Dread

What to do with dread

So, I am pretty chuffed about this idea.

I am going to write this piece in two parts. The first part is going to be regarding my feelings before a moment that I a dreading, and why I dread it. The second part will be written after the dreadful thing happens, and will be a reflection on my experience. I will also predict how awful the dreadful thing is going to be by using a score out of ten. Afterwards I will rate the dreadful thing out of ten again, which I will then compare to my previous score and you get the idea… A lesson will be learned.

Part 1: The dreadful thing

I study accounting, which is hard (for me anyways). I am in my last semester as an undergraduate and am therefore really tensed up and ready to get the mountain of difficult work firmly and permanently behind me.

My lecturers, however, are not done having fun. This is why, instead of teaching us about the accounting treatment for financial instruments, which is hard (for me anyways), they invited a bank to come and host a competition which will require us to simulate a stock exchange in a big hall next to a coffee shop, for a couple of hours.

Now I think investment management is interesting, but I don’t know how to trade in stocks, and for all practical purposes I don’t need to know just yet.

Of course I may sound stupid, since knowing how to trade in stocks is surely valuable, and that is true. That’s why there is an entire degree for people who want to do that sort of thing. For all the good in the world it may do for me to read up on stocks and investment management, a couple of hours floundering around in a big hall trying to figure it out manually, while a second year banking clerk reads fabricated market indicators over a broken intercom, will do little to prepare me for a career in money-management. The exercise is futile, and for third year purposes, I must be able to account for financial instruments, not play a game of Wolf of F*****g Wall Street.

To clarify, we will be put into groups of six, randomly, and tasked with artificially trading with our “fellow investors.”

Because I am meek, my group will dominate me. Because I am ugly, they will dislike me. Because I don’t know them, they will not think I am funny and they will probably eat me.

I dread tomorrow. It will be a massive waste of time and only probe the worst in a group of people who already study accounting.

7/10 on the dread-meter.

 

Part 2: The dreadful reality

Now most of you would have already spotted the idea behind the exercise. I would write the second part having experienced the competition and I would then tell you that things never turn out as bad as we think they will.

I can truthfully tell you that as of writing this I am at home after the stock exchange simulation and yes, it wasn’t that bad. My group wasn’t that bad. I wasn’t completely useless. It was even enjoyable at times.

But, it was still a waste of time, and just because I am feeling relieved that it wasn’t a s**t-show, and happy that it is over, does not mean that the experience was destined to be better than expected.

Sometimes things are just as awful as we expect them to be, and sometimes they are even worse, but I can offer this as an observation: worrying about the whole stupid exercise did not do anything for me, it only made me feel weak.

Of course everybody knows this, but as it turns out feeling anxiety and dread is not something we always have control over. Luckily there is a quote from a famous person, which is something that I always love using, that may actually shine some light on the dark sensation that is: dread.

Perfect relief is not possible except with time. You cannot now believe that you will ever feel better. But this is not true. You are sure to be happy again. Knowing this, truly believing it will make you less miserable now. I have had enough experience to make this statement. - Abraham Lincoln

At least I hope he said this…

Keep it in mind next time you are asked to do your speech on day one.

The competition scored a 4/10 in the end, not that it really makes a difference.