Author: NA

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Chapter 12 Picking Your Major



Being famous isn’t prety,
That doesn’t elevate us up,
No need to start an archive,
To shake over your writings.
Aim of creating is to give one-self,
Not ruckus, not success,
The shame of being worthless
While praised by everyone as best.
— Boris Pasternak, My Sister – Life




  • How to pick one.
  • Double major or minor.
  • What to do if you feel you need to switch.


    • My phone rang at nine am on a Tuesday morning, rousing me from my sleep. It was my friend and business partner’s  distressed mother asking me if I could speak to her younger son. He was starting his second year of college and had no idea what he wanted to do. He called me a week later and explained that he is considering physics but wasn’t sure if he would make money at it. To me that signaled like a path of mediocrity. I asked him: what is it that you want to do? He really didn’t know, he just knew he wanted to work with other people. I gave him some suggestions of how a technical degree could come in handy and how he could do something with other people with that degree. But essentially I said “find something that you love and pursue that, you will make far more money doing something you love than doing something you tolerate.”


    How to pick one.
    There are few who know who they are and what they want to be as they enter college. They are lucky but they also don’t necessarily stick to that. Remember that many artists, become writers, that many singers, become actors, lawyers, become sky diving instructors and engineers become motorcycle teachers. Without a lifetime goal, we become bored and move on to another calling. If you grew up with many interests, it may be difficult to decide on what you want as you enter college. But as I told Aaron, follow your passion and then find a way to make money at it.


    When I entered college I had no idea what I wanted to be. I figured that an engineering major would give me options, that if I wanted to switch to something else, it would give me the necessary pre-requisites. However, what I didn’t realize, is that once you start on a path, it can be very difficult to quit. The more time and effort you put into something, and especially as people believe or doubt your abilities to follow through, it may no longer be about your passion for that field, but a matter of pride. This has to be identified early on because regretting and resenting a decision ten years into a career is no way to live.



    When one major isn’t enough.

    Once you have your passion, look around for professions and requirements for those. They should direct you towards the best major. Sometimes, for some people, the major may not be a good fit because you may feel that your skills are more than adequate without further education. This is very rare, it is probably not you and you probably know it. For those individuals a complementary major maybe good. For others a double major can be a good idea, provided that it doesn’t leave you too much in debt. 
    That’s when it is good to look at just taking a minor instead. It’s faster and you can get two or three for the same time and fee as a major.
    For instance business is a great major to add to engineering, so is physics. For doctors, maybe a second language. For photographers, art or writing. A more broad engineering is going to open your horizons, push you academically and make you better at whatever you do.



    How to know if you should stick to it or not.

    Sticking with your major can be hard, and that may be a sign that it isn’t not for you. If what you think you will do in the end, if your most creative classes do not give you the satisfaction and pride in work. Then yes, I advise that you leave. If what motivates you are the good grades and praise from instructors and not the art project or lab or skills you aquire, move on. However, if you are not doing well grade wise, but you love to do what you do, and you spend many hours just to receive a bad grade for what you feel is good and pleasant work, especially in art classes, do not quit, keep going. You have found a passion that you should not give up on because even if you think you’re no good, you should continue. After all, at one point, we were all bad shoe-tiers, didn’t mean we should have quit.
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    Chapter 15. Graduate School

    “If you want to make money, you don’t need a PHD. If you want women, you don’t need a PHD. If you want freedom, then a PHD will help.”-Slava Rokitski

      1. Why apply.
      2. Studying for tests
      3. Personal Statement
      4. Experience
      5. Contacting professors
      6. When to apply
      7. What if grades are low
      8. Masters or Phd


    Those were the words of Slava Rokitski, one of my mentors during my undergraduate days. He has a soft spoken, calm and quiet demeanor. He is one of those who sits, observes and makes a decision carefully.  He gets his work done without a fuss. Why does a PHD get you freedom? “It makes you think clearly and forces you to question everything.” 

     When you question everything, you do research and when you do research you surpass ignorance when you are not ignorant you know reality and when you know reality you can make better decisions and when you make good decisions you are in control and when you are in control, you are free. Everyone I spoke with, did not regret getting a PHD. Not everyone can get a PHD but like my other mentor, Professor Shaya Fainman said when I asked him if it’s possible do a PHD later in life: “Anything is possible, if you have focus.”
    Taking Tests
    Many of my friends took entrance tests, most of them took them more than once. I took mine more than once. Most of us did the same thing, we didn’t study because we thought we were geniuses. But we did poorly and for the second time we studied our hineys off. At the time, I was unemployed and spending 3-6 hours a day studying for my GRE’s. I’d do a practice test in the morning, study during the day then take another one or two during the day and or at night.

    This paid off and after I took the test I began to take grad classes through my employer. I was lucky, they were flexible allowing me to drive to college at lunch or during the day, paying for several classes. This wasn’t easy and I wished I had taken advice of other PhD students, mainly to go straight from undergrad to grad school.

    When To Apply
    When you’re out and working, you get used to having money, having your own schedule and working a lot less than when you were in college. You don’t have finals, you have free weekends and you can take off on vacation any time instead of during designated times.

    Going straight from college to grad school means that you’re used to living poor and working hard. You are surrounded by people like you and that helps a lot. When you’re older you feel out of place and people your age will be a lot less understanding of you going through school.

    If you’re tired of school, just think how you’ll regret not pushing yourself an extra year or two when you’re working and feeling like you could have had another degree. Just a year or two more and your checks will be bigger and a lot more opportunities open. Just look at job openings, vast majority ask for Master’s candidates. So suck it up and do it!

    Personal Statement
    A grad school personal statement is not at all like the personal statement for undergrad. The Graduate school could care less about how unique you are or how hard your life was. What they care is that you can work hard, you have passion and you know what you want. They want that because that is the kind of people who thrive in grad school because that is the type of people who have focus.

    For this reason, look up some successful statements and model yours after theirs. This is how they will look:
    I first began to like subject A when.
    I worked on subject A in undergrad with Professor B.
    My grades in this area were C.
    I have done work on the subject, I read the papers on the subject and I intend to work on C in subject A at this school because A, B, C

    That’s it.


    Contacting Professors
    Do it early. In fact do it right after taking a class where you did well where they will remember you. 
    Give the professor a pre-written letter for them to edit and sign. This will ensure that they get to it in their busy schedule and maybe embellish it because you have shown you care for their time. Even if you worked for the pro-fessor pre-write the letter because they don’t remember what you did because they barely remember what they did.

    This is how the letter will look.

    A worked in my lab from A to B and was in my class for D. She was a hard-working student having completed all assignments on time and showed ability to perform in class by earning an A and in lab by quickly picking up the skills and performing them on time and with great quality. She is motivated by C and clearly sees a future for herself in this area of research.
    I recommend this person for your program as I believe they will be able to perform and excel given their talents, skills and passion for C.

