Replying to Reconciling with the fact I wasted my 20s

Hey. Expecting some troll posts. Bring em on! I love this community for it's degenerate immaturity and that's why I came back here.

Anyways, this is going to be a somewhat more serious post than most. I'm turning 29 in one week exactly, and looking back on my 20s, I'm wondering WTF I've been doing all these years. By many measures, I'm what many people would consider "successful". I got an engineering degree from CU and spent the last 7 years bouncing between high paying tech jobs in the Bay Area. I've gotten a chance to travel to amazing places, have a small but close group of friends, and still go skiing nearly every weekend in the winter. However, looking back, I still can't help but feel like I wasted the past decade. I didn't grow up. I feel like I've just been faking some alter-ego to please some master which I signed all my time over to in exchange for money. I could have stayed true to myself and focussed on the things that really matter: friends, purpose, and love.

I guess I must have had unrealistic expectations. Back when I was a teenager, making posts here which guarantee I'll never hold an elected office (not like I'd ever want that anyways), I always thought that inevitably I'd do something really great, like starting a fortune 500 company while living in the mountains and going backcountry skiing every day. I used to have really cool hobbies, like graffiti, robotics, etc. I was naturally creative. Now, that's all gone. I spend hours in traffic each day commuting to/from work without any sense of purpose and cover up for that by drinking too much on weekends and occasionally stuffing my body full of drugs and listening to aggressive music. It feels empty.

So next year I'm turning it all in, quitting my job, moving out of my apartment, and traveling full time. I have enough money to last a few years, but I don't have any idea what I'll do when I eventually go broke. I'm imposing a no-u-turn policy on myself. I'll try to make some money as a freelance programmer, and maybe give a shot at a few startups. I realize the odds are stacked against me and at some point I'll probably miss the comfort I've gotten used to. Just trusting that somehow things will work out.

Just posting this since it seems like there's still some old-timers here who might be able to relate.