Adrian Unger (Info.)

Or, the year of the sabbatical. What did I even do for my sabbatical? Well I quit my job for one—well that was in 2023. Then I didn’t really do anything. Of course, I could have gone on some grand adventure. Travelled the world. Gone on a pilgrimage. But I did not.

Previous Years in Review: 2023, 2022, 2021

I think that was the point. Not doing anything. It was in the not-doing that my body, nervous system, my cells got a chance to stabilize. To find some homeostasis.

It was tough at times. I really didn’t know if I could back to programming or any tech job again.

Reflecting now it’s wild to me how different I am. And I’m not being cliche or glib. I really had so much of my identity tied up in my job. And not like “ima programmer!” And being all proud. Rather the reality that I was spending the vast majority or my time and energy on work. That I left little to no energy for anything outside of work.

It’s obvious now that it lead to burnout. But at the time it’s like I had blinders on. I sought "work-life" balance to no avail. I adapted and changed trying to find a way to continue on the same path. But this burnout was of a different ilk than the one I assumed, rather it was as David Whyte defines it:

The foundation from which we transform the experience of burnout is always the realisation that we have been measuring all the wrong things in all the wrong ways and that we have for too long, mis-measured our sense of self in the same way; that we have allowed the shallow rewards of false goals or false people to mesmerise, bedazzle and entrain us: to hide from us an ancient and abiding human dynamic — that we belong to something greater and even better for us than the realm of the measured.

Anyway. What a trip it is to shift from a “doing” to a “being”.

I really don’t know what I’m doing. I feel I’m slowly coming out of my sabbatical. Yet I don’t have a clear direction or vision of where I’m going or what I’m doing. Energetically it feels like I’m shifting out of the reset that my sabbatical was/is and moving into just a new way of being. A new modus operandi. Where the doing will follow naturally from the being.

Other than that, I biked, I skateboarded, I read. My partner and I roadtripped through Oregon and Washington coasts. I actually wrote more this past year than ever before thanks to my side-project, The Existential Detective Network.

Looking forward

I see 2025 as another year of re-balancing, resting, and recalibrating. A transition towards 2026 which will likely contain more action and direction.

We'll see!