Any ideas? You two are at a very important crossroads in your life. I can't emphasize this enough. Choose the wrong path now and you're in for decades of misery. But choose wisely and you'll have a bright future ahead. In my opinion, it is somewhat unreasonable to expect people in their late teens or early twenties at best to make this type of far reaching decisions without any guidance or input from people experienced in life with good intentions and no vested interest in any particular path chosen. It wouldn't necessarily be a bad idea to take a break from your studies after taking the matriculation exam/finishing high school to go to work and give your future a serious thought.
You are young adults and the most important task in your life is to try things out and discover yourselves. All this may sound like a hackneyed cliche but the time to do these things is now and not when you have a number of responsibilities weighing on you like a ton of bricks. Don't embark on anything only because it is expected of you. To be successful in your career, you need passion and drive and it's a serious mistake to ignore that reality. Your life quality and chances at success will both suffer a great deal if you try to shoehorn yourself into being something you're not cut out for/have no real desire to do.
I've just noticed you were here. With some life advices.
Why don't you write a post about it? If you take your chat messages and combine them into a post it can really go well :D
That's a great comment and a very good advice. It is hard trying to gain information from various careers and life choices when I really don't know people who to ask from. Sure, there are news articles, youtube videos and what not but they don't reflect the actual reality. I don't have connections and I usually tend to figure out things by myself. The hard thing is that I seriously can't know what I'd like to do in the future. I don't have any specific passions in life just yet and it might take some time to find them. Luckily I am still young and have time to find one.
A really good starting point if to ask yourself what type of activity can you engage in effortlessly. What are your thought processes like when you're doing what you love doing. What is it about them that allows you to enter into a flow state? The specific activity is not as important as how you go about doing it and what motivates you about it. If you really want to excel at something, you need to be constantly honing your skills. What is the source of your motivation in general? If you manage to find job for the summer or for your gap year, it is a good idea to keep your eyes and ears open. Some people are happy to talk to you about their work. Talking to the guidance counselor at your school might be useful. A whole sub branch of psychology is specialized in occupational choice. When you cast your net widely to gather as much information as possible about the topic, you might stumble upon something particularly useful to you.