Paths and Goals

Sometimes, I wonder what things would have been like if I had chosen a different path.

I’ve wanted to be a variety of things in life. A doctor. A teacher. A writer. A scientist. A social worker. A lawyer.

All very generic and common aspirations. But they were mine nonetheless, and they speak to aspects of myself that I took pride in, felt that I could hone into a truly meaningful career, or just my personal desires.

Increasingly, I’ve realized that the path I’ve chosen may be the path I choose to walk for the rest of my life. Oof, that sounds terminal. It’s not like I’m only going to do programming,and the tech industry itself is an incredibly diverse field. But at least for now, this is where I’m going to be for the next little while.

This is also not to say that I’m extremely unhappy with the way things are right now. At least, I don’t think so. Programming has its ups and downs, but I still enjoy the field immensely. I gain a lot of joy from learning it, and fulfillment. The work itself though? I’m not sure.

Right now, I get a lot of fulfillment from knowing that I’m learning, and upskilling. But I imagine there will come a time when, well, I’ll become sufficiently skilled that it will start to just feel like work. I hope that day never comes. I want to be skilled, but I feel like if I’m stagnating that way, it’ll be because I’m either in a job I don’t enjoy, or because I’ve gotten complacent. I don’t know. Maybe one day I’ll want that because of work life balance.

Or maybe I’m just being too idealistic and selfish. Too narcissistic, wrapped up in the grandeur of my own imagination. Who is to say that my life is meant to have any more meaning than anybody else’s?

At the end of the day, I just want the simple things, sometimes. A good family. Time to myself to enjoy my hobbies. To feel like what I did mattered (okay, maybe this one isn’t so simple). I know the answer to that last one should be that I shouldn’t care about what others think, as long as I found value in what I did. Or maybe I don’t need to find value in anything (optimistic nihilism, anybody?).

Either way - I don’t think my wishes are that uncommon either. I just hope that it’s not too much to ask that I be able to fulfill them, while I can.