The following is an excerpt from 5 Things You Must Do As Soon As You’re Employed.
20 years ago, long before I starting managing money professionally, I remember a little nugget of wisdom my mother’s financial advisor Daniel gave me: “Your career is a far more important investment than any stock or bond I’ll ever buy for you.”
It was the late 1990s — at the tail end of the greatest stock market bubble in history — and I was a kid fresh out of college. The thought of grinding away in a cubicle for the next 40 years of my life was laughable to me. I was going to be a dot-com millionaire and retire by 30!
I often hear older men say that they’d love to go back in a time machine and kick their own asses for some of the stupid decisions they made in their youth. Well, I don’t have those urges because the 2000-2002 bear market did it for me.
In retrospect, it was fantastic timing. I had the get-rich-quick mentality bludgeoned out of me by a nasty bear market. It taught me discipline and humility. And from that point on, I took my career a lot more seriously.
Daniel was right. Getting serious about my career was the best investment I ever made. And by putting my nose to grindstone and getting to work, I advanced and managed to escape the greyish hell of the cubicle in just a few short years. I still work for a living, but today I have the freedom to make my own hours and work from anywhere in the world.
So again, work hard and advance your career. Yes, you’ll be a peon for a few years — just view it as a necessary stepping stone.
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