    That’s it, be honest about your work and let the professor embellish it if need be. Just don’t put anything that you wouldn’t put for others because then you may never hear from the professor because they are too “busy”, missing the deadline and opportunity for grad school.
    Grades/Test results too low.
    Never take a no for an answer. If you can work hard and have focus, apply to all schools and if you do not get into a school you really want to go to, appeal. My friend Ash had a 2.5 GPA and was able to convince the Dean to let him into the PhD program. He wasn’t regular, he had a patent and a start-up under his belt but neither are you, that’s why you’re reading this to learn before doing. So make sure that you are aiming for the fruit you are qualified for. Otherwise, there are plenty of less competitive programs where you might be a good fit. 
    However, hopefully you are reading this before you let your grades fall too low so that you have to resort to appeals and begging. Best is study hard and work for things and don’t slack or you will come to regret the time wasted and the poor grades as each C is a potentially closed door in the future, there are no do overs in life. I’m not lecturing, I’m just telling you how it will go.
    Masters or PhD
    A Masters degree is great for getting a extra pay when you get out of school and having a little extra qualification for jobs. It prepares you for more than just a bachelors but it is expensive. What many don’t know however, is that you can do is get a Masters via PhD. In United States there is a shortage of PhDs, so it is easier to get accepted into a PhD program which is usually free to the student and after you pass your prelim test which is about two years into the program, you get an automatic Masters. At which point you can decide to go on or to stay.

    Reasons to not go on to PhD:
    You don’t want to go into academia and teach.
    You don’t want to do a post-Doc, period of 2-10 years after PhD where you do the same work as people do in the industry but for a third of the money but with hopes of finding a position at a University to teach.
    Last reason that I know of, you can’t spend another second in the PhD. program.
    Pitfalls

    I have met PhD students whose funding was cut off after four years and could not get their PhD. I’ve met students who were going through the program for ten plus years and I have met students who got on the bad side of a tenured professor who would fail them and get them nearly expelled. One must navigate and tread the waters of University politics carefully.
    You must never burn a bridge, no matter how shaky and keep focus at all times.
    You will work like a slave for virtually no money but in the end you will be smarter, better and richer. So focus on your passion, don’t let others dissuade you and dig in. Others have done it and so can you.

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    Chapter 14 Getting First Job

    “If you do what you love, you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” -Ruth Ginsburg (first female CEO in USA)
      1. When to start looking for one
      2. Where to look for one
      3. What kind of company to work for
        1. Small
        2. Big
        3. Medium
        4. startup
      4. How to look for one
        1. Friends
        2. Family
        3. Websites
        4. recruiters
      5. Cover Letter
      6. What should your resume have
      7. What should it look like
      8. How to act at an interview
        1. Questions to be ready for.
        2. Questions to ask
      9. Follow up email
      10. Negotiating pay
    1. First Job
      1. What to expect
      2. How to work
      3. What to demand
      4. What is demanded
      5. How to quit
      6. How to act
      7. Keeping activities outside of job



    At some point you’re going to graduate and all those years of high school, college and advice from this will book will culminate in your first job. Remember a job? That thing your parents said you were going to need one day when you’re all grown up and have to start paying all those bills? Well, that feeling of adult is here (or will be here). I know you don’t feel it (it’s been ten years for me and I still don’t feel it) but now you gotta go and get that job and make a living.


    A lot of new grads graduate and have no idea what job they want, what to apply for or where to look for it. Many get waiter jobs and have horrible resumes which they send out into a void without hope. However, if you do it right, you should have to send only a handful of resumes to well picked companies where you hopefully have done some probing and found names of hiring managers. Out of those submissions, you should have gotten several interviews and had your first offer within a few weeks of starting your search.
    My first job after college was not easy to get. Most people think that you go to college, have fun, graduate, a bunch of people want you and they pay you lots of money and then you’re rich! And that’s exactly how it does not go. Sorry to tell you, but even if you are Ivy league grad, you will need to have work experience on the resume to compete, and I’m not talking about Jamba Juice. I’m talking some real life work experience.
     If you want an easy time finding a job with good pay, you will have to put in some work at a summer job or side job while you’re studying. And if you’re working while you’re in school, then you may as well make it in the field you plan to work in.
           My first job in school was my first job after finishing high school. I heard about internships, I submitted my resume and got two interviews. One for a pharmaceutical company creating artificial blood and lungs and the other at McDonalds. I gave McDonalds a try, but when they said that they want me to organize files, I said good bye and began doing odd jobs for the pharmaceutical company the rest of the summer. A job like that can give you valuable skills that you can use at the next job. I was testing batches of artificial lung in ovens, fixing industrial printers and doing web-design.
    At the end of that job, I didn’t hate engineering and stuck to my major, which is what you want at the end of internship. Not to stick to your first choice necessarily, but just awareness of it is what you want or not. At the very least, you now have a credible, professional resume and people who could vouch for me.


    Getting the job
    You’re going to have to find it first and there are two avenues: one is economic times are great so you go to where you want to work (search well) apply, apply, apply over and over until they have a position for you and hire you. The other is economic times are bad and you will have to network your little hiney off. I actually found my job in the midst of “The Great Recession” while I was volunteer coaching at a high school. My middle school wrestling coach was looking to hire an engineer and so there I was, hired by someone I knew. So try to remain calm and keep your eye out, employers hate seeing a pushy, stressed and desperate applicant. Just imagine that it is just like dating.

     

    So you network, or apply and you have a bunch of jobs under your belt, you are ready to send a resume.  Having experience means nothing if you can’t get it across to someone who is looking at you on a piece of paper; you have to be able to present your work and experience in a way that other people reading your resume will be able to grasp what you are trying to communicate. As an engineer, I had no idea how to do that. But I didn’t know that I didn’t know that.


    I remember I went to see a talk by Jim Branson at UCSD. Jim Branson was the owner and founder of SpaceDev (now part of Sierra Nevada Corp). This was the company that put SpaceShip 1 in orbit. I knew I wanted to get a job there and I sent them resume after resume. After a week or so of no response,  I would tweak the resume again and send it again. When I still got no  response back,  I went to my parents for help, they shredded it and I remade the resume. I sent it in again and no response. I went to the career center on campus and they shredded it again and I fixed it and again I sent it to SpaceDev.  After eight or nine months, my resume represented my experience and me in such a way that another person could pick it up and say yes, I want to see this person for an interview. I got the interview and got the job.
     
    My point is that you may think you have something that’s great, but until you ask others for help and review, you don’t know. So keep fixing and keep sending. 

     The thing about sending in your resume again and again is that it shows that you really want to work there. People don’t build companies to just make money, they build them because they believe in something and they want people working with them to believe in what they believe. Because people like that will work tirelessly to create what they want to create.
    This is why you have to apply to a company where you really want to work and to a company that you really believe in. Because you cannot fake enthusiasm, you cannot fake knowledge. Learn about them, know them, ask lots and lots of question and never be afraid. Fear will loose you the interview, fearlessness will just keep you from getting the wrong job. As Steve Jobs said “Keep looking, never settle” if you find your passion you will have the motivation to keep going and never stop.

    Resume Basics:
    When it comes to resumes there’s less of a what to do and more of a what not to do and you would be surprised about how much one ought not to do but is done by new grads and even old experienced people everyday.

    As far as the dos, you want a clean, basic, honest and succinct resume. As far as the don’ts, I’ll just list some that I saw glaring at me when I had friends send me theirs for review.

    • No more than a page. If you’re so accomplished that you have more than a page, then they know of you already and you don’t need a resume.
    • No @college emails. Unless it’s MIT, no one cares.
    • Irrelevant experiences that you think “show” what a great applied experience you may have, employer sees it as padding at best and throws it straight into trash at worst.
    • Objective that uses the word “learning”, your new bosses don’t want to teach you, they want someone who knows who they are and knows what they will do.
    • Overly wordy cover letters, experience or skills. Drill it down to the bare essentials. This will take a lot of work, but you’re trying to get someone to give you money; it’s worth it.
    • Being vague, know what you want.
    • Sending it out to someone who maybe concerned. It’s the Internet age, if you can’t find someone at the company to send it to then you’re not doing enough homework.
    • Read it ten times and only then have someone else read it. You want mistakes caught like the wrong name used and those kinds of mistakes are caught only if you’ve done your part of work to get rid of the big mistakes.


