Don't hide your age. We are lucky to be getting older

My overall education started a bit late than normal people due to my fathers transfers and school admission rules. Consequently when I applied for JEE Advanced back in 2017 i was 19.5 years old. I got it but wasnt satisfied so dropped a year and got a better rank. I was 20.5 years old when I finally joined IIT. Somewhere subconciously throughout my college life i felt that I did achieve what I wanted to but really late. I know theres nothing I could do about it but this was something still killing me inside. Most of my batchmates where 18 year olds and even the ones who dropped where at most 19. I always wanted to pursue my masters and phd but somewhere at the back of my mind I feel I would have to go theough the same feelings again. It just kills me so much inside. Currently I have completed 2 years as a software engineer and I am 26 years old. On one part my mind tells me that I am made for much more than just an IT job and should go to academia. On the other hand it feels like I am too old for it. I dont know what to do. I am not able to rationalize my thoughts. I am not able to understand how can I bring myself to overcome my fears and achieve what i really want in life.

I'll go first: Dad's college friend asked why am I not married. He didn't want the answer anyway So he goes: You know if women don’t marry, they start developing genetic disorders. It is science; the body needs marriage. He had the audacity to say this loud, and when I retorted back, my mom was not happy coz I was being 'disrespectful'

Some background, I went to a T-1 school for my undergrad. Did many great internships and went to several hackathons around the globe. Made great money doing GSoC in my second year. I was the happiest back then. I was making more money than any of my friends, the world was for taking and I was Alexander, the world ripe for conquering. Fast forward to today and I think I have done a disservice to my potential. Even if I still am the pot-smoking liberal teen that I was, I feel that I could have taken extreme risks when I was young. I could have still gotten my current job easily. I hardly work more than 3-4 hours in a day. I am always wondering what to do with my time and it feels like life has stagnated with nothing to look forward to except how much money I can realistically make over time. I feel when I look in the mirror, I am still the same person I was. Except, I have lost some hair ofcourse and some hair has turned white(blame bangalore water ig?). Here is my advice to anyone young, hungry, smart and ambitious... You only miss the shots you never take. So take your chances and shoot your shots. No one cares about you as much as you do. So if you got one life, why wouldn't you make it the best movie that it can ever be? Ps: I am looking for new ideas to start my own new venture. If any VCs are interested in hearing my idea, you can reach out to me in DMs. I will share my Calendly there.

I know it’s a very common question, and impossible to know or answer. But curious how you folks here rationalize the meaning of life. Add your age if that’s okay, for good measure For me: I’m 27, my life’s purpose (or so I think) is to build something that helps a whole lot of people have a better life. And it is to make the people around me - family, friends, strangers happier (the scale of which depends on how successfully I pull this off). Whats yours? Would love to engage on this :)

I know many oldies who should be fired immediately. Forget tech, they are not even able to manage teams properly. Even so called "Seniors/Leads" don't know how to be one, if you question them, somehow it hurts their ego and you need to follow/respect them because they were born earlier ? Tech should be limited to max till 12 years of work experience only, rest should transition into some other career, start your own startup or business or something but don't be an employee in a big company.

Let me just sit down and process it

Not a Ctrl {C+V} I never used the Blind app to say, "People connected to each other over a thread and planned to meet outside the app, calling it a Blind date". Not giving any shit about that app. Why don't we start it here again? - NCR people are no less Let's see if we can beat bumble and shaadi.com - No need to beat the shit, just date Just enough to drop your details in this format. (Gender: M/F) | (Age) | (Location) | (One liner bio that won't disclose your identity) Example: M | 29 | Gurgaon | I like this, not that P.S: I am not taking any ownership for anything happening under this post, I am not a matchmaker. All the best! Changed the title from Blind Date to Wine Date, cheers to Grapevine ;)