Meetup.com

Dear Diary:

I’ve been looking into Linkedin groups and meetup.com groups about business strategy groups, professional networking groups, etc. but I am just not inspired. Besides that fact that it fills up my email inbox (especially the linkedin groups that send out an email blast about the latest discussions in their forums when almost all of the discussions are spam messages themselves about some random shit) but because I think (correctly or incorrectly) that it would be a waste of time. Sure, you never know who you’ll meet, blah blah blah, but I might as well sit outside on my stoop of my New York City apartment and strike up a conversation with someone who looks interesting rather than trek all the way out to some random ass bar (why is it always in the lower east side??), talk to people hoping I can get them a job and spend money on expensive drinks just so I can tolerate speaking to people without an advanced degree who want to work in investments, real estate, or private equity.

I can’t tell you the amount of people that I’ve met who want to work for a hedge fund who have no business/finance/legal background.

Maybe it’s just NYC, but really?

I have a law degree and BigLaw experience and this jobby hunt ain’t going so damn smoothly for me and I’m your freaking competition!

Let’s be realistic in our job hunts, people. You can’t become a recording artist if you can’t sing, and you can’t be MD of a private equity firm if you only have a BA in English and you’re at networking groups asking other laid off people for a job.

The one thing that I’ve had to do is to look at what I have to offer. I’ve had to take a real hard look at what I can and cannot do. I had to be honest with myself when assessing whether I will be able to do the things I can’t do right now. And I had to be honest with myself about outlining what goals I can and cannot meet in specific time frames I’ve set out for myself. I’ve also had to separate what is just a hope and what is an actual reachable goal.

Sure, shoot for the stars and land on a moon, but make sure that star is at least in your line of vision and in the same universe you’re operating in. Or else you’ll shoot for a star and land on your ass and make a huge crater while you’re at it.

While we’re all bullshitters to some degree (whether it’s during an interview, with the hot chick over there, on an awesome blog called Law Shucks, or on our linkedin profile, or in our facebook profile picture that doesn’t even look like us) let’s not bullshit ourselves or else you won’t be able to get out of your own way so that you can get on your way.

Related posts:

1. Still Laid Off