Complicated feelings about interests

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Right now, I feel like I'm trapped. My main thing has been Japanese language and culture ever since I was 10 and started learning the language, and it became my biggest skill quickly and now I'm semi-fluent. However, lately I've been losing interest - I don't know if this is because of school becoming my highest priority, my medication or what, but lately I've started to regret taking this whole path.

The problem is, I can't find anything better to like - I enjoy Japanese culture and want to, but don't feel like enjoying it, and feel my condition is preventing me from branching out. I feel like I have no choice - my future career path HAS to involve Japan and the Japanese language no matter what, even if I'm also looking into university majors that involve other things I'm into, like chemistry and computers.

Please tell me I'm not alone in feeling this way!

Special interests can seem to take on a life of their own, but in the end they are just something your mind has found fascinating and anything can get stale in time. Some I find do end, but others just have dormant periods and always return.

Its a little risky pegging ones profession to them, as you might not have a surity about if the passion will last, etc. I'd feel more sure in your case if you had an interest in learning about other cultures in general, like anthropology, because then you have a wider interest base.

I can empathize with where you are. My language/culture of interest was/is German. Though I have also studied French and Spanish, German as always been first with me. But I never considered it as leading to any sort of career.

I think it is promising that you also have interests in chemistry and computers. Studies in either or both of those fields would likely yield highly marketable skills, as well as meets your interests. Focusing studies on chemistry and computers might be a good thing.

And in today's global economy, it is likely that your knowledge of Japanese could prove a big benefit in any future career in chemistry or information technologies. Chemistry/Computers + Japanese would be a skill set that few others could match, and may well provide the basis for a rewarding career.

Well, if you've attained proficiency in the Japanese language, and have no better options on the table at the moment, why don't you simply move to Japan?

At the very least, your advanced language skills will help you settle down and find employment within your adoptive culture, and at best, the practical and lived experience of something you only understood on a theoretical basis may serve to rekindle and even deepen your interest in that country's culture.

The worst that could happen is that you could spend a year or two living in Japan and end up deciding that you don't like it very much -- but given the psychological pre-acclimatisation to which you have subjected yourself, I would hazard a guess that your experience of cultural immersion would turn out to be hugely life-enhancing for you.

That's just my estimate of your position, but if had demonstrated even a tenth of your interest, and had moreover learned the language already, I would currently be packing my bags and booking my plane tickets.

You have my empathy too. Tech support has been one of my obsessions since I was a kid, and I wanted to do it as a job when I grew up, but this summer I questioned my interest in it for the first time. I'm sticking to trying to find a tech support job right now because it's practical and the mojo hasn't entirely faded/it ebbs and flows, but I worry.

Being able to control your emotions is hard, and not always possible. Just remember that sometimes a new obsession/interest will happen out of the blue and turn out to be incredibly rewarding. Keep trying, good luck on the jobhunting (you have my empathy there as well), and keep going to school if you can.

My interest obsessions rotate as I get bored. It is the same half dozen or so topics all of my life but it skips in random order, one at a time as the main focus.