I'm 26 and I know exactly what you mean and am going through exactly that. I have very little money at the end of each paycheck, my job doesn't pay very well nor is it in the field of my major, everybody I knew who could be friends in high school has long since vanished and love life is on the backburner owing to being poor.
Unless I can pull a miracle out of my ass (which is always possible even if not probable) I don't expect things to get to the point where everything is fine and handy dandy until I'm 30 at earliest. Time will tell however, I could look in the newspaper tomorrow and there's the job of my dreams.
edited 28th Feb '12 4:21:50 AM by MajorTom
Scott Pilgrim had a goal. It was to win the heart of Ramona V. Flowers Which he came to realise while noble, was no substitute for Self Respect.
I do feel you're pain however.
edited 28th Feb '12 5:47:37 AM by joeyjojo
hashtagsarestupidNew Geek: Yeah I hear ya, man. Ah well, things should improve once I leave here for basic training soon enough. Provided life doesn't fuck me over again, knock on wood.
Seriously, if Life was a person, I would drop kick the son-of-a-bitch in the chest.
^^ As long as it doesn't show on a drug test they won't really care. So long as you don't do it while you're in.
Only if you have a (criminal) record for such things will they care. To be brutally honest it's one of those things where if only you know about it, keep it to yourself, nobody else needs to know.
edited 28th Feb '12 6:05:18 PM by MajorTom
Giving in to despair is the one thing you can't do when times are hard, and the easiest way to combat it is to find something else to do.
In any business you have to start from minimum wage and work your way up. Even fast food gives a raise every six months or so. It's just that the minimum for some jobs and regions is higher than others.
Most importantly, if you have time to complain about your problems on the Internet, you have time to make some change that solves those problems instead.
I get the feeling that you just don't know how.
Join a group if you want a good start to revitalizing your social life. Writing group, book discussion, running, baking, whatever. You can find one on http://www.meetup.com/
since you're already here. Form one of your own off-campus if you find the ones at your college disheartening and can't find a meet up in your area.
As for your life goals, you can't really complain about having too much time to solve them. Do all of your research, compile a list of agents and publishers, organize it carefully, proofread your query letters, and start sending them out.
edited 28th Feb '12 8:42:51 PM by Leradny

I've been writing a book series for five years now, two thirds of a trilogy have completed first drafts and I found who I hope will be my editor, but I'm constantly reminded of how futile it is to keep slogging on with this when the economy has put a freeze on any quick progress with my life goals, and considering I took up writing to help me have an activity to compensate for the abysmal lack of meatspace friends in my life (I was hoping getting published might improve my social status, but even having finished two first drafts of two different novels makes people look at you weird when they know you had the time to do that).
Maybe I feel my life goals are slowly grinding because I have had less friends than I hoped since the beginning of University, the societies and clubs are a sham of their former selves during these budget cut heavy times and didn't even include me properly when they had student control over them.
I feel like I'm going nuts from lack of contact with other human beings even though I walk to Chatswood every day for exercise even though it's February in Oz and it's hot and I don't feel very attractive as a prospect for women when I'm walking around in this weather.
It's like working on my books and taking photos for my Photomedia art college degree is all I have, because I certainly don't think my love life or social life's gonna be any better until I'm at least 25, and I'm 22 now so I feel like some kind of mirror universe slacker who has vision and drive but no friends or social achievements to show for his trouble trying to make something out of himself.
This is probably why things like Scott Pilgrim make me angry whereas things like Densha Otoko fill me with hope because nerds of the Densha variety at least have some quest and goal to strive for even if he does live alone in the world with only his net friends to care if he lives or dies.
This isn't even much of a cry for help, the only reason why I think I feel depressed is serious sleep problems I've had for five years and social starvation in between University semesters. That and I don't feel noticed by the people around me and I feel like I have to become some controversial celebrity author for people to bother admitting I'm worth talking to. Thoughts?
Hell Hasn't Earned My Tears