Iron Man Training, Living on a Sailboat in NYC, and Software Engineer Layoffs

#51. Today I am interviewing my older brother Daniel Wilson otherwise known as Dan. Dan has had all sorts of wild experiences other than being a software engineer for 6+ years. The major ones include training for and completing an ironman, living on a sailboat in the New York City Hudson River and sailing said sail boat down the east coast, and most recently white water rafting in Zambia. And yes, unsurprisingly, he also has a stint of van life under his belt. Dan is certainly the most adventurous out of our family and is currently located in Denver, where we moved originally after college. In this conversation, we chat all about his adventures, where he got the inspiration to live like this from, how his tastes for adventure have evolved in his twenties, and his origin story / relationship with software engineering. Dan was also recently affected by layoffs so we chat a bit about that as well, being two software engineers whose jobs have been cut in recent months. Thank you so much for tuning in and I hope you enjoy the show.

Dan's blog: https://daniellytle.github.io/

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Transcript

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what's really appealing about these individual sports, running, swimming, biking, whatever is the ability to see objective growth. you can clearly see I'm getting faster. I'm getting stronger. And that's a huge confidence boost. They had quoted me, 800 a month for the summer, which in New York is like unheard of. I mean, if you're willing to live attached to a buoy in the Hudson River, but it all looks good on paper. something he told me was You're gonna break before the boat does. did you break on this trip? you're not going to gain anything unless you risk something. The fear always comes later when you're faced with realities. I think you benefit from change and, I just don't, I don't think about the nitty gritty until, it's right in my face. It was the heyday of like hackathons and the fang internship and, the money was just flying around, and I think there, there was a feeling of like, why would you do anything else other than, software engineering? Hello and welcome back to Passion Project Pending. Today I am interviewing my older brother Daniel Wilson, otherwise known as Dan. Dan has had all sorts of wild experiences other than being a software engineer for six plus years. The major ones include training for and completing an Ironman, living on a sailboat in the New York City Hudson River, and sailing said sailboat down the east coast, and most recently whitewater rafting in Zambia. And yes, unsurprisingly, he also has a stint of van life under his belt. Dan is certainly the most adventurous out of our family and is currently located in Denver, where he moved originally after college. In this conversation, we chat all about his adventures, where he got the inspiration to live like this from, how his taste for adventure have evolved in his 20s, and his origin story and relationship with software engineering. Dan was also recently affected by layoffs, so we chat a bit about that as well, being two software engineers whose jobs have been cut in recent months. Thank you so much for tuning in and I hope you enjoy the show. I started a new tradition recently where each guest I have on at the end, I asked them to provide a question for. My next guest, and so my last guest, had this question, which was what's a TV show you've been binging lately or really into? Interesting TV show. I, at this point, I think I believe there's enough media out there that I don't need anything new, so I just cycle through the old classics. And currently I'm in a, um, sort of dirtbag comedy phase. So we're watching it's always sunny in Philadelphia again, and we're in the, we're in the sweet spot where the film quality is pretty low. The aspect ratio is like a square, truly the golden age of that show, in my opinion. Is that a sitcom? Yes. Yeah. Sitcom. It's pretty, it definitely, you've never seen it. I think my roommate has played it. One of my roommates over the years would play it. I think like coming in, like watching the show with a sort of Midwestern ethic, like you're like, this is horrible. Like these are terrible people. I don't want to be like present for this. what is a Midwestern ethic? Just like, like, um, being around people in good faith, like support people, I think you, the characters, you're like, I would never associate with these people. these people are horrible. And then you detach from it and you're like, this is hilarious to, to observe. and, it's a lot of, it's a lot of like screaming and yelling over people and, just really like beautifully flawed characters. And I guess this, there's kind of a catharsis of Wow. This is like really tough. live in for some of these people. Like my life's not so bad. So there's probably an aspect of that as well. But yeah, it's like going back through an old classic of that. Yeah, nice. Okay. thanks for answering the special question of the hour. Yeah. now let us shift into talking about your many experiences, which I mentioned in the intro. Yep. So, to start, it's clear you've always had a taste for adventure. And I think the first thing, would that be the Iron Man, was the Iron Man before New York? Yeah, that was right before 2019. Okay, let us discuss about this, because I feel like you and Patrick both had an affinity for these races. I think you were the first one to really be like, let's do an Iron Man, and you like, set your mind to it. And all that stuff, and you did a half first, I remember that, in 2021, so