    There were some sticky points for me when I was looking for jobs: I didn’t want to work for a defense contractor. Defense is great, we all need it, but I didn’t want to build something that I knew contributed to killing people. So when I took a well paying job at a defense contractor where the CEO promised he wouldn’t give me that kind of work, I was naive enough to believe him, I sold out. He gave me a project creating rifle scopes and I couldn’t not work on it in good conscience. I did not believe in the project I was assigned to and I ended up loosing that job. If you cannot believe in what you’re doing, you will not do your best and you will not satisfy yourself or your boss. This is why you have to be true to yourself.


    When you are true to yourself you also have confidence when you walk into the interview. You know why you are there, you know what you can do and that fearlessness and asuredness will carry you through the questions you know and don’t know. It almost doesn’t matter what you answer as much as how you answer. This is not to say, if you’re an idiot and don’t know your shit you will get away with it, a good engineer will spot BS and throw you out before you have time to even recognize what went wrong.


    After the interview, send an email to the people who interviewed you. If you did well they will give you their cards, if you didn’t then they won’t and you probably applied for the wrong job. Do not send a pretty letter to HR, do not spray perfume on it, do not email HR. They don’t care, they will not pass it on, they will send it straight to trash.


    Where to work:

    I have worked nearly everywhere. Big companies, small companies medium companies and even start-ups.
    Start-ups
    Let me get to start-up first because that’s what EVERY one wants to know about. Start-ups take a lot of money and a lot of work and are like winning a lottery, you hear about the winner but most of the players are losers. They are usually run by people who don’t know business, creating a product that may or may not work for customers who may or may not exist. It’s fun, it’s great, but I would recommend it only for the very young (nothing to loose) or the very old (nothing to loose).
    Most important thing about a start-up is the people, do you believe that the people can execute; are they talkers or doers? If the people creating the product are those who can set out to get something done and can get it done, then you are likely to succeed. But if your team is a bunch of people who couldn’t get anything done somewhere else and this is their another attempt at doing something after a failure, then you may very well waste your time, make no money, and and be jaded by the experience. So my advice after the several start-ups I’ve seen, be careful before jumping in and if you have any reservations about the people, don’t. You may regret it, but most likely you will not.



    Big Corporations

    Big companies are great because there are lots of people to do the jobs you don’t want to do. You learn little about the product and most of learning is about the bureaucracy of the company. If you learn it well enough, you will see a bright and promising career and you can see yourself rising through the ranks. Should you engage in prideful fighting over details hoping to show others how smart you are, you are very likely to be laid off. You don’t have to do a great job at a big company, just look busy and don’t make other people’s job any worse than it is. They are probably just as bored and uninspired as you are. The giant machine with a tiny clog can wipe the spirit out of even the most spirited little clog.


    Some companies however are great at keeping the spirit alive. I saw once how Intel encouraged it’s workers through bonuses, team meetings and posters to remind of goals. This was great, but most people who just followed their job description, kept quiet about their lack of motivation and dissatisfaction about their bosses, did best.



    Medium Companies

    Medium companies offer that middle ground of support and expectation of hard constant work. I would say it is my favorite but it does depends on the job and the company. It also offers enough room to move around and ability to compensate the workers.


    Small Companies

    Small companies on the other hand can be volatile, are full of politics, always short on resources and have a lot of challenges. The place where I had to build a rifle scope was that way and it was really great. Except for I had no choice as far as what projects to do and when your heart isn’t into your work, you will have a tough time biting the bullet and putting in an eight to ten hour work day.
    But it is usually a tight knit team where everyone helps out and you will more than once go out with the CEO for beers.


    Salary

    To figure out how much you should be paid, just be honest with yourself and know your worth. Check how much other people earn. For instance even though Internet was pervasive and I could check how much others are paid with my education, I didn’t know exactly unless I asked my co-workers when I was interning. From them I found out how much someone with my qualifications can ask and so when the interview and negotiations came up, I had no issues discussing pay and generally was offered the amount that made me happy. When you’re earning your worth, you do not work with fear that you’re being paid too much or that someone is using you and that you could earn more somewhere else. That peace of mind is important and so you should not compromise that if you don’t have to. Being firm but polite will always be appreciative so long as you can back up that which you ask.



    At work, Under-promise, Over deliver.
    Some people think that they have to constantly work, they burn out. Some people have no idea how to work, they are thrown out. And then there are those who take their vacations, work eight hours a day, don’t brown nose and just get their shit done.


    That’s my MO. I remember when I was at Luxtera and I was hourly. I traveled every two months. I would work my hiney off and then take off for a week or two to some far off place. The important part was always to be dependable. Get your work done, keep your bosses and co-workers happy, don’t leave for so long that they have to replace you and then all the rest is up to you. One thing is estimating how much something will take you to do it. Usually whatever it takes, multiply by two. Especially if you are new because you will have some snags, you may have to pick up someones slack and no matter what you want to finish early or on time so that your boss is not angry. If you finish early, I recommend keeping it to yourself, then when you come back from that vacation, you can hand him your work and he is happy rather than slamming 15 more hours on you and making that vacation just another day dream.


    Quiting

    If you have to quit, you probably knew it a while before. Be a sport, ask for that raise or change in assignment first and don’t be so scared of rejection. If you have to be scared of your boss, you may need a new boss anyway and if you ask for those things, they may give it to you saving you the trouble of searching for a new job. If they do not give what you feel you need and you really want to jump ship, make sure to get something lined up before getting out. At least throw the line and see what comes up. Then when you get something else, give the boss a couple weeks notice and always go for an exit lunch and ask what you could have done better. Your boss will most likely give you a great set of pointers that will prove themselves invaluable.


    Jumping ship makes sense for two reasons, the company is falling apart and you are no longer learning. Don’t waste your life stagnating, as soon as you’re done learning you should be looking for the next venture. However if the company is crumbling you better get out before too late or you will be getting unemployment and that is a terrible thing to get if you have a mortgage and kids, better go early. How do you know you ask? You see smart people leaving. Smart people don’t leave good places.


    Co-workers
    Don’t burn bridges, you will meet those assholes again and be good to the good people, they will push you ahead and you can often pull them to wherever you are working. Aside from that, enjoy these people, they probably have the same passion as you and you are working on the same goal. So invite them to bar-b-ques, go out to happy hour because workers that have fun together, accomplish great things together. After all, if you’re reading this book, you’re not just going to have a job, you’re going to have a passion.



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    Chapter 11 Paying for College

    Chapter 11 Paying for College


    “College, the most expensive four years of your life.”


