When you're young, because much of your life is still about learning, it's very easy to keep asking people for advice and then taking their advice as the gospel truth. But at some point you gotta probe your consciousness and ask if that's what you really want. Don't force yourself into a corner, even if everyone tells you that corner is gold-gilded or something. Or it's the most worth it, or it's the best corner for you.
To draw a poor analogy, it's like on a crowded mrt. You step in and everyone is facing you, so you turn to face the same way as them. Or a huge crowd of people rush in, so you put yourself out of their way and in the dark link between the carriages where the floor jerks and shakes but where few people are. You do all this subconsciously. But back to the point-- don't do all this blindly.
You'll live your life in vain.
You were put on this Earth for a purpose. It's your job to find that purpose. Not to ask people what your purpose is. No one knows.
Don't force yourself into a corner.
Don't run because everyone is running.

People can be cruel. Cruel expectations, cruel ideals.
That's not their fault. It doesn't mean they are bad.
Most of them are, simply, human.
Including me.