
Ask HN: 23 with nothing to show for it. How do I start anew? - hsikka
Details in comment! Thanks for your time. :)<p>TLDR: I feel like I haven’t built meaningful deep skills, only brittle ones, and I don’t know what to do because time is just flying by.
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FiatLuxDave
If it makes you feel better, it is completely normal to feel this way when you
are 23, smart, and ambitious. You're past the cocky know-it-all teenage years,
and you don't yet have the experience to back up the potential that you feel.
I'd tell you to not sweat it so much, but that's like telling a teenager not
to worry about the opposite sex. Nothing I say will make you not worry, so
just don't let it drive you crazy.

I think that you are hitting the "working surface" (to use a mining analogy).
In other words, you've been training your whole life to do meaningful creative
work, and now that you are biting into the real stuff, you feel untalented and
unprepared. OMG, there are all these holes in your knowledge! That's what
happens when you work on cool, hard problems. Whether you believe it or not,
you are at the beginning of your career. It is unrealistic to expect yourself
to be incredibly accomplished at the beginning of your career. Developing
those accomplishments is what all those years in the career are for. You
aren't running out of time to make an impact. That is an illusion. Your
knowledge will get deeper as you keep engaging with the problems.

It sounds like you work on some really cool stuff, and I really hope that you
make something amazing. Whether grad school, startup, or a job is better
depends on lots of variables that are particular to what you want to do. I
would say first, have an idea of what you want to accomplish. Then go scout
the career terrain. You may not realize it, but you have a huge advantage that
you are probably not using - you are young enough to simply approach highly
accomplished people in your field and just ask them for career advice. They
will generally give it to you. They won't do that when you are 50. Make sure
you are getting disinterested advice though, because a prof who wants to
recruit does not give unbiased advice. On the other hand, maybe that's the
inroad that you need. I don't know your field, so I can't give good advice on
the best direction.

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yesenadam
Gee, you sound mega-stressed. And so over-crammed with all kinds of things.
Panicking about "losing time"...Maybe take a year off travelling, doing
something completely different, maybe meaningful low-tech work in another
country, or something? Not much good to feel burned out your whole life. What
is it all for?

23 is so young. A lot of people feel 17 their whole lives. A lot of people who
are 80 feel 17. "time is just flying by" \- well yes, it does that. I was 17 a
few years ago, now I'm 47, although it's hard to believe.

Good luck!

"Be careful of how you live your life, you may end up having to live your life
that way." – Keith Curran, _Walking the Dead_

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chatmasta
I’ve been in similar positions and my advice, in order of priority, is:

1\. Relax. Take a break. Gather your thoughts, preferably on a beach or the
outdoors or whatever makes you comfortable and relaxed. Use the time to
disconnect and chill out. You’ll be surprised how quickly you realize what is
truly important to you.

2\. Exercise every day, even if it’s just for five minutes. You’ll gain more
productive time from the energy it gives you than you’ll spend exercising. And
of course it’s good for your health and will help with the weight gain you
mentioned.

3\. Focus. Pick one goal and get after it. Take everything else off your
plate. If it does not move you toward your goal, forget about it.

I would also add that you are facing a problem of mindset more than anything.
Try to take a detached, analytical approach to your thought processes and
decision making. Keep emotions out of it. Also, make fewer decisions. Make
important decisions and commit to them.

Finally, have a sense of urgency but not haste. Live in the present.

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vectorEQ
you lack motivation. i felt exactly like this for a long time. It even made me
consider that i was ill, and i whent to the doctors to have my blood examined
etc. Only when i found my motivation again years after i realised there was
nothing physically wrong with me, and all these symptoms were simply a
reflection of my mind getting into my body. it's not an easy task to find what
motivates you. Self-reflection is key, and it can be a painful road to
discover yourself and accept yourself.

My advise is to drop the idea of starting 'new'. this is an impossible idea
people have. Since you learn and experience throughout your life, and these
lessons should not be discarded.

Ask yourself many questions, what do i like, why do i like this, and get to
know yourself more. That way you will find what motivates you, which will help
you find and decide on a nice path in life.

all the best, and remember this is only too human to feel like this, not many
people go through life without having a time in their life feeling lost or
without a clear goal. Recognising this in yourself is the frist step which you
have already made.

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hsikka
Hey HN community, been feeling a little lost lately. I just turned 23, and am
completing my master’s in Biology at Harvard. I’m also a student in Georgia
Tech’s OMSCS, specializing in ML.

Throughout my life, I always breezed through things, coasting through school.
When I started my undergrad at UCSD, I decided to study Cognitive
Neuroscience, because I’ve always been interested in replicating intelligence
and understanding human consciousness. I plugged into an amazing group of
student entrepreneurs and engineers, many of whom introduced me to the hacker
culture, including YC and HN. But, I really became enamored with trying to get
projects out, and scored a few internships as a PM on some health tech
products. But through this whole time, I never really built technical depth,
be it in programming or research. I showed up to tests, got As and promptly
forgot the material. I never made meaningful connections with Professors and I
never got involved with research because I just wanted to build the next cool
app. I graduated in just under 3 years, and because I didn’t really know if I
wanted to do grad school, I applied to a few Master’s programs.

By this point, I knew that CS, specifically ML and AI, and to a lesser extend
app development, were necessary skills I needed to cultivate if I ever planned
to do meaningful creative work in computational biology, AI, or health care,
which were my chief interests. I enrolled in Hack Reactor, gained some fluency
with modern web technologies, gained some recognition, and continued into both
Master’s programs.

The last 12 months were a whirlwind, I finished all of my biology master’s and
much of my CS master’s coursework, and have reached the stage that I can begin
work on a thesis topic upon finding a professor. Also, I worked on a startup
with a friend that got me to YC’s final interview stage and into a summer
accelerator.

But the thing is, I honestly feel broken. I found all the knowledge I have is
brittle and rushed, and that the sheer uncertainty of trying to build a
startup is daunting. I haven’t been able to develop my career in any way, be
it with software engineering internships, research assistant ships, or even
successful side hustles. I haven’t found a professor who would like to work
with me, and I’m utterly unprepared to apply to PhD programs this fall.

Through it all, I’ve found an intense love for ml, and I’d like to spend the
next 4-6 months diving deep, validating some hypotheses, and becoming a
capable researcher/ml engineer. But my insecurities force me to constantly try
and productize my learning, and I constantly get distracted thinking about how
folks are building incredible companies and I’m losing time to make an impact.
23 but me hard, I still feel 17, and I fear I’ll soon be 50 with the same
superfluous, brittle understanding of things. All fluff, no depth.

It’s begun to affect my health, I’ve been losing sleep and gaining an alarming
amount of weight, while falling behind in classes.

Do you have any suggestions as to what’s i should focus on? Should I go for a
job/internship as soon as possible? Should I try for PhD’s without any
research experience, only some novel projects and entrepreneurship.

Any advice would be appreciated, I really love this community and look up to
many of you.

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skadamat
Hey, I've experienced similar feelings in the past. Feel free to reach out if
you want to chat outside of HN bout this more (my email is in my profile).

