If our young men miscarry in their first enterprises, they lose all heart. If the young merchant fails, men say he is ruined. If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges, and is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened, and in complaining the rest of his life. A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont, who in turn tries all the professions, who teams it, farms it, peddles, keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and so forth, in successive years, and always, like a cat, falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks abreast with his days, and feels no shame in not ‘studying a profession,’ for he does not postpone his life, but lives already. He has not one chance, but a hundred chances.
Summer ‘14 Advice For Soon-To-Be Graduates With No Job Lined Up
This assumes you’re living at home with your parents and they’re not charging you rent.
Learn a programming language (Python or RoR) during the weekdays. Hang with your friends on weeknights.
On weekends, rent somebody’s parents’ Suburban and be an Uber driver in the closest wealthy vacation town.
Take your parents out to dinner once. With the rest of the money, spend half on yourself. Save a quarter of it. Put the rest in Amazon and Facebook stock. Don’t pay attention to the price of the stock for ten years.
Run every other day.
Keep your eye out for somebody special – you’ll know you’ve found the right person when you genuinely want to ask them questions, and not just make conversation. Take them on a date (not a group hang.)
Watch two Charlie Rose episodes a week without looking at your phone.
The week after Labor Day, go on a 10 day vacation some place affordable but interesting. Jet Blue has flights to Cartagena, for example.
When you get back, look for a job and/or build something neat with your newfound programming skills.
Have a bitchin’ summer.
It used to be that the best day to start your business was yesterday. Now, due to the constant expansion of what you’re able to invent in your garage, tomorrow is almost always a more advantageous starting point.
The Operating Model That Is Eating The World — Medium
Great business-y read by Aaron Dignan.