The Alchemist
If my dreams are apparent to me, should I...pursue them?
I’ve always remembered Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist as a story about a starry-eyed merchant who recognizes the limits of realizing his dreams.
In the book, a young boy named Santiago embarks on a journey in search of treasure. Along the way, he meets a merchant who dreams of going to Mecca. Together, they dream about Mecca and what they’ll do when they finally get there. When Santiago presses the merchant to—you know—go, the merchant protests in a moment of clarity:
Don’t you understand? Mecca is the reason I have to live.
If I go to Mecca, I won’t have anything left to live for.
And the merchant refuses to go.
There’s a popular belief that elite universities produce the most innovators.
In practice, most elite school graduates follow similar paths. Every spring, a migration takes place: from ivy-clad buildings, diplomas in hand, straight into the career pipelines of Wall Street, Big Tech, and Management Consulting.
Why should this be? asks Yale professor William Deresiewicz, to which he answers:
Because students from elite schools expect success, and expect it now. They have, by definition, never experienced anything else, and their sense of self has been built around their ability to succeed. … I was talking with [a student] last year about his interest in the German Romantic idea of ‘bildung’, the upbuilding of the soul. But, he said, it’s hard to build your soul when everyone around you is trying to sell theirs.
This is the paradox of elite education: it cultivates capable, curious minds to wield power1 but not necessarily to question it. We arrive bright-eyed and bushy-tailed; we leave eager to optimize and ascend, in boardrooms and courtrooms, rather than to inquire and reimagine. Of course, many do innovate within these structures. But the gravitational pull of prestige and security is strong. This is why most top students do not go forth to change the world. They simply aspire to manage it.2
A common refrain:
Make enough money, and then I’ll do what I want…
Make enough money, and then I’ll take that public-sector job…
Make enough money, and then I’ll be happy (relaxed, content, satisfied)…
This is a fallacy.
Not because the goal is wrong (many of us do want to make a difference, spend our days doing something we fervently believe in, or simply live more gently), but because it misunderstands what work really is and our time horizon to achieve it.
Work is not a neutral placeholder we entertain as we wait to self-actualize. It’s how we spend the majority of our waking hours, exercise our best mental energy, and form our closest relationships. For careers like finance, making money is the easy part. Once on the job, the harder work is knowing when to stop.
I’ve lost count of the number of schoolmates (roommates, hallmates, UGAs, first-year advisees…) who went to McKinsey for 2-3 years, then Harvard Business School (GSB for the West Coast-minded), then Goldman Sachs, and are now evaluating exit opps to Blackstone, Bain Capital, et al. They are some of the most driven and hardworking peers I know. Over FoCo cookies and late-night hot chocolate a decade ago, we also played out a variation of this conversation:
“After I make enough money, I’ll [do my dream job].”
“After I reach Partner, I’ll be able to slow down.”
“After I make $X, I'll just get off the tiger.”
But that’s not how it works. Because it fails to account for how our jobs shape us. Work isn’t just a way to pass time; it’s where we invest energy, forge identity, and build esteem. Over time, the lines blur between who we are and what we do. And when that identity is discontinued, it’s not the job that’s the problem—but the challenge of rediscovering meaning beyond work.
Making money is the easy part. The harder work is knowing when to stop.
Perhaps what we fear most isn’t failure, but commitment. Professor Mihir Desai calls this the cult of optionality: the impulse to keep every door open. “You can never create enough option value,” he warns, “and the longer you spend acquiring options, the harder it is to stop.” That’s the trap. Optionality is a poor substitute for purpose.
He concludes:
The shortest distance between two points is reliably a straight line. If your dreams are apparent to you, pursue them. Creating optionality and buying lottery tickets are not way stations. They are dangerous diversions that will change you.
The danger of deferral isn’t missing our dreams, but forgetting them altogether.
The aspiring novelist who chooses MBB over MFA is channeling her creative instincts into spreadsheet logic and client deliverables. The would-be teacher who detours through law school is internalizing a system where human potential is measured in billable hours. Bonus by bonus, promotion by promotion, year by year, it is not the dream but we ourselves who have transformed.
In The Alchemist, Mecca isn’t just a destination. It’s a symbol of the life we keep postponing. The merchant never reaches Mecca because Mecca serves him better as a dream than a destination. And because dreams are immaculate, unsullied by life’s disappointments, Mecca preserves both its perfection and purpose.
Dreams deferred have another seductive quality: they absolve us of the responsibility to act. Someday is a comforting fiction that allows us to maintain our self-image as idealistic and purpose-driven while outwardly pursuing material paths.
“This isn’t who I really am” or “This isn’t what I’ll do forever” maintains the illusion that our authentic self exists separate of our best hours.
But we are not static vessels waiting for circumstances to align before becoming who we are meant to be; we are actively becoming ourselves each day. The banker who plans to eventually teach is not a teacher-in-waiting but a banker becoming more deeply a banker with each passing year. The consultant dreaming of entrepreneurship isn't a founder-in-hibernation but a consultant whose identity is being forged in the crucible of client presentations and partner expectations.
Life doesn’t begin when the spreadsheet ends, when we finally hit a number, make Partner or Managing Director, or some other arbitrary milestone. Maybe, like Santiago, we set out for treasure and discover it was never far away.
It was merely waiting for us to act on it.
As of 2025, all but one of the current Supreme Court justices (Amy Coney Barrett) are Ivy League law graduates, with four from Harvard and four from Yale. Since 1990, every U.S. President but one (Joe Biden) has earned a degree from the Ivy League, often multiple.
It’s worth noting these industries offer the most robust early-career development programs at scale. After college, my employer shipped my cohort off for 4 weeks of full-time financial analysis and Excel modeling training, followed by sponsorship to take our FINRA licensing exams, paired with formal mentorship. There was comfort in being a clone: do well, pass the tests, keep climbing. I also got to defer the hardest part of identity formation as a young adult: answering the dreaded “so what do you do?” with a productive non-choice. And of course, the experience gave me several of my closest friends and career confidantes to this day.
“This is the paradox of elite education: it cultivates capable, curious minds to wield power but not necessarily to question it” and it makes everyone think the same things!! It’s like the knowledge itself doesn’t matter that much it’s more of an in-group signal that says “I went to a good school”