Hi, my name is Jackson. This post will be a foundational document (blog #1) that shares more about who I am, how I think about problems, and how I am approaching life.
Me
To begin, I am from a small town called Sylvania, Ohio which is nearly 10 minutes from the Michigan border to the North. I was raised by a librarian and a speech pathologist and quickly fell in love with learning, curiosity, and exploring the questions that excited me. Usually this centered around education and math, but as I grew older, I became fascinated with psychology, economics, and their intersection. Thinking Fast and Slow was my bible. This quickly taught me that there are many ways to think about a single problem, and it gave me a framework of how to approach the world's questions that didn't have a "right" answer.
I was born as the youngest of 3, with two high achieving siblings. One has gone on to build one of the world's fastest engrossing startups and the other helping animals across the nation as a veterinarian. I am grateful for both my siblings, they paved an incredible (and incredibly hard) path to follow. I also grew up in a house that had dogs, likely the largest producers of love.
I attended elementary school, middle school, and high school within my home city but saw the chance to explore more and left Toledo at first glance. In 2023, I attended the Ohio State University where I am now a rising senior graduating a semester early. I started my studies thinking about something medical, which shifted into economics, which has then shifted into finance. Regardless of the field, OSU has created an incredible community of people that I have learned an unbelievable amount of information from (like George Liu and Eashan Vytla, to name a few).
Throughout my time at Ohio State, a few things have stayed constant. One being my fiance Reagan. She is a compass for how I approach problems and has taught me more than I could ever tally on how to be kind, have empathy, and give back to others. She lives all those out.
Finally, within this section, I was raised Roman Catholic attending a small, old church in the Toledo area as a kid. At Ohio State, I found a quick community at the Newman Center and more recently have stepped into leadership within my faith community. I love sharing and talking with others about my faith and leading a group of 7 other great guys in their journey.
Thinking About Problems
I am worried about the curiosity development in my generation and the ones upcoming. I am a large advocate for AI and its application, but have quickly watched it displace my own and others' ability to ask good questions and think about the answers. There is an instant need for answers that might not be right, or even have a right answer.
Thinking about problems has always been one of my favorite things to do. This comes with a lot of listening and learning the ability to be quiet to intentionally listen. I get excited about a few topics in specific: relationships (how to build a life with another person), education (how can we learn better today and tomorrow), and health (how can I be healthy to live). More on those in later posts. For now, I think it is important to set these as the cornerstone of where I like to think and spend my time. This blog is a first step to a platform for education content/question answering.
At Ohio State, the majority of the time I thought that I wanted to be a consultant. Someone who's whole job is to wait for problems and then solve them. I think the drive to solve problems hasn't faded, but the type of questions I want to answer has changed. There are too many things going on in the world to sit and wait. I think that it is time to sit and think, not wait. Solve something exciting when the risk is lower. I will be interning this summer within a strategy team for M&A and will report back.
Approaching Life
This blog will be full of biases. My footsteps likely look a lot different than yours and we likely have ended up in radically different places. That's a good thing. We can learn from one another. How I approach life is within those last sentences. My main goal is to be others-focused, passionate, and myself. I think that change is really good for most everyone, and if we were a world that accepted change and new perspectives, there would be a lot less war, hate, and separation.
I also really like having fun. I have three amazing roommates as a Buckeye and we love to golf, be outside, sing country songs too loud, and have a couple beers here and there (minus Henry…). I love walking outside, often with my fiance and her dogs, and am elated to live in Chicago this summer. I also attempt to tap into creative outputs as much as possible. I am a newbie needlepointer, love making greeting/celebration cards, and am learning guitar.
Something that we often talk about in bible study is the purpose of being here and believing. Faith gives us a hope that there is more to life than just the 50, 60, or (hopefully) 100 years on Earth. I try to live my life so that all the years of my life I can look back at and be grateful. Grateful to my friends, to my parents, to my wife, to my children, etc. Live a great life here to live a better in heaven.
I will leave this foundational testament with my future outlook. Good things are coming.