Maximizing your career and hobby

[ChimpGrip]

I have lofty goals in both my hobbies and in my career path. For hobbies, I want to be the strongest bench presser in the world and learn 30 languages. Career-wise, I want to become an investment portfolio manager (long-term goal), build my own company, and earn a PhD from Harvard. 

I believe in being great all around. Being “like everyone else” is not enough, so that is why what’s written above may seem ridiculous to many. 

My question is, how did you guys achieve balance between hobbies and career activities in your life? Do I have too many lofty goals? 

I will word it and explain better if needed, but this is an important topic that I have wanted to cover since I have less than a year left of grad school (ie less than a year before going off to the “real world”).

[HSFBfan]

22 minutes ago, ChimpGrip said:

I have lofty goals in both my hobbies and in my career path. For hobbies, I want to be the strongest bench presser in the world and learn 30 languages. Career-wise, I want to become an investment portfolio manager (long-term goal), build my own company, and earn a PhD from Harvard. 

I believe in being great all around. Being “like everyone else” is not enough, so that is why what’s written above may seem ridiculous to many. 

My question is, how did you guys achieve balance between hobbies and career activities in your life? Do I have too many lofty goals? 

I will word it and explain better if needed, but this is an important topic that I have wanted to cover since I have less than a year left of grad school (ie less than a year before going off to the “real world”).

I believe this is a quote from will Farrell in a movie.

If you have no goals you'll never be disappointed 

[Belly Bob]

10 hours ago, ChimpGrip said:

I have lofty goals in both my hobbies and in my career path. For hobbies, I want to be the strongest bench presser in the world and learn 30 languages. Career-wise, I want to become an investment portfolio manager (long-term goal), build my own company, and earn a PhD from Harvard. 

I believe in being great all around. Being “like everyone else” is not enough, so that is why what’s written above may seem ridiculous to many. 

My question is, how did you guys achieve balance between hobbies and career activities in your life? Do I have too many lofty goals? 

I will word it and explain better if needed, but this is an important topic that I have wanted to cover since I have less than a year left of grad school (ie less than a year before going off to the “real world”).

Are you at Harvard now?

In my own experience, part of getting older -- and perhaps wiser -- is becoming more humble about your own abilities.

When I was about your age (or what I'm guessing to be your age), I wanted to continue training BJJ, which I had started doing in high school, and earn my black belt while pursuing a PhD. Within a year of grad school, I stopped training seriously. With courses and language requirements and area exams and trying to make and develop new friendships in a new town and trying to date seriously and attending conferences etc. etc. -- it was all too much. I found it heartbreaking to have to pick and choose, but that was my own experience -- that is, having to make hard choices about what to give up and what to pursue. I just couldn't do all the things I wanted to do, no matter how disciplined I was with my time. 

If you can do all those things and maintain a healthy, romantic relationship with a woman and make time for your friends and your family and keep your apartment clean and so on, my hat's off to you.

But there are only so many hours in the day, and a man, -- even a young, healthy one such as yourself -- has only so much energy to burn. And you'll find as you hit your late 20s that you can't stay up all night working anymore and that your body doesn't recover like it used to and so on. You start to feel tired in a way that you never felt in your teens or early 20s.

Plus you have to make time for HSFB. 

That was my experience, anyway.

If you yourself have any secrets you'd like to share, I'd love to hear them.

[I AM IRONMAN]

All this AND your foot fetish..wow!

[Mjd33]

6 hours ago, ChimpGrip said:

earn a PhD from Harvard. 

If you’re white or Asian don’t bother applying. 

[Belly Bob]

4 hours ago, I AM IRONMAN said:

All this AND your foot fetish..wow!

The young man is ambitious. 

[I AM IRONMAN]

1 hour ago, Belly Bob said:

The young man is ambitious. 

He sure is!

#respect

[ChimpGrip]

On 7/16/2019 at 1:48 PM, Belly Bob said:

Are you at Harvard now?

In my own experience, part of getting older -- and perhaps wiser -- is becoming more humble about your own abilities.

When I was about your age (or what I'm guessing to be your age), I wanted to continue training BJJ, which I had started doing in high school, and earn my black belt while pursuing a PhD. Within a year of grad school, I stopped training seriously. With courses and language requirements and area exams and trying to make and develop new friendships in a new town and trying to date seriously and attending conferences etc. etc. -- it was all too much. I found it heartbreaking to have to pick and choose, but that was my own experience -- that is, having to make hard choices about what to give up and what to pursue. I just couldn't do all the things I wanted to do, no matter how disciplined I was with my time. 

If you can do all those things and maintain a healthy, romantic relationship with a woman and make time for your friends and your family and keep your apartment clean and so on, my hat's off to you.

