In each installment of “Senior Scaries,” Erin Ye ’26 confronts her senior-year fears in her final three quarters at Stanford. You’ll hear about the triumphs and tribulations of tackling the Senior Bucket List™, and hopefully feel less alone in the never-ending soul search that comes with growing up.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about ambition.” When a Stanford student says that, it’s usually in the context of wanting to change the world, but not quite knowing how to. My predicament is a little bit different: as a Stanford student, particularly one about to graduate, I feel like I should want more than what I do.

Four years ago, I wrote the following in my Stanford Roommate Essay:

“I want to design bilingual curricula, teach robots to understand sarcasm, and research the effects of globalization on linguistic diversity. I don’t know yet if I’ll be Erin the Professor, Erin the Entrepreneur, or Erin the First-to-Be-This-Kind-of-Thing. What I know for now is that I’m Erin the Compassionate, Erin the Dreamer, Erin the Intellectually Curious.“

Even though I cringe now when I read this back, past-me would be very excited to know that I actually did do a lot of what I wanted to, and probably even more that I didn’t know was possible at the time. Still, sometimes I feel unaccomplished when I see all that my peers have done in the same four years and I wonder if I should have hit the ground earlier instead of treating my freshman fall like the free-for-all that it was.

I also learned that I don’t want to be Erin the Professor, at least not before I spend some time outside of academia. I don’t think I’m going to be Erin the Entrepreneur, because I had every chance to start a venture while in college and simply felt no urge to. Much to my frustration, I still haven’t found a career that I want to tie my identity to. I love school, and I hope I spend every day of my life learning, but something Stanford doesn’t tell you is that intellectual vitality alone cannot make you a living. I often find myself stuck in the tension of wanting to make a social impact, wanting financial stability, and wanting to not feel like a failure to myself or those around me.

There are people here who are driven by ambitious inertia, who will go on to be or have already become founders, policymakers, doctors, lawyers, or all of the above. I don’t think I’m that type of person. I love thinking about business problems, reading education research, and organizing birthday parties; my interests and strengths are rather lacking in product market fit. The job offer I’ve accepted for next year is a job I’d never heard of prior to interviewing for it, and I have no idea where I want to be in five years careerwise. I know I want to do something, and that whatever it is, I want to do my best at it. But I am profoundly unopinionated on what that something is. 

If I’m being real with myself, the life I want most is one where I can go home to my family and enjoy dinner at the dining table. I want time to read and write and call my parents. I want to have meaningful conversations and to sit with difficult problems, to have enough breathing room for real breakthrough moments. I would like to travel, to go to concerts, to try new coffee shops. I hope for good health and a long life. I want my kids to grow up knowing the joy of learning and having the option to go somewhere like Stanford if they so choose.

I struggle at times to justify the cost and time of my education. If I’m not going to change the world, what was the point of coming to a place like Stanford to begin with? Did they waste a spot on me if all I’ve done here is have a good time? But that wasn’t for me to decide. 

By being a loyal and kind friend to people who will no doubt change the world, I suppose I play a role in making that difference too.

Maybe it’s enough to be content with what I am: Erin the Student, Erin the Friend. The RA? The Tour Guide? The Girl?  If that’s all I end up amounting to, I think it’d be enough for me.