You're only 23, stop rushing your life
medium.com
You're only 23, stop rushing your life
1–8 of 8 posts
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#2I had just joined Amazon at 21 and felt the same anxiety. I was with another new hire in the kitchen when our principal engineer came in. We both asked him for some advice, as newly minted engineers, on what we could do to become most effective. His reply, "Go find a woman, get married and build something that matters- a family. You have 30 more years to get better at software engineering, you'll be fine."
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#3After having worked as a developer through my university years I partly regret it now because there was not much reason to start working at 18 and I missed all the university experience and lifestyle.
Lately my struggle to always do better than everyone is slightly smaller and I enjoy my life much more.
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#4I had just joined Amazon at 21 and felt the same anxiety. I was with another new hire in the kitchen when our principal engineer came in. We both asked him for some advice, as newly minted engineers, on what we could do to become most effective. His reply, "Go find a woman, get married and build something that matters- a family. You have 30 more years to get better at software engineering, you'll be fine."
You just rewrote her essay into a paragraph. Concise, I like it!
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#5Oh, I can definitely sympathise with this article and it's message. I mean, I feel pretty much the same thing, and not just in a startup/work sense either. I simply cannot enjoy doing anything unless it's A: completely revolutionising some field or another, or B: better than just about everyone's work in the field. Which has led to some pretty miserable times these last few years, since there's always someone or some group that's absolutely amazing at anything and can seemingly do really well at it even if they put in less 'effort'.
Maybe I'll calm down a bit now and stop being obsessive over every little thing.
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#6I had just joined Amazon at 21 and felt the same anxiety. I was with another new hire in the kitchen when our principal engineer came in. We both asked him for some advice, as newly minted engineers, on what we could do to become most effective. His reply, "Go find a woman, get married and build something that matters- a family. You have 30 more years to get better at software engineering, you'll be fine."
That's actually terrible advice, in my opinion. Raising a family is REALLY hard work that requires a lot of time and dedication out of you. It also restricts what you can and can't do; quitting jobs that you hate or moving somewhere to seize an opportunity become astronomically difficult with a family.
Families are important, but why limit your potential early?
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#7Thanks for sharing my article. Glad to see people relate. I think it's still all part of the learning/growing up process.
Re: You're only 23, stop rushing your life
#8I had just joined Amazon at 21 and felt the same anxiety. I was with another new hire in the kitchen when our principal engineer came in. We both asked him for some advice, as newly minted engineers, on what we could do to become most effective. His reply, "Go find a woman, get married and build something that matters- a family. You have 30 more years to get better at software engineering, you'll be fine."
That's actually terrible advice, in my opinion. Raising a family is REALLY hard work that requires a lot of time and dedication out of you. It also restricts what you can and can't do; quitting jobs that you hate or moving somewhere to seize an opportunity become astronomically difficult with a family. Families are important, but why limit your potential early?
I think the take away was to avoid optimizing 'potential' and stop focusing on anything really. He meant go do something else with your free time, like meet people and experience new things.