It’s 4:30 a.m. While most are soundly asleep, Marina Shifrin is at work. She works at a Next Media Animation as a video producer. She hates her job. She has had to sacrifice her family, relationships, and free time in order to get work assignments done. Her boss was focused on quantity and wanted as many videos with as many views as possible.

The day finally comes when she doesn’t want to do the job anymore. She makes a video, puts it on YouTube, and it goes viral just days after. Less than five days after the video, titled “An Interpretive Dance For My Boss Set To Kanye West’s Gone” is posted, she appears on The Queen Latifah Show. Towards the end of the video, Queen Latifah speaks up and offers her a job. “With your experience, I could create a position,” Latifah said. The job she creates for Shifrin is a digital content producer position. Shifrin is meeting with the shows representatives and still considering the option.

This story brings about something very familiar to what I witness a lot while in college. These people are ones that are constantly trying to choose your path for you. They tell you to major in this. They tell you to not major in that. They tell you to join this, do that, take up this, and so forth. It can cause a person’s brain to go into overload. What “correct” thing should the person do?

Navigating college is tricky path. You have to focus on balancing schoolwork, working a job, paying bills, and at the same time trying to gain experience in their field.  The important thing to remember is that you can build your own way of life. You have the power. It’s time to experiment and college especially, is a great place to do this. There are so many resources available to students. There are a variety of majors in college to choose from. Find a niche. Utilize all the things available to you. Take advantage of them. You shouldn’t let others decide what you will do. You are in control of your own self. Go out and make your highest goals come true.

“Sometimes I think that you need to forcefully close one door in order for another one to open a little easier,” Marina Shifrin [to Queen Latifah].