walk me through that evolution of the first time you were like, huh, maybe, did you go to a race and see it and be like, did you have friends who were doing it? And you were like, wow, I want to do that. Yeah, so I lived with a guy who had done a full Iron Man and we were training together to do a half and I really liked, they do a really good job of branding the half race and the full race and I think the best way to describe it is when you finish they say, so and so you are an Iron Man and that, that kind of. Simplicity and like, objective, like accomplishment really, it really appeals to me. And I halfway through training for the half, I was like, I'm going to be in really good shape. Like I might as well just extend this thing and go for the full. and it's a lot, it's a lot of, time and your weekends. Yeah. and eating really cleanly. and it's also like you do it, how you go, how hard you want to do it. if you want to be competitive, that's just more time. if you want to be really like, safe from injuries, that's more time. That's more, that's a slower ramp up. and I kinda got in this dangerous game of I don't have this much time. I want to do it sooner and trying to force my body to be Ready sooner when it really couldn't have been. And so I ran into some injury problems and ended up having to walk like most of the marathon. so for people that don't know that the full Ironman race is a two and a half mile swim and then a 112 mile bike and then a marathon at the end. and. if you get hurt, before it's re it's really tough to heal up in time to be able to do something like that. And, um, the impact on your body, especially from like running is probably the toughest for me. I'm a bigger guy, so it's a lot of impact on my body and I just, I'm tall. Yeah. ramped up too quickly and, had some knee issues that I couldn't really get around. So maybe someday I'll try to, Beat that time. But, I finished, which I was happy with and, got that satisfaction. And, yeah, it was a cool experience. Um, yeah. Nice. Yeah, it's definitely a big accomplishment and, was definitely a source of inspiration for me. I remember when, I ran, trained for and ran my marathon and it was like really nice that you and Patrick came out there and you had race experience and we had, we could talk about that and relate to that. I obviously had done something on the smaller scale, but I remember us talking about how we were both like, or like in your experience, you had done many races at that point. And you had talked about this experience of like post race bliss for a short period of time, which was then inevitably followed by a question of what's next? Or let me do it again. let me start again. So obviously, you still do bike races now, but you're not doing, like, huge, huge races like an Ironman anymore. So did you, do you feel like you kind of shifted away from that as time went on? So it wasn't like, I need to have another race. Yeah, I think, that's a good point. Like the goal setting aspect of that was probably what I liked the most about it. Like growing up, you just run just to like go run. And that was always the hardest way to motivate myself. and when, I mean, the Ironman, Like it's such a massive thing. It's so far off in the future while you're like training, maybe you're training with other people. That's a great motivator. You've already sunk hundreds of dollars into equipment and the fees and the plan of doing it all. That's another motivator. So it was easy. it was easy to motivate, to do that. And I think while I feel like I have the satisfaction of that type of race and I want to do other different things now, like I like that, like you make a commitment, you set a goal and then you kind of flip to the other side of achieving that goal, working towards it. You know, how am I going to do this? yeah. And then did you like after the Ironman, did you have a post Ironman era where you were like shifting away from wanting to do things that extreme? Yeah, I think the do doing the Iron Man, it's, it's very boring. It's a lot of, it's a lot of solo time. It's a lot of like time in the pool where you're not even looking at anything. You're just paddling through the water. And yeah, I was looking for more adventure after that. You know, that is like a very triathlon is a very like pure, pure exercise Endeavor. So there's not a lot of thinking involved. it's a lot of will. And there is a lot of preparation and I'd say training is probably the, how you train is a very calculated and thought about, thought through thing. But the actual race is like, you stick to your plan. Yeah. Yeah. I have a lot of thoughts on this as we're talking about it. one is. I've noticed as I get older, I get better at things when I do them multiple times and you like do something and then you step back and you reflect and you're like, what worked, what didn't, and then you go in again with that knowledge. And similarly for me with the marathon, I was mainly motivated by doing it at least once, not by any means was I like, this is a thing that I want to do. And Rigorously pursue and improve at, and do many more of, I think it's different for everyone. But I was mainly motivated by having been on the other side of at least doing it once. And that was like a huge confidence booster. So there wasn't a lot of strategy and like the first time and the only time. and then I also agree that like, When, after I had done it, like you were saying, there's not a lot of mental stimulation as part of it because you literally just have to put the hours in, you have to get out there and get the workouts in to be able to like stick to this plan. I remember being like, yeah, that