    Christine is a smart go-getter. Her parents came from Vietnam  during the war. Her mother survived the war as a flower girl and when she arrived in the states she had no education and put Christine and two other daughters through high school in Baltimore. Christine was the oldest and the pride of the family having graduated at the top of the class and earned a spot at the prestigious University of Southern California. Christine moved to the other coast and trained to become a famous architect. She took a a year to study abroad in Italy to study how the masters built their masterpieces. She was a favorite of many of her professors and was offered jobs right out of college. She traveled the world and worked in South Korea for one of the top Architecture firms. She traveled alone through middle east on a fellowship to study middle eastern native architecture and design. She came back to jobs waiting for her in a depressed market and within a year brought her fiance from Tunisia to live with her. At the age of 27 she was earning good money at a good firm doing what she loves. She had many opportunities thanks to her studies and was living together with her fiance in a studio barely big enough for a bed, a desk and no kitchen. She has no car and sends most of her money that she makes to a bank. She has a wonderful life on one hand but her future is far from comfortable at the moment. At the age where she should be able to put money away for a wedding, for a house she is barely making ends meet because she has over $200,000 in loans which she did not realize she would have or how she would pay back. She told me that she does not regret her decision to go to an expensive school given the opportunities she now has but the debt obviously weighs her down considerably.

     In 2011, colleges are financed through a form of predatory lending that is similar to the lending in the housing market, except it is worse. Unlike your college loan, with a house in foreclosure, you can walk away from your debt. The college loan creditors will pursue you across space and time: garnishing wages and collecting to the end. You can escape kids and spouses, but you cannot get away from college debt. 

    Unlike with a house or credit cards, the bank do not asks how much you make, how much the education will cost and do not look at your major and how much you will make before saddling you with debt. The bank does not look at how much you have, how well you studied, if the college is credible or even if you will ever make money to repay. Tuition is the same cost regardless of the cost of that education. It is the same no matter how much professors in your department earn or how much your labs cost or what your prospects for making money and paying back that loan with your chosen major. They also don’t seem to wonder that it may be predatory to ask 18 year old that has never paid bills before to take on the responsibility over hundred’s of thousands of dollars and make decisions without considering for a second if those kids know what they are doing. It is also a shame that many parents allow their kids to sign the contracts that saddle them with obligations for life without advising them better. In the end, for those without generous parents, the only way to choose less debt is to choose a less expensive school or to work and not have loans.


    So now that you know that signing up for a loan is a big deal and that no one cares if you will be on a hook with a giant mortgage payment for the rest of your life, I will tell you how to make that decision of taking a loan or not through a couple stories.



    Unlike Christine, I decided to go to a reputable but cheaper University. My parents were able to pay the tuition (which they still to this day remind me of), I worked for  most of my living expenses  even though my parents were still able to help me considerably. I graduated late but I had no debt. I was able to travel the world, buy a car, buy a house within a few years of my graduation. Having no debt and a job which paid well meant a fairly relaxed life style.


    Another friend Arthur who went to the same school as Christine also traveled the world but being an orphan and disabled, was unable to find a job and so had to try and escape his impossible debt or as I call it, 21st century indentured servitude. Many people who put themselves into poor financial situation, are unable to recover mentally. They begin to rack up credit card debt, buy houses they cannot afford. The freedom and cheap money corrupts people and the financial institutions then charge exorbitant fees knowing fully well what will happen, relying on the fact that these poor and naïve kids will make uninformed decisions at a time when they are not ready and thus profit from the misfortune of others. If banks were charlatans fooling people out of nickles and pennies in the streets, they would be in jail, but stealing millions puts them in expensive board rooms.


    If this book is still relevant, and our government failed you, then I suggest, look at your finances, how much can you afford, how much will you earn in the end, what will be your debt, do you want to owe someone money for the rest of your life?


    Think about these decisions hard and make the hard choice of going to a cheaper school, or going to a community college or saving up some money before entering college. Whatever you do, remember that no one will save you or warn you except this book and that if you follow your desire without thought of how that desire will impact your life, you may come to regret your decision for the rest of your life.


    So what are the other options besides debt and work?
    Well, my best friend paid barely anything, he lived at home, went to community college, went to a less expensive public University and finally attended Law School on a scholarship.
    In a sense, you should always try to go where your skills and abilities permit you to go. The choice to go to an expensive school is yours and you can spend a few days per scholarship application, work and study. The odds for those who are not mega rich are tough. Many do not graduate due to the stress of earning money and going to school and life. However with the goal of a better life in your sight, and the belief that many people before you managed to do this and so will you, will help you overcome, graduate in a good financial position with the freedom to pick and choose the next step in your life.
    college, Jobs, Work

    Chapter 10 Work

    -If you do what you love, you’ll never have to work a day in your life” -Ruth

      1. Why work?
      2. Internships
        1. Where
        2. How much
        3. How to work
        4. How to quit
      3. Money issues
      4. Lab work
        1. How to get one
        2. Where to work
        3. How to quit
        4. What to work on
      5. Menial Jobs



    There are very few kids lucky enough to go through college without having to pay tuition and/or having to work for a living. I knew a lot of kids who worked on campus, off campus, in labs, in bars. That is fine and to each their own. Whatever you choose to do, whether you need money or not, I advise that you do what you like and make sure that it goes along with your life plan. If you work retail and you’re studying biology, you’re wasting your time. On the other hand if you’re studying business, retail may be valuable place of experience.
    I fell into my profession by accident. I was at a party and a friend of family happened to be a Professor of Electrical Engineering at my University and invited to come to his lab. I showed up at Shaya Fainman’s small office on the fourth floor of a spaceship-looking building. It was neat and with a bookcase full of books. He didn’t say much, just that I should go to the lab in the basement and talk to his PhD student Wataru Nakagawa. Wataru spoke with me for about five minutes. He asked which classes I’ve taken (pretty much none at the time, I was a freshman) but I did have some graphics experienced having had my own magazine. Wataru told me to come back next day to help with some posters.
    I put together presentations and posters for the lab that lined the halls. As I took more classes, I was given more projects, my jobs expanded to working with fiber optic cables, learning about optical-components and eventually to working on things no one had ever worked on before at the time. 
    I had a tough time showing up to that first meeting. I felt guilty getting this chance through family. Lucky for me, I talked it over with friends first, my best friend told me to take the opportunity and go with it. This one little decision made me change my major and led me to start clubs, meet people across the world and work on some amazing projects. You will have a lot of decisions in your life. Pick three people who know you and whose opinion you trust, they will make your life.
    The lesson is always get advice and always take opportunities that present themselves. Each one opens new doors so don’t worry about a bigger opportunity to come, you have to take the small ones to get the big ones.


    At one point I quit college. I’ll go into that in another chapter, but while I was out of college, I worked several odd jobs. Unlike the nice University job where I was paid well and had good hours, and an easy going boss-those jobs were tough, they were menial, the bosses were not great and I learned about what I wanted and what I didn’t want. I learned I did not want to work for minimum wage, that I wanted to get a degree and have a better life than what life without education offered. I learned that real world outside of college is tough and making little money meant a lot more work, it meant struggling, it meant less free time.


    Things I learned at jobs:
    Be dependable.
    One of the jobs during my time off was at a photoshop. I got the job off the street, no interview no application. I told the owner that I used to work as a photographer at a magazine I founded and that was enough for her. I was late the first day, and the third day and on the fifth day I was late again and she fired me. What I learned was that people count on you and when you make a promise, you have to keep it. The work at a small shop relies on customer service and it relied on me be there  and me being late meant that she couldn’t rely on me. All of my good work with photoshop and machines counted for little if she couldn’t count on me.


