The Macintosh team’s average age was 21. Most researchers at Xerox PARC were under 30.
Sharif Shameem, Looking foolish is underrated
At 35, that’s kind of uncomfortable to read.
50 year old me, if I make it that far, will laugh at that. In fact, 40 year old me will probably scoff at that, but it’s true nonetheless. Our culture directly exalts the beauty, potential, mindset, and raw power of youth in contrast to the spent, outdated, sagging and tame life and thinking of those who’ve been blessed with many decades.
As an individual contributor in the tech industry, I see and feel myself moving forward relative to the average age of my colleagues (who are stellar and talented folks). The temptation to compare my life to those around me is pretty constant in part because youth is beautiful (and hard), but it’s easy to look back on it with rose colored glasses or read into the youthful lives of others bliss and fervor that’s not necessarily there.
I try to fight back against this idea by reminding myself of what is actually true and the most helpful form of doing so (I’ve found in my short, 3.5 decades) is regularly renewing my way of thinking by comparing it to what the bible says about youth and old age.
The glory of young men is their strength,
but the splendor of old men is their gray hair.Proverbs 20:29 (ESV)