I’m an undecided college freshman at Purdue University.. I’m in Exploratory Studies, a temporary major for undecided students to explore majors and to understand their personality and strengths. This is a great major and one of the benefits is that you get guides and tools to research careers and different types of majors. What you also get is to take many, many personality tests.

These tests are helpful but they also bring confusion. After the results of several personality tests, I was thrown into an identity crisis.

Who am I? What do I actually like to do? What major would be good for that? Is that practical? Do I actually want to do that?

Can you relate?

Continually this semester, I wasn’t thrilled with the results of these personality tests. Secretly, I was ecstatic, but I was also scared. I knew what they were going to be every time, and I knew the results fit me nearly perfectly.

So what’s next? Do I follow through with what I want to do, or do I ignore everything and pretend to still be “exploring?”

I realized you can look for a major, only after you've found your mission.

If you haven’t gotten as far as nearly deciding on a major, something that helped me greatly was the speech “What if money was no object?” by philosopher and speaker Alan Watts.

Be warned. His speeches will make you think very deeply. The speeches are powerful. They are light and deep. They are sad and happy. They are calming and empowering.

The speech is compelling every time I listen to it. He says, “What would you like to do if money were no object? How would you really enjoy spending your life?" He tells you to ask yourself, “What do I desire?”

Identifying what I like to do was difficult for me. I managed to make a short, concise list of things I’m passionate about. I urge you to do this. Even if it takes a while, get to the core of what you like. Don’t search for a job title, ranking, or salary. Search for your calling, your ambition, your mission. Everyone has an uncertain future, so what can you stand doing for the rest of your life?

When I thought about this, it’s like I woke up. As Alan Watts said in “The Real You,” “The real you is not a puppet that life pushes around.” As the cliche goes, you are the author of your own life.

After much searching, I think I’ve found my mission, consisting of the very basic thing that drives me. Find yours.

I’m not going to tell you I have everything perfectly planned out and this realization just fell into place. I had to think about it very deeply, and I still don’t have it figured out completely. Even though I have a mission, I’m still not sure about a lot of things.

The combination of analyzing myself in a way that was different than personality tests and listening to inspirational speeches gave me the confidence and courage to pursue what I might want to do in the future. For me, this was everything.

I have a direction instead of being like the needle spinning on a broken compass. I don’t have to aimlessly wander around anymore. I’ve found my mission. I’m done exploring. My next step is to find the home to fulfil this mission.