Tag: Business

• I let my 14-year-old son skip school to attend the opening of a new Lego store together.
• It was a special bonding experience, and I don't regret it.
• While in line, I realized he's interested in Legos again for the same reason I wanted to take him.

Two weeks ago, I let my 14-year-old son take a day off from school so we could go to the grand opening of our new Lego store.

I know it sounds frivolous. And I'm not the kind of parent who encourages blowing off school for a trip to the mall. But for us, it was a once-in-a-lifetime moment — one of those small, strange, wonderful opportunities to make a memory I know we'll both hold onto.

Going to the new Lego store was a good chance to spend time together

My son was big into Lego blocks when he was little, but like many kids, his interest tapered off as video games became more appealing. And then, out of nowhere, it roared back with teenage intensity. He started following new releases, quoting "price per piece" statistics, and making regular visits to our local secondhand Lego shop for a "quick look."

Until two weeks ago, the closest official Lego store was over two hours away, so the idea that one was opening practically in our backyard felt big. When he told me the date for the grand opening, I half-jokingly asked if he wanted to go. His eyes lit up like it was Christmas morning.

So we went.

We stood in line for almost two hours just to get in the door — surrounded by a huge, good-natured crowd of mostly adults, some with young kids — but it honestly didn't feel that long to me. My son and I spent the time chatting about everything from what he was hoping to buy to what we were looking forward to doing on the upcoming holiday break.

I realized in line why he was into Legos again — and why the day felt so special

It struck me as we waited in line: he's clinging to Lego for the same reason I wanted to take him to the store opening that day. We're both holding on to something that feels simple and uncomplicated in a world where everything seems to be accelerating for him.

At 14, he's in this place between childhood and adulthood. He's mature and focused, and more self-aware than I ever was at his age. He earns good grades, is on the student council and the Model UN team at his school, volunteers at the library every week, and has recently told me he feels like he has a lot on his plate. He's busy in a new, adult way, and Lego is his way of decompressing, something that lets his brain (and emotions) take a break.

Seeing the little kids waiting with their parents, I was reminded of just how quickly time passes. My son and I often talk about the future and his college and career aspirations. He's forming his own opinions and priorities, and I'm grateful that he still wants to talk about (almost) everything with me. But I'm also aware that the window for spontaneous weekday adventures is rapidly narrowing.

Taking him out of school for the day was about showing him that, as he grows up, there's still room for joy and silliness. He got to experience the child-like excitement of being a kid with no responsibilities for a few hours — and I got to match his excitement just by watching him be completely in his element.

When we finally made it into the store, he took his time wandering around to see all of the displays and make his choices. He didn't get the Gingerbread AT-AT Walker Lego set he really wanted — we would've had to have been closer to the front of the line for that coveted purchase — but he found a couple of other sets he liked, as well as one for his brother, and even one for me.

More than the stuff, we came home with a shared new memory. One that we'll pull out at holiday meals and visits home from college — "Remember that time we waited in line for hours at the new Lego store? That was wild!"

I don't regret taking him out of school for a day. In fact, I imagine I'll do it again a few more times before he graduates. Grades matter. Attendance matters. Preparing for the future matters. But so does carving out space to connect with my kid before the time slips away.

• Donald Trump signed a bill that will release the DOJ's files on Jeffrey Epstein.
• It's the latest in a long line of Epstein documents that have been released.
• But this one stands to be different. Here's how.

More than six years after his death in jail, Jeffrey Epstein is still alive and well in the public discourse.

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act after months of pressure from members of Congress, including some in his own party.

The law requires one of the most radical acts of transparency in the Justice Department's history, requiring it to make public its records related to Epstein, the notorious and well-connected pedophile financier who killed himself while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.

The department has 30 days to comply, setting a deadline of Saturday, December 19.

Epstein counted Trump, Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew, and other titans of finance, law, politics, and science among his acquaintances. His alleged victims and other members of the public hope the files will shed light on those relationships and law enforcement's handling of the case.

Here's what sets this release apart:

Haven't we already seen a whole lot of 'Epstein files'?

In recent months, the House Oversight Committee has made public Epstein-related documents it obtained through subpoenas, including emails provided by his estate.

Other documents have been made public through the federal prosecution of Epstein's co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, who was found guilty of sex trafficking and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Civil lawsuits involving Epstein, Maxwell, banks affiliated with Epstein, and the US Virgin Islands government have shaken loose even more records about his life. Various drips and drabs have also entered the public domain through Freedom of Information Act requests, government reports, and an inquiry from the Senate Finance Committee.

All of that may pale in comparison to what the Justice Department has in its possession.

