I do?
I stopped chasing trends and started valuing fundamentals
For a while I was convinced I needed to be learning whatever tool was hot that week. Every LinkedIn post seemed to be screaming about some new platform or framework I'd never heard of. So I kept signing up for things, never finishing them, feeling behind on something I couldn't even name. What I eventually clocked is that the stuff holding up best isn't the trendy stuff at all. Logic, how systems work, how people actually behave and make decisions, ethics: that's what's ages well. My understanding of human psychology? Still completely relevant. That certificate in a platform nobody uses anymore? Yeah, not so much. Now when I'm picking modules I try to ask myself: is this teaching me how to think, or just what to click?
I started learning in parallel, not sequentially
I kept telling myself I'd sort out the "real world stuff" after I graduated. Classic. The thing is, every careers fair I went to made it pretty clear that grades weren't going to be enough on their own. The students who seemed to actually stand out weren't just the ones acing assessments. They had something beyond their transcript. So I started doing a Coursera course alongside my actual degree, joined a society I actually cared about, picked up a small internship that paid almost nothing but genuinely taught me a lot. It felt like things were finally connecting. I really wish I'd started earlier, but better late than never I suppose.
I started building my network while I still had time
I only thought about networking when I actually needed something, which is apparently the worst possible time to start. Professors, peers, that one person in your seminar who always seems to already have an internship lined up: these people know things about what's actually happening in industries that no syllabus ever covers. I've had real opportunities come through conversations I nearly didn't bother having, and gotten honest feedback I couldn't have paid for, just by showing up and asking genuine questions. Don't wait until you're desperate and panicking three months before graduation. Start now, when it still feels low stakes.
- Anna, currently doing an internship at heyCoach!
Join the heyCoach! Community
We don't send newsletters to your inbox. We believe it's too time consuming. But you can follow us and read from time to time about heyCoach! on our channels.
