Become our integrated selves

For the past week, I shifted gears and started working on my ikigai. Below are my personal and technical lessons learned:

Personal Lessons Learned

I’ve always struggled with choosing what I do because I can see the merits of pretty much any type of job or work. As I embark on a journey to continuously cultivate my highest self, being self-aware and knowing my ikigai has become my path to peace and fulfillment.

There are those of us who can see the forest and zoom into the trees. We are detail-oriented and yet able to connect each tiny part into the bigger universe. This sounds like something to be proud of or to be excited about. In reality, this can become a curse if we’re unable to remain aligned to our reason for being.

I tried being a singer. I tried being a president and co-founder. I’ve tried being a dishwasher and a line cook. I tried being a waiter and busser. I’ve been a software engineer, solutions architect, product owner, program lead, project manager, Scrum Master, enterprise architect, process architect and manager, service designer (owner, creator, etc.), IT change manager, peer mentor, choir singer, dancer, teacher, special needs tutor, product designer, blogger, vlogger, music producer, and many more.

With each role or work I tried, the persistence of feeling numb and empty, and the “Is this it?” feeling kept being the soundtrack of my life. Through all the roles and work I’ve tried, I also had to live a life of constantly being a people pleaser. This caused me to be a target for abuse, manipulation, and neglect. My sense of self was non-existent. I was extremely fragmented and didn’t do much work to deal with the consistent dissatisfaction with my life.

There comes a time when we all must choose ourselves over everyone else. This sounded selfish to me at first, but when you put everyone else in front of yourself, you become amorphous and unable to live a life that is aligned and present. You walk like a zombie and let others just take whatever it is they want or need from you. I was so afraid to let go of the idea that as long as I am kind and helping others, I will succeed. Experience shows otherwise. 

The hardest lesson I’ve ever had to learn is that kindness without boundaries is self-abandonment. Kindness without purpose is cowardice. Kindness that enables unhealthy behavior is self-abuse. I now believe that bounded, empowering kindness is a way to remain kind without becoming bitter, hateful, or numb. 

I’ve lived 37 years of my life feeling untethered. Not belonging anywhere, no matter who I am with. Not feeling enough, no matter what I accomplished. Most importantly, not feeling worthy of my own love and kindness. Realizing that the root of our greatest fears is often the events that have already happened to us is the most liberating and empowering feeling of all. We learned to be fearful because we want to avoid pain.

I now strive to live a life that gives what I’ve never received as a child. All I needed was love that made me feel consistently connected to those I love. I’m sure that I am not alone in wanting this. I am grateful for finally loving myself enough to no longer allow others to take my love for granted. I am grateful for finally feeling certain enough that I can act without hesitation. I am still hyper-aware and vigilant because of the traumas I experienced throughout my life, but I am grateful that I consistently remained one sliver of thread connected to who I truly am.  

As I embark on this journey, I want to remain open to experiences and other people’s struggles. I want to share what I’ve experienced and use the software tool that I’m creating as a way to walk beside those who’ve been abandoned and discarded. I am no one’s hero; I am just a human who struggles as much as the next person. All I can do is offer an unconditional relationship that can potentially make each of us believe in love and kindness again.

Technical Lessons Learned

1. Used GitHub's Codespaces

   1. I highly recommend this if you like to do rapid prototyping. This is by far the fastest I've ever spun up client-side code.

2. Used Copilot for coding

   1. I like that it can give me recommendations on how to fix my code.

   2. The downside is that if you're not too comfortable with how every part of your code works, Copilot makes coding more confusing and frustrating. It is useful to make sure that you're comfortable with the version of React or whatever framework you're using.

3. Designed front-end while making sure to only include functionality or features that have not been patented

   1. This is something I've never done before. That's partly because I never had to worry about the possibility of getting sued in my own job. I was great at policy and coding, architecture standard adherence, but designing software without patent infringement is another ball game. It has been fun learning about the patents, though.

4. Used ChatGPT to brainstorm ideas around features, existing patterns, UX, human psychology, and many more

   1. The primary task when using AI is to make sure to do the following:

      1. Use your own intuition when curating or aggregating information for actually designing features

      2. Make sure to go to the source documentation to verify content relevance and accuracy

5. Learned about LLC establishment

   1. It is best to wait 30 to 60 days after product launch to save some money on the fees. :)

   2. A lot of domain names are bought up even though they are not being actively used. This was a very frustrating and sad experience to realize. I knew this would happen, but I wish we had a rule that restricts people from buying up domain names just so they can sell them for higher prices. Uggghh...