At 21 years old, I got a job and I was really grateful for it. Suddenly, I could buy anything I wanted and go anywhere I liked. That was a life-changing moment for me because I had never felt that kind of freedom before.
Fast forward, and almost three years have passed. Out of nowhere, a heavy thought strikes me: What will I be doing when I'm 30, 40, or 50 years old? What do I actually want out of life?
That thought has been growing as I work alongside coworkers who are older than me. Some just got married, some have a newborn baby, and others are stressing over where they can afford to buy a house.
While handling all these heavy responsibilities in their private lives, they still have to carry the pressure at work. Our company has a really intense workload. At first, I naively thought, "This workload is totally manageable." But that was just my naive perspective as a single guy with no dependents, no family to support, and no kids.
When I see what they deal with, I am genuinely amazed by their hard work. But it also feels like a painful irony: they work so hard for their families, but they have so little time left to actually spend with them. Some have to commute 1 to 2 hours every single day, and some live so far that they can only go home on weekends.
Seeing that makes me stop and wonder: is it really worth doing all of that?
Let that sink in...
What are we really chasing with all this effort we put in every single day?
I’m still discovering what I actually want to achieve. Is it for my family? My career? Personal achievement? Or is it just money?
Sometimes I try not to overthink it because I’m still young, but I feel like I can’t let my guard down either. I want to be ready before life catches up to me.
I just hope future me can find the answer.