Some Changes

Upon being accepted to business school, I decided to make a few changes to my personal life.

First, I decided that I needed to start waking up earlier.  At my job I work a varied schedule, sometimes coming to work at 7:15am and other times not until 10:00am.  In the past, I’ve always got up about one hour before work (so, sometimes 6-ish, and other times 9-ish, depending on the week), but now I’ve started waking up at 5:30 every morning.  I hope that this will help me both in my MBA studies by allowing me to do homework in the early morning hours before the kids and wife are up, when it’s quiet.  I also hope that it will help me when I get into my chosen field; I’ve known lot’s of accountants that burned the midnight oil to get their job done, and I’ve known one controller who came in to work every morning at 6:00am and was never at work later than 6:00 or 7:00pm (and often 4:30 or 5:00), while others were working 8:00am to 9:00pm.  I’d much rather get home in the early evening than in the middle of the night.

I’ve also decided to get in shape and drop some weight.  Like most people, I was in good shape in high school, but sort of stopped worrying about working out and eating right when my life began to revolve around paying bills and feeding kids.  But, there are studies that show  a correlation between BMI and income, and I’d prefer to be on the good side of those numbers.  One of my favorite books, “Influence: Science and Practice” also maintains that one way that we can have influence over others is by being perceived as attractive by our marks.  While that may conjure up images of women “using their feminine wiles”, the research shows that being physically attractive is just as handy for a business man as for a movie starlet.  So, I’m running twice a week (Tuesdays and Fridays), and going to the gym that the University gives me free, and 24 hour, access to.

What I’m trying to do is give myself every chance for success.  From going to the best school that was an option for me, to studying as much and as hard as I can, to dressing right and looking good, nothing should be left to chance if I have a choice in the matter.  And if all of this sounds sort of girly and metrosexual, let’s remember that 90% of military boot camp is spent learning to dress, wake up early and to get into good physical conditioning.  Relatively little time is spent there learning to shoot a gun.  I’m not claiming that I’m an Army Ranger or anything like that, but when I come against an ex-Ranger in an interview, I don’t want to look like and undisciplined slob by comparison.