It’s Jan 2026 and I’ll be 34 years old soon. That’s mid 30s! It feels like I have reached that stage of my life where everything feels familiar or to restate it with a more gloomy perspective – nothing feels new anymore. Honestly, that was the original title of this blog post but then I decided to change it to have a more positive outlook and so used “everything feels familiar”.
Been there, done that
I have been getting this feeling since quite a few months now but it’s only now that I am able to fully realize and articulate it. This state of “nothing feels new” applies to all aspects of my life now. Let me explain below.
Movies
I can now fairly accurately predict the plot, character arcs, hero’s journey and the climax of movies across genres. Documentaries and real-crime stories that I used to love watching, no more feel exciting. Love stories feel like the same story being told over and over again. I am now naturally inclined to watching movies that I hated previously – sci-fi, fantasy and classic dramas. May be that’s my brain craving for novelty.
Songs
I used to love listening to songs and I still do but now the lyrics and music of most songs feel the same. Inspirational songs, love songs, sad songs, it all feels like I have heard the lyrics before and it no longer leaves a strong impact on me as it did previously.
Books
I have been a sucker for non-fiction, self-help and biography books. Thinking Fast & Slow, Atomic Habits, Sapiens, you name it and I have read it. I have learnt a lot from all these books and I am glad that I read them but now whenever I start a new non-fiction book, it feels like I already know 90% of the concepts in it. It feels like the author is selling old wine in a new bottle. The concepts no longer fascinate me as they did before. Similar to movies, I am now getting inclined more towards the fiction genre which I previously hated.
Travel
I have never been an avid traveler but I have had my fair bit of travel across the different countries of the world. Every city now feels the same. It’s the same market, same street layout, same restaurants, same public transport maps but just with a different arrangement. Now with travel, I am not sure how would the logic of exploring previously hated genres would work out like it did for movies and books because as I said I wasn’t an avid traveler in the first place so I had no idea of what I liked and what I did not.
Politics, Economy & Stock Markets
It feels like I have seen enough of the “biggest crash ever” and the “once in a lifetime opportunity” moments in the stock markets now. I have also seen many of the “hard recession is coming soon” news cycles and the “World War 3 is starting” headlines. I have seen multiple 5 year election cycles to understand that no party is different and that all politicians are the same and that nothing really changes as dramatically as news channels want you to believe. After the hype train settles down, everything gets back to normal pretty quickly.
Technology
AI is the hot topic in technology and it’s ruling the world right now. It’s definitely something new and immensely useful and I have never seen anything like this before. In fact, I cannot imagine how did software development work before the advent of AI. Having said that, I have used digital technology long enough now to be no longer excited by it. I am still using my 7 years old iPhone 11 Pro Max. Back in my 20s I used to swap to the newest mobile device every couple of years and now here I am still using a 7 generations old device. Even if I have not bought a new phone in many years now, I still do immensely enjoy watching new device launch events and YouTube reviews. Nowadays, every new “revolutionary feature” feels like it has existed since last 2 decades and it’s just being repackaged and sold now.
I have followed the world of software development long enough to see it go from skeuomorphism to flat design and now back to gradients and skeuomorphism. I have seen development paradigm shifts go from server-side rendering of the classic LAMP stack to the modern client-side rendering of JavaScript frameworks to now going back to server-side rendering. I have seen the monolithic to micro-services and back to monolithic cycle. Now I feel like even though the presentation layer changes a lot, the underlying fundamentals of computer science are still the same and will stay the same in the future. It’s like the veneer and paint aesthetic keep changing but the underlying carpentry fundamentals stay the same.
Relationships
I have seen how people whom I thought I cannot live without, drift away slowly as life changes. I have seen how relationships that once seemed unbreakable, end abruptly. I have seen how unknown people can suddenly become an important part of your life. Now it feels like I am well prepared to deal with relationships and no drama is big or new enough to create an impact on me.
What Next? A new way of life…
Now I know that after reading all of the points I mentioned above, it might feel like I am complaining and whining. I fully understand that it can feel like it’s depressing and boring to live such a life but trust me, it’s not. In fact, it’s exactly the opposite.
Even though things have become predictable and monotonous, life is much more clear now. I know what I really like and what I will enjoy the most. I won’t deny that it gets a bit boring and mechanical at times but it’s 100 times more peaceful than the 20s. I spend a lot more time enjoying small moments in my day to day life now than wanting to run behind big achievements.
These days, I am also engaging in some new and some old activities that I enjoy. New activities like long distance running and old activities like going to the gym, playing cricket, writing this blog and learning new technologies and programming languages.
I am really grateful to be in this privileged position to be able to reflect on these feelings that might feel pseudo-intellectual and meta. A big part of this privilege comes from having my financial and personal life sorted out. Following a strict monetary discipline and marrying the right person are the two biggest factors that decide how you live your 30s and beyond.
To conclude, I am no longer impressed by new experiences (because in most cases, I have already experienced it before) but now I am more focused on enjoying the small moments of happiness of actually “living” life and being at peace.
