They Call Me Peter Pan

So down to move to Never Never Land.

🔥 Go to my blog for the latest and greatest articles: https://www.stuartoden.com

Why can’t I figure out what I want to do with myself for the next few years?

I’m so fucking sick of thinking about this. It feels like everyone else has their shit figured out but me.

Still, let’s pretend I wasn’t comparing myself to other people. It would still be hard for me to make a decision.

We already know the options, but just for fun let’s go over them again.

The first one: work in Oz for six months and then go back to school in Tel Aviv.

This is more of a known quantity. I’ve lived in Israel before. I’ve worked in Australia. I pretty much know what I’m getting into.

It would give me a chance to go back to Australia. I loved my time there and would often say that the year I spent there was the best one of my life.

I’d also be pretty much guaranteed to make 4–6 thousand dollars a month. I could use that money to make an online store, blah blah blah.

After six months or so (roughly June or July) I would go back to Israel. I’d get student loans and start studying again in October as a freshman. 3 years later I’d have a degree.

Over these 3 years, I’d be able to spend plenty of time at the beach. Israeli summers are very fun, especially in Tel Aviv.

When I used to live there, every free minute I had was spent at the beach. I had a great tan, a bike to get around, and was in the best shape of my life.

I also had regular sex. And this was before Tinder. Just imagine what it would be like now.

True, I don’t keep in touch with many people I knew from before, I do still have some friends there. A lot of people I knew from agalot are from Israel and live there now. Finding people to chill with shouldn’t be that hard.

For the most part, I know what I’m getting into if I choose that path.

Overall it’s good. Sure, there are negatives like not being able to make any money, but I’m not making any money anyway. And I’d always have the job in Australia to fall back on if I needed some quick cash.

It’s the safer option. It’s the option I know would be… satisfying?

Good food, attractive women, free society. Sex with slutty Israeli and foreign girls. Sounds pretty fucking good now that I think about it.

The other option is to stay here in Los Angeles.

I’d have my nice one bedroom apartment in Brentwood.

I’d have my membership at Equinox. All of my gym friends would still be there.

I’d also have my 10:15 AM yoga classes. I’d have my yoga friends and amazing yoga instructors.

I’d have all the things that still make me happy here.

But then why is leaving the “safer” option? Why is that the known quantity and not my present existence?

Well, the big roll of the dice here is staying to work in real estate.

Corey, a friend of mine from the gym, told me a while back that he’d get me a job working at his firm if I got my real estate license.

In order to do that, you have to take the equivalent of 3 college level classes. It can be done online, which is what I did.

All I have to do now is apply to take the test.

To do so, you have to send your application and payment via snail mail. A month or so later, they verify your shit and let you pick when you want to take the test.

Once I pass the test, I can start working in real estate. This scares me.

It scares me because it’s not a quick and easy job. Selling real estate is not something you do for 3–6 months and then stop once you’ve made some money.

I mean, I can do whatever I want obviously. But getting into the real estate game is a long term thing. People don’t buy and sell houses every day, or even every year. Someone buys a house once every few years, if that.

The name of the game is to make connections, get people to like you and then when they want to buy or sell a house, they hit you up.

Then they refer their friends and it just snowballs from there.

My friend Corey pocketed a million dollars last year.

A million dollars.

A million fucking dollars.

He’s not the type of guy to flaunt it either. Understandably, he doesn’t want everyone knowing how much money he makes, although I’d assume that many of the people who go to that gym and work in real estate are pulling down way more than that.

Still.

So let’s assume I pass the test. Let’s say it happens in mid-February.

Coincidentally, this was the deadline I gave myself to leave for Australia. Granted, this was back when I was driving for Uber every day and was super stressed out. I wanted an escape.

But since I got into that accident, I haven’t driven in about two weeks, so I’ve chilled out considerably. I start again tomorrow, so we’ll see how long that lasts.

Anyway, let’s say I start in February. I can sit here and speculate on how long it will take me to sell my first house, but I really have no way of knowing.

Corey said that when you get hired, you’re paid $25 an hour to work part time. Something like 15–20 hours a week. Let’s round down and say that it’s an extra $400 a week.

