Agony Unc(le): I think I want to switch my major, but I’m scared it’ll mean I’ve wasted a year and fallen behind my peers.

Ah, the mid-degree crisis—a proud tradition right up there with oversleeping lectures and pretending to understand Student Finance when they tell you to stop spending money on maccas and The Lab’s nine dollar coffees.

So, here you are: knee-deep in your second trimester, staring at MyDegree like it’s an ancient rune, and realising that maybe, just maybe, you don’t actually want to spend the rest of your life talking about the Freud or coding Java or pretending to care about GDP.

And now you’re panicking. Because switching majors now doesn’t just mean tweaking your academic plan—it means possibly throwing away a year. A whole year. Twelve months. Thirty-something weeks of awkward tutorials, overdue readings, and that one class where someone always has a strong opinion about Marx.

Let me be blunt: if the thought of continuing your current major makes you feel like you’re slowly calcifying from the inside out—good. That means your brain still works. It’s telling you to stop wasting time trying to care about something that bores you more than a hall party at capacity with no beer.

Here’s the thing they don’t tell you at course planning: most people don’t finish their degrees in three tidy years. Some take four, some take five, some disappear halfway through to become yoga instructors in Tāmaki Makaurau. Time isn’t the enemy here—regret is.

You didn’t waste a year. You spent a year figuring out what you don’t want. That’s not failure—that’s education. And I promise you: no one is actually ahead. Your “peers” are out here switching majors, failing papers, questioning their life choices in the Hunter Building toilets. Some are still trying to remember how to write an essay that isn’t a ChatGPT hallucination.

Switching now isn’t the end—it’s the start of finally not hating every lecture. So, do it. Change course. Be brave. Because forcing yourself to trudge through two to four more years of “sticking it out” is like committing to a bad haircut just because you’ve had it since O-Week.

And if you ever feel lost, remember: your Uncle did three different majors, two questionable minors, and once enrolled in an elective just because the lecturer had a nice voice. Still turned out employable-ish.

Yours,Agony Unc(le)

Ready for the next bout of existential dread? Agony Unc(le)’s inbox is always open. Bonus points if it involves romance, rent, or whether a $14 flat white is a crime.