OK, so what's new here?

The Epstein Files Transparency Act requires the Justice Department to publish "all unclassified records, documents, communications, and investigative materials" about Epstein and Maxwell.

Those could include more emails and text messages, as well as internal prosecutorial records. The Justice Department has overseen two different criminal investigations into Epstein's sexual abuse of teenage girls. The first took place in Florida and led to a widely criticized deal where Epstein pleaded guilty to a single sex offense in 2008. The second was the Manhattan-based investigation, which led to Epstein's 2019 arrest and Maxwell's prosecution.

During Epstein's 2019 arrest, the FBI searched his Manhattan townhouse and his home in the US Virgin Islands. In the process, they obtained more than 70 computers, iPads, and hard drives, along with financial documents and binders full of CDs.

Those seized materials form the heart of the "Epstein files," which could shed even more light on the deepest, darkest secrets of the notorious pedophile. According to The New York Times, the FBI had already prepared 100,000 pages for public release before the Justice Department decided to keep them secret earlier this year.

That's pretty wild. Is there anything else the Justice Department might release?

Yes! A whole bunch of stuff, including:

• Any deals between the government and Epstein associates, including non-prosecution agreements and sealed settlements.
• Records tied to Epstein's death in the Metropolitan Correctional Center, such as transcripts of interviews with people in neighboring cells the night he died.
• Records into what has widely been criticized as a "sweetheart deal" for Epstein by Southern District of Florida prosecutors.
• Material surrounding calls victims say they made to the FBI as early as the 1990s about Epstein's conduct, which did not lead to any known law enforcement investigation.
• Additional flight records from Epstein's private jets.

That's a lot? Is there anything the government isn't releasing?

While the law requires the Justice Department to make its records publicly available, other federal agencies are off the hook.

The Treasury Department, for example, is in possession of more exhaustive records related to Epstein's finances, including Suspicious Activity Reports some banks filed about his fund transfers. A separate bill proposed by Sen. Ron Wyden would force more transparency there.

The Federal Aviation Administration possesses flight records that it has so far kept from the public. And to the degree that intelligence agencies like the CIA or National Security Agency have anything, the bill doesn't cover them.

Doesn't the DOJ have loopholes to keep this stuff secret?

The Epstein Files Transparency Act permits the Justice Department to redact or withhold documents for victim privacy and for national security purposes.

'National security'? That sounds fuzzy.

Well, sure, but there are limits.

Four people who have had access to the seized material previously told Business Insider that nothing in them indicated Epstein had any kind of domestic or foreign intelligence role. Nothing in the discovery process or court proceedings for Maxwell's criminal case, which involved those records, indicated that there was anything of national security importance.

Furthermore, the Epstein Files Transparency Act requires all redactions to be accompanied by a written justification submitted to Congress.

The law specifically prohibits the Justice Department from withholding, delaying, or redacting any documents "on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm, or political sensitivity, including to any government official, public figure, or foreign dignitary." It also requires the department to produce material "concerning the destruction, deletion, alteration, misplacement, or concealment" of Epstein-related records — meaning Congress wants to know if there are signs of a cover-up.

What about that new investigation I heard about?

A provision in the law allows the Justice Department to withhold records that "would jeopardize an active federal investigation or ongoing prosecution."

Days before the bill's passage, Trump ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to open an investigation into the links between Epstein and JPMorgan Chase, as well as a slew of perceived political enemies. Bondi handed the investigation over to the US Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York.

But even if the Justice Department withholds any of those records from the public, it's still required to hand them over to the House Oversight Committee, which subpoenaed them.

Any perceived attempts by the Justice Department to use this investigation as a shield could lead to backlash from both Congress and members of the public. A number of Epstein's victims have pushed for the release of the files, seeking to understand more about the circumstances of their own abuse and the Justice Department's handling of the case.

• Investor Harry Stebbings secured Marc Benioff as a podcast guest after 53 cold emails.
• Cold emailing is a skill that's "super learnable" and one he still uses, Stebbings said.
• Stebbings shared his cold email strategy, emphasizing clarity, credibility, and personalization.

Harry Stebbings isn't shy about sliding into inboxes. And he's persistent — just ask Marc Benioff.

Stebbings, the 29-year-old founder of venture capital firm 20VC, interviewed the Salesforce CEO in 2023 for his podcast. He wasn't the easiest guest to score, but Stebbings was committed to getting him on the show.

Stebbings spoke about his strategy for getting Benioff to say yes — which involved sending 53 cold emails over a year — during a November 12 episode of the "Biography" podcast with Wouter Teunissen. It's a skill that Stebbings has honed over the years of hitting up potential guests.

