I’ve been quiet on this page for a while because honestly… I think I’ve been learning to let go of a version of success I used to believe in.
For most of my life, becoming a software engineer wasn’t just a career goal. It felt like the answer, the thing that would change everything.
I grew up understanding how much financial stability can shape a person’s life. I knew what it felt like to think carefully before spending and to see financial freedom as something you had to work incredibly hard for.
So when I found engineering, I attached so much meaning to it. I studied hard. I pushed myself constantly. I built my entire identity around being “the engineer.” The ambitious one. The one who made it into tech and who achieved the dream.
And when I finally got there… it did change my life.
This career gave me financial stability in a way I will forever be grateful for. It changed the trajectory of my life and my family’s life. And honestly, for a long time, I thought that feeling was the finish line.
I thought once I got the job, the title, the salary, the promotions… I would finally feel secure. Like I made it. Like I could relax.
But somewhere along the way, something shifted. The industry started changing faster than I expected.
Layoffs became normal. Burnout became normal. The pressure to constantly execute became normal. And now AI is changing the way we work so quickly that sometimes it feels like we’re all trying to catch up to a future nobody fully understands yet.
And I think that’s been emotionally confusing for a lot of people in tech. Because many of us spent years studying for a version of this industry that doesn’t really exist anymore.
We were told:
“Study hard.”
“Get the degree.”
“Get into tech.”
And you’ll be set.
But nobody prepared us for what it feels like to arrive at the dream… while the dream itself is changing in real time.
Nobody talks about how disorienting that can feel. Especially when your identity is deeply tied to your career.
I think for a while, I felt almost betrayed by that realization. Like wait… I worked this hard to get here, and it’s still not enough?
And for the first time in my life, I started questioning things I never questioned before:
Why do I feel anxious when I’m not being productive?
Why do I feel like my worth changes depending on how “successful” I feel at work?
Where did this pressure to always be employed, always climbing, always optimizing come from?
At some point along the way, I realized I had spent so many years building my career that I never fully built an identity outside of it. And that realization hit me hard.
Because if work is your entire identity, then every industry shift feels personal. Every reorg, performance review, interview rejection and market change feel personal.
You start living emotionally attached to something that was never fully in your control to begin with and I decided I didn’t want to live like that anymore.
What’s interesting is that this career also forced me to take a step back and ask myself:
What actually and truly makes me happy?
It wasn’t another title. It wasn’t prestige. It wasn’t trying to prove I belonged in every room.
It was the life I had outside of work.
🧘🏻♀️ Teaching yoga. 🤍 Conversations after class. 🚶🏻♀️ Moving my body after sitting at a computer all day. ✈️ Traveling. ☀️ Slow mornings. ☕️ Coffee with people I love. 🌱 Feeling present in my own life again.
I realized that maybe work was never supposed to be my entire source of fulfillment.
Maybe the point wasn’t to build my whole identity around my career, maybe the point was to build a life that my career supports.
And honestly… that realization has changed the way I think about ambition.
AI didn’t kill my ambition, it made me reevaluate what ambition actually means to me.
I still care deeply about my work. I still want to grow. I still want to build meaningful things and continue becoming a better engineer.
But I no longer allow my self-worth to rise and fall with my job title. I don’t want to spend my entire life chasing the next achievement while secretly waiting for permission to enjoy my life.
BUT I also don’t want to sound naive about reality. I know interviewing may become harder. I know competition may increase. I know the expectations for engineers are evolving rapidly. I know no job is guaranteed forever.
But weirdly enough, instead of making me panic… it’s made me think differently. If the future is uncertain either way, maybe the goal is to create your own stability. And yes, I think that’s possible when giving up employment control. You have control over so much more:
Financial stability.
Emotional stability.
Adaptability.
Community.
Transferable skills.
A life outside of work.
A sense of self that still exists even if your LinkedIn title changes tomorrow.
The goal isn’t to find a job that never changes, it is to become someone who can grow through the change.
I think that’s what I’m learning right now. Not to stop caring about my career and not to stop being ambitious but to stop expecting work to carry the entire weight of my identity.
Because the older I get, the more I realize that a job can change your future but it can’t be your only reason to feel valuable.
And maybe this next chapter of my life isn’t about becoming less ambitious, maybe it’s about taking the wheel. Because while we can’t control every outcome, layoffs, market shifts, AI, or whether a company decides to keep us, we can control how we prepare, how we adapt, how we respond, and how we continue moving forward.
Maybe real security was never about finding a job that would never change. Maybe it’s about trusting yourself to keep going even when things do.
XOXO,
Paola
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