was so impressive. My reaction was like, what if I like took all that effort and I apply it to something more like something that could evolve like a project, like something like, cause it just didn't really. After a while, like it's like the exercise loss. It's a lure. It's like, okay, maybe I just need to exercise an hour a day. That's great. do I need to exercise two, three, four hours? Like, no, I don't think so. And so it lost its allure for me. And that's why I was like, I don't need to do this again. Yeah. Yeah. I think, what's really appealing about these like individual sports, running, swimming, biking, whatever is the ability to see objective growth. Like you can clearly see I'm getting faster. I'm getting stronger. And that's a huge confidence boost. You're like, Oh my God, I'm, I'm growing. This is amazing. Whereas like you go to an open gym basketball game, you make half your shots, someone elbows you in the face, it's. That's a good day. You know, you don't really know, if you're getting better or whatever. and, but I get that. it's, it's not the most, mentally stimulating. Whereas like an open gym, that's that's really interesting sport. there's a lot of dynamics and like decision making. but yeah, I think, and like, you know, there's pros and cons. I think it's just good to like fluctuate between the two. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it sounds like after the Iron Man, you shifted to more adventure type activities and this landed you somehow in New York. You transferred teams, is that right, at Amazon so that you could live in New York and then you lived in New York for a bit and then you decided to live, purchase and live on a boat in the New York City Harbor or whatever the harbor was called. This is where you jump in and talk about what was going on there. What was happening. Yeah, so I, was in Denver working at Amazon and had sort of a, I want to be where the people are moment and was like, I want to move to New York City and be a big. Be a star in New York. And, thankfully Amazon is a massive company, has offices everywhere. And so they had a team in New York, which was like more exciting work than, yeah, then what was going on in Denver, interesting stuff in Denver. But, I was like, this is great. they'll, pay for everything. And two months after moving there, COVID happens. It's, I go from, you know, the vast expanses of Colorado to this, tiny apartment in New York, uh, you know, everything, cockroaches, bed bugs, all the classics, there, but it was exciting. It was new. It was like, I'd never been around that many people before. and it was a total shift, of lifestyle. It was tough to like, I went from riding my bike and running around Colorado to just like pound in the pavement and granted, I still think you can do whatever you want in New York. if you want to be an athlete, if you want to be a, there's every type of person there. but it was a lot of, yeah, it was a lot of pavement pounding to get started. And then COVID, I spent most of COVID there. As a, you know, single man thinking we're back every week, basically. which obviously wasn't the case. but, something I loved about New York is that it's just such, there's so much drama going on all the time. You really feel like you're the center of the world. Like the, there's always some new controversy, the mayor's doing this, and with COVID that was just like times 10. cause like the first bit was, obviously very scary. no one knew what was going on. you'd hear ambulances was like the only sound you'd really hear out on the street. as a. Healthy young person. I was, very shielded from the like nastier bits of covid, obviously the loss of life, but new york was responding, in a lot of different ways. There were very complicated restrictions. there were, The testing clinics, there was the tracking core that was supposed to keep track of everyone who had traveled and follow them around and make sure that they like stayed put and quarantined. there was, the daily or weekly COVID updates from, de Blasio and, Andrew Cuomo, not Andrew Cuomo, governor Cuomo at the time. and it was just, It was wild. everyone was looking at the case numbers. Everyone was looking at, what, what was going to happen, where are we going to get tighter restrictions or less restrictions? And, I remember running 5 K's on the treadmill with a mask over my mouth, sweating, huffing and puffing through this, piece of fabric. at one point the blue angels flew over the city to like, Boost morale. it was just, yeah, morale was not a really wild time. And, like that, like very restricted, but also like everyone so densely populated, like a lot of people like, just laughed. Yeah. A lot of people left. A lot of people left. which I think was the move. My, my, reaction was to like dig in and, uh, You know, I just got in there at what's that? Tough it out. Yeah. Tough it out. just be extremely optimistic, which, it was not a good run for the optimists in the beginning there. The, two weeks flat in the curve or whatever it was, one week, something like that. and I'm not someone who likes to do nothing, which is what, was the best way to, combat that. When did you get that boat? Was it in 2020? It was yeah, I think we did the first year and then you know, I moved around to some smaller apartments but the I think living in Manhattan or Brooklyn you it's easy to see the rivers and all the boat traffic out there the Hudson in the East River and there's all the ferries, the big, commercial boats going around the cruise ships that leave from Manhattan. But there's also a good amount of like private sailboats, like just people sailing around. they do some racing. so