Stebbings shared his winning formula for landing Benioff.

"Do you know how few people cold email well?" Stebbing asked the host. "It's super learnable."

It starts with a clear subject line that doesn't sound needy, he said, and an introduction that skips the filler phrases like, "'I hope you're well.'" You should state your objective almost right away after your salutations.

Then, he said, you'll want to give your claim some validity and explain why the receiver should say yes, using some brief background information.

"'We have X amount of subscribers, followers, you name it, and I have had guests like X, Y, and Z,'" Stebbings said.

After letting them know how much time is required of them, Stebbings wraps it up with a personal touch. For his emails to Benioff, he tested different options. For some, he'd offer to gift him his favorite whiskey. For others, he'd mention his holiday home, favorite vacation destination, or Salesforce's quarterly results.

In the era of AI, Stebbings said you can use LLMs to quickly find out little-known facts about your intended recipient that could show you've done your homework.

If you've already met them at a dinner or a chance encounter, Stebbings said, don't make the mistake of waiting to email them the next day.

"It's so important because it just shows them that you're on it, and it's fresh in their mind," he said.

Some of 20VC's other notable guests include Scooter Braun, Bill Ackman, and Sam Altman. Ultimately, it's about putting yourself out there for connections and new opportunities.

"I just always think, always take the option which has another door opening," he said.

It's also clear that Benioff was aware of the sheer number of attempts.

In a 2023 post on X after the release of their interview together, the Salesforce CEO highlighted the value of not giving up.

"Harry must have texted and emailed me 100 times before I agreed to be on his podcast," Benioff said. "Persistence pays Harry."

• Market watchers can't get enough of Michael Burry's crusade against the AI giants.
• Nvidia's stock reversal on Thursday sparked memes featuring the investor of "The Big Short" fame.
• Burry, a vocal skeptic of the AI boom, has bet against Nvidia and Palantir in recent months.

Michael Burry is officially a meme.

The investor of "The Big Short" fame is lighting up social media after he bet against Nvidia and called out the chipmaker and other AI companies on X, which may have contributed to the stock market's slump on Thursday.

Why Michael Burry is having a moment

Burry is best known for predicting and profiting from the collapse of the mid-2000s US housing bubble. His massive, contrarian wager was immortalized in the book "The Big Short" and a movie adaptation starring Christian Bale as Burry.

Known for his dire warnings of crashes and recessions, Burry goes by "Cassandra" on X — a reference to the priestess from Greek mythology who was cursed to speak true prophecies but never to be believed.

He burst back onto X in late October after more than two years of silence, and wasted no time firing off several warnings about a dangerous bubble in AI stocks.

His hedge fund, Scion Asset Management, revealed days later that at the end of September it held bearish put options on Nvidia and Palantir with a combined notional value of $1.1 billion.

Palantir CEO Alex Karp called the bets "batshit crazy" in a televised interview, spurring Burry to fire back that the AI company's boss couldn't "crack a simple 13F."

In later posts, Burry said that he wasn't short and had exited the Palantir puts in October. He also terminated Scion's SEC registration, closing it to outside cash.

Most recently, he took aim at Nvidia after its third-quarter earnings beat on Wednesday. He questioned the longevity of its chips, its "give-and-take deals" with other AI companies, and its stock dilution.

Some market watchers rushed to ridicule his bearish stance on the AI boom after Nvidia shares popped more than 5% following its earnings beat.

Other commenters poked fun at Burry's defiance, and his willingness to go up against technology titans and the dominant market narrative.

Still others have defended Burry, saying he's many things but foolish isn't one of them.

Shares of Nvidia opened higher on Thursday but swung to a 3% decline by the market's close, and fell another 1% on Friday.

Nvidia is the world's most valuable public company with a market capitalization above $4 trillion, so its sudden downswing dragged the entire stock market lower on Thursday.

The S&P 500 gave up a 1.9% gain to close 1.6% lower, while the Nasdaq Composite went from a 2.6% rise to a 2.2% fall, marking the indexes' largest intraday swing since April. Both closed less than 1% higher on Friday.

The reversal led some market watchers to rally behind Burry, celebrating his surprise comeback and suggesting he may have been right to be skeptical.

They also gave him kudos for cashing in on the chaos, even though Burry hasn't said whether he holds Nvidia puts or profited from Thursday's selloff.

Burry also received praise for his Palantir bet, as the AI stock has tanked 25% since November 3, when it reported earnings and Burry disclosed his puts.

