confusion

I've been asking a lot of different people what I should do right now in my life with regards to grad school. Deep down I know it will have to be my decision. And deep down, it'll have to be a decision that I have to live with, that I will have to be happy with. A decision that I ultimately have to make on my own. For my own reasons.

I feel in my heart that if I stay in school, that I will be staying in school because everyone around me is voting that I stay in school. Everyone wants me to stay in school and to be in school because I'm capable of so much. I can do this. I should do this. Job security. Why not? It's only two years. What else would you do? Will you be happy if you quit? Why shouldn't you do this? Is this something you really want to give up on? Isn't it worth it? Will you be happy settling for something else?

Everyone around me wants me to "succeed" and I almost feel like it's for their reasons. They want me to succeed because I can. And if I don't then I'm wasting something. I don't want to devote my life to math. Struggling over roughly 17 problems a week that take hours upon hours does not appeal to me. Not even for 2 years. I don't want to sit in an office. I don't want to teach, I don't mind tutoring, but I don't want to teach.

I don't know what I want in life. I hung out with some very dear friends and some new friends this evening. And the one thing that I came away with was "I DONT KNOW." I walked this in the snow as I walked home in circles and thought about what I wanted in life. The only real answer I have right now is I don't know. I know very little, I know I love my family. I know I want to be here for them. I know I want time for craft work. I know I want time to read. I know that I want to travel. I know I want time with my mother, with my nephew, with my community. None of this amounts to me knowing anything definite about my future.

I'm absolutely terrified of not knowing what I want in life, what I want with grad school and if I'm staying in grad school because I'm scared, that's yet another reason not to be there. I'm scared of people thinking I'm a failure because I don't want grad school. I think I know what I need to do. But I don't know if I'm ready to live up to all the implications that come with my decision.