Why do you do it?

Why do you do this job? Why do you need the title, the money, the deep and omnipresent sense of “I need to make it”?

Random guy or woman in the middle of Ohio are 10x happier than you. Married their college sweetheart and living in a BX- owned rental. But you know what? They are happy! Sleep 8+ hrs a day, exercise regularly, cook because they need to, but its okay. Knowing you could be happy too, why do you do it?

21 Comments
 

Can you DM me? Would love to hear about your experience. I’m at MF PE and very rough… would love to hear more about a success story and what to look for in the next gig

Nicolas
 
Most Helpful

This is backwards thinking. Would be more inclined to believe that randoms in Ohio are both unhappy and completely directionless

One of my close friends grew up in Ohio and mentioned how the majority of his HS were drug users, predominantly illiterate (sub 50% reading literacy in his hs) and spent all day high on opioids, roaming the mall or wandering around in the forest, and this was not unique to just his school either, but rather common in his area. He grew up in a nicer town outside of a large city as well, can’t even imagine what kind of hellhole the inner city was like. 
 

Ohio is kind of like a big cornfield of nothingness, small ponds, hicks and slow drivers. Kind of like the Florida of the Midwest, but without any of the sunshine or nice parts 
 

 

Random guy or woman in the middle of Ohio are 10x happier than you. Married their college sweetheart and living in a BX- owned rental. But you know what? They are happy! Sleep 8+ hrs a day, exercise regularly, cook because they need to, but its okay. Knowing you could be happy too, why do you do it?

What evidence do you have for any of this?  Ohio is the 6th most obese state in the country, I sincerely doubt there are tons of people exercising regularly.  Ohio is in the top third of the country in terms of poverty - my guess is lots of people in central Ohio barely sleep at all because they worry about paying their bills.

Stop with this bullshit that people working in banking are "unhappy" because you work long hours.  Folks in IB spend two or three years working their ass off, and getting paid an enormous amount of money to do so.  And then they just get paid an enormous amount of money to do what many other Americans do to make ends meet.  I get it, you're 24 and you are fetishizing the hours you work, because that is what people in the Wall Street bubble do.  That's your business, and if you want to play make-believe like you've got it bad because you work 60-80 hour weeks, no one can stop you.  Romanticizing someone who makes a quarter of what you do if they're lucky and then acting as if the constant stress and concern around providing for themselves or their family is non-existent, and that they live in some fantasyland where they're all working out, getting good sleep, and eating healthy and just living their best lives because they don't sit in an office moving logos around a powerpoint slide for 6 hours a day

 
Funniest

You sound like a LOSER! I do this because I don't want to be a grown a** man with a family living in a shoddily built rental home in the midwest where me and my fat wife got to Cinemark to watch some Dwayne the Rock JOHNSON movie then go to PF CHANGS afterwards for our anniversary!! I do this because I'm tired of playing public golf courses with LOSERS like yourself who clog up the entire course with their hand me down goodwill set of clubs!!! I do this because I am not  a LOSER!!!

 

Wow PF Changs sounds really good right now. I like their Lo Mein.

"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
 

Is this only directed at bankers / PE folks working 70+hrs a week? I can't answer as I'm not this cohort

I'm working in AM where a full workload is ~50-55hrs a week (earnings season is higher, maybe 60-65). I think this schedule allows for most of the same things that that 9-5er in Ohio has but also lets you accumulate a lot more wealth. Wealth does buy nice toys, nice dinners, nice travel, etc up to a point....but the real important element is buying freedom. The ability to walk away, that's what I want.

Let's say I have a $10ml net worth at 40. That's the point where I can walk away and not worry even with a fam of 4-5. Maybe I'll still need to return to work but I don't have to stay in a crappy situation (terrible company, doing stuff I hate all the time, working for bad people, etc). Would still want to work but I'd have greater choice -- that's the idea. I don't want to work for someone forever, ideally at 45 unless I'm at a place I really love either I want to 1) move somewhere where I love it or 2) start my own thing

 

Money

Florence Stanley in Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)

"If you don't have any enemies in life you have never stood up for anything" - Winston Churchill | "It's a testament to the sheer belligerence of the profession that people would rather argue about the 'risk-adjusted returns' of using inferior tooth cleaning methods." - kellycriterion
 

“Why do you do this job?”

What does “this” mean? WSO has a variety of different roles. 

"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
 

Happiness comes in different forms for everyone—some find it in simplicity and stability, while others in ambition and exploration. It's about knowing what truly fulfills you.

 

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