With a bit of extra Uber driving on the side, I’d be making about as much as I am now; enough to pay my rent, a bit of food and my nice gym membership.

I’d probably also still be able to go to the majority of my yoga classes as well.

Those are all good things.

A few things are stopping me from fully committing to this idea.

Like I said before, going into real estate is a long term thing.

Let’s imagine the best case scenario and things go really well. That means I’ll be here in LA for the foreseeable future.

That also probably means that I’ll never go work in Australia again. I probably won’t go back to school in Tel Aviv. All those positives I listed before in my first option, well, I just won’t have those.

I will have my yoga classes here, though. I love my yoga classes.

Every time I’m feeling upset about my life and go to yoga, halfway through I always think to myself, “How could I possibly think about giving this up?”

A few weeks ago when I was driving for Uber and not seriously considering the real estate thing, I was even prepared to just keep driving indefinitely JUST SO I could keep going to yoga. That’s how much I love it.

That said, since I took a mini break from driving, yoga has been less appealing. I still love it, but less so.

Without the negativity from driving, yoga has less work to do in making me feel better.

Another strange thought I have is that EVEN IF I make a ton of money selling real estate, there’s no guarantee that I’ll live a satisfying life.

Now, I realize that it’s complete speculation because I have no reference point. In other words, I’ve never sold real estate before. I’ve never made lots of money before. I don’t know how much I will or won’t like it.

In fact, I’ve never actually had a job in LA that was even somewhat respectable. All the jobs I’ve had have been shitty sales jobs that I found on Craigslist. Borderline scams.

All of them except the PPC gig I did with a friend of mine. That was legit. But working for him was like being a slave.

Still, I did make bank. He even left the door open for me when I left, offering me a job a few months ago where I’d be making ~$6k a month.

I took it.

It was too boring though. I quit after 3 days.

Anyway, the real estate is different. You need a license for that job, which immediately raises the quality of the people who do it. Those CL “jobs” didn’t require any qualifications other than being able to fog a mirror.

Also, I’d be around people who were making serious $$$.

From what Corey’s told me, he’s a sort of one man show because he’s been doing it for so long.

For someone just starting out like me though, I’d be part of a team. That means they’d take part of my commission if I actually managed to sell a house, but they’d also help considerably with the process.

I’m cool with that. Even though I’ve taken all three courses I still have no idea how the fuck real estate even works. Probably not a good thing.

There’s something else that trips me out too.

Alright, so let’s say that I choose option 1. I go to Oz, work, then go to Tel Aviv and study.

Three to four years pass. I have my shiny but completely useless psychology degree and $50k in debt. What’s my next step?

Well, one option is to continue on and get an MBA. Let’s come back to that in a second.

The second option, the one that trips me out, is that I’d probably just fucking END UP COMING BACK TO LA TO SELL REAL ESTATE ANYWAY.

I’d be in the exact same place I started, except with a lot more debt, a degree and (presumably) some fond memories and notches on my belt.

I can even picture myself in the mall in Australia during a particularly slow day. There I am, wondering what the fuck I’m doing there selling straighteners for $200 when I could be selling houses for $2 million.

Isn’t that fucking weird?

I was at the doctor the other day. I was feeling particularly shitty, so I decided to ask him for some life advice.

I’ll spare you the details of the conversation, but one thing that stuck with me was that he said:

“You’re 33 years old. You have to sink your teeth into something eventually.”

Is it possible that I’m just not ready yet?

I see all these young Persian kids at the gym. They’re in college, either at USC or UCLA. Two great schools.

Or they’re selling real estate. In their early 20s. Putting in work to make the big bucks. I feel like THEY’RE ready. They don’t hem and haw about what to do with their lives. They just want to stay in LA, sell real estate and make bank.

Then again, why the fuck should I care what other people do? Comparing yourself to others is a surefire way to make yourself feel like shit.

I mean fuck, why couldn’t I compare myself to them on some other standard? Why does it always have to be about money? Why can’t it be about something where I’M better than THEM? Why does it always have to be something negative?

Anyway, what the fuck was I talking about…

Oh right, not being ready. Yeah, I just don’t know.

