Why are you the way you are?

This is a little long but the question was on my mind...

So I've been reading all these cases and articles trying to explain why certain industries are consolidated, or why certain cultures work most in building a high performance business.  And I've read Outliers by Gladwell recently which attempts to answer why talented businesspeople, hockey players, and lawyers became who they are.  The short answer being luck, timing, and a support network which propagated intelligent repetition.

But beyond talent, have you ever wondered why you are the way you are?  What makes you angry, sad, happy, messy, grumpy, laugh?  What makes you like or love a certain person, but hate another?  What makes you react one way in a given situation, and another with only a minor difference in context?  We know the broad, generalized answer is a mixture of genetics and environment (the whole nature / nurture construct), but what specifically in nature / nurture made you the way you are?  

For example, I'm a messy person - my worktable is filled with strewn papers, chewing gum packs (orbitz if you have to know), and business cards.  I almost never put my coats back on the hangar - I always leave them on the couch or a chair.  I inevitably clean all this stuff up, but I've never learned how to be organized in a continuous process.  I think I'm like this because my home was pretty messy growing up (our home was never clean) as our family business demanded so much time and effort, and I was never punished for disorganization.  Also, it reflects my thinking - I tend to be nonlinear at times and my imagination hops around like a rabbit on crack.  Similarly, my sister's home is pretty messy, though we both clean up when guests come over.  Whenever I see someone's clean, organized desk, I'm always a little envious - and completely baffled on how he/she does it.

Now it's impossible to explain a person entirely (or is it?), but of the few most prominent features of what defines you, how would you explain those features?  If you dig enough, there's an interesting story behind the little tics and characteristics which explain who are better than broad philosophical statements like "loyalty" or "hard work." Certainly, the answers won't be consistent

PS  on a more ironic note, I wonder if I can explain why I send out these random question emails.  Some of the reason is pretentious - I mean, I think understanding who we are helps us get some meaning or truth out of life.  

Some of it is just distraction - all my coursework is so analytical and causative, that it fails to take into account the complex, nonlinear, and unpredictable aspects of existence.  Life is boring if all we do is plug a formula, interpret data / facts, and make obvious assertions.  

And some of it is just curiosity - so much of what we know about each other are these small snippets of shared experiences which do little to truly reveal who we are, because the tricky part is that you can't ask this question directly.  It's like staring into the sun - you only get a true sense of its heat and light by feeling it, or seeing the reflection, never by staring directly into it.  

What's next?

So banking is dying:  http://www.slate.com/id/2205995/

VC is next:  http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/12/06/the-end-of-venture-capital-as-we-know-it/
And PE is shuttering, due to lack of debt.  

And MBA's always get in too late - look at the Soifer index http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/25/newest-harvard-mbas-flocked-to-wall-street/

It feels like we're recruiting for dying industries.  Sure I admit, I'm doing banking for the summer, but I'm not exactly bullish on getting more than one or two offers, if there are any banks left by January.

So the question is:  what are we missing that could be hot?  Is it entrepreneurship?  A new financing product?  Something completely different?

No answers today, but worth asking the question...

B-school, the first three weeks

We are busy.  We are crazy ass busy.  Wharton is no joke.  

But it's fun.  I've learned more finance, both for startups and large corporations in the last three weeks than I have in the past ten years.  I've improved my speech giving skills.  I've worn a wig.  I've done an LBO model.  It's been great.  

The best part of school, versus work, is just the feeling of freedom.  No need to follow a corporate culture.  No need to censor my language or stop an inappropriate joke.  No need to meet anyone's expectations but my own.  I work at my own pace, manage school and activities at my own pace.  It's like personal entrepreneurship or self-expression at some level.  

I miss NYC sometimes though, and weekends.  Every day is a marathon of meetings, classes, preparation, and the like...just to keep up.  But the energy is good, everyone is pretty damn friendly, and there's a party every week so I can't complain.  

I'm beginning to sound like a damn advertisement. 

