Tuesday, April 17, 2007

when you're losing when do you give up?

I remember writing a depressed entry about not being able to get an internship some time ago. Well, five failed interviews later, I'm still singing the same song. So in the face of rejection, what do you do? Do you just admit that it's time to start looking at something not so glamorous? I've been aiming the top, so maybe it's time to check out the lower ranks? But oh, I could just imagine the discontentment I'd feel and the whatif's that would poison my brain and the questioning of self-worth.

Yet I have honestly done my best. I have talked about yen carry trades, about natural hedges and forward contracts, about how we should just keep releasing British sailors so that oil prices would stay low, about the burgeoning growth in China and the political constraints its electricity demands are causing, about the mad dash to sell off Treasury bonds in the face of inflation, about CAPM and Black Scholes and speculating and valuating and trading and selling.

Maybe I AM just not good enough. I have to admit that sooner or later. Maybe I'm just good enough to get to the last four or to the last two but I just don't make the cut. Maybe someone else displays more confidence, more capability, more grasp and knowledge about the markets. Maybe someone else knows programming, treats the Bloomberg machine like his lover, and can quote the closing price on any stock without blinking.

Maybe my competitor(s) could make even the fiercest interviewer laugh, shed a tear, say the words, "You're hired!"

Maybe I should just be content and be proud that I have had the opportunity to compete with these amazing people.

But I can't. Because it's a zero-sum game and if they win that means I lose. And oh God do I want this most recent internship! It is just perfect. Please don't let me screw this one up. Please let them just call me tomorrow and tell me it's all over and I got it. Please. I will work my ass off, go home at midnight everyday and be there at 6 am to prepare morning notes.

I guess all I could do is hang by the phone all day tomorrow and if it doesn't ring, then I'll know that I'm already defeated.