I can relate. Before I get into university, I already started self-learning physics, math, engineering and other stuffs. I plan to get into research area. Without a degree, it'll be harder. Now, I'm studying electrical engineering in an university. Every day it's a "torture" to sit down, re-learn and doing all those trivial things that I've already learned before. I don't feel like I'm learning anything substantially useful at the moment. The curriculum is even less rigorous than how I learned the subject before. BTW, I'm not saying that attending university is a bad idea, it looks like I'm the only student who has this problem, while others are having very good review towards their uni life/experience. Maybe I'll also change my view towards my university when the curriculum gets harder or when things get more practical in later year, but let's talk about what's happening at the moment.
Whenever there are assignments, I am always the first to complete so that they don't bother me for too long. During free time, I don't study for exam, I study many other things that are not even in my degree's curriculum, e.g. some post-graduate level maths, advanced physics, computer science, machine learning etc. People around me consider studying these as something not right for me because it won't help in exam and I partially agree with them because the reason I attend university is to get good result so that I can do my master/phd degree at better university. I know I should put more time to "polish up" my degree but at the same time, my mind cannot stop myself from learning other things that interest me, although they're not so useful, even in my daily life. (This addiction to learning is also a reason why I was able to quit gaming in the past.) This kind of ironic situation gets me into "depression" for many times already ... I just hope that I can soon learn the advanced materials that are more challenging in the later year of my degree. Meanwhile, I'll just keep studying things that seems "not right" for me so that I don't regret not doing them now in the future.
“Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.” --- John Lennon
