Finding What Drives You

Every year there are predictions that "'x' will massively change 'y'" or "'a' will be the death of 'b'".

AI continues to be a disruptor (for better or for worse) in many industries and one of the 2025 predictions is that "AI will be the death of the software engineer". As a software engineer, my knee-jerk reaction is to balk at the idea that AI could replace my craftsmanship. I love building software and AI appears to be positioned to threaten my livelihood and my passion.

I don't feel like this is an accurate prediction, but to find some sense of safety in this, I've had to do a little self-reflection to understand why I love software engineering.

Finding My Drive

After I graduated high school, I was in South Korea teaching an English lesson. One of the stories in the book we were using was the allegory "The King's Highway". It's short, so I've included it here for your viewing pleasure and to help provide context.

The King's Highway

Once a king had a great highway built for the members of his kingdom. After it was completed, but before it was opened to the public, the king decided to have a contest. He invited as many as desired to participate. Their challenge was to see who could travel the highway the best.

On the day of the contest the people came. Some of them had fine chariots. Some ran along the highway and others rode horses, mules, or donkeys.

People traveled the highway all day, but each one, when he arrived at the end, complained to the king that there was a large pile of rocks and debris left on the road at one spot and this got in their way and hindered their travel.

At the end of the day, a lone traveler wearily crossed the finish line and walked over to the king. He was tired and dirty, but he addressed the king with great respect and handed him a bag of gold. He explained, "I stopped along the way to clear a pile of rocks and debris that was blocking the road. This bag of gold was under it all. I want to give it to you so you can return it to its rightful owner."

The king replied, "You are the rightful owner."

The traveler replied, "Oh no, this is not mine. I've never known such money."

"Oh yes," said the king, "you've earned this gold, for you won my contest."

"He who travels the road best is he who makes the road smoother for those who will follow."

The lesson in this story struck me deeply. It has stuck with me and I believe it has influenced my actions ever since. While I get paid as a software engineer, I don't get paid for any of my open-source projects, speaking events, or volunteering at hackathons. I'm not saying I'm above any of that, so if you'd like to pay me for those things, I'll gladly take your money. 😉 What I am saying is that I would do these things whether I was getting paid or not because I like to help smooth the road for other travelers.

What does this mean?

Making the road smoother for others is a driving force for me, and software engineering is a mechanism for me to express that. I don't believe this is who I am in my entirety, but this is a way I feel I can provide value.

I have no plans to stop software engineering any time soon, but this helps me disassociate my identity from my profession. It now frees me to be open to the idea of growing beyond my trade and pivoting to something else if needed. This also allows me to feel less threatened by AI and opens me up to opportunities to embrace changes it may bring that could improve my existing development experience.