Been a while
November 9th, 2024
It's been a while.
My grandma fell sick, so I flew home in a hurry to visit for a week. That week I worked 12 hour days to get this project done. I spent time with my grandma.
She's doing better now, but she's ill. It's hard for her to walk. I flew back to California, but I know her time is drawing short.
My sister's birthday was yesterday. I called and wished her a happy birthday.
My friends back home had a halloween party, of which I missed. Too much work.
I've been working 14 hour days a couple times this week. They certainly pay me enough to do so, and I feel good being useful. I'm really a workaholic at my core.
I've definitely got grit. And, I would do anything to help the people I care about.
Growing older
Some things I just look back and can't really give much of a shit about.
Like, morals for example. Who gives a shit if I'm right? I care more about if shit gets done. People aren't looking for excuses, or good character, or whatever the hell that means, they just want people to get what they want done.
I realize now that I've been thinking of it all wrong---it's not the intention that matters. It's the result. It's that the ends justify the means.
Because frankly, we can think all we want of ourselves in our lands of abstraction, but it's the here and now that people will hurry over for.
Getting lost in the flow of it all
Sometimes I forget to zoom out, and remember where I am. Sometimes I get sucked into the to and fro of everyday life, of all the "tragedies" at work that I really forget what matters and what doesn't matter.
In other words, when I get so lost in the flow of things, I forget perspective. I forget to take a big perspective on the whole picture.
Telling a better story
When I walk into the office, I'm usually the first one in. I work a standard 9 to 6, with the stress and pressure included. My boss is usually in by 10ish, and stays well into the night until 8pm. I wonder when he spends time with his newborn children.
I wear dark Lululemon ABC trousers, my grey New Balances, a solid tee, and a nice bomber jacket I got from Costco for a cheap price. I dress quite nicely I'd say, as I recognize that people do just appearances unconscious or consciously. Myself included, as of the times I've caught myself acting different or strangely because I'm in a nice suit is too many to count.
My coworkers stream in, they're either seniors or juniors. We're all young relatively speaking, under 40 for the most part. Once you're older than 40 you're in the managerial roles or the principal and technical director engineering roles.
Sometimes I wonder what it's like to get older, this job especially has aged me quite a bit as to what I can dedicate my time to caring about.
This job has taught me that there are line items that need to get done, and my boss doesn't care about the details about how it gets done. It NEEDS to get done by this date, and you are to use as many resources as you can to get this done. If you need to pressure other teams into delivering this feature faster, so be it.
I talked to another team before, trying to integrate with their platform, and I had trouble understanding their vague documentation. I asked some fairly fundamental, basic, maybe even stupid questions, and I was met with passive-aggressive annoyance towards my questions. I understand that each time I ask, I take five to fifteen minutes of their time and distract them from their line items that their managers want done.
Though my feelings are not hurt anymore. I think if it had been a couple months ago I would've been sensitive to the whole subject, in fact at the beginning of my job I was reluctant to ask people of their time, because it's a nervous thing to do! Waste other people's time! I didn't want to be hindrance or a bother.
But the fact of the matter is---I need to get my work done. And it doesn't matter to me or my boss if I waste some other cross-functional team's time---that's their problem. I have too much on my plate alone, asking stupid questions saves me ludicrous amounts of time instead of me searching trial-and-error for the right answer.
The way I interact with other people is changing---because the goals of what I need to do are rapidly putting pressure on me.
My life is rapidly becoming my work. And I don't like that. I liked when work was separate from my life---I liked when I didn't have to work and think about only work. I miss the wonder, the sensitivity I had for life. I miss when I care more about the way I looked, or if I were making a good impression on a pretty girl.
That's the other thing now. When I talk to women and hear about their dramas---it feels almost childish. The gossip and the who's sleeping with who and when. It feels like some sort of play or fiction. Maybe that's just the turbo virgin in me, but for some reason I feel above that.
Though, it's still fun, right? Aha. It just feels like... I'm talking to someone younger than me.
