Take the Pay Cut, Take the Risk, Take the Floor

"No one could understand why anyone in his right mind would give up a $125,000-a-year job at a comfortable and respected firm like Weeden to take a $50,000 position—with the promise of “consideration of partnership,” but no guarantees—at a house like Salomon Brothers, a big leaguer in general but a minor player in my specialty, municipal bonds. But then, some people just don’t understand risk."

"I would be interrupting a successful career, uprooting my family, and giving up a comfortable and relatively predictable lifestyle for the vagaries of Washington. But my country called, and I was raised in an era when if your country called, be it to fight a foreign enemy or serve in government, you answered the call—with pride and honor and gratitude and respect. If you truly love your country and if you fear for freedom, can you stand by and see the battle lost without joining the fight? Inconceivable."

"I’m not sure where my life would have led had I declined President Nixon’s offer and stayed on the comfortable road I was following on Wall Street. But by listening to my instincts, taking a risk, and beginning a new journey on an unknown path, I learned more about life, discovered more about myself, stretched my horizons farther, and savored experiences far richer than I would otherwise have ever known. Some people might call it fate. Some might call it luck. But I would call it God’s plan."

"Aside from providing what seemed a celestial salary, the world of finance fascinated me, and appealed to my risk-taking, poker-playing nature. Do I feel lucky today? What are the odds? What is my opponent up to? Imagination, ingenuity, hard work, and luck determined whether you won or lost. I, of course, subscribe to the maxim that the harder I work the more luck I seem to have. But you have to be willing to take a risk. Even a turtle makes progress only when he sticks his neck out."