[colgin]

I haven't read the whole thread so maybe this has been discussed already.

However, I wanted to point out one important thing. You are 21 and people (interviewers, grad schools, family) are very forgiving of choices you make at this age. Later in life it can be hard to take chances, try somthing different or move into new field. Very hard! At college age it is not hard to do these things and many people expect that you will.

I went straight through college to law school. In general, I don't regret it since I made so many lasting relationships. However, in retrospect I would have taken soem time off and done some job, any job, in a different field since I could always go back to law school later. I was in a rush to "get on with my life", but I did not appreciate that that was a great age to try something out. When I started law school, while there were many people like me, many others had done various things since college, a number of whom, from what i could tell, did [censored] all for two years+. Yet, the admissions office was pretty forgiving because these were qualified people with good grades. Now I know you have some concerns becuase of the way poker might be viewed and how good your own grades are but you take my general point.

Moreover, you may be underestimating the value of a Columbia degree. Columbia B.S. and a 3.0 is still pretty good. Don't assume you won't be an excellent candidate for whatever you may choose to do school or work-wise whether that is now or in a year or two. (My little brother had OK grades at Cornell but did well on his GMAT's and got in to Columbia Business School after working at a so-so job for a few years.)

I am not saying that you shuld play poker for 1-2 years now. But if you choose to I would not assume that people will hold it against you in any way, in large part because of your age (coupled with the fact that you will be able to demonstrate a good deal of success in that endeavor). It is really hard to totaly [censored] up your life at 21. I am 37+. Even if I could earn more playing poker in the next 12 months than in my current law job, if the whole online poker world fell apart in a couple of years my decision could have really ruined my life. Not so with you. At 21, unless you get caught up (in a bad way, since I think they are generally a good thing) with drugs or get deep in debt, it is hard to totally mess up your life. You will be 22 or 23 when (if your prediction is correct) poker blows up. And you will have somethng to show (yourself and others) for it. You can still do anything you want at that age whether it is in engineering or soemthing else. People won't see you as too old. When you are in your thirties or older, by contrast, they may very well see it that way.

If it sounds like I am suggesting you should play poker I am not. I just think that you could and that the potential adverse consequences, if any, from that choice are not as dramatic as you make them out to be. Now, if I am completely ignorant of engneering firms and engineering grad schools then OK. And if that is what you want to do and you thnk you materially hurt your chances of doing that then I think your poker earn number has to be pretty high. However, my experience is that opportunities for smart people (with good degrees to boot) at your age don't dry up, even when that person has made bad choices. And many people will not even view making 6-figures at the age of 21 as a "terrible choice" (albeit via poker) even if it is not the one they would have made themselves. If I am correct, then the earn number doesn't need to be that high, although I could not say what it should be.

Best of luck with your decision.