So I got "dinged" (nice word for those in the bschool process of saying "sadly rejected") by another business school today....In a spurt of feeling particular depression, I looked up the definitions of the words "fate" and "destiny" online- just to see if there was a difference.
Fate is defined as: something that unavoidably befalls a person; fortune; lot
Destiny is defined as: the predetermined, usually inevitable or irresistible, course of events
I know that these two definitions basically say the same thing, but I feel like the connotations are different. I feel like "fate" is ominous...it implies a lack of control, but in a doom-like way. "Destiny" on the other hand connotates moving towards finally achieving something that you were meant to do- something that you wanted to do. After being dinged, I began to ask myself today a plethora of questions, none that I really have answers for- Am I maybe reaching too high? Is it possible that schools do fit a "type" and I'm just no one's "type"? What can I do to change where I'm at? and most importantly....What now?
I think to say that what is happening right now is my "fate" would be passive- it wouldn't be taking responsibility for where my life has ended up, so I'm hesitant to say that fate is what this is...But looking forward, what is my destiny? Am I meant to go to business school? More importantly, does all of this fate and destiny talk even exist? Maybe everything really is a random collision of time and space. THEN what?
Ironically, I've meant to post a story about what happened when I visited this school a few months ago. Because the school was known for marketing-type classes, I decided to sit in on an accounting class during my school visit. Unsurprisingly, I was the only one that signed up for that particular class. As my student host shuffled me and the 4 other potential students to our class choices, he quickly dropped me off in the lecture hall where my accounting class was supposed to take place, and left with the other students to deliver them to marketing strategy 101. When I sat down, I realized that there was something off about this class. Apparently, the accounting class had moved to a different location, and the Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science was hosting a mini-conference on Matching (entitled "Matching: Findings, Flaws and Future"). Parag Pathak, a professor of economics at MIT, he explained "The Mechanism Design Approach to Student Assignment".
What were the odds? I was sitting in a classroom as a potential student, listening to an MIT professor (a school I already got rejected from) tell me about how public schools choose students for their schools through a student optimal stable mechanism. It was an interesting discussion, but the one thing that he talked about was how the choosing system can be gamed. Schools would often ask students to choose a certain number of schools, and then the schools would choose the students based on a number of factors- but depending on the number of choosing occurring on both sides of the equation- there was gaming happening on both sides. The one thing that stood out to me was when he noted that, the more constraints there were, the easier it was for the system to be gamed. So I can't help but think back now and wonder, is it a constraints issue? Have I somehow mis-gamed? Are there people out there that have gamed the system? Again, I think that would be passing off blame, but it's an interesting idea. I guess the question that I really need to focus on is ...What now?
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