I think I've been feeling a little down lately because I've just given up on work. I'm still churning out the report and speaking to analysts but somehow the work doesn't do it for me anymore.

You want the truth. It's always a fun idea to have a job that everyone wants. The prestige is great for inflating egos. It's also a fun idea to earn more than most. But when I went away I realized who the hell really cares. When school is over who is going to give a damn if you earn more than everyone else? Who is going to congratulate you when you've got your whole life confined to a desk?

Maybe the problem with me is I've always judged my success by other peoples' yardsticks, by the number of times people have said congratulations. I am not proud of that. It shows a great weakness for vanity. The problem is that when no one is looking we have to face our biggest critic, ourselves. And I am sick of running from that. I work extremely hard, and it's time I work for what I really want.

Thinking about the last couple of years it amazes me that I've pushed so hard for something I wasn't even sure of. People who know me best know that I've always been myself as a person, and maybe somewhere along the way I stopped thinking of myself when it came to my work.

Perhaps the biggest consolation is that through the last 4 years I've managed to figure out what I want for myself, and I finally feel like I have more guts than I thought.