Escaping the local maxima

when i was a student, everything was simpler.

grind leetcode. build projects. get an offer.
i knew the salaries. i knew what “winning” looked like.
it was a somewhat straight line from broke student to backend engineer at a top company.

and i did it, i 10x my life in the span of 4 years.

five years in. and honestly? it’s… fine. it’s more than fine.
but it also feels like i’m stuck on a plateau. the growth feels logarithmic.

the peak that isn’t the peak

things are good, but i can’t stop feeling like i want more, even though i am comfortable.

i look back at the student version of me, and i see hunger. direction.
i look at me now and i see someone who’s tried a bunch of things:

• built products that barely anyone used

• started a newsletter, got some nice traffic, but it didn’t stick

• thinking about podcasts, courses, maybe a dev agency?

dreaming of 10x-ing my life again, but not sure where to invest my time.

when i was younger, the path was obvious. now it’s all vague, i could do anything.
do i go all-in on indie hacking? live off my rsu’s for a few years and just build?
try again with another product? double down on the blog? start a podcast?

well, the next level doesn’t seem to come with an instructions book.

escaping means risking the fall

as a cs student you learn that escaping a local maxima usually means exploring a few downs to find a higher maxima. well, applying it to life is scary. what if i lose everything i worked hard to build? i am no longer a student living off of scholarships, i have more obligations. and also, the scariest part of all is what if this is the best it gets?

i prefer to be positive and believe there’s another jump out there. something worth building.
something that might actually shift my trajectory again.

i just haven’t found it yet.

but i’m looking.