there's a lot of boat traffic and I think I was just staring at that. And, Got the idea of like, huh? Hey, maybe this could work. There was a lot of other factors like, van life was super popular. I had talked to a few people who were doing like, Or had done a long term boat cruise. I think cruising is a boat term for just living on a boat, like traveling around, and talk to them I was like, is this, could this happen? Could this, can I do this? thankfully the boat market was also like coming down pretty substantially. So a lot of people were trying to get rid of their boats. I imagine to get some cash for, Maybe if they lost their job or something, but I found this boat in this place called City Island, which is an extension of the Bronx. very interesting spot. Lots of boats up there. right at sort of the, base of Long Island Sound. And I had grown up in sunfishes, which are like tiny little boats, two peoples. It's crowded on there. One sale. but I, I thought, you know, I, I, I talked to these people. I'd seen some videos and I was like, I could probably manage this thing, wrangle this thing myself. talk to this guy. There's a really cool guy up at the Marina up there. Fred, great man. One of those like characters you meet in life, it was just like a wacky dude and kind of sticks with you. but he was really nice, supported me through the whole thing. And, I had just vested some stocks from Amazon and this goes to show you my kind of financial planning, situation, but, I was like, screw it. Let's do it. It'll be an adventure, so sign the papers, got the boat, was at one point I was living on it and every morning I would Get up, I would row my dinghy to shore, shower on shore, get on a bus, which took me to the train station, take the 6 train all the way down to Midtown, and go to the office. The whole commute was like two and a half hours. It was gnarly. D C level commuting. and that had burned on me for a while. but I was fixing up the boat, I was working on, I was doing some little projects on it. I was very basic as far as like boat work at the time, but, can't remember what I did exactly, but I, you know, the goal was always to move it down to Manhattan. cause I found this place right by battery park. there's a really nice. Marina right by Battery Park, which is very expensive, but there's a mooring field just north of that called Pier 25 where they hold the sailing class boats some charter boats some like touristy boats and They had quoted me 800 for the summer, 800 a month for the summer, which in New York is like unheard of. I mean, if you're, if you're willing to, to live attached to a buoy in the Hudson River, but it all looks good on paper. It was cheap. there was going to be someone on shore that I could just call on the radio and they would come pick me up. And I would be, I'd be closer to my office. I'd be, there was a gym nearby that I could shower at. I was like, all right, this is, this could work. let's do it. And I put, I put the boat up, you have to winterize a boat cause everything freezes. And, everybody knows how expensive boats are, but, winterizing it, that was pretty penny. I found this place. down Long Island Sound in Connecticut that would winterize it for pretty cheap. and did a fun little sail with our brother Patrick to this place called Block Island. before putting it up for the winter. that was a fun trip. And that kind of got me into like, that was a big confidence step. You know, I was like, I, I can, I can sail this thing solo. I can like, I can plan routes out. I can check the weather. I can. make reservations places and it's fun. Like it's a good time. I saw some dolphins like playing on the bow. That was like a magical moment. the currents are pretty tricky up there. There's a lot of like tidal currents. So you gotta, if you can time it, that's great. But, sometimes you're just plowing into like water rushing at you sucks. But. So I put it up for the winter, hunkered down in New York for the winter. And then was like, all right, in the spring, like I'm going to bring this thing down to Manhattan for the summer and took it, back to city Island for a little bit, with some friends. That was a fun trip. And then, had to make some repairs before navigating the East River down to Manhattan. but then, it all, it all started to happen. it was down there. it was a little bit funky living on it, but, it was fun. it was so cool to be able to, you know, let's get some, let's get some drinks and get some friends and we can go sail around the Statue of Liberty like it was pretty, pretty cool experience to be able to do and to like show people and yeah, it was like the closest I've been to like a little boat guide, which is fun, you know, staying, staying out of the way of the Staten Island ferry and all that. I think they, they honked at me once, but, it's amazing. you'd think all this stuff would be like heavily regulated, but, Yeah. you just go to it. So yeah. And then, spent the summer there and, and then at this point, this is 20, this is 2021 summer of 2021. I feel like you got the boat in 2020 then, because I did, I must've, okay. I did. Yeah. That makes more sense from what I recall. And then Half Iron Man was actually in 2019, Ariel, it's not 2021, Yes. On the record? Yes. okay, so you got it, you're living there, and then you take a trip after you quit Amazon at your four year mark, right? So you quit. Yeah. And you, is it, was you didn't have a job for a while, or you found a job and you organized your start date for a couple months later? What was it? Yeah, it was perfect. I found a new job in the boating industry, funny enough. And it was great. I basically pushed out the start