For many people, as they age and mature, they life goals tend to change. You wouldn't really expect a 40 year old to have the same life goals as a 20 year old. So what has changed for you? How surprised are you by this change?
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Some of the change came from finally paying off debts and having well-funded retirement and savings accounts. I can finally afford to not try to make more money, so suddenly the super stressful job with the mind boggling salary just isn't worth the stress. I recognize there's certainly privilege there, and I would hope that someday we're all so lucky as to have solid safety nets.
The rest of the change came from having a broader view of the impacts (and non-impacts) my work has. I don't like being part of the wealth inequality gap in the US. I don't like working for tech companies that use their mission statement to devalue and underpay their workers. I don't like contributing to technologies that are being used in backroom deals to support burgeoning humanitarian crises (whether that's creating racially biased algorithms, selling personal data, or literally building bombs). So much of Silicon Valley is well-intentioned but myopic engineers building tools that greedy business people sell to the highest bidder without regard to their final use case. And speaking up, regardless of the HR propaganda, doesn't work-- they will quickly show you the door and corner you into silence with lawyers and hush money (which, on the flip side, is one way to fully fund retirement and savings accounts).
So I'm in my mid-30s, still young by non-silicon valley standards, working through a bit of an identity crisis to figure out what goals really are worthwhile. But my 20s taught me that selling my soul to someone else's company isn't my goal. And building my own company with VC money isn't my goal. So I'm left with tending my personal relationships, refocusing my career outside of startups (back to nonprofits and academia), spending more time outdoors, and pursuing whatever tangential curiosity piques my interest this week.
I used to think in my early 20s that if I worked really hard and lived that SV grind lifestyle, that I would magically make a lot of money and life would be easy.
In fact, what ended up happening was reality - I lost a loved one midway through my 20s, and it altered my perception of just what is actually important vs. what is noise.
Now I just want to make sure I spend just enough time to keep doing well at work, and use everything else in the tank for the really important things.
Partially it’s a life crisis im going to overcome, but in big extent it’s intellectual maturity.
You just see how silly and worthless most of the goals people fight for.
And most of the meaningful things in life, like family, health etc. are not really goals, but rather a process or part of life itself, part of you who liked to set goals in the first place.
Now I think "is another reddit/tiktok/silly app/game reeeallly worth doing when all big apps are a trade off for other things like privacy etc" - I feel I talk myself out of things before trying them.
I hope it is repeated lockdowns and covid life in general right now that has destroyed my optimism and not intellectual maturity.
So im sure next big thing will find me when time will come, but I really don’t care if it’s an app or something totally different.
Post-30 I’ve done an about-face and realized that I do want a family. It’s come from a shift in attitude. Whereas before I thought avoiding unpleasant things was a solution, I now realize that doing things correctly is a better one.
Don’t get me wrong : I have a kid and it’s the most beautiful thing that happened to me. I never ever had any regret. But o boy I think it must be hard to have kids if you did not want them.
What regularly break my heart is hearing parents yelling at their kids for mostly nothing, only because of the stress.
However, if you are ok with the idea to have this little alive thing be more important than yourself, go for it, it’s full happiness from day one and it rapidly goes from exhausting to a lot of fun. My 4yo make me laugh every single day.
I grew up in a very rough area, my teenage years was focused primarily on getting out of there. Had I stayed, I would've likely been caught up in a drug life like the majority of my graduating class.
As I'm just over 30 now, I'm trying to get more specific. I can't keep riding the wave I'm on, expecting things to keep working out.
My career is bound to plateau, and where I'm at now is paying me well but I don't know I can keep up the required pace/concessions (eg: 12+ hour days at random, deadlines)
I believe the term 'golden handcuffs' applies here, it's been a developing concern of mine.
I've made decent pay since my early 20s, but without a plan like... buying a home, I worry it's all likely to be for naught.
All that to say I suppose, aim for goals but be willing to let them flex or outright change. I never could've fathomed where I am now, but I've learned their value.
After burning myself out failing for years to even pick a project, get started, stick with it for more than a few hours, and all the while feeling more and more depressed about that fact, I’ve experienced something called “ego exhaustion”. I gave up, which over time allowed me space to stop being so hard on myself, and start to recover, and I’m finally feeling the beginnings of creative energy coming back again. I know better now, that pushing on that energy won’t help anything, so I’m just focused on nurturing it and seeing where it takes me. For now, that’s happiness. Later, maybe I’ll make something big after all. If not, that’s okay.
This is something I’ve heard happens to a lot of people as they get closer to the middle part of life
I’ve realized external ambitions like money, power, status, fame aren’t useful unless you know WHAT you would do with those that make them worthwhile. What do you enjoy in the moment?