The Long, Dark Night
2024 has been the darkest year of my life. The layoff at the beginning of the year and the subsequent labor arbitration left me in a state of deep anxiety. From March to June, I spent three long months scrambling to find a new job. What worried me the most was my father, who hasn’t worked in 20 years. In his mind, having a stable job is essential to living a proper life—anything less is irresponsible. I didn’t want to argue whether his perspective was right or wrong, but during those months of unemployment, his pressure weighed heavily on me.
I spammed my resume across various job platforms, sending out dozens of applications every day, but hardly received any responses from HR. At first, I was confident in my years of experience as a software developer and aimed for an architect position. However, as time dragged on, I began to doubt my abilities and gradually lowered my expectations.
Jobs that offered good pay, light workloads, and were close to home seemed out of reach. Fortunately, in June, I landed a backend development position at a medical equipment company. The software team I joined developed supporting software for hospital devices. Although the salary was only half of what I used to earn, the work was straightforward, and the company rarely required overtime. Just like that, I settled into a nine-to-five routine.
My family was happy for me, but deep down, I knew this wasn’t what I truly wanted. I yearned for freedom and still had ambitions. I believed I was still young and should be doing something more meaningful, something cooler.
A New Beginning
With over six years of experience in backend development and system architecture, I started to explore new fields. My first interest was artificial intelligence. I began searching for job openings in this area and quickly realized that to dive deep into AI development, a master’s degree in a related field was often required.
My first thought was to pursue a master’s degree in computer science. In fact, I had already started preparing for the entrance exams earlier this year, but it wasn’t until I secured this job that I could truly focus on studying.
So, during my free time after work, I began reviewing materials for the exams—calculus, linear algebra, algorithms, and data structures. However, it didn’t take long for my department manager to put a stop to it. He warned me not to spend time on these studies, claiming they were unrelated to my work.
At first, I felt disheartened, but I didn’t give up. I knew that the path to pursuing my dreams would never be smooth. Even though my current reality felt restrictive, I still believed that the future held endless possibilities. I would continue to seek opportunities and strive toward my goals.