date as far as I could. And then once that was set, quit Amazon, it was like, I want to do a big trip. I want to go out in the ocean. Um, I want to really be like at sea, And, that ended up changing a lot, but, something I found was it's tough, it's tough to, it's tough to find people to sail with, not everyone can just leave for like weeks at a time. there are people who do that, but they expect to be paid and I was not going to be offering any, any, that can salary on my tiny boat. So I ended up doing most of it alone. there's a lot, a lot of sailing. there's a lot of sailing history and sailing, community in New York and all over. the Northeast, of course, like there's big races that go to Bermuda, from a place called Newport up the coast. people leave for, transatlantic sailing from New York. It's just a big. Big Harbor and a hub. I was excited to try that, but I think the trip ended up looking like a snowbird trip where I just wanted to run away from the winter weather and, go down someplace warm. a lot of people, a lot of people leave New York in their boats to go down to like the Bahamas. the Caribbean for the winter, Florida. and so, yeah, I took me about a month and a half. I got down to Daytona beach, Florida, mostly going through this system of canals called the intracoastal highway, waterway, intracoastal W intracoastal waterway, ICW short. But that's a pretty interesting route that a lot of these, folks in boats, retirees, people moving boats for other people, it's just a nice steady route down South through canal, inland canals. You're not out in the ocean fighting the waves. so that was, that was pretty interesting to see that whole route and that, community and, not a ton of young people doing that, but, yeah, it was cool to meet people and talk to them about their experience and their sailing adventures and things like that. Just a quick break in the episode to talk about the second hand shopper's best friend, which is called Benny. It is a Chrome extension you can add to your browser for free that suggests second hand alternatives available on different resale sites to whatever item you are looking for. I have been using it for a couple months now, and it is incredible how accurate it has become in matching to the same items as what you're looking for. So if you're looking to shop more sustainably, but don't always have the time to thrift or sift through everything available on Poshmark, eBay, Mercari, et cetera, et cetera, then Benny is your new best friend. Just click my referral link in the episode show notes and happy shopping. yeah. So when the boat trip reached its end, and I think shortly after you sold your boat, like what did that whole experience of living on the boat in Manhattan and then, really wanting to do that trip and then the realities and the difficulties of the trip. Like what did the whole experience teach you? That's a good question. I think it made me really tough to like little things. I think with a boat, you're sort of constantly monitoring like a million different things over and over. you're looking at, am I going the right way? Yeah. You're looking at, is there anything around me? Is there anything in front of me? Is the wind hitting the sail the right way? Is, do I hear a funny noise? like that, those kinds of worries, like you learn to just sit with them and, think when to act and when to, Went to make changes, I, I definitely learned that the hard way. sometime, one time I got, I went out into too harsh of weather and I ended up getting pushed into the sand and I was like, keeled over for a few days, had to be pulled out. So that was a great learning experience. and also preparation, like you, When you're sailing, especially solo, everything needs to be prepared. you don't have the capacity to like, to mess with things while you're, sailing the boat. Um, first few times, you might leave a cup on a surface and, with monohull boats that, that, Heal over really far, Everything has to be strapped down or else it's going to be flying all over the place. When you say keel or heel, it means like the boat's like tip, like the surface is like this. yeah, I paused there. I wasn't sure what the right term was, but yes. And this was a particularly light boat, so it would really crank over, to the point where I was pretty worried about, and, oh man, Oh my God. The, the anxiety that strong winds give you is, is crazy. Like you can hear it, like you can hear the sail, like struggling, and you can hear the cords that hold the mast up, like really straining the winds, like whipping through there and you're just staring at this thing for hours, is this going to snap something that Fred told me was who is Fred So fret fred's the guy who sold me the boat And then was my like guardian angel when I was doing silly stuff in the long island sound kind of Protecting me from myself. I think something he told me was You're gonna break before the boat does. don't, like these boats are pretty, resilient. And, especially these models, like they might bounce all over the place, but. they're going to stay upright. did you break on this trip? there's definitely some points where, I think I got very lucky. Like I, I put myself in some like risky spots and sometimes just was fortunate. sometimes had to rely on the help of other people. I had a guy come tow me out of that sand bar that I got stuck on. and I think the learning there is I'm pretty happy with the kind of. Um, you can't, you're not going to gain anything unless you risk something. And yeah, I'm a, I hate to, I didn't like, to put people into a position to come and, have to come and save me or whatever. But, I do it again, I suppose, you