How do you choose where to be?

I started by eating a chicken sandwich for the first time in 15-ish years. It was unsatisfying, and it was not enough.

Then I decided to move out of the suburbs of a major city to a neighboring city that is much smaller, but much cozier and still within commuting distance. I started looking for rentals.

One day the following week I decided to just buy a place in this neighboring city.

Two weeks later, I bought one.

It all went very quickly, and usually my decisions are much more based on logic than a whim. I did think it through after acknowledging the whim - the move logistically, financially, and socially makes sense. But first and foremost, what I was pulled by was just a "vibe". A feeling that I had to just be somewhere different. I've done this once before, and back then it turned out to be a great decision.

So to answer "How do you choose where to be?" - For me, sometimes (rarely) I just feel a strong pull to some thing or some place. I cannot explain it, but I can research and justify it after the fact. Unless I can tell that it is clearly a stupid decision, I try to follow that urge, because it is so rare.

Or in other words, sometimes the problem is thinking that you need to move while what you might be needing is to change.

Then again, you are 27. You are still able to move wherever you want without too much effort. So, if you think you need to move, do so. But going back to the paragraph above, don't just move. Do think about what it is that you're looking for, what you expect to achieve with the move. And then consider that moving may be a part of the solution but that you may need other parts to reach your goals.

I ended up where I am because of an internship abroad I took almost on a whim 9 years ago.

You are still young. The cost of trying different things is still low. That window of opportunity never really closes, but it’s hard to make big changes once you are tied down by obligations.

If you want out, this is the time.

If you don't yet have a person like that in your life, then I'd recommend move to wherever puts you in the best position to find them. If you already do, then I would say move to wherever your ambition takes you, and try not to let sunk cost fallacy bite you too hard.

In retrospect they may have missed out on many things, if they were in another place at that time, life might have turned out much differently for them, for the better or worse. But life is oftentimes happenstance or habit, instead of willed intentional (inter)action.

Habitual or even changes of perspective can be rare, and choosing to explore without any direction can be very difficult.

Think about. It probably isn’t. I mean, I hope after some thought you can reason that it isn’t.

Moved to SF, spent 20 years there, then moved back to the countryside because I was going to climb mountains instead of tech and breathe the fresh country air. Hiking and climbing was a great adventure but 5 years later I see that it wasn't the "solution" I was expecting it to be.

Sometimes I feel the way you're feeling; I miss the tech scene, the vibrance of the city. Other times, I feel great about the move. I know more people in this tiny town than I ever knew in the bay, and I feel more invested in the community's future. I've grown a lot through this change, and learned much that I'd never have learned in the bay.

I do wish we'd moved closer to my parents. Caring for them as they age is difficult from afar.

The grass is always greener, somewhat, and IMO the best "answer" is to make what you can from wherever you are. Don't be in a rush to force life's progress.

It was extremely fulfilling to get more into music (been playing instruments since I was a kid). Once I graduated, I oscillated between trying to make a living with music and computers. Even did some work using both!

In the end I realised what I really liked was the creative process, not so much whether it was in music or computing. There were more jobs and better pay for technical roles, so I focused on that career wise, but I still play and enjoy music.

You are in a good place right now, in that you are exploring what you want to do with your time, and you are still young without many responsibilities (I assume). This is not wasted effort, even if you "jump ship" from one to the other.

I can't say what is right for you, often the only way to know is to try. Whatever you decide at this point, your decisions are not irreversible, and trying different things will enrich your life.

This doesn't mean be irresponsible, but it does mean listening to your "gut feeling" and knowing when it's time to move on.

I regret very little I have actively done in life, even the things that at the time seemed to turn out so poorly I thought I may not ever recover from. I do regret, sometimes very deeply, the things I did not do but knew I should have.

There is of course a balance in life, but you have time to find it. So long as you are not hurting others or putting yourself in harms way I would always err on the side of "do something new" - but that does mean finish the things you commit to. Both for yourself and others.

Do you have some goals that you felt needed to be accomplished "in your youth?" In what way do you see your "not youth" as being different to your youth?

It's interesting (to me) that you felt the first change based on "achievement" (must achieve x before age y) but this change is brought on by "relationshop" - your interaction with others.