    Know which fights to pick.
    After I got fired, I had a tough time finding another job. It was the 2001 recession after 9/11 and I was overqualified. I finally found one for minimum wage at a local deli. I had to be there at 7:30 answering the phone, washing dishes and making lettuce. It was humiliating and humbling to go from lasers to dishes.
    But I saw myself being more and more valuable to the business. One day the owner came up to me to ask me to make deliveries since delivery driver was leaving for vacation. I said yes and later thought that he should reimburse me more than tips. Instead of saying that at the time, I told him as he was about to send me on a delivery. He fired me. 
    Lucky for me, the owner’s wife had more sense to talk to him and me or else I really would have been fired. Although, he would have been right, I should have been fired for picking a fight at such a moment.


    Tip the poor guys,
    At that time I was able to get a second job as a parking lot attendant. I was working a parking lot in the gay area of San Diego and until the business owners of the shops near by realized that I was straight, they were giving me a lot of attention. The look of disappointment upon learning I was straight was classic.

    I sat in my little booth for hours on end taking people’s tickets and asking them for money back. It was boring work and I spent a lot of time just reading books and studying for fall when I would be going back to school. For me, the best part of the day after working both jobs was getting 15-20 dollars in tips. It made a difference and I recommend everyone that if you go out there, give the poor people a little extra. It may not mean a lot monetarily for you but it meant a lot to lift the spirit to go home with a little bit of cash in the pocket.

    Your work position does not define you, your goals and work ethic do.
    It doesn’t matter today that I was a delivery boy or that I had worked at a grocery store when I was young. It doesn’t even matter that I put up Christmas lights when I was thirty because what mattered were my goals. When I worked at a grocery store, I was really just earning money, but I was working on going to college. When I was working on roof tops stringing lights, I was earning money, but I was working on a book. But when I am working as an engineer, I am working on a career, I am working on a product and the work ethic at every job was the same, do your best and that pays off because that is what gets one to the goals.


    Work at work hard, but work at school harder.
    A lot of people when working at school, will skip classes because they care more about money than classes. But each class you skip counts for ten work days you skip because the money you earn during college is pennies compared to how much you will earn after college. The job you will have after college will give you healthcare, nice hours, kind boss and vacation time in addition to the good pay.
    My roommate Masha was once fired from a waitressing job because to her, waitressing was a dead end but school had no limits. She found a tutoring job with better hours and bosses who cared more about her well-being than their paychecks. It worked out for both but that attitude allowed her to get straight As which gave her far more than extra 20 dollars she would have made if she had skipped a class.


    So work hard, pick your jobs carefully and never forget why you are working: to afford education to later work less, earn more and have a better life; not to have better things at the expense of education.

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    Chapter 9 Living Situation


    Who you live with and where you live will determine your success.

      1. The Fun
      2. Conflict Resolution
      3. Cleanliness
      4. Respect


    Philip Andrew Sidney Bliss: “At one point I spent all of my money on beer, and just ate junk food occasionally. After a few weeks, I noticed my gums bleeding and some cuts I had were not healing. I gave myself scurvy!”


    There were several choices facing me when I was submitting my college housing form in May of High School senior year: live in dorms on campus, live off campus with other students or stay at home. My parents lied to me saying they would get me my own place so I chose home. Although it was a lot cheaper than moving out, I don’t know if that was the best choice. At home I didn’t worry about money as much but because I did not live close enough to the school, I was at a severe disadvantage; especially because I had early morning classes, had to drive through traffic and I was not especially disciplined.


    My first year was spent getting to the bus station early morning and then taking about an hour to get to my 8am class to fall asleep promptly as I sat down in class. This was a very poor return on investment as saving money on living expenses and then getting C’s in classes is a net looser.


    My best semesters as far as grades were when I was living with my girlfriend ten minutes from school by bike. It was great except when the relation ship hit rough patches, my schoolwork suffered as well. Fights untill four am can really eat into study time. So with careful planning, these hick-ups can be easily avoided.


    Conflicts and Conflict Resolution:
    I had a lot of roommates over the years and eventually, there was almost always some kind of conflict. Not serious, but enough to where they negatively impacted the relationship flow. To keep from problems sneaking up on you and make sure first that you can get along, spend at least a few hours a week bonding with each other. Doing that will ensure that you hash out problems before they get out of hand. Like with any relationship; it’s all about the communication.


    However, if there is a problem, follow these three steps: 

    1. Smile.
    2. Tell your roommate that you like them and are not trying to do harm. 
    3. Ask how the issues can be resolved. 

    This happened to me when I was living with a couple of Korean guys near campus. One of them flipped out because I was living in the living room at the time and blocked off the whole room to myself without asking when my girlfriend was visiting me. I know it was disrespectful on my part, but totally fixable. He just needed to talk to me but didn’t. We resolved things amicably later because I followed the steps I outlined above.


    Two of the biggest issues that creep in between roommates is laziness and girlfriends. Don’t let your or your roommates’ girlfriends change the dynamic. It will throw everyone off, so make sure to keep your time split between her and your place and communicate with your roomies. Living problems can spill into your love life and then you will have to deal with triple stress as your schoolwork will start to suffer as well.
      Relationships with roommates, friends and girlfriends are all founded on the same principles and all of them can go smoother with empathy. So try to walk in their shoes and do unto them as they would onto you. Even if you have tests and stress, do your best to be compassionate so that they understand that you understand why they do what they do and they will be more likely to help you  ie. not play loud music while you are studying, or putting a towel under the door while they are having sex.


    Big No Nos:

    • Never sleep with your roommates boy/girlfriend. Unless he/she asks you to join.


    If you’re going to have a party, I recommend that you invite only friends and hide the important stuff behind lock and key. This will save you the anguish of someone stealing your old iMac with all of your art projects on it as happened to my friend Julie. However, if that happens to you, get over it; if you’re not Picasso, your art projects are crap anyway and if you are, then you probably were more careful about storing your important work than leaving it on an old computer in a garage during a rager.


    Beer and Food:
    If you eat it, replace it! And not with the lesser quality crap and not with less quantity. Ie, replace organic with organic food and a twelve-pack with a twelve-pack, not a couple of left over cans. In fact, if you plan to be lazy and eat your roommates food, replace it with more than you ate so as to not make them resent even buying food because they know that they will have to buy it again just to have you eat it again. Because when your food is eaten, it always seem like more was taken than there really was. It’s our nature to lament the lost so be considerate and return laziness with quantity plus interest.


    Here are some basic Roommate Rules, feel free to copy this page and place it on your refrigerator:


    House Rules:
    • Be considerate
    • Be Clean
    • Don’t be anal/OCD
    • Put a towel under the door if you have “someone” over.
    • Replace food with more than you took.
    • Do bills together.
    • Do not sleep with the partner of a roommate. (Unless asked to join)
    • Do not use their stuff if you tend to break stuff.
    • If you break it, replace it.
    • Watch out for each-other.
    • See each other once a day
    • Hang out once a week.



    If you are living with a boy/girl friend same rules as above except:


    • Don’t cheat
    • Don’t live together, (it’s not worth it and it usually doesn’t work out.)
    • Don’t be a little bitch: do everything they ask and then resent it.
    • Chill out if you’re angry (it’s probably not worth getting too angry over anyway.)
    • Do not keep things bottled-up inside either, (that’s probably why you’re yelling at eachother now)
    • If you’re paying for everything, something’s wrong, don’t be an idiot.


    These rules might seem self explanatory but trust me, even the best of us have difficulties once we stop using our brains and anyone who has ever dated or had a big fight with a roommate knows exactly what you’re arguing.


       Finally, if you do decide to live at home, good luck getting a date although if your mom cooks, you may be able to get her or him enticed with a home cooked meal.

