23… and becoming reckless
For the last couple of months I’ve become a bit reckless… or a combination of reckless and brutally honest. Nothing too serious mind you (well at least recklessly). I’m still healthy and as sane as I’ve ever been, but I’m taking more chances.
I thought for this post, I’d share some ‘words to live by’:
- Go Big or Go Home
- You Miss Every Shot You Don’t Take
- It’s The Crazy That Counts
- It ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward…
- Don’t be afraid to make mistakes… or enemies…
- Don’t take life too seriously… you’ll never get out alive
I’ll add more to the list if I think of any. Sure it’s just a list of phrases that people hear all the time, but I think they’re worth remembering. They’re all related one way or another too… Take risks… Go Forth and Conquer!… This is SPARTA! If you end up doing these things (take risks) you’ll have confidence in yourself whether your crazy venture works or not. I’m a firm believer that you need to make mistakes in order to learn. I haven’t always felt that way, and I definately haven’t always taken risks… I am typically very calculating. I try to think of every possible scenario… then I do something and it turns out that the result was something I had never thought of.
It’s like they say about the ape in the cage. Someone once did a study where they put an ape in an escapable cage. They had carefully designed it so the ape had 5 different escape options…
…Well the ape found a 6th way.
So why waste time in thinking about every possible outcome? There will only be one outcome and you probably didn’t think of it anyways. Live Life! Make Mistakes! (and have fun with them)
p.s. and I realize I’m really not that old
The Real World… sooner then expected…
So I don’t think I’ll be going for my PhD in one straight shot. Grad school is definitely a lot of work… and I can’t see myself doing this for another 2-3 years after this one. So the job hunt begins! I’ll be looking at the big corporations (Electric Boat, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman(still bitter), the US Navy… maybe Exxon/Chevron but I’m probably more interested in the military stuff).
Realistically I’ll probably end up working for the Navy up in Carderock (DC Area), because of the job security/benefits and it sounds like it could be interesting.
What are my work priorities though? I don’t want to just sit in a cube day after day after day… that gets old, I know that… I also know sometimes it’s inevitable. My dream job would be where I could just sit around all day and think of crazy ideas, maybe get to try them out (I guess like a think-tank somehow)… something where someone would just throw me money and probably 1 out of every 10 ideas I’d think of something that would pay for the failures and then some. But no one is just going to throw money at me. The military always has interesting projects going on, and worst case scenario if I’m not coming up with the ideas, I’m good at poking holes in ideas too (mine as well as other people’s). So it has to be interesting work.
Next priority would be pay. With a Masters degree I think I’d be able to make at least $60,000. I’m smart, have almost 2 years experience (1.75 cumulative, not counting grad school work) and have a clearance already (assuming it didn’t expire).
Finally location. I know a lot of people up in the DC area now, so that’s a plus. I don’t like traffic however, but that once I get a newer car (probably a year after I get my job wherever), that will be manageable. One thing I’ve learned from being a Navy brat is that it doesn’t really matter where you live… in the long run it’s about the people. I’ve always thought the Boston area would be nice to live at… not sure why… I’ve never been there, and scum like my friend Palmer are from there… ha.
One important consideration is also retirement planning. Some places will match portions of your salary that you put directly into a 401k or IRA or something. I’ll be maxing that out as much as possible.
Well that’s all for now… my overall craziness is subsiding and I may be reverting back to the quiet, reserved guy. Maybe I’m just a lil down… we’ll see…