Insomnia

I am tired but cannot sleep. I feel the need to check email every 5 minutes. I feel incomplete, like I missed something or forgot to do something. I cannot sit down and read a book or see a movie. I feel like the time is crumbling underneath my feet like quicksand and I must keep moving else fall to my demise. There is so much to do and so little time.

None of it really matters. I have everything I need. But not everything I want. The distance between those two desires is the source of happiness and misery.

And not for the first time, I wonder where I want to go even though I know where I am going. I wonder if they are the same place.

Exercising...

Maybe it's the warm weather. Maybe it's burning off stress from being busy at work. Maybe it's time.

But I've been exercising like crazy.

Five hours of basketball last weekend. Two hours of b-ball and twenty miles of biking yesterday. Nine miles of running today through Central Park. Like I'm unconsciously training for a triathlon (without the swim part). Thankfully I gorge myself right afterwards - buffets and Korean BBQ definitely hit the spot.

When I was running today, about the midway point, I started feeling euphoric. The music in my headphones, the sweat soaking my shirt, and the light shining through the trees. I felt I could run forever (but of course, didn't; my knees were killing me as I finished the CP loop).

But I remember having these strange feelings and ideas (thankfully no visions, but they felt close). I realized (or maybe it was "revealed" to me :-P) that death is a painful, frightening experience, but it is a transition. The pain strikes, and then leaves. We remain, in some form. To where or what, I don't know. I wish had facts or experiments or something to prove this intuition, but at the same time I don't think data would make any difference.

I need to go running again.

Spitzer, Crane, and Bear Stearns: Bad Things Come in Threes

A career on the rise. A sturdy building overlooking the Hudson. A company which stood for decades.

In one week, all gone.

I'm not moralizing. But it is humbling, isn't it? We can marvel at our own greatness, congratulate ourselves and each other on conquering the impossible, and then we fail. Horrifically. Spectacularly.

Ok ok, I'm moralizing.

In other news, I think I'm going to give up cynicism and sarcasm for lent. That's for a week. I think I can do it. I'm actually worried that my cynicism/sarcasm, while generally hilarious and entertaining, is making me bitter, or sound bitter. I'm beginning to forget what it feels and sounds like to be sincere and straightforward.

Saying it without words

The young man sips his coffee. His head stares out window, then the other. His eyes squint then relax, then squint again. He sips his coffee again. A woman sits across the table, one hand on her chin as she nods against her cell phone. She puts down the phone and reaches for his hand in a fingertip embrace. She stares at his polo shirt and old slacks and grimaces. He puts on a grin masking a grim foreboding. They chatter and worry, tossing words into the air like rock salt on snowy asphalt.

A gray-bearded man and gray-haired woman walk through the door, their eyes searching. The younger man and woman raise their hands. They smile like the practice piece of an apprentice dollmaker, the teeth too big and pupils even bigger. There are handshakes, hugs, and offers of coffee. The young man leaves and after three quick steps, exhales.

He returns with the wrong order, and the gray-haired woman tightens her lips while saying nothing. The young man speaks too quickly, laughs too often. The young woman clenches her teeth. She says what she came to say. Both couples stare at each other and can hear only the conversations around them. The graying couple nod their heads in resignation. They gray-bearded man reaches for his coat, the older woman grasping his shoulder but half-heartedly. He points his wrinkled finger, and as if in aim, launches his sentences in a cadenced cannon volley. Spit, like marker rounds, accompany his words as his cheeks blush like an overheated barrel.

The young man falters to the chair. He searches within for his own barrel of retort, but instead stammers and repeats. He spills his cup of coffee onto the porcelain floor in frustration. The young woman's eyes blink and fill like an overdrawn mug of cold tea.

The heater belts out warmth through a raised vent, but the air is cool and empty. The older couple flee the scene while onlookers stare in surprise. There will be no police tape, no reporters seeking eyewitnesses. Just a woman in tears and a man who is still looking for his gun.