By no means was Burry solely responsible for the market slump. Investors also soured on Nvidia after analysts flagged increases in inventories and deferred revenues, raising concerns the company's growth may have been frontloaded and could slow in future quarters. Moreover, delayed economic data showed US unemployment rose to an almost four-year high of 4.4% in September.

Burry is yet to post about the online furor surrounding his crusade against the AI giants. But his followers may hear more from him very soon, as his X bio reads: "'Unchained' coming maybe sooner than Nov 25th."

• Staying active with daily walks may help prevent symptoms of Alzheimer's as you age, research suggests.
• Cognitive decline and memory loss happen as we age if certain proteins build up in the brain.
• Walking just 3,000 – 5,000 steps a day helps to stave off these toxins and keep the brain healthy.

Every weekday afternoon, Harvard neurologist Jasmeer Chhatwal gets up from his desk, heads out of the office, and walks about three-quarters of a mile to get a cup of coffee from a neighborhood cafe.

There's a perfectly good coffee maker in the office, but the afternoon ritual isn't (just) about caffeine. The 20-minute stroll is helping to stave off symptoms of brain aging like memory loss, according to Chhatwal's research.

His latest study, published November 3 in Nature Medicine, helps pinpoint how little movement you can get away with and still see benefits for the brain.

The goal? 5,000 steps a day — around two miles.

"People don't need to run marathons," Chhatwal told Business Insider. "In terms of things that you can do for yourself and your brain, this is a pretty easy one."

Here's why walking may help to make your mind more resilient to aging, and how to get the most out of your daily steps.

Why walking is linked to better brain health

Your risk of cognitive decline as you age can be influenced by your lifestyle, your genetics, and even the environment around you.

But increasingly, researchers are finding that a higher risk doesn't make Alzheimer's inevitable — and small lifestyle changes may have a huge impact.

The latest study, led by Chhatwal and colleagues from Harvard Medical School and Mass General Brigham, looked at nearly 300 cognitively healthy adults between the ages of 50 and 90.

To understand how their brains changed over time, the researchers scanned for key markers of Alzheimer's risk, including deposits of amyloid and tau proteins, which can accumulate over time and disrupt nerve cells.

Amyloid tends to show up in the brain first, sometimes many years before symptoms develop. Tau, which appears later, has been linked to the development of memory loss, behavioral changes, and cognitive decline.

Using brain scans, they found that people who got between 5,000 and 7,000 steps a day had a healthier, better-functioning brain over time, and a slower build-up of disease-causing tau protein, compared with people who were more sedentary.

That was true even for people who started the study with higher levels of amyloid plaque build-up in their brains already.

For this high-risk group, even a little activity paid off, with benefits starting around 3,000 steps per day (roughly a mile and a quarter).

While previous research has linked exercise to lower Alzheimer's risk, this study stands out because it followed participants for up to 14 years to see how changes in their brains slowly developed.

Chhatwal is excited to move this research along, to refine the benefits even more — especially for people who are at high risk for Alzheimer's.

But, for now, he is keen to spread the word that this study suggests it's not too late to get more active for a healthier brain, and every little bit counts.

• Trump has proposed sending $2,000 tariff checks to Americans in mid-2026.
• He's got a lot of work to do to convince his allies in Congress to go along with it.
• Many Republicans would prefer to see any tariff revenue used to reduce the national debt.

President Donald Trump wants to send $2,000 tariff checks to Americans next year.

But to do that, he'll have to get Congress to go along with it — and even some of his top allies are skeptical.

"We're facing a deficit this year around $2 trillion," Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin told reporters. "I think whatever revenue we get, from whatever source, ought to go to try and bring down those deficits."

Trump's proposed tariff checks have received a cool response from most Republicans on Capitol Hill, with many saying they'd prefer to see the national debt addressed first.

That's a big problem for Trump, considering it takes an act of Congress to actually send the checks.

Even those who aren't outright rejecting the proposal — it's always risky to oppose Trump as a Republican — are politely signaling that they'd prefer a different path.

"I mean, everybody's got their own idea," Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona told BI. "I would prefer we reduce the overall tax rate, and make that permanent."

"You know, my focus would clearly be paying down the $38 trillion of the debt," Sen. Rick Scott of Florida told Business Insider. "But I have to see what he proposes."

Trump's getting more specific — but lawmakers aren't budging

Throughout the first year of his second term, Trump has at times flirted with the idea of sending checks to Americans. It began in February, when Trump said that "DOGE Dividends," checks paid for by purported DOGE savings, were "under consideration." The tariff rebate talk picked up in August, when Trump embraced the idea, seemingly in response to a question from a reporter.

"We're thinking about that, actually," Trump said at the time.