know, I think, I think how else, how else do you learn, Yeah. How else do you learn on your own? Yeah, I need to ask you a couple of questions from the followers along this vibe, and then I need to ask you about software engineering before we run out of time. one of the questions is, what's your life motto slash where does your sense of adventure come from? Life motto. I really like that quote that George Mallory quote. Because it's there, it's like a, it's like an anti quote. Like, he's talking about, he's talking about climbing Everest and it just says, someone asked him why do you do it? And he just says, because it's there. Um, I think I get a lot of motivation from like other people, other people do cool stuff and it's hard to do something completely new, completely on your own. So I like to be with people and. And try to, Hey, maybe I can take this and go a little further. I can change it in a little way. And I think environment's really a massive factor, but where do you think that comes from? anything from childhood? I'm trying to think back. That's a good point. Probably dad, dad's got an adventurous streak in him. and, maybe, maybe a, uh, yeah, a willingness to be, I'll see what happens kind of thing. So, um, thinking a lot about what could go wrong clearly, but instead just being like, this sounds cool. Let's jump in. Yeah. Yeah. I think that did start in like Colorado. you meet people who are doing back country skiing, whitewater rafting, whitewater kayaking, this really technical adventurous stuff and, makes me think of that fad, just Instagram quote of you don't need to, you don't need to wait for someone to tell you to do that. You just do stuff. You don't need to. and I think I met a lot of people just doing stuff out there and I was like, Oh, this is cool. Like this is people deciding for themselves. Um, you should work for Patagonia. I'm just going to say, I'm just going to put that out there. And then moving on to this question, which is kind of funny to me, given what I know about you, but is there any fear that comes with committing to so many major life changes? Cause you were in Denver and then you were like, I'm just going to go to New York city. And then you went there. And then you're like, I'm just going to get a bow. And then you sold the bow and you went back to Denver and you've done a bunch of crazy trips, which we don't have time to talk about, but you've gone skiing in Switzerland, I believe it was Switzerland. You've gone whitewater rafting in Zambia or South Africa. Yeah. So is there any fear that comes with, with going for these things or making these like life changes? Yeah, I think the fear always comes later when you're like faced with realities. I think that's just how, I do things is like you, I think you benefit from change and, I just don't, I don't think about the nitty gritty until, it's right in my face. I love a good venture. And then, I know, you know, it's going to be tough. You don't know the specifics. moving to New York, I didn't really know anyone, moving to Denver. I didn't really know anyone and it's tough, but I think, you really benefit from that. You really grow, you live, and I'm going to keep doing that. I think it's good to be, it's good to be afraid. It's good to be. A little bit anxious. It's good to be, yeah, up and down as you go. Yeah. And I would just add, I think like my relationship with putting myself out of my comfort zone has changed over the years where I'm not so aggressive with it anymore. So I definitely am a proponent of putting yourself out of your comfort zone and like growth is on the other side of doing something that you've never done before. But I no longer force myself to do anything too extreme in the name of, personal growth or, confidence. there are ways to do it in moderation, in a really productive way. And I would say like, yeah, it's good. The feeling of like fear or like anxiety a little bit can be good and can be a sign. the discomfort can be a sign of growth, but, it's also like equally important to listen to yourself. Are you okay? Are you happy? do I like doing this? don't neglect those feelings. I think it can be tough because you're like, I want to embrace discomfort. I want to really push myself, but it's like not at the cost of, my like sustained happiness. I just think it's an interesting like balance there. Yeah, absolutely. I think like any big change I've ever done has always been guided by a vision of like, how cool would it be? If this happened, or, We did this and it, it rarely ends up looking like that, but, it's a good way to move in a guide your decision making. Yeah. But before we run out of time, I really would love to ask you about your relationship with coding and software engineering. I've spoken a lot on the podcast about how my brothers are a big factor of what I studied and everything. And, You have had, I don't even know how many years of experience as a software engineer and the industry changes fast. life comes at you fast. there's new technologies, like it's always changing and you've been at two main jobs I would say over the course of your 20s so so yeah, What has it been like for you? Like you spent four years at Amazon and then I'm not sure how many years at DocWa, which is the docking software that we talked about briefly. so yeah, like what has it been like for you? Yeah, I think my entry into computer science, probably the same, similar to yours, like I. I got in, uh, you know, they asked you, what do you want to study? What do you want to major in? And the best I had was like, I like fighter planes, but the most like coherent thought I had. and then I saw, our older brother get an