    In the end, if you’re fun, respectful and clean and ask for the same in a respectful way and find those that can live with and ask for the same within reason, living with others should not be a problem and in fact will leave you with lifelong friends and memories.
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    Chapter 8: Studying

    Why you study will determine how you study.

      1. Why study?
      2. Prep before
      3. Review after
      4. Notes during
      5. Homework
      6. Tests
      7. Groups and distractions
      8. Place of study
      9. Asking for Help


    There was this time that I was at an upscale bar, listening to music and watching women dance on tables. That’s when it hit me, if I didn’t have a degree, I probably wouldn’t be able to afford this and neither would most other people at the bar. Almost everyone in the bar, no matter what they did for a living, had gone to college. At the very least, education gets you ability to afford a pretty fun life.


    You got through high school and now you’re on college; so long as you pass you’re good right?
    WRONG!
    Remember why you worked so hard through high school? Do you remember why you participated in ten clubs, three sports and practically killed yourself for the grades? Do you remember why you worked harder than the slackers to get into college?
    I’ll remind you, you wanted a good job. You wanted to be able to live comfortably and not struggle for minimum wage. You didn’t want to sweep floors. You wanted money and career and etc… So many of us loose sight of that once we get into college, get freedom, and start to have fun.
    But once in college it is not over. To get the job, you may need grad school and to keep the job or to get through grad school you will definitely need the good work ethic and solid knowledge foundation to succeed and do well in school.
    So before you say, “After high school I can relax, there’s no homework in college,” or “I’ll study right before the test,” buckle up and get ready to study, it may save you some bad grades, some study time, some good play time and it may mean the difference between a dead end job and open doors.



    Hitting the books:
    If there is one thing you take away from this book, it is that everyday you have to wake with realization that you are at school to get your degree. You are there to do your best, to learn the most, to open your doors to have that piece of paper to show to employers and to yourself that you can do four years of intensive and hard studying and that you can do it. However there are easy ways and there are hard way to go about it.
    A lot of intelligent people (like me) who whiz through high school and get into college do not realize what is expected of them until their midterms or even finals or sometimes ever. Old habits die hard and old thought patterns even harder. Many times after coming home to a bad grade I thought: “That sucked, I’m going to study hard for the next one, I’m not going to waste time next quarter only to have the same thing happen again.” But because I never thought why I studied, I would later just slack off because I would forget to take it seriously. I lost sight of the goal.


    Studying is hard and unless you have a battle plan, a schedule of what and when and how you’re going to study and create the environment for success, you will not reach that success. You have to know what you are working towards, why you are working towards it and work every day to work towards achieving your goal. You may be an 18 year old, you may want to focus on the “four best years of your life” and feel that it’s all about fun but you have to remember, that will get you nowhere, college will go by and you will just have loans and debt. Instead, focus during college, study by yourself, study with a focused group, remember that you must earn that fun and when you earn it, it feels so much better. Plus, that four years crap is a lie, if you do it right, your twenties will be amazing. In my twenties I traveled the world, and partied with friends all over United States. I went on road trips and weekend getaways and all with cash I earned by working hard in college.



    How to do it.
    Everyone has their own system, but I will tell you first the systems that do not work, no matter how much you fool yourself into thinking they do.

     First failed system is studying with your friends. Unless that group is quiet, without internet or social networks, without chatter and with books out in front and with a solid goal of how long and how much to study, you are not going to be productive but will only waste valuable study and play time. Avoid those groups.


    Second path to fail is studying with TV or Internet and most kinds of music. They are distractions, coffee shops are distractions, especially ones which are not the ones selected by people to study. There you will hear other people, be constantly hungry and your focus constantly interrupted by gossip, phones and conversations around you.


    If you are studying a difficult subject, find a quiet place or a place with a noise that is irregular, where you can have at least fifteen minutes of zero interruptions so that you can get into the study mode. After that, you will be able to study for a good while even in spite of small interruptions.

     That’s all you need, fifteen minutes of willpower and momentum will carry you through the rest.


    Don’t spend time “reading the chapter.”
    A for sure no go is studying without a goal. If you have homework, don’t spend time “reading the chapter.” I spent so much wasted time reading a paragraph over and over, with the homework sitting by the side until finally there was no more time and I just had to start answering the homework questions. At that point I would often go through the texts and quickly find the answers I needed. 
    This desperation at the end led me to the path that was most efficient which was to scan the text before class, scan the notes after, and scan the text before starting the homework. This way you get the understanding of where to go in the textbook or notes to find the answers to the homework and then you will have the time to let your creativity take you on tangents to learn more about the subjects. 
    Sometimes, we just don’t have enough time to learn everything and often, we don’t actually need to. We need to learn the concepts that the teacher wants us to learn and then we need to take in that which will help us in our future interests. It’s not about learning everything, but about learning enough to know where to go back later and learning such that you can use the information in the future. What often happens as a result is that you learn to find information and that leads to a life of no stress. And life without stress is so much more enjoyable during that last week at the end of class.

    Sometimes, you have to cram.

    There are tests you can cram for and there are tests you can’t. For conceptual classes it is better to do problems and get your needed sleep to be fresh and awake when you see a problem you haven’t seen before on the test. That way instead of freaking out, you can try to figure it out starting with the basics and working backwards.
    For classes like history on the other hand, if you fell behind for some reason and you now have to fit three months of information then by all means: cram, cram cram… 
    My favorite way to study for those tests was to compile a list of words and concepts and find those in the book. You will end up getting a decent understanding of what happened.


    Don’t be a chump.

    Ask for help; even if it feels too late. It might mean an extra five percent in the end and an extra concept that you will learn. I know, it feels awkward and scary to look the professor in the eye and feel that look of judgement because you feel clueless and irresponsible. But hey, you probably won’t see them again and he/she may have no idea that you are clueless just from one question. Maybe phrase it in such a way that makes you feel better such as “I feel silly asking this but I keep hearing this term and I’m embarrassed to ask what it means because I still don’t get it.”
    What may actually happen is that the question may not be stupid after all and it may prompt a not so stupid discussion. Imagine my surprise when I found out that electrons are still an unknown substance, it has never been officially seen. So if something like an electron isn’t trivial, your question is probably not so trivial either.


    Also, remember, you’re in college, that means you’re not an idiot.. Unless, you put yourself there by not asking for help.

    A personal story how I’ve done that: I took this computational physics class. I got a D in a class before I withdrew from it twice. Every time I took it, I would come to class with a smug look at the beginning of the semester expecting to ace it only to fall into the same routine at the end by assuming I could do it without help. It was a hard class and by the third time I realized that I needed help. On the third time, finally, I broke down and admitted that this was not possible for me to do on my own. I went to office hours, I got a tutor and studied with other smart kids. In the end, I did better. I was able to catch Professor’s mistakes during lecture and at the end of the quarter, I got a B. This is to show that it does not matter how the professor “looks” at you, because in the end, the only thing of importance is that you want to learn, your grade on home-works and tests, and those are the ultimate judges.