The president in recent weeks has begun to speak more seriously about the idea, bringing it up multiple times in public remarks and Truth Social posts. On Monday, he said he was eyeing a rollout in mid-2026. And in calling for $2,000 checks, he's gotten more specific than before.

That's all been music to Sen. Josh Hawley's ears, who introduced a bill to send a tariff rebate to lower-income Americans in August.

"This is my pet idea," the Missouri Republican told reporters on Wednesday. "I just think it's a terrific way to give relief to working people."

And other Republicans have been forced to soften their opposition. In February, when asked about potential DOGE dividends, House Speaker Mike Johnson was relatively firm in saying he preferred to see the national debt reduced.

This month, he's struck a slightly more conciliatory tone.

"Well, I think there's some merit to it," Johnson said on Fox Business earlier this month. "I mean, we'll have to figure that out."

"The discussion would be: If you have trillions of dollars in new revenue, what's the best use for it?" Johnson continued. "Should you pay down the debt? Because that saves families a lot of money in the long run and puts us back on a sound fiscal trajectory."

Still, plenty of other Republicans are holding firm. In July, when Trump was merely floating the idea, Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio told reporters that the proposal would "never pass" given the soaring national debt.

On Wednesday, he reiterated his opposition.

"I think we should pay down the deficit," Moreno told Business Insider.

'There are ways that they could maybe spin this'

Aside from the politics of it all, there are more basic problems with Trump's proposal.

First, there's the math: Several independent analyses of the proposal have found that there's not nearly enough tariff revenue to fund Trump's plan.

An analysis from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget found that the program could cost $600 billion — about double the $300 billion in projected annual tariff revenue. And that's assuming the Supreme Court doesn't strike down any of Trump's tariffs.

There's also the fact that stimulus checks are likely to be inflationary.

That's a pill that Republicans in particular are unlikely to want to swallow, according to Scott Lincicome, vice president of general economics at the libertarian Cato Institute.

"Republicans have spent five years railing against the Biden administration for cutting people checks and sparking inflation," Lincicome told Business Insider. "Now in power, they're going to start cutting people checks and maybe sparking inflation?"

Still, Lincicome predicted that Republicans might try to find other ways to satisfy Trump's demand, including by simply rebranding tax refunds that Americans are expected to receive as a result of the "Big Beautiful Bill."

"There are ways that they could maybe spin this," Lincicome said. "You know, have a big press conference and some really nice poster board, that makes it look like they're actually giving people tariff rebates, when in reality, it's just One Big Beautiful Bill tax cuts."

• Dagobert Renouf funded his wedding by selling company logo spots on his suit.
• His creative approach gained support from his entrepreneur community and social media followers.
• Renouf's unique suit led to a discussion with a fellow founder and, ultimately, a new job.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with entrepreneur Dagobert Renouf, 36, who lives in Lille, France, and now works in tech sales at the startup Comp AI. The following has been edited for brevity and clarity.

I was an entrepreneur for seven years, bootstrapping businesses. That means not getting any funding. I had some good moments and some struggles. Over the summer, I launched a solo startup, and it wasn't going very well. I was running out of money.

Almost two years ago, I met my now wife. She's Russian and I live in France. We wanted to live together. Because of visa issues, we wanted to accelerate the wedding. I could absolutely not afford any kind of wedding because of the business situation, but at the same time, I didn't want to give up on either dream — of building my startup or on the wedding.

I have a community on social media talking about my journey as an entrepreneur. So I posted something like, "I have to find a way to pay for my wedding. No idea how I'm going to do it."

I said the minimum wedding I can do is going to be 4,000 euros. A friend of mine who's a famous entrepreneur in our community said, "I'm going to loan you the 4,000, but you don't have to pay me back if you can't. I just want to support you." Then somebody joked, "If you really need help for your wedding, you just put my logo on your suit." Because it's an entrepreneur community, everybody wants to promote themselves. That's what we do.

After all these years in business, I'm like, "You've got to get out of your comfort zone. You try crazy shit if you want to make it." So I said, "Let's do it." I posted on X, and then dozens of people were like, "Yeah, I want to put my logo on your suit."

How my fiancée felt

When I told my fiancée, she hated it. All she saw was the reaction on X — people joking, making fun of it. What made her come around, and what was making this whole thing beautiful, was when I really connected it to the fact that it was a way to bring my community to our wedding. She said, "OK, we can do it, but only if it's nice companies that you love, mostly indie companies — people you know."

I had to convince people that she loved it. So, it became way harder than I thought to sell it. On average, I sold spots on my suit for 300 euros. I ended up selling about 10,000 euros' worth.