internship paying 25 an hour. And that was crazy to me. That was. Money bags, money, it was probably like 2014 ish vibes. yeah. And, we, when I, we, I take the same coding classes that every engineering college student takes and it was tough and, but it was huge to have our older brother to, to, support me and be like, Hey, this is hard, but it's it's hard for everyone. you'll get through it, you'll get around it. so that was a big boost. It was the heyday of like hackathons and the fang internship and, the money was just flying around, um, it was incredible. Yeah. and I think there, there was a feeling of like, why would you do anything else other than, software engineering? It's so validating to hear. Cause I've tried to like. Defend it or justify it like so many times. I don't even know why maybe because I feel like greedy for pursuing it for the money. But yeah, that's how I felt like I don't It's yeah it's also like we had to cough up some coin For college so it was like it put it into perspective of what's gonna get you this money back yeah, And I came out of college with some loans, a little bit, of debt. And, but I was grateful for. That, like these big company, big tech companies, like it's, you get good support, you get, a lot of resources and it's a good stable place to get started because software development in practice is much different from computer science classes. Um, and so worked within the Amazon world and then, move to A very small, very hip, software shop, called aqua. And when I, so when I joined, I think there was 12, 12 engineers. Um, and it was all the classics. it was Ruby on rails. It was react, which was so exciting because at Amazon, it was like you needed, you needed a permission slip to pull in some new library, which makes sense because they are, they need to have very high security. Are you allowed to discuss their stock? Sorry. I think so. I don't think, yeah, I'll have to talk to my legal team to make sure I'm not violating anything, but, no, it was, um, it was kind of the, the Vogue Ruby on Rails shop, which was so interesting to me because, all of my programming experience was all around, like, how do I, almost like, how do I make this please the computer, whereas moving to a language like Ruby, especially Ruby and Rails. it is so tuned to the developer experience and, it just felt so much more comfortable and, and natural to program in that environment. it was, there are different use cases for those different technologies. And. At this startup, which built a Marina inventory management software, basically, almost like Airbnb, but for your Marina. So reserving slips and stuff like that. but that was so much more about, experimentation and quickly delivering features. so it suited them well. And then, something, a dynamic of that world that I never had at Amazon was you're subject to. market conditions and runway and, startup problems. And so there, there were some laugh rounds. and I had, I wasn't picked for those early ones. when I joined, I think, They just raised some money and they were hiring, growing, they really wanted to take a big, take some big swings, with a bigger engineering team and there were probably two rounds, of layoffs. And then, and you know, the, what sucks about that is like, when you go through a layoff and you stick around, you, you almost double down. You're like, I'm on the team, I got picked. and then. Yeah, one, one day. you could tell, things were tightening up. There was layoffs in the headlines. And, sure enough, it's, it happens so fast. Like I, I woke up, there was a meeting on my calendar in an hour. It took five minutes. and I was gone and I was out of everything. and it's crazy. It was a new, new experience for me. emotionally, that's, that kind of sucks. and, it happens. um, I talked to some people who have been laid off multiple times, but it was, it was a shock. And, yeah, it really changed, changed. My career, I would say. but how so, like, how did it change your perspective on what you do for work? Sure. just lay it out, since being laid off, I've been continuously interviewing, working on personal projects, focusing on some things that I enjoy myself and. Really sort of, burning through some of my savings, living more frugally. it, it's been an interesting last few months. I think there's an initial wave of shame around, I'm not working. I don't have a job. I just got laid off. which I went through. And came out the other side, I'd say. And, now I'm, now I'm, I don't feel that so much anymore. I'm, I enjoy my, my, my day to day. But, I'm not working. It's, it's very interesting. I also, you take a lot of, Pride, or maybe, you get a lot of identity from your work, it's a considerable amount of your time and not having that was very strange. it's almost like a, what is my purpose? What is my purpose feeling? And then almost a reverse, was my purpose really doing software development for the Marina industry? is that my life's work? yeah, it's, it's been wild. And I know, It's no secret. We're in a, we're in a tricky job market right now. I've been pretty much continuously interviewing since I was laid off about almost six months ago now. and I think my perspective would change in that. I think, I recognize it's like a shifting, it's a shifting market. I think, there are, you always want good things to stay forever, but maybe it's possible that, those previous years in my career were the good old days and things that are about to have a radical shift, I think that if there's any industry that kind of cannibalizes itself, it's, it's software engineering, like we're all building tools to, make ourselves irrelevant. That's it's a very pessimistic