It sounds hopelessly stupid, but it saved me. I'm one of the few percentage of the population that can
frisson to certain works of music.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frisson
When I was sitting there, knife to my wrist, the thought of all of the music that I would miss, that I wouldn't discover or be able to frisson to (I didn't know what it was called at the time and only learned what it was decades later, but I knew it was very real for me) was the one thing I couldn't accept.
I've never regretted that decision.
What I've found is that outside of academia, the real world problems are so messy, and so complicated, that it takes all of my intelligence to work on those problems and deal with other messy soft issues, like selling my ideas to higher ups, or balancing financials against employees, are so intellectually stimulating that it literally "gets better" if you have the drive and will to find a line of work where you get to work on interesting problems.
(I've always thought the wonderful "it gets better" ads do a disservice to other disaffected members of society by not talking specifically to us, even if the message it true for more than the community they target)
As a matter of fact, it doesn't just get better, it gets awesome. I've gotten a job I never get bored of, I got the girl, I get a pretty nice paycheck, live a nice life, travel as much as I want to wherever I feel like (see the world!), and always work to write a novel of my life that I'd find interesting.
Just remember, if you are as smart as they say you are, you can figure out how to solve your own problems. Not popular at school? That's a solvable problem. No girlfriend? Solvable. Bad grades? You can solve it. Your mind is your most powerful and flexible asset, you can use it to do anything you really put your mind to, even things that don't come naturally once you solve the problem of learning how to grind on boring stuff.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frisson
When I was sitting there, knife to my wrist, the thought of all of the music that I would miss, that I wouldn't discover or be able to frisson to (I didn't know what it was called at the time and only learned what it was decades later, but I knew it was very real for me) was the one thing I couldn't accept.
I've never regretted that decision.
What I've found is that outside of academia, the real world problems are so messy, and so complicated, that it takes all of my intelligence to work on those problems and deal with other messy soft issues, like selling my ideas to higher ups, or balancing financials against employees, are so intellectually stimulating that it literally "gets better" if you have the drive and will to find a line of work where you get to work on interesting problems.
(I've always thought the wonderful "it gets better" ads do a disservice to other disaffected members of society by not talking specifically to us, even if the message it true for more than the community they target)
As a matter of fact, it doesn't just get better, it gets awesome. I've gotten a job I never get bored of, I got the girl, I get a pretty nice paycheck, live a nice life, travel as much as I want to wherever I feel like (see the world!), and always work to write a novel of my life that I'd find interesting.
Just remember, if you are as smart as they say you are, you can figure out how to solve your own problems. Not popular at school? That's a solvable problem. No girlfriend? Solvable. Bad grades? You can solve it. Your mind is your most powerful and flexible asset, you can use it to do anything you really put your mind to, even things that don't come naturally once you solve the problem of learning how to grind on boring stuff.