Once I started doing the suit, then I'm like, "OK, now I want it to look good. I don't want to look like an idiot." I have a friend who's a stylist — a very talented guy, but very expensive. He was like, "It's going to be like 5,000 euros, but I can do this."

We had the final list of logos at the end of August, and the wedding was in October. At first, he wanted to print everything on the suit, but that takes more time because you need prototypes. So we ended up having to do embroidery. The suit is high quality and very beautiful. When you look at it in person, it doesn't look like a joke. Our family and friends loved it.

The fun thing is, out of the 26 entrepreneurs who supported it, I know almost all of them. A lot of them told me something like, "Just keep the money, but don't put it on your suit. I just want to support you." It was like a wedding gift between entrepreneurs.

I was like, "No, I want to do the suit. We love it."

Landing a new job

It's the most basic thing that we hear all the time as entrepreneurs: At first, they think you're crazy, and then it seems obvious. For the first time as an entrepreneur, I had this experience.

I really had to fight for this. It took months of me posting on social media about it. Every time, half of the people were like, "This is so bad. This is disgusting." I feel like sometimes I was the only one to see the beauty. That's because, for me, entrepreneurship is my life. There's nothing on the suit I don't like. I can almost see the face of every founder associated with their company.

I wanted to do right by all the people who supported me. They helped me get to where I'm at now. Because I felt like I owed them something, I was actually quite stressed — more stressed than my wife — during the wedding because I was always like, "I need to make sure these logos are visible."

I joked with a friend who was beating himself up because he missed putting his logo on the suit, "Don't worry, you can have dibs on the baby crib." My wife wasn't on board with that.

One of the people who replied to my posts about the suit was the cofounder of Comp AI. We were only acquaintances, but he kept replying to my posts, saying to put his company's logo on my suit.

At the same time, I realized that I can do sales, and he said, "Let's get you a sales job." That was completely unexpected. I was an entrepreneur for years, and I couldn't see any other way of living. Without the suit, I would have never gotten this job.

Do you have a story to share about your career? Contact this reporter at tparadis@businessinsider.com.

• I've always had a very strong bond with my mother and frequently turned to her for advice.
• Losing her unexpectedly made it more difficult to parent my own kids for a time.
• Now I'm drawing on my mother's values and lessons to guide my parenting journey in her absence.

Being the youngest of six and having already lost my father at the age of 7, my bond with my mother was exceptionally strong.

Over the years, I leaned on her for advice on everything and never made a major decision without her input. From home remedies for my children's illnesses to finding balance in a busy life with three kids, she stayed at the center of my world with her guidance and steady support.

Ammi, as I lovingly called her, lived a life filled with challenges, but her strength stayed firm. She became a widow at a young age and raised six of us on her own. She managed the home, the responsibilities, and her own losses. It felt like she never had a pause from hardship, but she moved through each phase with calm determination.

We remained close, even after I got married; I lived only a few houses away from her. That physical closeness deepened my emotional dependence on her. She played a major role in raising my three children, who adored their grandmother with their whole hearts. I will always remember how she was always there for me with a warm embrace, yummy homemade food, and above all, a sense of stability that filled the void my father left years ago.

Life shifted in a way I never imagined after she was gone

I genuinely believed things would continue on this way forever. I thought she would stay in this world long enough to watch my children grow and to keep guiding me through every new stage. But in a devastating turn of events, I lost her.

My mother went to visit my sister in New York, over the summer. She planned to return this November. Instead, she suffered a massive brain stroke in early September, slipped into a coma, and was moved to hospice care. She passed away soon after. From thousands of miles away in Pakistan, all I received were updates about her condition. First, the stroke. Then the coma. Then the end.

My family and I only managed to see her for a few minutes through a video call, lying still in a state no child wants to witness. It felt unreal. I never spoke to her again. I never touched her hand. I never said goodbye. I never asked her how I would go on without her.

It has been two months since her death. As I move through grief, I often feel lost while parenting my kids. I still reach for my phone at times when I would ask her something. I scroll through her voice notes and read her messages because hearing her words gives me a moment of comfort. I ache for just one more conversation with her.

Parenting became much harder without my mother in the picture

My children need me. They feel her loss, too. But in those first weeks, even simple tasks like handling a tantrum required a strength I could not find. There was a time when I had to attend my eldest child's parent-teacher meeting, but I had no strength left in me to discuss important issues with his teacher, and my husband had to step in. Although I had always handled these things perfectly before, I was too overwhelmed by the feeling of having lost my guidance to handle everything properly now.

