Definitely one of the challenges coming out of business school is there is a lot of pressure to get that top consulting job, or that Wall Street finance job, that marketing job. I think business school was a phenomenal experience, but most of my classmates were dreading going back to work. If you step back and thought about it "Okay, I just spent two years with the opportunity cost of not making any money and also having to pay for school, and yeah it was a great two years, but the bottom line, ultimate goal was to find a better job, more suitable, and better qualified job." I think a lot of people lost track of that.

It was kind of frustrating, because I'd be in business school and people would say "What job did you get? That sounds cool." But it was more about "Where are you going to be living, what are the perks, what's your bonus going to be", instead of "Does this really make you happy. Is this what you want to be doing?". I didn't want to be in that situation.

We started doing this small business consulting as a means for cash, but in the interim it turned out that there were a lot of opportunities that were coming out of it. The truth is that the lifestyle is great. I obviously don't make as much as some of my other classmates who are making $70,000 to $100,000 a year, but they're miserable. Most of my friends who are happy are doing something entrepreneurial. It's giving them a better chance to use their skills. There are other classmates who are just crunching numbers. And some of that is "paying their dues" for the first couple of years.

I think different things have happened in my life that have made me realize certain things. I think my year abroad really made me realize that there are other pretty important things in life besides just work. And I think that coupled with the fact that I didn't enjoy the culture at [my company] was a huge realization that this isn't what I want. This isn't the type of environment.

I think what's important is to visualize what you want to be in 30 years, the type of person, the type of energy that I have within me, the happiness level, things of that sort, and I wasn't finding that. I was realizing that I don't work well in that environment. I realized that I could always do good work, but I would never be motivated enough to do phenomenal work because a) my ass wasn't on the line, and b) my contribution wasn't big enough to make a real difference. I wasn't pushing myself and I was letting myself get into the routine part of just going into work, doing the job, and getting out, and not really striving for anything more. That's the way [my company] started becoming and that's when I realized at that point that I did not want that kind of lifestyle.

I think experiences in one's life accelerates the learning process. I think for myself, I learned early on that what made me happy, because my Mom passed away, and so it was kind of a growing process. It's kind of funny because when I would sit in business school and there would be somebody who didn't get an interview with McKinsey and they were about to shoot themselves because they were so upset, I would sit there and I would think to myself, "You don't get it! It's really not THAT important. You've come this far in your life with so many great things, but because McKinsey won't give you an interview, that is just the most detrimental part of your life." Or people who would be just completely stressed out. I mean a lot of times people don't realize or don't take a step back and say "Oh my God, how many people are in my position? How many people have the luxury to say they could easily find three or five jobs coming out of school and all would be at least $60,000." And you lose site of that.

On the same token, if you've always led a pretty charmed life, and you haven't had to worry about a lot of things, or you haven't gone through really difficult times, then that does become really important to you. You can't see the bigger picture. I mean even for myself, sometimes I wonder, am I not seeing the bigger picture beyond me. It's always a struggle for me within. Maybe I'm just as myopic in my view, but it's important to try and understand and value what's truly important and what's not. And that's tough.

I admire certain managers who you could walk into their office and no matter how chaotic things were, they could put down what they were doing and they could focus on you and help you with whatever you were doing. And there are only a certain people who can do that. I think one of the things is being calm enough within you that you can understand that "you know what, this is important, and I can focus" and I am not so important. I'm not so concerned about "Am I going to get this done." Part of it is this peaceful sense, part of it is being compassionate and understanding that someone else is needing your advice and assistance.

The other thing is that these people seem to be able to surround themselves with people that make things work. I haven't found out what that is yet, how that works, but it's true. There are certain people that draw chaos to their lives and there are other people who draw consistent friends, strong family, and strong values to themselves. It is something you learn and grow within yourself. A lot of it has to do with becoming less self-centered, being peaceful with yourself so that you can give to other people so that they respect you and that they work with you and not against you. A lot of that stems from inner peace. Just knowing that life has always treated you well.