Is it my superiority complex? I'm not sure. I think as I get older I'm becoming more okay with being morally wrong as well. Like, I just do not care who's sleeping with who. I wish them the best, but seriously?
I guess the real answer is that I don't care until it happens to me, then it matters. How horrible! But it's the truth. I don't know why sex and younger women just don't seem to really interest me that much anymore.
I feel like finding someone---a wife---is more of an obligation than something I actually want to do. Having kids---a sense of duty or righteousness rather than something I'd like to do.
To add on top of this, there's this pang in my heart that I wouldn't make a good father. I guess there's still a part of me that casts doubt and feels these sensitive emotions. But isn't the truth of the matter that it has to be done anyway? It MUST be done? Just like my work. It really doesn't matter how I feel about the matter---just that it gets done?
I've changed, haven't I?
I used to be brooding, moody, and obsessed with women. I used to be upset, insecure, and unhappy with who I am as a person. As I've worked, and as more and more people rely and depend on me to execute things, I feel, I feel useful.
I feel like I'm contributing to something. I feel like I'm existing in the world as someone. Being depended on... it really is such a magical potion.
It's like when the external pressures come onto me, that, that, that, I don't have time to think of my insecurities. That I don't have time to think about myself. I don't have time to process whatever I'm feeling. It's just that I have to execute to my full potential.
And, well, I can scorch earth this. Because my will is just that strong if people are depending on me to do this.
I used to think that I have one of the weakest wills. Which I do when I'm alone. But, if someone is depending on me to execute this. But, if someone is depending on me to continue this plan and get it out to fruition, I will do everything in my power to get that out, immoral or moral or whatever. I will do everything I can to get it done. I will scorch the earth and give up everything in my life if it needs to be done.
I literally just proved to myself that if someone else is depending on me to get something done, that I will work 16 hours a day to get it out. And I will keep doing it over and over because I can. And because I can, I will.
Maybe that's why I still think about looking for a girlfriend---that if someone were to depend on me like that, how would I change? What grit would I develop to get things done?
I've changed so much these past few months, my humor has become more high-brow, and I feel more dignified in how I conduct myself. It's scary.
For better or worse, I guess. Am I really still stoic moral person I had imagined myself to be just those few years ago? Am I the same schizo babbling about abstraction layers? Am I still the health-obsessed freak who'd read medical articles on how to optimize health against depression and anxiety?
Sometimes I wonder. Sometimes I wonder. Sometimes I wonder.
Video Games
I still play a freakish amount of video games. I wonder why. I play them just to pass the time it feels---I don't feel good after playing them. They feel kind of meaningless.
Now that I've gone through 996 working schedule, I'm starting to feel like the only meaning in my life is work. But I'm trying desperately to pull back---if I work too much my coworkers will start to feel the pressure. That's not good... or is it?
Whatever. I just need to work whatever it takes to get what's asked of me done by when it's needed done. I need to start a business on the side.
The business is more important anyway. This whole salary thing of working for a company---it's not sustainable. I can't do this for the rest of my life. I have to find some way independently to make money and scale fast.
If someone is relying on me, perhaps my parents, I must succeed.
Recording my thoughts---for who?
Zooming out, why am I writing these thoughts out publicly on the internet?
I'm not sure. Do I want someone out there to know that I exist? That I was some edgy and brooding twenty-something year old that's out here suffering in some journal?
And now that I've gone from a friendless-college-experience to workaholicism in this world, perhaps I want someone to know what I'm doing?
I think to be honest with you as well, I was a better writer just a couple years ago, aha. Perhaps now that I haven't been writing as much or reading much good fiction literature my writing has become more stale, bland, corporate, and straight-to-the-point.
Or perhaps, before, I had edited what I wrote and actually honed my message of the blog post. At this point, it's just pure stream-of-consciousness.
Nightmare
Just the other day I had a nightmare of a close family member smothering me in my sleep and molesting me. I tried to scream, but nothing would come out. I wonder if my roommate heard me sleep talking.
The world is all that is the case
A gentle reminder to myself, to zoom out. Perspective on this, on that "the world is all that is the case."