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    Chapter 7 Classes

    “Work four years, coast forty.”   -Mr. Carnevale


      1. Registering
      2. Which times are good
      3. Which classes are good
      4. How important are they


    Remember the movie Clerks? If not, let me just tell you about the part where a guidance councilor is trying to find the perfect set of eggs. He is crouching on the floor and he puts the eggs through a set of ridiculous tests to find the perfect egg as shoppers look at him and wondering why he’s doing this. One of the characters by the name of Randall says that if your job was as pointless as his, wouldn’t you go nuts as well? 
    This should be a guideline for you in terms of deciding which classes to take. After listening to councillors and realizing that their advice was always wrong, I decided to never let anyone anyone decide for me which classes to take. A lot of students including myself would take on a massive load of classes only to fail or drop most of them because councillors didn’t say no. Or would take the wrong classes or the wrong major. Listen to yourself and believe in yourself. Take a few classes and if you do well, then challenge yourself and take more. College is much tougher than High School so don’t go balls out until you are ready.

    1. Classes
      1. How important are they
    “Can you put up the circuit for an inverting amplifier and write out the equation for us please.” asked the manager. There were three other engineers in the room. They were firing off questions one by one with various tasks for me to complete.
    If you put something on your resume, be ready to defend that you actually took that course and learned something. This is why you should take your courses seriously and if you don’t then you are in the wrong place because you are wasting your time, your money and your life.
    All classes are useful and the only people that say that they never use their classes are C students and teachers (sorry teachers). Those who say that, are those who don’t use the classes because they never learned anything when taking them. All classes I did well in, I use if not on a daily basis then very often. Because every time I watch TV, read news, read books, go to work, I use Humanities, English, Math, Sociology and I use them in general conversations to understand people who are different from me. If you never took Art or Acting, how do you expect to connect to an actor or an artist? You can’t and if you can’t connect to people around you then you will not have a fulfilling life and you will not do as well in life because it’s true, it’s not what you know but who you know but to get to know people, you have to know a lot about everything.


    Better grades also means perks: like options! When you finish high school, you want options. That’s why you work hard to have more colleges as options. When you finish high school, it’s not the end, it’s the beginning because you’re out of your parents’ house and now you’re free and now you need options more than ever. So if you want to pursue a good job or an additional degree, you want to be able to apply to as many places as possible. For that, you need to know a lot and get good grades! Because it ultimately matter if you want to get into good schools which will give you the most options in life.
    Good grades also get you money. Not only can good grades get you a scholarship, but they can also get you a better paying job. Think, a few years of hard work can allow you to later party your head off, buy a nice car and travel all you want without loans or worries about money. Imagine all that time you can spend studying instead of working to get better grades and get paid better than all those other students who sacrifice study time to work at the cafeteria.
    Also, those who have better grades get front of the line privileges when registering so you’re not stressing out about your schedule and graduating faster. You can be in control of when to wake up, when to study, when to work and keep doing better in school.  For instance, everyone I knew who had 8am classes especially out of those who commuted, had difficulty making good grades in those classes. Imagine avoiding having to take those classes in the first place because you get preferential registration?


    Which classes are good? 
    Well that depends on the professor. At UCSD we had C.A.P.E. Reviews but after I graduated we had websites as well which you could find useful information about professors. I would generally trust the A students more than C. C students hate most professors and blame everyone but themselves. So ask around and the best students will point you to the best professors and best classes.


    Difficulty rating.
    Classes are like video games, you set the difficulty rating too high and you’re not going to pass the level, set it too low and it’s a cake walk without learning. Either way not fun. Forget about other students and parent’s pride. Make sure you do well and make sure it is challenging. If it’s not challenging, make it challenging by asking Professor for more problems or harder problems. Don’t be a looser; learn something! And do your best to find a way to see how the class will be useful. If you hate what you’re studying, you will not learn well, you will not work well, and you will quit. So get the worried voice of parents out of your head and study that which you could study even if you weren’t paying for it. If you learn what you love, you will be good at it. Last thing we need is more mediocre people.

    I remember there were classes which were required, and I struggled and that’s OK, some classes are required but I liked learning those subjects anyway. I knew probability would come in handy even though I just didn’t seem to get it. I knew Quantum Mechanics was necessary even if I found it incomprehensible but it was a must. But when I went through my classes in Optics, I coasted because I was like a sponge, absorbing everything I could get my hands on. That’s what you want and if that’s not happening in your chosen subject/major, then for God’s sake! Get OUT!!!!
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    Chapter 5 Sports

    They walked down library walk in bright jerseys, with numbered sports bags, with jugs of water to hydrate and in peak athletic condition. At the same time, I seemed to get skinnier and nerdier and further away from their bronzed and toned bodies every day. The seemed popular and good at school and I felt a world away. What’s funny is that I was them just the year before.

     In high school everyone was involved in some sport and my wrestling coach planed on taping my matches for Cal Poly and UC Davis. His dreams and my parents’ nightmare came to an end when I was tackled by our 189 pounder and cracked my collar bone in two places. That season was over and next year I was splitting time between Academic Decathlon nerdom where our physical activity consisted of racing a stuffed sheep and hacky sack and wrestling for the team a couple times per week. In High School I was with the in crowd but in college, the thought of doing sports did not cross my mind. I was stuck in the mentality that college is for studying and only near Olympic level athletes do sports in college. I learned my lesson by senior year. I picked up Judo and then wrestling again, mostly to get in shape for studying. But I got quiet good at both as a result.

     You see, physical activity promotes fitness and blood flow. Blood flow allows more oxygen to reach the brain which helps think better. At the same time, fitness allows one to have the stamina to work longer. Sports create discipline and time management. With a full season and workouts, most athletes find themselves completing assignments in a more efficient fashion than those who have all the time in the world and don’t have the discipline to sit there and work on the problem until they get it right as they would on the mat or a the track field.

       I missed wrestling and I stepped on the mat in my senior year and was hooked all over again. The wrestling team is always a bunch of crazy rejects. I don’t know why, maybe it’s the close contact, maybe it’s the gay jokes making light of the close contact, or maybe we are just a few neurons short of realizing that we are fighting for no reason. Whatever the reason, wrestlers have been known to be an odd bunch. But once you find you are good at something, you realize that you are stuck with it and for better or worse, you keep doing it, keep teaching it and you end up living it.

       The UCSD wrestling club was actually almost shut down. No it was shut down. I started a facebook page to bring it back and a guy by the name of Paul Montanez out of the blue contacted me about taking over the page and starting the club. I thought I’d let him, but soon I was running the club and he was gone. It was nice to give 8-10 guys on campus have a place to work out every once in a while, teach them my skills and most of all, I needed other people to work out with. UCSD is not a big wrestling school is a major understatement. UCSD football team is undefeated is a T-shirt proudly worn by many because the school has no football team. Our male sports are a joke while women’s sports are ok. It was an easy transition for me as it was essentially how my high school was. This actually was great because almost anyone could get on a team, and if you couldn’t, there were a plethora of clubs. Some were good like the squids or ultimate frisby A team. Some were not so good but great party and social clubs, like Rugby, BOARD, Surf and the squid B team. There were some clubs that were on par with our actual sports teams like the Volleyball club and some clubs which actually created Olympians like our ping pong, sorry, table tennis team

    And there were the bizzare like the inner tube water polo. Probably my biggest regret was not doing that one. It was co-ed, it was in the pool, you just need a keg in one of the tubes and you’re set.

    I made a lot of friends as a result of running wrestling club and I others on the team did as well. You could always rely on the surf team to throw a good party. The friends were often made on the long trips to the competitions. A year after graduating, as a coach, I went with three other wrestlers to Lakeland  Florida. We stayed at a motel that was constructed around a bar. The bar was owned by a large black man with a sense of humor and he employed a tiny, girl with a loud southern accent. There were nothing but guys visiting this bar. Often laborers like those working on a railroad. There would be all sorts of mayhem. Locking of each other in bathrooms, throwing people into the pool, ice baths on customers and bar owners.

