Student bogged down by the letters J-O-U-R

Its seems now that ever since I have chosen journalism as a major of focus, therefore having classes that force me to write, I feel paralyzed because I am now not writing out of enjoyment, but out of assignment.: to make the grade. To distinguish myself among a hodge podge of other aspiring writers whose talent far exceeds my own. I feel as though my writing has gotten so much worse. What ever happened to “’beautiful paper’, ‘excellent technique’, and ‘I can see you have a flare for writing?’” I’ve gotten to “journalistic”, but reading the New York Times articles daily gives me hope.

Now every time I approach a paper or an article, I feel this unrelenting pressure to “prove myself”. I try way too hard now. Because I am a “journalism major” I must write perfectly. As absurd as this must sound, it resounds truth about how I think of myself even now. I wish I could write freely once again, which almost makes me want to change my major, and just keep writing on the side as a hobby. I’m truly interested in people and different cultures of the world, and history. This is what I would like to study as well, if I were to attend grad school. It’s like one of my friends from high school told me, who was in marching band with me: He loved music so much, he wanted to study it at the University of North Texas, a top music school, but by the time he got to his second year, he was burnt out because he felt ‘they,’ the professors, were “taking the fun out of music” for him. He lost his zeal, and his sense of enjoyment for the art.

Now I’m not sure what he’s studying, but he definitely quit studying music. I feel like I would almost rather be an English major, or history, international studies, or something no longer having to do with journalism. I feel all this knowledge is getting to be a little bit too much for me, and I’m starting to feel the pressure to perform under this journalism umbrella. What is so wrong about pursuing what I would like to do, which is work in media? I would like a way to do this, write and work in the media, while studying something more of interest to me. Naturally I’m interested in learning about media because it’s what I want to do now, but I feel like it’s getting to be too much, and I want a taste of something different. It’s like trying to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches your whole life, or in my case, jelly sandwiches since I’m allergic to peanut butter!

As much as I may love my sandwiches, eventually I’m going to tire of them. Eventually, I’m going to have to eat something else to stay healthy, you know? Just a thought.
So I said all this to say: I am so looking forward to learning international relations and economics of the European Union when I go to study abroad. Don’t get me wrong, I will not stop writing, and I will not stop blogging and taking pictures and videos, but finally I can take a break from learning about what I liked to do so much already, and hearing about it every single day.

But can I do what I love, while learning something else?

Continued: I’m soo looking forward to finishing my international studies minor, taking anthropology, etc… and I can’t wait to be done with this journalism undergrad degree, and start interning, moving, and traveling (hopefully). If I do go to grad school, which I see now as a possibility, I want to study about people, literature, etc… a subject that is NOT communications or journalism. Maybe I can learn more about these things from experiences. I really want to do well on this paper about Jews in the American South! (I’m SUCH a nerd! Lol)