A few years ago, I quit my job as a corporate bond trader to become a professional MMA fighter in Peru. I went to Wharton undergrad and interned in finance every summer on various trading desks. I wound up full-time on a prop desk as an analyst and got right into the grind. After two years, I was about to get my own book to trade. But I had always missed my career as a college wrestler. One day I took a trip to Peru and connected with an MMA team there. They offered to sponsor me to come train with them, and even though it sounded crazy, a few months later I quit my job and moved to Peru to fight full-time. I had five MMA fights during my year there before leaving it behind. Since then I've been living in Spain for two years teaching English. I wrote a book about the experience called [The Cage: Escaping the American Dream](http://amzn.to/1Y0xbzD). There are a lot of stories on here about people trying to break *in* to the finance world, and I thought I'd offer one about breaking *out*. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.
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You sound like a classic pre-2007 trader haha
But seriously, props to you. Can I ask, if you measured your happiness right now to back when you were a trader, how would you describe it?
And how would you describe the monetary aspect of things? Obviously finance would be more lucrative, but how is the tradeoff in terms of lifestyle and happiness?
What are you looking for in the long term?
I'm trying to make some tough decisions about finance right now, and it would be enormously helpful to get your perspective in this. But if not for anything else, it sounds like you are feeling fulfilled, and you can't know how genuinely happy I am for you that you're able to do this, especially as I'm being surrounded by people who willingly submit to an unwinnable rat race and am starting to wonder about myself sometimes.
TheRealGorilla thanks!
It's crazy how different I am now from four years ago when I was sitting at that desk. I have had so many transformative experiences. If you could somehow measure and quantity my happiness it wouldn't even be close. I didn't even realize how miserable I was before that. But when I look back, I sometimes shudder at the thought that I might not have done it.
Obviously I make way less money now than I did. But I have found that it hasn't negatively impacted me. I have adjusted my lifestyle lower and I live just fine. No more expensive dinners or lavish hotel rooms, no problem. One thing about finance is you get addicted to expensive things and then it becomes a cycle where you have to earn more to keep up etc. But when you step outside the cycle, it seems weird to me now how much money we used to spend on things that just aren't important to me anymore. Not trying to criticize it, it's just that I have a different perspective now.
I honestly don't know what I'm looking for in the long term. And I'm okay with that. I've been teaching English in Spain for two years and had the time of my life. In the meantime, I've learned Spanish and Portuguese. I've been to 40 different countries. I worked in a hostel in Croatia last summer. I've made friends from all over the world. If I do decide to go back to a "serious" career, I think the lessons I've learned will help me bring something to the table.
Soft, trading is obvs way harder than fighting mma lol
@JordanBelfort1" Haha I mean it's intense and nerve-wracking in it's own, different way. Some days it felt like a fist fight.
Per your handle, the guys at the gym in Peru used to teasingly call me El Lobo de Wall Street....