view, but, I think, I think there are, there's always opportunity out there. yeah. Yeah. I wouldn't, if I were you, I wouldn't look back on the older jobs as those were the good old days. I think this probably marks a shift in your career. often being like laid off and I can speak from experience myself, And having that time and questioning your identity or being forced to do so because of the absence of the job to which you unconsciously naturally attach your identity when you were young and just out of college like because of that absence and time yeah like you're forced to confront or you can probably like suppress those questions but they are there i think it's natural but beneath the surface You're forced to confront like these questions and it's very uncomfortable, but like on the other side of them lies like more clarity. And from our brother Patrick's experience, like he was laid off and I think being laid off in tech, very much not a representation of our worth or our skills or our value as workers, Not at all. And I think it's very easy to internalize that. especially when you're out there recruiting and it's not going well or whatever, but like for Patrick, even it turned out to be a good thing. Like now he's a product manager and that's much more aligned with like his skills and his unique, like gifts and abilities. and I feel like if you like zone out and look at it, This is just a blip on the radar and those times of uncertainty are super uncomfortable and they suck and yeah, maybe we're really down bad. and I totally get that, but you never know what's on the other side of this. I feel like what's just important is just going through it. Feeling those feelings. Yeah, they suck, but they're happening. So you have to process them, let them pass through you. what am I feeling right now? What am I learning? And like, you could end up in a job that aligns more or brings you more value or like joy than DACA ever would have, but you were pushed to move on. So I try to see it that way, even though obviously it's hard and that's so valid. but yeah, like you were saying, it is interesting in software engineering, and the industry's evolving with AI and everything. And it's like when we were graduating, maybe it was much easier to get a role or whatever. And now, once you're in industry for a bit, it's You get like a little rusty at having to prove your skills to companies. maybe, yeah. Do you think have you experienced that feeling at all? I guess you recruit for new places. Yeah. I think, probably my biggest, my biggest worry about this time currently is that I really was learning the most when I was working. Working with other people, they were challenging me, and that's something I really want to get back to, like it's tricky to push yourself when you're, alone, alone. Yeah. um, that's something I think about, but yeah, you're absolutely right. It's been a, it's been a nice time to do some kind of thinking around that. I think, the tech world is such a dreaming place. Especially now with everything times a I and I think everyone is almost looking around going, what's going to be the, what's going to be the thing to really, get some traction and, what's going to be a really good application of some of these newer technologies. so it'll be interesting to see how that plays out. I think, I think personally I've taken a lot. Stronger view of like, all right, let's look at some like things, careers, opportunities that are like sturdy and not so much like ventures, it's, what I do specifically web development, it's amazing how that has Consumed almost every process that exists think of any business function, like there's basically a sass offering for it out there. and it's, it's interesting, everyone speculates about what's next. Yeah, we'll see, but as far as right now it goes, yeah,, still a, a blur I suppose. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's always a tricky process, but yeah, as we've talked about, like all the, like interviews you're getting and experiences. You're getting, it is just like anything, a process you have to brush up on those interviewing skills. and it takes a long time. But that's not to negate the fact that it does feel very demoralizing putting in that effort and not necessarily seeing the results. for sure. But I need to ask you the question for the next guest. Oh, Okay. Let me think. Hmm. how about this? You have to save one thing in your house. Before running out of it. what do you take? Cause it's on fire. Yeah, it's on fire or yeah, it's on fire. Oh my gosh. I love this question. It's actually like in a romance movie that I love. Really? It's so cute. Yeah. So nice question. Watch that rom coms. Yeah No, not really, but i've been trying to embrace the softer side of myself recently actually Very good. Nice. Well, thank you for taking the time. Oh my goodness Thank you, and sorry we couldn't Spend more time on all of the things. I feel like we could have gotten more in depth with the software stuff. But, regardless, I love looking at your specific experience of your twenties as a little case study, cause you've done so many different things and, that's so important. And yeah, it's so important for learning about yourself. and it's very on par with what I'm trying to do with a podcast and show people what other people have done, expose them. and yeah, I'm very lucky to have you as an older brother and I'm very proud of you for pushing yourself. So thank you for letting me interview you, Dan. Of course. Likewise. I, I get a lot of inspiration from you. Thank you. And if anyone out there is, yeah. Is in the job hunt. Stay strong. yeah, we're in it together. Yeah.