Perhaps this reflects a general maturing you are experiencing? A more concrete idea of what is important to you and the ability to better articulate your exact goals?

Typically in "ones youth" you are "finding your place", better understanding yourself and what you want out of life. It sounds like you are doing that well. Trying different things. Seeing what fits.

From there you can get a clearer picture of what you want your life to look like.

Good luck!

That said, also consider the psychological aspect. Perhaps you have a personality that never feels at home, always looking for greener pastures somewhere else. I do. Not sure what to do about it, but it could be that moving won't help, because it's the dream of change that drives you, not an actual dislike for where you are now.

It's early, but you can currently narrow things down across US counties by filtering across 60+ different metrics: https://www.exoroad.com/

With more time, I think we can source all the extras someone is looking for ("want hackers, techie, software people") and do a more detailed comparison by sourcing the top matches. Basically use the huge amount of data we have and give someone an easy way to explore it.

Good.

Keep doing that, don’t settle. You’ll find what you’re looking for.

A life in tech with music as a hobby is much easier to do than the reverse.

PS combine the two like Brian Eno.

Leaving music school doesn't mean you cease learning music. You have a lifetime to learn more about music. That's good because that's what it takes to scratch the surface.

Anyway, it sounds like that music school might not have been the right music school for you because it didn't make you feel like you wanted to stay. That is probably some mix of its culture, curriculum, and location with your ambitions. You can take music lessons anywhere.

Anyway, I don't think where I am is an independent choice. There are external factors: friends, family, work, etc. Recognizing the complexity of the world a reward for growing older. Good luck.

10/10 would recommend.

Some of us have no home, and seem doomed to wander the planet forever. Everywhere has good points and bad points, and the grass is always greener elsewhere. In Berlin, we [0] missed the beach. In Australia, we missed the nightlife. In SE Asia we didn't like being "Farangs" (foreigners, assumed rich). In Mexico we missed SE Asia (for multiple reasons).

Being able to work (globally) remotely is a blessing and a curse, because we can indulge this wanderlust. Committing to a single place and just putting up with the less-great points would be great, but every time we've tried we end up moving on after a couple of years.

We have friends all over the world now, which is kinda cool but no substitute for having friends in the same place as us. But neither of us kept any friends from our childhood and once you get past your 20's you don't make those kind of ultra-long-term friends any more.

So yeah, my advice: if you can settle somewhere, do it while you're young and preferably still at uni/college/school where you can make long-term friends. OR accept that you have no home and deal with the consequences: an adventurous life with very little community around you.

[0] "We" is my wife and I. We met while travelling, both looking for somewhere to call home, and home is now mostly each other, at least until we find somewhere. Maybe. Eventually.

But that aside, we live in a remote island and by family, that’s all we really need.

I do wish there were more “hackerman” people I could find and hang with though.

But it sounds like you have a good thing going with a tech background and a second skill (music) - why not finish the music school then have a second look at areas you can move to with more people/opportunity?

One thing I do for difficult decisions is make a basic solutions matrix: rank your n priorities in decreasing number towards 1, and then rate “staying put” vs “moving” giving each a score of 0 or 1 for each priority. You can only assign 0 or 1 once per priority. Multiply each score by the priority weight and sum up the total. Whichever wins is your answer. You should also definitely add a “green grass bias” priority whose weighting is the negative version of the weighting your most important priority. Do this in excel etc or by hand.

———

Here’s a simple attempt (not tabular):

Priority scores (etc):

- Proximity to people (5)

- Fulfilling (4)

- Software-centricity (3)

- Career opportunities (2)

- Cost (1)

- Green-grass bias (-5)

——-

Staying Put (L) vs City (R)

- 0 , 1 [proximity etc]

- 1 , 0 [fulfilment etc]

- 0 , 1 [software etc]

- 0 , 1 [career etc]

- 1 , 0 [cost etc]

- 0 , 1 [bias]

——

Total scores:

- Staying put : +5

- City : +5

—————

Add more priorities, the deeper you go the better analysis you can make of the results. I’ve made up the priorities as examples, but you will have your own!

Good luck