Why I treat(ed) the GSB like a sandbox
I vividly remember the moment when I got into the Stanford Graduate School of Business. It was December 11, 2019 when a 650-number popped up on my home screen. I instantly knew what that meant, and the rest of that evening was a blur. A few days later, I got a call from an alumnus to make sure I would enroll. He didn’t have to convince me as I knew all I wanted was Stanford. A few words, however, stuck with me: “Christoph, if there’s one piece of advice I can give to you: treat the GSB like a sandbox. Like you were a kid, just playing around and doing things that truly give you joy. If you do that, you’ll be successful and happy.”
It sounded a bit cheesy, but it stuck. When we were kids, playing in a sandbox meant there were no instructions or objectives, just sand… we crafted whatever we wanted with it out of our imagination… whatever made us happy in the moment. As kids, we were not self-conscious and not calibrated by our social and cultural environment that dictates what’s desirable and what’s not for us as adults. We lived from moment to moment, and our mind was not there to interfere in our bliss.
Fast forward 8 months, and I came to the GSB to inherit that mindset, seeking whatever makes me successful and happy, both in my career and personal life. This mindset has become so important for me, because I know how bad the opposite could be: 18 months before that call, I was going through a longer phase of depression and a bad mental state. After the end of an incredibly toxic friendship that had robbed most of my energy in my first year of college, I spent the remaining time in undergrad heads down studying and interviewing to set the foundation for a successful career. At the same time, an exchange program in the US — which I fondly remember — let me dream about a life in the US, with problems so far away. But when I graduated college, I faced a hard reality that I couldn’t escape: I wasn’t able to move to the US. Instead, I moved to a German city where none of my friends from college or high school lived. I started neglecting my friends that were spread across the country, and just worked. As I stopped seeing other people, I worked even more, and ended up spending weekends at home doing absolutely nothing. It was the beginning of a downward spiral.
Despite my personal challenges, I was successful at my job. I got great reviews and was surrounded by inspiring peers to learn from. But it couldn’t matter less, because it didn’t give me anything. I chose that job because I wanted to understand how the business world works and have a steep learning curve, not particularly because I’d love it. While there’s nothing wrong with that, a highly demanding job that I did not pick for the love of it was not compatible with what I was going through at the time. I felt overwhelmed.
Finally admitting to myself that I wasn’t okay, I went through therapy and eventually got better. I promised myself that I would treat my career and life as equals from now on, and mental health has been one of my core values ever since.
Shortly after, I went on a year-long adventure in the Middle East — quite literally a sandbox adventure. It was still the same job, but I had pushed my company to allow me to join a project that I was truly passionate about. I ended up having the time of my life. While there, I also applied for the GSB, and thankfully I got in.
Arriving at the GSB in August 2020, I promised myself to find and follow my passion as a catalyst to work successfully and live happily, following the advice I had been given 8 months earlier. I deliberately minimized my classwork and took whatever opportunity to socialize. I wanted to build a new life in the US, beyond just my career pursuits. Similarly, after some deep reflection exercises, I began telling literally everyone I met in our class about this one opportunity I was pursuing — a personal passion of mine for over 20 years that I had never even closely considered as a professional opportunity. My priority was to find a job that I’d truly love, remembering that “your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” Telling everyone about that opportunity was a forcing mechanism to not fall into the trap that I fell into in the past: to maximize my career choices and neglect my life choices.
At this point, you might be wondering: why am I telling you all of this? With graduation only a week away, I find myself surrounded by more than 400 amazing classmates. Reflecting on my past two years, we’re all striving for success, consistently seeking the optimal outcome for our Post-GSB endeavors. In the hunt for success, however, we talk so much about our careers, what job pays well, and what market is ‘hot’ right now, that our life and happiness often fall by the wayside.
Are we planning our life around our career, or are we planning our career and life together? Are we pursuing success in a certain industry or job because we want it, or because that’s what our social and cultural environment calibrated us to do? That thing that we didn’t do as kids.
Instead of just seeking success, I argue we should seek success and happiness in our lives and in our careers. In that pursuit, the single most common advice I have received from GSB alumni is to follow our passions and we’d be able to figure out the rest after.
Well, in theory, that all sounds great, but we all know that reality hits differently. The GSB is a tempting place to accept that higher job with higher salary to pay off our student debt quickly, to take that better brand name that might lead to a better job after, or to enter that hot new market everyone is going into.
That temptation is the reason I stuck to that cheesy sandbox concept from two years ago: to not let myself lose focus of my priorities. Thankfully, that one opportunity I kept people telling about worked out. But by no means I have figured it all out. I have felt and still am feeling anxious: Thinking about what if the job ends up not being as fun as I expect it to be. Thinking about paying back my student loan rather than taking sponsorship from my previous employer. Rejecting a job with much higher pay, and a position that would set me up for success in tech. Thinking about paying for an apartment that I’m going to spend only a limited time per month in — in an obnoxiously expensive real estate market.
It all might not be perfect, but it’s a good place to start. I believe that I have found a post-GSB path that is true to myself, and a life around my closest friends from the US and Germany, eliminating both challenges I had before the GSB.
Some of us haven’t found our passions yet, and that is totally fine. I went to the GSB not knowing exactly what my passion was. I might even reevaluate mine in the future. But taking the mindset of seeking success and happiness helped me prioritize and figure out something that was authentic to me. And I’m certain that we all will if we prioritize it and resist the temptations the GSB brings. At the GSB, we can play around because, frankly speaking, we have comfort and privilege by virtue of being GSB alumni — just as the kids have the comfort of being taken care of once they leave that sandbox.
So why not pursue an opportunity that might not be the hottest right now, but gives you joy? Why not do so, knowing that you can always go do something else, and be fine? A guy who inspired me to apply to the GSB said that “sometimes you gotta lick the stamp and send it.” Just go for it, don’t look back, and make the decision right after.
When thinking about our lives after the GSB, I do want all of my classmates to be successful. But most importantly, I want them to be happy. We all should pursue success and happiness simultaneously and make our decisions in life based on what we individually want, not what other parameters tell us to do. Just as we did when we were kids… in that sandbox.
