I am out of my element. And I'm 100% sure that is a good thing. I remember as a new banker having to go to networking events. I didn't know anyone and I wasn't experienced at going there. I still don't love the term networking and I cringe every time someone claims to be good at it. But you can drop me in a room full of strangers and I can mingle and make small talk comfortably. It's a very small accomplishment, but it isn't something that everyone is capable of, and it's not something that I've always been capable of. It also wasn't easy to get there. There were a lot of awkward, forced conversations along the way. And a lot of bored participants that I cornered. In my early 30s I took a modern dance class. I had never felt comfortable dancing, it wasn't something I was good at, and it wasn't something that I enjoyed. As we progress in our career it's very rare that we do something that we're absolutely terrible at. Danc...
It is generally my nature to consume and not to create. This is my attempt to try to change that, even if only slightly. My favorite thing in the world is to talk to smart people and learn from them. If I've had any success as a banker it's been because I'm so curious about learning from smart people. And small business owners tend to be pretty smart. So I've seen structuring deals as the necessary evil to get into the room in the first place. My first goal with this blog is to get shit out of my head. I've consumed too much info without having processed any of it. I used to just read and read. At some point I started reading and highlighting or taking a few lines of notes per book. Now I want to have it all in one place. There may be betters ways to accomplish this goal. But starting here is better than not starting. My secondary goal is to eventually use this as a way to share with the internet what I'm thinking about so that...