I suppose there is a third option as well.

The third option is to prepare for both. I would take the test in February and commit to doing real estate for let’s say, 6 months.

If I don’t like it after that amount of time, I can go with plan A. At the very least, I will have experienced something new. I’d know if I would like it or not.

Who knows? Maybe I’d like it. Maybe it would be easy to sell houses and make a shit ton of money. Maybe it would be the answer to these questions I’ve been asking myself.

Maybe I’d make lots of friends through work. Maybe having all that money would make me feel better about myself. Maybe I’d finally be sure that I’m in the right place.

Maybe maybe maybe.

The thing I don’t like about the third option is that it’s a sort of half-commitment. I’m giving myself an escape route. And if I know myself, it’s that I love using escape routes.

I know deep down that if I commit to the real estate thing, that eventually I’d make it work. I don’t know how I know that, but I just do.

I mean how hard could it fucking be? How many complete retards are out there make a living from real estate?

Building my client base shouldn’t be too hard either. Just go to a bunch of Jewish events, meet some rich people and boom — instant success!

Obviously joking there, but you get the idea. So many Jews in LA. Jews have money. People with money buy houses.

I’m a likable guy. It’s just a matter of time.

Meanwhile, I would have my Wellbutrin and yoga classes to keep me mentally stable.

So I don’t have a social life. Friends are overrated anyway. Hope of a better future will be my new friend. Money will be my best buddy.

Ha. If only.

Another strange thought: one of the reasons I feel compelled to succeed in real estate is that I want people to see me transform from a loser into a baller.

Like I mentioned before, I spend a lot of time at the gym. Every time I go there, I wear one of 3 pairs of shorts, a random T-shirt and the same white Abercrombie sweatshirt.

People who know me there know I am a bit of a scoundrel. That’s not the right word… Scamp? Whatever. They know my professional life is shit and that I’m broke.

After I make money, I want to go out and buy 10 new gym outfits. I want to wear them at the gym so people will notice that I’ve changed. I want them to ask me about it, and I want to revel in that moment where I get to tell them that I’m not a broke loser anymore.

With a trace of pomp I want to say to them, “I do real estate now.”

Then I’ll just leave it at that and let their imagination work overtime.

They’ll think, “Wow, Stuart has changed so much. Now that he’s a successful real estate guy, he’s the total package. Nice, smart, attractive AND he’s making money. He’s so kewl.”

Isn’t that weird?

Let’s take it even further.

With a bit of concentration I’m sure I could think of quite a few other people whose faces I’d like to rub my success in. Not in a necessarily malicious way, although not in a completely friendly way either.

Not like I want to genuinely share with them that my life is great because they mean so much to me and I want them to celebrate with me.

More like, “Hey remember when you brushed me off because you thought I’d never amount to anything? Well guess what? Now I make more money than you. HAHAHA.”

I suppose there is a bit of malice there. These aren’t even people that I dislike, per se. I even like some of them.

Anyway.. I guess that’s not the purest motivation to do anything. After all, that moment of realization that I’m the shit will only last a brief second.

Eventually everyone who thought I was a loser will realize that I’ve made money. Then where will I be? What will my motivation to continue working there be after that?

That’s where I’m drawing a blank.

Granted, I’ve never experienced that so it’s entirely speculation.

Hmm. I guess drawing a blank would be the opposite of speculation, since you’re not actually thinking of anything.

Whatever. The point is that there are a lot of unknowns there. You hear a bunch of shit about “successful people take risks” and the like.

Strange that my version of taking a risk is staying in my hometown and getting a good job.

The fourth option is to get an MBA.

From what I understand, getting an MBA is like being part of a special club. It gives you access to jobs other people can’t access. All of them make bank right out of the gate.

Of course, if I do that then we can add another $100k to my student loan debt. An incomprehensibly large number to me at the moment. Might as well be $100 million.

You want to talk about speculation? Well I have even less of an idea what getting an MBA will do for me than the real estate.

At least the real estate is somewhat easy to figure out: you sell houses and shit.

