On Motivation

I have a final exam in Math 176 (Applied Calculus) tomorrow morning.  Almost exactly eleven hours from now, in fact.  If I get at least an 84 on it, I go a perfect 15-for-15 in getting A's in my classes at TMCC---a perfect score to carry forward to Nevada-Reno this fall for the start of my junior year.  I've been thinking a lot about what's been motivating and driving me recently, and it's a dish best served cold.

See, when I decided to go back to college to start the steps needed to ultimately become a CPA by 40, I went in quite humble thinking that all I cared about was making a good show of it so that I could achieve a goal of being a wealthy-yet-balanced family man, wife and kids, whole nine yards like that.  Really, anything much higher than a B+ average would've been great (really; go back and read the entries from last June.)

But that's not good enough for me now.  For starters, even though I've got a new girlfriend I'm still not 100% sure on the whole family-man thing...I've been with her for all of a month so it's way too early to start making those sorts of plans.  Furthermore, I've discovered a dark side of my personality I thought had gone into a sort of permanent remission about six or seven years ago, the part of me that's like a cross between Colonel Kilgore and Ivan Drago.  It's my sociopathic, ultra-dominant, Complete Monster side...and it serves amazingly well at keeping me motivated.

When I went to the student loan workshop at TMCC in March of '09 to apply for financial aid, and when I decided to commit myself to what will likely be in total about $40,000 for college (not counting grad school/professional degree studies), my then-wife reacted with a combination of veiled contempt and open doubt.  "What happens when you're sitting on all that debt and can't get a job?" she asked.  Implicit in this was a certain "I don't believe in you...just try not to fuck up any more than you already have" mentality---and people wonder why I'm glad to be rid of her and think she did me a favor by asking for a divorce!

When I was growing up, I lost count of the number of "you've got the talent but not the ambition or drive" or worse, "you've got the talent but you're perfectly content to waste it" backhanded compliments I got from about fifth grade onward.  There was even an occasional "you're all talk and will never amount to anything" from the more cruel folks in high school and my first attempt at college.  Certainly no way to take a fresh-faced kid and make him think he's worth a damn.

I've filed all those criticisms away.  And since returning to college last May and putting up a perfect 4.0 GPA, every time I get a test or a paper back with an A on it, my biggest thought is "Fuck. You."  I want to destroy people.  I want to break them down and use my skill and talent and natural disregard for both social norms and authority to completely ruin their shit.  I've switched from a sole focus in accounting to a dual major in accounting and finance---taking a look at investment banking as a possible career, and I intend no more scruples in my application of myself to the task than the Goldman Sachs executives of the subprime bubble and "shitty deal" days brought to theirs.

I'm tired of being the good guy.  I suck at it.  I might be able to pull it off if I meet the right girl, have a few kids of my own, and turn into the "snake by day, sweetheart by night" kind of guy, but right now it's the furthest thing from my mind.  I just want to kick the shit out of people.  I think dominating them like an Abu Ghraib prison guard would be a fucking blast.  And fuck you to anyone who has a problem with that.  I'll stomp you too.