Sometimes being wealthy isn’t about the cash, it’s about doing the right thing. There is no price on doing the right thing.
The Need to Network
Throughout my career, I have never taken networking too seriously because a job path has been laid out clearly before through the academic system from being a student to becoming a tenured professor. In this I always assumed that networking wasn’t so important since it’s the quality of work that should speak for itself and open doors for moving forward. However, in considering an alternate career path it has become much more obvious how important the network is, and how it could have helped me in an academic career (and is doing so now). For academics, it’s important for gaining ideas on funding, publicizing your work (citations!), getting new ideas, and also knowing how to move on from each step to the next. This last point is where I did not realize I needed the most help, as doing research has always come naturally and being a bit different in my approach has led to innovation, but there are certain expectations at each stage of the game that must be met. Taking a bit of time to network and asking the correct questions, can save an invaluable amount of time wasted from not having a network and working hard doing the wrong things. It’s also a meter of success for how relevant your work is, because accomplishing goals of interest to your network is more likely going to benefit the community than something produced in isolation.
Moving the ball forward
Failure is inevitable and life is unfair. That’s just the way it is, and when faced with setbacks there are always two choices, to try even harder than before or to stop and move on. I used to consider trying even harder as the only available option for success, but sometimes the cost of continuing on a project outweighs the benefits. The most important thing is to progress through growing yourself and moving towards a higher state. It’s okay to admit failure and move to something more meaningful, if the project doesn’t live up to it’s initial expectations.