Generally speaking, there are two ways to live your life -
Doing work you want to do, or doing work to be able to do what you want to do.
The first is difficult - not only because not all people actually know what they want to do, but because we change over
time, and because what you want to do might not be feasible in terms of sustaining your own life.
The latter approach is often much more constructive, because
A.) if you're working to be able to do things you enjoy,
you're more likely to be able to endure a larger amount of different types of work and stick with what you
choose even if you're going through rough patches or change opinions on what you want to do
on your own time, and
B.) it's more realistic, since work is work, and even things you love can get tedious when you're doing it
to make a wager, not as a past-time activity that you can enjoy purely on your own premises.
Should people chase their dreams? Certainly. Some people even have to be willing to risk complete and abject
failure in pursuing their dreams, because these are the kind of people that make the world go round.
We wouldn't have most of the world's greatest art, technology, and knowledge if we didn't have people like this.
The other side of the coin though, is that 99% of the people who pursue high-risk dreams, fail.
Most people can't hack it.
That's why, it's generally smarter, unless you're all gung-ho and don't have anything else weighing you down
(like a family, or debt etc.) to pursue dreams within reason -
that is to say, prioritize covering your primary and secondary needs first, and then build a platform where
you can safely pursue your dream whilst having something to fall back on.
Practically speaking - it's better to, for instance, be a trained chef, or electrician, and then enter university
and go for the strange and exotic degree, then to just go for the degree.
Similarly, it's better to pursue your dream of becoming a musician after you've attained a proper day-job.
It might take longer this way, and feel like your chances of succeeding are smaller because your attention is
divided, but at least this way you don't have to worry about what happens if your dream turns out to have been
just another fantasy.
Like always, the saying "Know thyself" is alpha omega. Don't make choices based on what you vaguely feel is the case,
or what other people tell you that you ought to feel is the case. Instead, carefully introspect and make a choice
based on who you think you are, and what you think you can comfortably risk in pursuit of happiness.
Many people are okay with mediocre levels of happiness granted a high level of security - others don't need
security. They'd rather fail and live in squalor knowing they tried to reach the top, than not having tried at all.
Only you can know which camp you fall into.
If you're uncertain though - it's almost always better to safe - to pick the option that gives you the most
amount of flexibility. As an engineer, you can make a lot of money, and there is nothing stopping you from
taking a second degree once you finished your first. That way, you can do whatever you want to,
success or failure notwithstanding, and still have something to fall back on later.
As they say in Japan,
Ganbare!
Money doesn't make happiness nor buys it. But when have you seen someone on a financial disaster that is actually happy? Yeah, didn't think so.
I would disagree on both accounts here though - not only can you buy happiness with money, if you know what
makes you happy and those things cost money (if playing games, for instance, makes you happy, then
the act of purchasing those games is the equivalent of buying happiness) - but there is also
a large spectrum of financial situations, where in many cases, you can have relatively poor people being
both happier and more psychological healthy than those with a lot of money.
You say "financial disaster", and yeah, if you have no money whatsoever, then your chance of being
miserable is large - but this is hyperbola, because you know as well as I, that even with today's job-market,
even with a relatively useless university degree, you could still opt to work in some sort of unskilled
labor profession, and at least earn enough to put bread on your own table.
So, in the case of "sacrificing everything for the sake of a pipe-dream", as long as you're not racked up
in debt, or have a family to support etc. pursuing a "useless" university degree is probably not
going to lead to financial disaster, so it's a moot point to make in relation to this conversation.
And, as a person who grew up around insanely rich people, but spent most of my teens with friends
from poor neighborhoods (because I just can't stand rich kids most of the time) I can say that in my
experience, after a certain point, your happiness and mental health will be negatively proportionate to
how much cash you have (although there are exceptions of course).
The rich people I know lead some of the most empty lives you could possibly imagine, and dope themselves
up regularly to run away from that fact.
The lower-middle-class, working-class people I know on the other hand, mostly lead fulfilling and rewarding
lives.
