Self-reflection meme

[azekeil]

Has your life gone the way you expected it to? What did you imagine your life would be like now when you were a child? When you were a teenager? Shortly after education? Somewhere between leaving education and now?

If it's different to what you expected, why?

What about your life in the future? Do you think it will actually turn out that way, or do you think it will be different? Why?

Comments

[gerald_duck]

Until I was eight, life was just about boring lessons at school and interesting books at home. My passion was astronomy, and I probably wanted a job in that, if I ever thought about employment at all. I wasn't interested in girls.

At eight I switched to a much better school. Between eight and thirteen, I gradually became aware that I was very intelligent. I also started following academic pursuits more intensively, and developed a passion for maths. At that point, I decided I was going to do a maths degree at Cambridge University, followed by a PhD. (The school encouraged insufferable precocity; I took it for granted I'd get in.) I still wasn't interested in girls.

Then, as eighteen approached, I also became fascinated by computers. I decided a maths degree followed by computing PhD and postdoctoral research would be a better option. I became interested in boys; gradually the option of settling down with a nice man some day began to appeal.

Sure enough, I got into Cambridge. During my first year I realised university-level maths wasn't as much fun as I'd anticipated, so switched to computer science for my second year. I dated some men, and ended up long-term attached to one. Having grown up thinking of jobs as boring things (my father was a quantity surveyor, my mother an accounts secretary) I started socialising with people in industry; I realised I didn't have to continue in academia to have an intellectually stimulating time, and I could get paid much more for having fun in the outside world. Thus, my interest in PhD and post-doctoral research waned, and I was already learning what I needed to know about computer science.

After graduation, I started working in the software industry. My boyfriend and I committed ourselves to one another for life (without any ceremony or legal recognition back in those days, of course) and bought a house.

In the late nineties, I moved into software engineering for audio systems. That's where I've stayed for almost a decade now, and I feel very much at home in the field. When I was an undergraduate, I hadn't envisaged there being a suitable job for me in the field — hooray for ever more advanced embedded systems! My boyfriend left me, which completely knocked me for six.

A friend and I started living together, having a couple of relationships during that time. I began to give up hope of finding a life-long partner, and since I never really pine for a partner in the abstract anyway, hankering only after specific individuals, this didn't upset me greatly. The friend and I were planning on buying a house together and turning the arrangement — that had already lasted seven years — into a more permanent thing.

Then he got a girlfriend and abruptly decided to move out, which kiboshed that plan. Then, completely unexpectedly, I found myself with a girlfriend, too. Now things are looking quite earnest. We've made no commitments to one another, but we'd certainly like this to be for keeps. Suddenly, there are surprising options like having children, that I need to consider.

For the most part, changes in my life that come from myself are extremely gradual. I always seem to be looking at least five years ahead, and tweaking things gently rather than suddenly changing direction. But once in a while I get a major external surprise — most of them bad.

In general, I yearn for security. I like adventure and exploration, but I need a dependable home to which I can return and benefit greatly from having someone I can depend upon utterly in adversity. Broadly speaking, my life seems to consist of repeated strenuous effort in the direction of security, punctuated by major setbacks.

But my girlfriend is very special, and very dear to me. Things now feel comfortable in a way they never have before. Given a few more years, I may finally relax and feel at peace. Certainly, my plan for the future is of a 'til-death-us-do-part nature.

I intend to keep working on music and software for as long as it's fun. Then, I could move into other areas of software, or I could possibly become a writer. Writing could be something I did to keep myself alert during retirement, punctuated by extensive travelling.

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

Stability is important, especially to those somewhere on the autistic spectrum. The trouble with stability is: once you have attained it, the only thing that can happen is for it to get disrupted. For this reason I don't think it's a valid goal in and of itself, but it should be factored in as a by-product of the life you wish to create for yourself, if it is important to you.