My father passed recently, and he was twice my age. I am approximately the same age that he was when I was born, and I am now “the old generation” - there’s no one left in the generation above me.

At the same time, I recently joined a company that skews younger-than-me. When I joined Google in 2011, I had just turned 30, and was in the mainstream demographics of Google in 2011. There were a bunch of more senior folks, with the very senior ones being in their 50s and having completed stints at Bell Labs. I admired a lot of these “greybeards” (even though this is a sexist term - what’s the right female equivalent? There were a few very senior female engineers that I would love to include).

So perhaps it is natural that I am reflecting on “what were the important realizations that I made since my early 20s that had a profound impact on the way I think about the world”?…