When You Look Back at Your Last 4 Years and Are Left…Stunned
So I saw this meme I can’t find now that went something like this:
People: 2021 starts tomorrow
Me: I haven’t even processed 2016 yet
And yeah, I laughed a bit, I’m not going to lie. I mean, who hasn’t processed something that has happened like 5 years ago, right?
But then, my brain decided to be like: “yo, want to go over what has happened in your life in the last 4 years so you can be left stunned enough to write this article?”. And since you can’t really tell the brain what to do at times, I did exactly that.
So, here I was, trying to remember anything important that has happened since 2017. And this is where my reality started to unravel. Because I started to realize just how blurred everything actually was.
I mean sure, there’s the important stuff like my son being born, some good holidays I spent, and me being a Godfather at my friend’s wedding. But the time period between 2017 and the second half of 2019 is extremely blurry otherwise.
I don’t remember anything else from that time period except…Dragon Ball Super ending in 2018, Sir Lewis Hamilton winning the F1 world championship in 2017 and 2018, and various moments from my own personal life, mostly involving my son learning to do various things.
But I have no recollection of what I was doing in my day to day life. I knew I was coding, but I don’t remember what I was working at, for how long, or when everything started and ended.
And it was at this moment I realized how my way of living seemed to be set on auto back then. Get up, force-feed myself, go into an overcrowded subway train which was a nightmare even before the pandemic, work so my then CEO could flounce around in his newly acquired supercar while my salary was stagnant, go home, repeat.
Now some of you may be thinking that I have a bad memory. To which I say that you are wrong. I vividly remember my first day of high-school, and if I really try, I think I can remember my first day of school and that was in 1997. I remember a lot of stuff from 2005–2009, which includes and is not limited to actual Yahoo Messenger statuses and photos I had set up during that time period, random events from high-school, the way I decided to jump in last minute into a school trip even though I was hesitant at first and it became the best experience of the year 2007 until I met my future wife that same year.
My perspective starts to change in the latter half of 2019 because that was the first time I was able to escape the daily automated routine mentioned earlier. 8 months I was free of this (until February 2020) and I somehow manage to remember way more events from those 8 months than from the previous 30 or so.
Again, I’m not talking about major life events, I’m talking about moments when I actually felt I was…living. Doing something, remembering the details of what I was doing. I mean, I remember this one Sunday I was out in the park and this torrential downpour came down just before the German F1 GP of 2019 which saw a similar downpour that produced the greatest race of that season.
February 2020 saw 2 major things happen. My first ever songs went live on Spotify and I got hired again as a software developer. But I was a different person then than I was in 2019. And I ain’t talking that “new year, new me” shtick, I mean I understood my motivations better. Of course, the daily routine then started to get the better of me again, but this time around, I actually felt the urge to fight it.
The reason was mostly due to the fact that I was no longer willing to accept the status quo at any place I was working at. I was always keen on improving things and leaving them better, especially when people listened.
The sad thing is though, people don’t listen. Or they choose to ignore the bad things going on because “that’s how the person yelling at you is, we can’t really change that, we should focus on getting the job done”.
In case you haven’t grasped, my new employer had this person in charge of the project I was working on who was apparently so pissed that everyone around him was stupid that he felt the need to scream, and shout, and let it all out, every time he had the chance. I’m sure there was a time when someone asked him what time it was and he shouted back the answer.
So, what is the point of this article? There isn’t a singular point, but the main idea is that I want you to stop for a minute (or an hour, a day, whatever) to reflect on your life. Is your current situation what you envisioned your life would be? Do you want to change something? Do you need to change something? Did you honestly think as a 7-year old that your dream job would be sitting at a desk, working yourself off on projects not your own, so that the cult leader could get his hands on the latest supercar and toss you a bone or a breadcrumb here and there to keep you happy enough so you continue doing the same thing?
I’m not saying you should quit now. I’m not suggesting you do anything else than reflect on what your life has become. If you are truly happy with your current situation, far be it from me to want to ruin it for you.
As for me, 2021 is the year I have decided to embrace my musical side completely. It’s scary and I know very little about it, even though I have been studying how to do it properly for the last 4 months or so. But you know what…in the end, I’ll know what I need to know. Because if there’s one thing both me and you, the wonderful readers of this article need to do, is never stop learning.