One of the crazy things that I always think about is that we have made thousands of great decisions in our lives and for some reason we seem to dwell upon maybe those two or three that maybe were "wrong", but we don't even know if they were the wrong decision. It's kind of the Zen way of looking at things, but it's truly believing that life has purposes for everything. I still believe that even the difficult hardships that you go through in life still teach you an incredible amount. Even though they are painful, they make you stronger and there is a purpose for it. The same thing when you make decisions, you gotta have the belief and confidence that I've come this far in my life and I have this many great things in my life, what makes me think that at this point I'm going to falter. And it's not an ego thing. It's a sense of understanding that it's okay. Because if you take route A, it could be just as good as route B. It's just going to be different. Either way if you just enjoy the process of life you'll be a lot happier.

I think happiness is something that we all have within ourselves. A lot of times people look to other people for happiness. And I think that there is something wrong with that. I think the true happiness is within you as being able to make yourself happy. I think it's different for everybody else, for me, it's feeling peaceful. It's feeling like I'm not dependent on other things in my life to make me happy. The only thing I'm dependent on is myself. I think being able to constantly evaluate yourself and knowing that you are going to go through ups and downs and that's okay.

Happiness is something that you just don't have in certain spurts of your life. Happiness is being able to do the things you want to do, being responsible for your own actions, but also understanding that life has difficult things and it has good things and that they're all just a part of life.

It's like when you are sitting in the car, can you sing at the top of your voice and be okay. Can you do the things you want to do without always being concerned with what others are thinking about. Because you do what's right for you. You do things that are important to you. You're not doing it for somebody else, or you're not doing something because you feel it's awkward or whatever, but it's having that sense of confidence within yourself that "you know what? I'm responsible for my own happiness, no one else."

So somebody else sitting in another car wants to laugh at me, well I hope it's a happy laugh and if anything I hope they start singing in their car. It's being able to always find that feeling within yourself.

I believe that if you find what makes you happy, success will follow. Even if you were to define success as owning a ranch in Montana and having a beach house in Cabo and four other houses around the world, even if you never obtain that but you were happy the whole time you were working and doing the things you were doing.

It bothers me when people say, "Well, he's just a janitor." If he likes being a janitor, then who are we to judge that he or she should aspire for more. If they have found the thing that makes them happy, then success to them is having found the thing that makes you happy. I think most people spend many years trying to figure out what makes them happy. I still search for things in my life that will make me happier, and I'm not convinced that I've found that point and I still think there are more things that I can learn, but I think it's that understanding that that is part of life. I wouldn't want to stop right here and say "You know what, I'm as happy as I can be. It doesn't get any better." So, I would say success comes as a result of happiness.

There are definitely a number of things in that philosophy [Zen] that bring you to the point where you can have the peace of mind and where you can start to feel compassion. It kind of goes back to that whole wisdom-thing of being comfortable with yourself so that you can go out and be silly. Part of that comes from striving for that. Zen Buddhism teaches you that. It teaches compassion towards other people. It teaches you not to be so self-centered about your life. It's okay to be always be developing yourself, but there is difference. There are certain people that you've probably met in your life that you meet and you are automatically entranced by them. They are emitting energy. They give energy. It's obvious that they are not self-absorbed. To become content with yourself is to really understand. It teaches you to really enjoy the process of life and not to press so hard against it, but to go with it. That kind of goes back to the thought of "You've made this many great decisions in your life, what makes you think that you are going to make a bad one."

I've always thought about what I'd like to instill in my children. One thing is responsibility for oneself. Even when your kids leave, you want to know that they'll always be able to survive, that they'll always be able to make themselves happy. Responsibility is one. The other thing that I think is really important to teach children is resourcefulness: how to survive. I think one of the things parents really worry about is the difficult things your children go through. You always hope that your family and friends won't have to go through really hard times, whether it's a physical ailment or something emotionally disturbing. But if you can teach your children to be resourceful enough so that they don't feel like they're trapped, they have the ability to be responsible for themselves.