With time, my family and friends reassured me of the steady devotion and strength my mother had instilled in me during her lifetime. My elder sister also reminded me how committed our mother was to her responsibilities after our grandmother died. She never let that grief overcome her love and dedication as a mother. None of us ever felt she wasn't there for us when we needed her. That memory finally pushed me to believe that I could keep going, too.

Carrying on with instinct instead of memories

I won't have my mother's guidance and support in everything, nor will I have her message or voice note for every challenge that comes my way in life. But I knew her well enough to understand how she thought about life. Now, when I face decisions, I pause and imagine what she would have told me, trying to stay strong even in the painful silence she left behind.

I will miss my mother for the rest of my life. No one will ever fill the space she left. But her courage, resilience, and compassion now shape the way I raise my own children. This feels like the lasting gift of having a loving parent. Their values stay alive in you long after they are gone.

• Meet Semlani quit JPMorgan in 2018 and now has raised over $6 million for his startup.
• He says he was afraid to leave the money and validation of JPMorgan, but life had become static.
• Semlani says leaving JPMorgan helped him redefine success and feel meaningfully busy.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Meet Semlani, a 33-year-old startup cofounder based in India. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I was two years into my time at JPMorgan when I realized how disillusioned I'd become with my life. It felt robotic.

I was following the motto "30 VP," a phrase I'd heard at the company. It means the goal is to reach vice president status by the age of 30. I'd seen my seniors have these glamorous investment banking careers, so that's what I thought I was supposed to do.

At 26, every day felt the same. I'd be in the office by 9 a.m., go to the same meetings, do the same actions, and leave at 7p.m. During that time, I lost friends and relationships.

On a whim, I signed up for a 10-day silent meditation retreat with the intention of taking a digital detox, and came back with the clarity that it was time to quit. My time at JPMorgan shaped my career, but quitting helped me redefine success and eventually raise over $6 million for my startup.

I was chasing a goal that wasn't mine at JP Morgan

I started working at JPMorgan in 2015 as an intern on a US visa. Later, I moved back to India and became an associate within the asset management department. I was focused on climbing the corporate ladder.

At the same time, I felt like every conversation with coworkers was about having kids, buying a house, paying loans, and planning for the future. But I didn't see a future for myself at JPMorgan. I had just grown accustomed to the status, validation, and money it provided.

I wanted to make a real impact and keep learning, but I was afraid to quit.

I had associated my identity with working at JP Morgan

If I went to an event and said I worked at JPMorgan, it meant something. People seemed more curious about me when they learned where I worked. I liked the validation and didn't want to give it up.

The idea of leaving a good salary was also a hesitation. I got used to buying the best gadgets and going to nice restaurants. I definitely experienced some lifestyle creep, and I wasn't sure how I'd maintain my habits without that salary.

I knew I needed a break from work

I had no idea what to expect going into the meditation retreat. There were no screens, no talking, just breathing. The first few days felt depressing, but when I really settled into the meditation, it gave me space to question everything.

I asked myself, "Do I really want to live like this? Is this how I want to be known?" The answer was no.

I questioned what's the worst that could happen if I left JPMorgan, and kept coming back to the idea that, no matter what happens, at least I'm not dead. When I returned home, I felt a sense of calm and a knowingness that I was ready to let go of my job. I didn't know what was next for me, but I knew it was time to forge a new identity.

The day I returned to work, I told my manager I was thinking about quitting. I ultimately stayed a few more months, until February 2018, to hand over my work as smoothly as possible and ensure the team wouldn't be negatively impacted.

I took a 70% pay cut to work for a startup that fulfilled me

I was living with my parents rent-free at the time, but I still had some expenses. That's when I began looking into startups.

I applied to some jobs and ultimately got hired as a customer service associate at a startup. I really resonated with its mission of helping international students go abroad through scholarships, loans, or grants, because of my shared experience as an international student, which motivated me to take a 70% pay cut from JPMorgan.

I had to scale down on a lot of things I was doing before, like eating out at nice restaurants and traveling, which was tough. There were even moments where I considered going back to JPMorgan because of it, but I'm so glad I stayed.

The learning and access I had in a startup environment were unbeatable

Being able to grab coffee with the CEO, share ideas, and see decisions happen in real time changed me. It was a real startup hustle, and I was actually building things, not just attending meetings.

I felt meaningfully busy, not just calendar busy. That's when it clicked for me that success isn't only about money or titles. If I focused on becoming truly competent and useful, the success and money would eventually find their way.

In late 2019, the startup was having fundraising issues, and I was asked to leave. It came as a bit of a shock, and I felt like I hit a professional roadblock. I thought about going back to a secure role at a place like JPMorgan, but I realized I wouldn't fit into a structured setup again.

