Freedom and Purpose

What is true happiness, and how does one get it? This question first entered my mind when I hit my thirties, and I have been pursuing it since then. As I head into my forties, I have a pretty good idea of what true happiness is (spoiler alert: you find true happiness when you find your purpose) and a rough idea of how to get it. This post is some parts walking down memory lane, some parts philosophy, some rambling, but mostly, it is to pacify the words in my head demanding to be written down. 

Adults often ask children what they want to be when they grow up. I don't think they actually mean it. OK, maybe some do. I believe that most parents have already made up their minds about what they want their children to be when they grow up. This is especially acute in south asian cultures, and my family was nothing different. From an early age, I showed a propensity for languages and arts. As a kid, I remember creating my own comic strips filled with complex characters to pass the time because comic books were a luxury during those times. I am sure the shadows of those worlds I created as an over-imaginative ten-year-old are still alive in some long-forgotten composition book locked away in a dusty trunk. I think they visit me in my dreams, but I can never remember them after. They always fade away like wisps of smoke. 

I remember my parents being pretty supportive of my artistic endeavors during the early years, but all of that stopped when I entered high school. Back then, the only acceptable career choices for south asian kids were to become an engineer or become a doctor. I had to pick one of the two, and I picked engineering because I wasn't good enough academically for the other one. I never planned to be an engineer. I took that path because I knew it would help me get away from the shadows of my creators. Becoming an engineer meant a decent-paying job, which meant affordance to make my own decisions and live on my own terms.  

I was an average academic but made it through the four years without failing any classes, which was my objective from the beginning. All I wanted to do was simply power through to the other side and leave the rest to fate. But the other side was barren thanks to 9/11. The towers had just fallen, and the entire world was thrown into disarray, including the job markets. After struggling to find a job, I decided to follow my friends to the United States for greener pastures. Again, my goal was not academic success but financial success so that I could own my destiny and eventually find my purpose. As stupid as it sounds, twenty years ago, the only thing I wanted to spend money on was a giant TV, a PS2, and a comfortable couch. Now, I realize that what drove me forward was not owning those things but being able to buy them when I wanted to. 

It drove me to the United States to graduate and find a job. What better place to pursue freedom than the United States! As I entered the workforce of the United States, I realized freedom doesn't come easy for immigrants. The official moniker that the USCIS (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services) gives to people like me who moved to the States to study and work is Nonresident Alien. And it comes with a bunch of strings attached. As a Nonresident Alien, you can't join any company. You can only work for companies willing to sponsor your work visa, which is pricey, which means startups are out of the question. If you stop working for the company sponsoring you, you must leave the country in sixty days unless you find another company to sponsor you. This means you can't take the summer off and go drive an Uber or go work for your local charity organization. You end up paying taxes like everybody else but can't vote. You also can't start your own company. 

Most people end up sticking with the company that sponsored their work visa until they become a permanent resident. This process typically takes north of ten years. If you move companies before you become a permanent resident, you will have to start the immigration process all over again. Either I was naive or stubborn or dumb or all of the above, but I had no intention of sticking to the same company just for the sake of becoming a permanent resident faster. I ended up switching jobs when I felt like I had to move on. Better pay, more interesting problems to solve, exploring a new career path (management), etc., pushed me to move jobs. I regularly caught flak from my parents, who were concerned that I would forever remain an alien and never settle. My friends would gently remind me that I should stick to a place even if the job sucked just to get through the immigration process. All my immigrant friends and work acquaintances powered through their immigrant years by sticking with one company, and most of them are actually citizens now. By my guesstimate, I probably lost about 5-8 years because of my constant moving around. Do I regret my decision to move frequently earlier in my career? Absolutely not. All the opportunities that came to me later in my career (Director, VP, CTO, etc.) were all because I moved around earlier in my career. Because I took risks, I quickly learned what I was good at: being a people leader. All of that eventually pushed me one step closer to financial freedom.

A rolling stone gathers no moss, but it acquires a unique shine.

Somewhere around the five-year mark of my career journey, I was able to buy the things I longed for since I was a teenager. I bought a house, a car, then another car, a bike, expensive clothes and the PS2! The spikes of joy those things brought me were intense but fleeting. For a while, I thought that's where happiness lies. Make enough money so that I can buy expensive things and then bask in the jealous gaze of the world. And keep moving up in my career so that I can keep making more and more money. As my debt piled up,

I realized that material things don't bring happiness, BUT being able to buy them did.

Which again circles back to freedom. When my debt threatened to hobble my freedom, I decided to curb my materialistic cravings and instead focused on paying down the debt. 

One last thought on materialistic pursuits: I don't necessarily think that retail therapy is bad and, in moderate doses, could act as a motivator, but it is definitely holding the tiger by the tail. Tread carefully.

The world will always expect you to behave in one way or another. Sit, stand, roll over, heel, fetch, settle down, etc. But it will never guarantee your happiness even if you follow all its directions to the tee. The only one who can guarantee happiness is yourself, and the only way you can get it is by following your own path. We have to optimize for our happiness. And optimizing for happiness sometimes means taking the less-trodden part. Taking risks. Going out in the world and asking for what you want. Asking for help. Grabbing what the universe throws at you and making something out of it. 

I am in my forties now, and the premium I put on freedom has survived the test of time. As I age, I am beginning to value it even more. But these days, I have started asking the question, what do I ultimately want to do with freedom? What is my purpose? I enjoy being an engineering leader, and helping companies and individuals grow brings me a lot of joy, but I am not sure if that is the rest of my life. Expressing myself through my writing brings me immense joy, so I feel that writing will be a big part of my future. 

I don't believe we were all put on this earth to get a job, make some money, raise a family, buy a house with a white picket fence, get old, and die. Those are all important things for sure, but I don't think that's our purpose. I think our true purpose is hiding behind the moments that make us happy. Some people sing, others paint, some help others, and yet others write, and in those moments they are truly happy. But they put it all away to satisfy the societal norms that we all feel compelled to conform to. I think our purpose is hiding in plain sight. It is hiding behind the activities that we reluctantly put away. Finding your purpose will bring you happiness. However, to find your purpose, you must acquire freedom first, and the fastest way to get freedom is to sometimes take the risky path. That, my friends, is what I ultimately wanted to say in this post.