The Jack of All Trades Resigns

The Jack of All Trades is the Master of None

Context

1. I am currently a double major in communications (media production) and theater (performance technology). I am minoring in music. I have taken classes in all three programs.
2. I have a meeting with the Computer Science department head tomorrow to change majors to Computer Science while minoring in theatre (and maybe communication). 
3. I have had internships in chemical laboratories, NASA, a recording studio, and a theatre. 
4. I'm extraordinarily well rounded in coding, theatrical lighting, screenwriting, law (thanks dad), creative non-fiction, business skills, communication, audio production, (arguably) video production, piano, marketing, and music theory.
5. I have LLC paperwork pending to form a company I now realize I will not have time to run.
6. This summer, I've been able to isolate the root cause of my unhappiness as "trying to do too many things." I came to this conclusion after purchasing 2DO's project management software and spending not only $50, but 10+ hours developing my plans for the future.

"But oftentimes better than a master of one."

What is more valuable, sincerity or the ability to put on a faćade and bullcrap your way through life? I used to have an 80/20 balance respectively, but it's changed to become a 50/50 split. Those who knew me in high school know it was a 90/10 split. The 10% bullcraping consisted of shutting up about things that will get me into trouble, that is, most of what gets posted by high school students on social media and the friends I think are stupid.

I had the happiest time in high school because there was no pressure to have a defined role or a resumé. I also truly never hated anyone; it was all for some sort-of purpose. I was quite confident that I've had life all figured out (more than I do now) and rarely ever complained. It also helped that I had quite the resumé in high school doing lighting in a theatre and helping start a robotics league; however, now I'm a point where every action I take now has future consequences, and thus, the ratio starts tipping the other way.

Why did it start tipping? What consequences did my talents have? We turn to loss aversion; that is, we are afraid to cut things out of our lives after we invest time in it. Loss aversion is more than our time, for example, you are less likely to sell a stock you purchased before getting a return on investment than you would be if nothing was at steak. I bought $20 worth of HMNY knowing it would probably fail (but was so cheap!). Then when it started failing, I failed to sell it at $18, $15, $10... I still have it now. It's worth nothing.

All of my skills are turning out to be worthless stocks. In high school, being good meant not spending all your time playing video games. Now, being good as a student in college means getting an excellent internship with excellent grades. Long term, I think a GPA is a terrible indicator of job performance past a 2.5. I think it is funny how much we all praise it. With that said, it makes getting great internships easier in my immediate future which is the goal right now.

The jack of all trades is the master of none.

I'm extremely confident in my ability to get employed and have a job; however, I'm competing in a much larger pool of individuals. Before, I was the coolest senior in Walsh because I knew how to operate 3D printers, write code, and threw awesome dance parties in the theatre with my lighting knowledge. Now, other people who choose one thing and stuck with it are way better than me. There are better lighting designers and programmers, far better computer science students, and far better individuals in the entertainment field.

By attempting to do all three at once, I've essentially failed to be amazing at all three. I'm really sad that two of them have to be reduced to "hobbies," but it makes sense to do so. If I want to follow Clay10's footsteps and start working at great companies, it's time to reduce everything but classes and computer science tasks to "hobby" status.

The scary part is that I think this includes my 20hr/week job. More on that another time.

What does this all mean?

I'm happy. People who are more aggressive and willing to quit are usually happier. If you don't believe me, take a listen to this podcast of Freakonomics Radio. Does economics fall into that list of "all trades" too? I wrote an economic experiment here for a social science class. When I quit gymnastics, I was much happier... darn loss aversion.

1. I should stop worrying about my website.
2. My social media presence doesn't matter; maybe I'll take that off the website and discontinue my "social media presence" weekly goals.
3. I don't need to host my own version of "Wikipedia" from Mike Chase's eyes where I talk about my entire life and people I'm with because nobody but me gives a flying f***. For context, Wikipedia is open source. I was going to re-use it, host it on Digital Ocean, and start keeping track of my friends by putting them on password-protected wikipedia like pages. Partly for personal reference. Partly to show I can write code and make cool things. Besides, Fandom already exists (probably not the password protected bit).
4. What's the meaning of life anyways?