I have no idea what to do with myself

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I keep trying to consider the future and where I want to end up, and I honestly have no idea. In terms of career and also in general I just don't know what I want anymore. I feel confused and lost and without a purpose. Every time I think of some kind of goal I might want to reach, I start considering the pros and cons and what it would take to get there, and every time I either realize it is not realistic, or I change my mind about wanting it after thinking about what it would entail, and I end up back at square one. It often feels like I just have to choose between equally sucky options. Or there is just way too much uncertainty associated with the options, which makes it impossible for me to pick anything.

I would elaborate on the "options" I'm talking about, but it's way too much. Basically, things involving where I want to live, where I want to attend college, what I want to study there, what I want to do with that education afterwards, etc. I have all these life choices, and I don't even know what I want in my life anymore. But I feel a sense of urgency, like if I don't pick something and run with it now, I'm simply going to end up as a worthless loser contributing minimally to society and barely managing to take care of myself forever. That's how I feel about myself right now. I just don't know what to do, I don't know where to start turning things around I guess. It's just too much to consider.

I say, start with career options and find a working idea. Then work backwards to see what you need for that.

Can you meet with some people of your prospective career ideas to get a feel for them to find your fit?

Well, part of it is that my career ideas aren't very specific. All I know is that I really like music and singing, and that I want to do something involving that. But beyond that I don't know, and I don't know how to narrow it down.

Get as involved in those fields as possible.

Start with your interest in music and singing and don't overanalyze the future of what your specific career will be, what specific jobs you will have, where specifically you will attend college, etc.

Instead, take action to move in the direction of attending a college to set the foundation for your career. Make it a goal to make a list of colleges you will apply to and revise this list over a couple of weeks as you research colleges. Don't revise it for months. Set a time limit for deciding. Find out about their music-related majors and programs. Figure out what locations you definitely don't like. See if any colleges catch your fancy as places you would really like to go. Prepare your application. Update what you are doing on WP if you feel it helps you, others will respond to encourage.

It seems that you do know what area you want to be in, so what you need to do is stop analyzing and start doing things to go in this direction.

Coincidentally, I also love music and singing. I hesitated for years to really do something with that. But now I have joined a band and although in the beginning we really didn't sound good and I didn't always want to go to practice, we sound pretty good now and have just had our first gig. I don't know if I will ever be able to earn any relevant amount of money with music, but even 'just' doing it as a hobby is great. I would recommend that you too try to find a band or at least take singing lessons if you're not doing that already. It definitely gives you a sense of belonging and purpose, since you're working on a 'project'. I also have phases of hopelessness like this, it helps me to get more active, even if you feel like you just want to sit around in your room and be sad. Sometimes you really have to force yourself, and not give up too early. It might take a while to work out but I'm much better and you can do that too.
Also, concerning career, what I found is that it doesn't matter so much what you are doing, but how and with whom you are doing it. If the atmosphere in your company is good, you like your colleagues and the job itself isn't too bad, you can be content almost everywhere, I think.

I'm aware I over-analyze things a lot, and it makes decision-making almost impossible, but it's really hard for me to not do it. Like, I realize what I'm doing, but the only solution I know of is to just stop analyzing completely, which also gets me nowhere. Usually what happens is I'll stress myself out going over things in my head until I just can't handle it anymore, and then I stop trying and basically give up for a while.

I have wanted to be in a band for a while but I don't think that's a good option for me right now. Really the main thing I need to take care of first is my financial situation, but for some reason this is something I really struggle with too. I am not very logical when it comes to spending, even though in the moment I think I am being logical. I really believe that I need to buy this or that for whatever reason, and then down the road when it's too late I realize just how much I don't need or even really want what I bought. I keep telling myself, "This is the last thing I am going to buy." But then I always end up "needing" something else. And I can't even make a budget because I over-analyze that too, and it just stresses me out and I end up just giving up on it.

I wish I had some kind of mentor that could help me with these things, at least at first so I can get some kind of system going, because I've pretty much lost all confidence in my own ability to do it. But I don't know who would be willing to do that for me, and I feel wrong about asking anybody so I just don't. I was raised being taught that I need to do things for myself and that asking for help where it isn't needed is really wrong. Which is a lot of the reason I never got diagnosed, because I was too afraid to even tell my parents I thought I had a larger underlying issue (even though I was pretty sure I did ever since I was 16, and did briefly consider autism). I couldn't tell them because I knew they would just tell me I was making excuses. Even now that I have a diagnosis from a professional they still have this attitude like, "Ok, well maybe you were right, but it still shouldn't matter. You know what it is now." They think now it's just a thing of the past and I should never talk about it, like somehow knowing just fixes everything.

One good thing about applying to colleges is that there are clear application deadlines, so you know that you have a limited time frame if you want to apply this fall. The essay questions should be coming out soon, if they are not already. Then, there is the other stuff you need to get to apply, like rec letters and score reports and transcripts. The hardest part is probably deciding which colleges to apply to, that would just have to be internet research and any gut feelings about particular places you don't like or really like as you research.

You don't usually have to actually declare a major until you've finished 2 years of college.

I still think you'd do well with speech pathology. You like kids, and you like music.

That’s why you have to prepare budgeting beforehand. I can get intense urges to buy things too but I’ve prepared beforehand and I always know that my primary objective is survival to achieve that I ‘need’ food, water and depending upon environment you may need heat. So my advice is if you can’t be rational in the moment of spending be rational before it.

Preferably establish a system which will govern you when you spend money thus removing emotion from the problem and turning control over to a pre-determined system. Similar to how some autistics practice social scripts and then when encountered with a particular social situation they enact the script designed for it you just plan it all beforehand and then act out a routine. Works better with money than people.

You could always join in on Anonymous activities...