    I was taking a video of a massive ice fight. Ice pitchers being poured on the girl, then she would get the pitcher and give it to someone and that person would pour it on someone else and then someone else would get a pitcher from her and pour it on the owner. At the end everyone was soaked but me. The owner looked at me and asked: “Why ain’t you wet?”  
    “I’m observing” I said.
    “We don’t like observers here” And he poured a pitcher of ice and water all over me.

    I walked into the room at two am, drenched, cold and happy. We barely made it to the tournament the next day on time. The guys had a great time, we laughed non stop. We maybe should have competed better but the memories of that trip were better than medals.

    That’s what sports are: comradery and physical fitness and that will allow you to succeed in class and maybe a chance to meet girls and have other kids in class envy you, your girls and your grades.
    boyfriend, college, girlfriend, relationship

    Chapter 4: THE GIRLFRIEND/BOYFRIEND


    “Nothing is as rewarding and beneficial as love, nothing is as destructive either.”



      1. Benefits!
        1. Stability
        2. The sure thing
      2. The negatives
        1. The loss of single hood
        2. Attachment
        3. Time commitments
        4. Drama
      3. Moving-in together
      4. Long Distance relationships
      5. Dating around



    My first girlfriend walked through the door of a study room at the dorms and I had that sensation where you stop breathing. I remembered this girl because she had passed me by a week before and I felt the same. That night, we spent the entire night talking and the next five years dating. A long distance relationship lead to a breakup that we just couldn’t manage to make earlier. Today she is married and we are still friends.

    So what can I recommend from my experience? I can say that it depends on where you live. In San Diego and other big cities, it is becoming more and more difficult to have a relationship in high school or college that lasts. There is simply too much life to experience and too many people to meet that makes it nearly impossible for some people to prevent themselves from experiencing. At schools and in small college towns it is a lot easier. For instance at Purdue University, my friend in her mid twenties found it extremely difficult to find potential suitors as most grad students were already married. While in San Diego, there was no shortage of willing partners. So let’s go over why should you date, why shouldn’t you date, how to survive dating and should you (and you should) take the plunge.


    Why date?

    If you are serious about studying and doing well in college, few people realize because it is counter-intuitive is that a stable relationship can help. A stable relationships even with its ups and downs, keeps you from going out too often, gives you a place to go to and provides a friend that’s always there. When you have college relationships you experiment with rules and some try not having any. A relationship without rules however, can be a disaster. Even such a simple rule on who you can and can’t see, because that slut across the hall has her eyes on you, a good girlfriend will find a way to keep the threats out of a relationship. There are other more mundane rules like not letting stress of exams get to each other because that is the prime time for fights to occur. Holding out on those until the end of exams is a great rule.

    Cons

    The negatives for some are of course not sleeping around, experimenting and going out and partying with friends as much. So get it out of your system before the relationships and don’t forget, there’s always grad school.



    Virginity
    A lot of people who go to college, were late bloomers and probably never had sex or even had time for sex in High School. So your first time will probably be in college. I’d say it can be a horrible or a good experience. In the end, I don’t think most people dwell on it too much unless it was horrible. So pick wisely, be in a good situation where you are in control and don’t freak out. There will be liquids and smells that you’ve never seen or smelled. So do some research before hand. Talk it all out with your partner. Talking is hard in college but you’re a mature young man/woman so I have faith in you that you will make it a good time. Also, I recommend reading the Kama Sutra, the original not the semi-porn with pictures you find at the bookstore. It is a two thousand-year-old ultimate guide to relationships and sex and will make a pro out of anyone.

    Living Together

    Sometimes, it makes financial sense to move in together. I’m not a big advocate of this as most relationships break up after this. Because unless two people are in a mature and committed (meaning ready to marry) kind of relationships, it is a certain way to end what could be a promising young love or a way to keep going something that should have been over a long time ago. People who live together, often let each other slide on things that they otherwise wouldn’t let slide and that creates problems in the end. Imagine, you live together but you figure it’s not forever so you are ok with them not picking stuff up or leaving things out. But then you get married and now you start voicing your opinion and the other person is thinking: “What the hell, this used to be fine before marriage.” And so now, the marriage gets blamed, more stress occurs and eventually.. divorce.
    So when living together, be honest with things that bother you. Split chores evenly. Be responsible financially. It sounds basic but if you can do that, you will be alright.


    Long Distance
    This, for college kids, often happens but it is almost always a bad thing. Usually you stay together because one person isn’t strong enough to break up with the other. The two end up wanting to date and feel ashamed but while still acknowledging that they love and care for the person far away. They will both have wandering eyes and begin to get suspicious and jealous.  
    Long distance is reserved for the older like my boss Kevin. He had a long distance, cross-country relationship for six years while he went through grad school and his girlfriend went to business school. Theirs worked, they now live and work together because they were mature and date each other long enough to do so. 

    • So if you’re going to get into this type of relationship, a few things will help you. One thing that can make it easier today is the ability to skype and see each other. So set designated times and make it a date. 
    • Also seeing each other once every month or two is a must in order to keep the relationship strong. 
    • Of course, there has to be an end date that the two can look forward to being reunited. 

     

    The awesome thing about a long distance relationship is the high you feel when you finally see them. All that repressed energy and affection and then an entire weekend just focused on the two of you is really really great. You get to share a lot and really spend time with each other. When two people in a long distance relationship see each other, they don’t take the time together for granted and really squeeze out every minute. A long term relationship can offer that stability without the fights and can be a great way to grow together but it has to be done right and if you follow the few rules outlined above, you can do it.


    Dating around
     When dating in college, have fun! But remember one thing, karma is a bitch. Be honest about your intentions when you start. It may be tempting to do things like cheating but don’t allow others to cheat with you. 

    Rape or sexual assault are a huge problem on campuses for guys and girls. It has to be addressed because with majority of women in college experiencing rape or assault from guys who are drunk or just don’t take time to listen. You never know how someone acts in every situation, which means that dating a so called nice guy, can and sometimes does result in date rape. Because it is usually someone you know and would have never suspected. 

    As far as guys, even if you think you’d never and that you’re not the type, hold off on drinking, realize that the stupid act or poor decision can cost you a lot. It’s better to be lonely for the night than cause yourself and the girl problems. So don’t let your buddies do anything stupid.
    Girls, realize that those nice guys are still guys. So do your best to keep yourself out of those situations by not drinking too much by yourself, not walking late at night without escort and surround yourself with good girlfriends who will look out for you.

    There was one guy at our fraternity who spent a night with a girl after both of them got drunk. Maybe he thought that she flirted with him, maybe she did. But she woke up feeling violated. It is a grey area, but it was his fault for following her when they are drunk.His friends also should have stopped him. It was a huge deal because he nearly got arrested and who knows, maybe he should have. It is such a big deal because women have a lot to loose. Besides the STDs they can get pregnant. And pregnancy whether she keeps the child or doesn’t, is a big deal on the body and on her psychology. Every year smart, capable women drop out of college with heavy psychological issues after date rape.

    The guys are drunk and don’t expect it is a problem and can have psychological effects of guilt and shame afterwards too not to mention legal and social repercussions.


    In conclusion, my relationship in college ended because we took too much time in between seeing each other, we got in a relationship too early without experiencing our desires and we didn’t have an end date on when I would move in with her. That was my relationship, but I’m sure yours will go much better.