Doing dumb shit

So, several years ago, I withdrew from some community college classes to go to law school. They failed to mention that Ws become Fs after two semesters. A few years ago I applied to engineering school, and found out about the Fs. Ever since I've intended to fix the problem. Here's the problem. They're classes I have no need for. It will cost about $1k, books and all. I got into engineering school anyway, though I will need to reapply 'cause I didn't go. Do I go ahead and take the classes? I really feel like I need to do it for me. On the other hand, it's sort of a waste of $1k, which I can't easily spare. I can take these classes through distance learning in a matter of weeks, with almost a guaranteed A. They also might serve as a sort of back to school training wheels, just in case the law ship doesn't get righted and I have to abandon it.

This is really a debate about a larger issue: I used to just sort of do what I wanted to do, and things worked out. For the last several years I stopped doing that. I'm not sure which came first, but now I have things to lose, and if I do dumb shit, then I may lose them. However, I'm also miserable. So what if I lose my house, my car, my career, if I can be other than miserable, right? The problem is, I can't tell when I'm doing dumb shit that is the good shit that got me here, or just doing dumb shit to try to do the good dumb shit.