The pandemic hit shortly after, and oddly, it gave me time to explore ideas. I decided to go all in on my startup idea as a cofounder.

Leaving JP Morgan helped me redefine success

The early days of fundraising and building were hard. There was a point in time about six months in where I went to bed crying every day, thinking, "When will this end?" But I'd wake up the next morning and remember that this is what I signed up for. This is what I wanted to do.

Since then, our startup has raised over $6 million from global investors and we've built Tartan into a leading data-infrastructure platform.

I still feel like JPMorgan was an integral part of my career. It shaped me into becoming disciplined and structured. Sometimes I think about what my life would be like if I stayed there. I'd probably be a managing director with a corner office, but that's not what success looks like to me anymore.

These days, success isn't about title, big paychecks, or nice things. It's not even about chasing a goal 10 years down the line. It's about what keeps me going every day. If I'm waking up in the morning smiling and going to sleep smiling, I think I'm good.

Do you have a story to share about taking a risky or unconventional career pivot? If so, please reach out to this reporter at tmartinelli@businessinsider.com.

• ChatGPT now has a group chat function where you can add your friends.
• I tested it and found that ChatGPT was often too long-winded and annoying. Let me know if you try it!
• I can imagine that having multiple users is great for certain things, like for work or studying.

ChatGPT just added a group chat feature, which is intriguing and slightly confusing. You add your friends to a new chat inside the app, and then as you and the real humans chat away, the AI chatbot can weigh in as needed.

Like I said, intriguing. The idea of moving your group chat with friends to something that lives inside ChatGPT is, well, somewhat headache-inducing, if only from a privacy and security standpoint. I won't even touch on the freakiness of moving our social lives into an AI chatbot app — I'll let you ponder the implications of that all on your own.

I can imagine there is some usefulness, though. In the demo video created by OpenAI about the feature, a group chat is shown where friends are trying to decide where to meet for dinner, and it provides several restaurant recommendations.

(Side note: "Trying to decide what restaurant to pick" is a human conundrum use case that seems like every tech company has attempted at various points to solve. There are, indeed, many potential technical solutions here, although, in my experience, the only true fix is having one extremely forceful person in the group who goes ahead and picks a place for everyone.)

Anyway, I had to test out this new group chat feature.

I tried inviting some friends to three separate group chats with ChatGPT. Now, of course, I was testing it out for the first time, so we were doing the standard "let's play with a new AI tool" schtick. In one chat, we pretended to have an argument and tried (mostly unsuccessfully) to get ChatGPT to take sides; we accused ChatGPT of hurting our feelings. Our immediate impulse to try to torture a chatbot as a sort of game reminded me of a famous tweet about killing E.T. with hammers.

In another chat, we tried to talk normally, but ChatGPT kept butting in. One weird thing is that ChatGPT replies to nearly everything people write unless it's explicitly addressing the other person ("Hey Peter …").

This, as you can imagine, is pretty annoying. ChatGPT tends to be long-winded compared to a typical human. It answers in paragraphs and bullet points, with lots of throat-clearing and hedging, taking up inches and inches of screen per answer. This is fine when it's just you and ChatGPT, but somehow reading ChatGPT's replies to someone else is intolerable.

As for the restaurant use case, I suppose it needs a little work. I asked it for a restaurant in NYC, and it suggested Gramercy Tavern, which is very famous, expensive, and hard to get a table at. But, sure.

It was, however, helpful when I tried doing a "normal" chat with my colleagues Peter and Pranav. Pranav talked about weekend plans for a hike, and I asked ChatGPT to make him an itinerary. It gave him helpful advice (screenshot his parking pass because there was spotty cell service — good tip!).

None of these were particularly amazing or unique uses for ChatGPT, just one-on-one, and they weren't particularly thrilling in a group chat, either.

I won't be taking my group chats to ChatGPT

I don't imagine I'll switch my group chats to the ChatGPT app anytime soon. But I can see some other great potential uses for it as a multi-user version of ChatGPT. Think of a group study session, or coworkers writing code together, or preparing meeting notes, or the myriad of other things people use ChatGPT for — now just with another person able to do it, too.

I don't think my personal group chats need an AI assistant at the moment (maybe yours do? I don't know your weird life!), but the ability to work with another person inside the same ChatGPT chat seems productive and appealing.

Like with any new AI product, figuring out "what will people use this for?" is a bit of a guess, and there's a huge range and lots of unexpected uses. I'm curious to see what happens here — email me to tell me if you have fun uses for this with your friends: knotopoulos@businessinsider.com. I want to hear!