V is for Venerability

Dear life, dear fate, dear all that is good in the world: please give me a chance. I screwed up so badly in the past; if heaven were merciful, it would give me a chance to make everything right again.

After an interesting weekend and some introspection earlier today, I made some pretty drastic changes to my Life Goals list. What originally consisted of 10 focus areas was cut down to 5 areas; in addition, I cut away a lot of long-term goals and commitments that I frankly was probably never going to accomplish. Or would have been absolutely miserable trying to accomplish them. It’s one thing to have a challenge, but it’s another thing to feel forced to do things that are not absolutely necessary. Why put yourself through a more miserable life than you have to, right?

On a slightly more upbeat note, I think I might be on track to receive a full-time offer from the firm I interviewed with in Dallas. That’s great to hear, of course; any full-time offer is better than none. Although arguably, I might still consider taking a summer internship in equity research and then starting FT in the fall instead. I really want to experience equity research, and I think I have some opportunities that might play out for the summer. We’ll then see where things go from there. Life is always so uncertain, and if I’ve learned anything in the past four years at this institution, it’s the fact that we should never settle on a single path in life. Situations are volatile, people change drastically, and what interests you today may be the thing you hate tomorrow.

If there’s anything else I’ve learned, it’s the fact that you should never take for granted the things that you have; things and people you overlook today may be the ones you’re fighting with every fiber of your being to get back tomorrow. Unfortunately, sometimes that realization comes a little too late, and no amount of begging, praying, or hoping can bring them back. We’ll see (rather soon, I hope) whether or not my present situation falls into that unfortunate category or not.

Whenever I’m asked to “describe myself in one word” during interviews, I always opt for one of my favourite words of all time: relentless.

It’s not quite as “I’ll try to pick myself up” as perseverant, not as wishy-washy as hardworking, and not as egocentric as adamant or harsh as ruthless. Instead, “relentless” gives off an air of fierceness, strength despite the odds, and a firm confidence even when things may not be going my way. Lately, however, I feel as if I’ve downgrading quite a bit from relentless to something more like perseverant. I’ve still been cold-calling and emailing and applying, but I’ve gotten very lazy about it in the past week or so. Instead of focusing my energies on following these leads to their bitter end, I’ve gone for quantity over quality.

Not that quantity isn’t a good thing; on the contrary, in such a horrible job market, quantity is absolutely necessary. But at the same time, quantity without quality isn’t very impressive or effective at all.

As this new week comes up, I’m going to refocus my energies on my job search. I expanded my search to Corporate Finance and Accounting jobs last week, but to be honest, that has been more detrimental. Each of these job functions requires specific interview preparation, and I can’t possibly cover all of them and cover them well. As such, I’ll be refocusing on Equity Research and Investment Banking, my initial two selections, and go full-force from there. ER has been a challenge, especially since I didn’t really start following the markets until late last year… and my capacity to speak fluently about anything in ER is incredibly limited. But that’s what interview preparation is for, right?