A: Pursuing Math and Science because it seemed cool. Engineering was an awful degree and not worth the headache for what little it does in the grand scheme of things. I’ll get into my Freshmen experience at Georgia Tech in another post and link it here when I am finished.
I wish I could have had more time to chill than spend hours solving problems that have no relation to the real world. Granted, I did get 5s in AP Calculus and Physics but I haven’t heard of the concept of opportunity cost at that point and followed the usual rhetoric of “If you work hard enough, anything is possible!” (or other generic platitudes)
I often wonder how many centuries of collective human effort has been expended chasing after hollow dreams because of following idiotic platitudes.
Anyone who has read Victor Niederhoffer book Practical Speculator knows the picture of the hard charging Gold miner getting in way over his head while still chipping away for the gold deep into a mine that is about to collapse. It is the reality to the typical cartoon you see about not quitting before you strike gold or diamond where the other guy gets the prize and the loser goes home empty handed 3 feet before striking it big. Well, they never covered the scenarios where people got buried alive due to foolish pursuits! Survivorship bias always makes the best tales as those who have died trying don’t live to tell their story so all you hear about are all the winners who lived and succeeded!