Being 26 is interesting - 25 felt like a big milestone and a time to "get things together", 26 is more casual. Okay you're supposed to have things together and think about family (I think?) but yet you're in the prime of your life and your brain has reached full development. At this point I've also been in software engineering for 4ish years and might hit Senior soon. Less worries about money, job security, and emotions that come from hormonal fluctuations.
Yet really since 25 I've been thinking more and more about life. What is the one I want? I don't see myself working for years and years in corporate software engineering, I like to code but I don't love sitting in an office where frankly I don't feel inspired by others and politics can play a big role in what you are working on. I'm not done with tech, perhaps once I have a family and am more "settled" it's the environment I would want. But right now, in the prime of youth, is this really the way life was meant to be spent?
It deserves it's own write up but in 2025 I took a year off of work and 2 months was spent traveling. It was an incredible experience and a foundational way that I now think about how I spend my time and what is important in life. Family, friends, connection, boredom, connection to work, curiosity, intentionality, love - Some of the things that make life meaningful. It's incredibly hard to fill life with these things with a significant amount of each day in an office.
Again, I'm skipping a lot of things in this write up but to keep it brief I wanted to jot down one main thing. Youth is a gift and it runs out, I'm blessed to be in the position I am in terms of work and financial position but corporate work cannot be the best way to spend the prime of a human life. So recently I've had a daydream: 2028, Europe -> Singapore by bike. I've read blogs of people doing it and am inspired by regular people doing irregular things. 2028 is a long way away and many things can change, but it's been a week of reflection and this has been the fruit of that labour.