I don’t even know what the fuck an MBA does, or what they teach in business school. As far as I know all they do is teach you to throw around buzzwords so you’ll fit in with the rest of the douchebags who have MBAs.

“how to get there from here”

“create value for our customers”

“our mission is to change the world”

Barf.

Still, it would give me another year or so in Israel. My previously useless psychology degree would be transformed into a ticket to even HIGHER education.

More notches on the belt. More shawarma. More beach time.

Eventually though, the party has to end. I think that’s what scares me the most about these decisions. I’m 33 years old. I only have so much more time to fuck around.

What I don’t like is that eventually I’m going to have to pick SOMETHING.

I can’t keep bouncing around forever. Someday I’m going to have to get into real estate or some equivalent industry, buckle down and do it for a fuckload of years.

No more traveling, no more beach time. No more notches on the belt.

I guess that’s what getting old is about.

I hashed this out with my mom a few days ago.

She kept saying shit like, “You’re under the impression that older people don’t travel. And that’s wrong.”

Not exactly what I said, but my mom likes to try and twist my words to make a point.

Yeah, of course older people can travel. Anyone can buy a fucking plane ticket and go somewhere.

The difference is that people with real jobs and commitments travel for a week or two, maybe a month. Then they come back to whatever their chosen grind is and put the cuffs back on.

What they can’t do is what I’ve been doing: live somewhere new every few months. REALLY travel. REALLY be on the road.

Then again, was that really such an enjoyable way to live?

I mean, isn’t the whole reason I came back to LA because I didn’t want to do that anymore?

Fuck, it’s been so long I can‘t even remember.

I used to blame my German girlfriend for taking the fire out of my belly. New Zealand and Germany were not the most enjoyable years of my life. I went there so we could be together.

Locked down with my GF in a boring place with no social life. Not my ideal lifestyle.

But meanwhile we’ve been broken up for almost two years and I never jumped back into the ocean.

I tried the LA thing, first working with my friend and making decent money. Then I couldn’t stand that anymore and tried the shit CL jobs.

Those didn’t work and now it’s crunch time. Real estate or bust.

The thought that I need to pick eventually is scary. I don’t like it, because it implies a loss of control, a loss of freedom.

What’s even worse is that I am under the impression that if I go to Israel I’ll just end up back here anyway.

With a shitty liberal arts degree, real estate will still be my best option.

I’ll be right back where I started, 3–4 years older with nothing to show for it but a useless piece of paper and maybe some more pictures on Facebook.

God fucking damn it! I wanted to write because I thought it would help me figure shit out.

Instead, it just made me realize I need to make a choice between moving forward and going back.

Seems easy, right? Moving forward is always better, isn’t it? Progress and all that shit?

Well what if moving forward is moving into something shitty? Why would anyone want to jump into a fire? Wouldn’t it be better to just go back?

Then again, I don’t know for sure that the fire would burn me. Maybe I’d figure out a way to survive the flames.

All I’m doing is speculating. Just comparing an unknown future to a known one, relatively speaking. But do I even know?

Wanna know something crazy? This past year in LA parallels the last time I tried to live here.

When I had gotten out of the army, I came back here right away thinking I would finally make it big.

I thought that since the army was so fucking hard, making money should be a piece of cake by comparison.

Full of vim and vigor, I dove headfirst into whatever job I could find.

Once again they just happened to be shitty Craigslist jobs. A few weeks here, a month there. I made $30.

Granted, this was in 2009 at the peak of the recession. Not like now.

But still, I fucking hated it and was desperate for some kind of change.

At first I wanted to stay in America and make money. Then I ran out of steam.

Without a support network to keep me afloat I went with the easy escape route: back to Israel.

Do I regret my choice? Definitely not.

Two fun years in Tel Aviv followed by four years of traveling the world selling shit to women. Made me who I am today.

The point is that I feel like trying to live here in LA follows a pattern: I come all excited to make money, shit doesn’t work out, and then I escape to something else.

Why do you think I joined the army in the first place?

UGH. I’m so over thinking about this. It’s fucking Christmas, for God’s sakes. I should be out taking mushrooms and walking around Santa Monica or something.

Meh. Maybe I’ll just play Dota all day instead.