But there are only so many hours in the day, and a man, -- even a young, healthy one such as yourself -- has only so much energy to burn. And you'll find as you hit your late 20s that you can't stay up all night working anymore and that your body doesn't recover like it used to and so on. You start to feel tired in a way that you never felt in your teens or early 20s.

Plus you have to make time for HSFB. 

That was my experience, anyway.

If you yourself have any secrets you'd like to share, I'd love to hear them.

Not at Harvard, but currently working on my MBA. It’s on my bucket list to earn degree from an Ivy League institution. And maybe teach there... but that’s another animal. 

And I’m 25 years old

You’re right on all points, all of this will almost certainly require a lot of time, and I will have to figure how to get family time in there along with finding the time in the day. 

And yes lol I still have to make time for HSFB as well as a personal life. 

I don’t know, there’s a lot to it. I have to think about it more. 

Do you do martial arts today?

[ChimpGrip]

22 hours ago, I AM IRONMAN said:

All this AND your foot fetish..wow!

Lol nothing will come between me and feet! 

Nothing!

[ChimpGrip]

22 hours ago, Mjd33 said:

If you’re white or Asian don’t bother applying. 

Hehe well I give it my best shot anyway 😅

[Belly Bob]

2 minutes ago, ChimpGrip said:

Not at Harvard, but currently working on my MBA. It’s on my bucket list to earn degree from an Ivy League institution. And maybe teach there... but that’s another animal. 

And I’m 25 years old

You’re right on all points, all of this will almost certainly require a lot of time, and I will have to figure how to get family time in there along with finding the time in the day. 

And yes lol I still have to make time for HSFB as well as a personal life. 

I don’t know, there’s a lot to it. I have to think about it more. 

Do you do martial arts today?

These days, the only thing I do in that respect is hit the heavy bag. But I do that pretty frequently. Surprisingly it's usually enough to scratch the itch.

The truth is that I'd still  like to roll two or three times per week if I could find the right place to do it, but I've had some health problems and I'm a littler older now and training at a standard BJJ gym would be hard on me. I'm okay with just working up a sweat in the garage. 

But I tried hard to keep it going. I once fell asleep at a red light after leaving the gym. That's when I thought it was about time to give it up. 

[Belly Bob]

25 minutes ago, ChimpGrip said:

Hehe well I give it my best shot anyway 😅

I have two friends, both white guys, who did professional or graduate work at Harvard. 

One guy did law school and the other guy started a PhD program in philosophy but dropped out after a year.

But look into it. In many programs, you need near perfect GRE scores, straight As in your undergrad work, strong letters of recommendation, and samples of quality work. Even then, the odds of being accepted specifically to Harvard might not be great. It's often simply a case of there being more qualified applicants than there are available spots. When I was applying to grad school, I was told to apply to about 20 schools, which is expensive and time consuming. (I didn't take the advice and applied only to 8). Still, some of the schools who rejected my application were ranked significantly lower than some of the schools who accepted my application. There's luck involved. 

[ChimpGrip]

23 minutes ago, Belly Bob said:

These days, the only thing I do in that respect is hit the heavy bag. But I do that pretty frequently. Surprisingly it's usually enough to scratch the itch.

The truth is that I'd still  like to roll two or three times per week if I could find the right place to do it, but I've had some health problems and I'm a littler older now and training at a standard BJJ gym would be hard on me. I'm okay with just working up a sweat in the garage. 

But I tried hard to keep it going. I once fell asleep at a red light after leaving the gym. That's when I thought it was about time to give it up. 

Ah. Well sometimes we have to listen to our bodies. I worry all the time about my herniated disc, and where I’ll be 25 years from now. 

[ChimpGrip]

12 minutes ago, Belly Bob said:

I have two friends, both white guys, who did professional or graduate work at Harvard. 

One guy did law school and the other guy started a PhD program in philosophy but dropped out after a year.

But look into it. In many programs, you need near perfect GRE scores, straight As in your undergrad work, strong letters of recommendation, and samples of quality work. Even then, the odds of being accepted specifically to Harvard might not be great. It's often simply a case of there being more qualified applicants than there are available spots. When I was applying to grad school, I was told to apply to about 20 schools, which is expensive and time consuming. (I didn't take the advice and applied only to 8). Still, some of the schools who rejected my application were ranked significantly lower than some of the schools who accepted my application. There's luck involved. 

Yes it is extremely competitive. And I most likely won’t get accepted because of that. I will not not try, but I will not beat myself up if I get rejected. I’ll try my luck at other schools if it happens. There’s always Yale and Columbia (although the latter may be in too busy of an area based on what I’m used to).