As a young cs students where even the uni professors tell us there's more about it than just money, what would you say is something regarding personal development to do?
Learning things for fun and not just for profit. Physical development, learning a new sport. Spiritual development, meditating, observing. Engaging in arts, creating, exploring. Helping the less fortunate, volunteering, teaching. Traveling, learning about different cultures, different languages. Cooking. Spending time in nature, watching animals, birds, mushrooms, sunsets. Photography. These are just some examples, the list is endless :-)
Personally I’ve grown a lot from gardening and weightlifting. Having children made me more human.
During my late 20s I realised I was very good at my programming job but not much use at anything else. It was quite a disappointing realisation.
I started to do less and eventually no programming outside of office hours and instead invest my spare time in different hobbies and experiences.
I found gaining these new skills really helped build my confidence. 15 years later I'm not just a programmer, I'm a also a motorcyclist, experienced carpenter, been a member of certain meet up groups for over a decade, travelled to a few exotic locations, flown upside down in a plane, the list goes on.
None of these things are exceptional but doing this extra stuff has given me enough dimensions that I kind of feel comfortable with the way I've done the last 15 years. This along with starting a relationship and building a family is enough for me now.
Sure, I could have done more but compared to the corporate quagmire of my 20s things are very different.
I can relate to this pretty strongly, although on a slightly earlier timeline. Went through a similar period of focusing entirely on coding in my teens and early 20s, always occupied by personal projects when not studying etc. Realized how much of myself I had cut off for that (and how little value it'd hold on its own) and started diversifying what I did in downtime, and now I seldom code outside of work.
I haven't outright dropped coding for personal projects, rather just that the singular task of coding doesn't define my down time. Instead I've picked up tinkering with electronics, building and playing with 3d printers, learning languages and drawing. I feel like as a result I've become closer to my idea of the kind of person I'd find interesting and attractive, someone who has a variety of aspects to themselves rather than just being defined by being a 'rockstar' at their job.
Initially I had worried that this would cause me to fall behind professionally, but so far that hasn't really been an issue, I still typically end up having tinkered with some new technology well before it becomes relevant professionally.
Get a hobby that you can do outdoors with other people. Hiking, hunting, paddling, sailing, bouldering, volunteering, playing sports, LARPing, reenacting...
Embed yourself into the local community, become a pillar of it.
Start a family and support your children, don't try to mould them into what you wish you could have been.
No distractions like friends? No awareness that Max has headlines like "forged by his father's beatings and humiliation?" You should probably seek a less results driven focus on life, perhaps with a therapist, unless just trolling in which case carry on. But regardless, there's an article called "Why we stopped making Einsteins" that you may find interesting.
I'm not trolling. I have been against having children in the past, doing the whole beta bucks provider role thing for a family, basically just other people living off me , well that seemed ridiculous to me. However when I reframed the situation as being able to respawn myself and achieve my dreams through my kid it makes it very interesting. Many other men have done this. Some may disagree but it's not illegal to do it. I had a quick look at "Why we stopped making Einsteins". Some good ideas there thanks.
A lot of footballers are only in the game for the money. I will manipulate the kid into being extremely materialistic and build his entire ego and self image around the football.
