Another New Year, New Life Changes!

Checking into this journal again since my last post at the end of last year.

Looking back I realize it has been over 5 years since I started this journal, time goes by so fast! It's amazing to slow down and reflect on how much life can change just in 5 years. 

New life events for 2023, I started a new job at an aerospace and defense company just over a month ago at the end of June. I had quite a few hesitations leaving my last role so quickly(just over a year) as well as going into a field which is quite foreign to me. However, the main motivation I found to move forward was the opportunity to learn. If I were to remain afraid to take steps outside my comfort zone, I would not be able to push my development and grow as an individual. 

So far, the job has been relatively good in the sense that I have had the opportunity to get back into the lab, which I believe I did sorely miss in my last role. I am definitely learning a lot in terms of power supply design and testing as well as the overall PCB design, manufacturing, and verification process. I am consistently awe-struck and impressed by the technical ability of my teammates: they are all very smart and have so much knowledge in their respective areas! I hope I can absorb as much knowledge as I can in my role and from my team.

My teammates have been generally quite supportive and welcoming despite the seemingly never ending supply of activities and projects they are working on. I am especially happy with my Director as he gives very detailed and thoughtful feedback when reviewing your work. His comments also come from a place of mentorship and teaching not from critiquing and belittling(which I had seen in previous roles..). 

The company itself is quite different also in terms of absolute size: it is a pre-IPO "startup" company of about ~650 employees currently. This fosters a quite exciting environment as everything is rapidly growing and changing. However, there could be challenges in terms of constantly shifting priorities and some ambiguity in tasks at hand. I hope I can learn to adapt to these situations. 

The leadership team at this company also have been very adamant to encourage new employees to show enthusiasm and energy when joining the company which I have taken to heart. I have tried to volunteer to help out as much as I can with activities and just try to be enthusiastic about the work in general.

Overall, I am generally happy with the role and team so far. Crossing my fingers that I can continue to grow into my role and feel truly part of a great team as my time here progresses.

On the personal side, this year has still been quite challenging connecting with our friends. One couple C/KC we have started to meet with more frequently when we are both available and I think in general we get a long well and enjoy having our talks with them. We usually play boardgames on Friday and just chat about life updates. I think KC is quite similar to myself in that he is also interested in Financial Independence and the whole FIRE movement. I'm also happy that they get to interact with our daughter(even though they are not planning to have kids themselves). I think that we both get along well with them as their lifestyles are relatively similar to our own and we share same viewpoints on a lot of things. We also just seem to be very comfortable and open chatting with each other and connect better than some of our other friends who have other priorities in their lives.

I hope we can continue to maintain and hopefully grow our friendship with them as I do have a lot of fun hanging out with them.

Our daughter continues to grow so quickly, her speech is improving so quickly. She can start putting words and sentences together and in the right context, which means she can actually comprehend what she is saying and use them in the appropriate situation. It always amazes me seeing how she develops and grows smarter each day! Her 2nd birthday is coming up soon and I am excited to have a small party with some of our friends.

Not many big plans for the rest of this year, just hoping to settle into my job and continue spending time with friends and family. Financially, the market has been very good this year so not much worry there and looking forward to continue growing our financial position throughout the year :).

Cheers!