I think women are not born with the innate ability to be mothers. But when the time comes for their motherhood, they do their best to care for their offspring. This is often done even without the benefit of prior training or education. They suddenly get thrust into this world wherein the baby that they delivered is now fully dependent on them. And because of this dependence, they had to let go of certain aspects of their lives: their free time, their career, their social life.
Full Circle
This blog is named “Technology and Financial Independence”, but lately there have been no posts related to either. For the Financial Independence part, there is good reason: the fundamental concepts on investing have already been laid out.
Back in 2015, I was engrossed about the topic of personal finance. Coming from a family of modest means, I wanted to build a better future for myself. I read books about finance and investing, followed articles from financial independence bloggers, listened to podcasts, and built my own tools to manage my money. I was sold on the philosophies touted by the Bogleheads and the simple but effective teachings of JL Collins.
I Have Lived
What is the measure of whether someone has truly lived? Is it based on the number of birthdays that person celebrated? Is it the amount of wealth one was able to accumulate? Or perhaps how well-traveled a person is?
In Seneca’s letter, On Old Age, he referred to Heraclitus that said:
“One day is equal to every day“. This can be interpreted in several ways:
Spikes
At work, I was trying to figure out performance issues in our application. To aid in finding out the root cause, I analyzed our monitoring tools and found that our application transaction times had “spikes” throughout the day.

These can indicate potential problems such as:
Self Sufficiency
What does it mean to be self-sufficient? According to the dictionary, it is defined as “needing no outside help in satisfying one’s basic needs”, or “emotionally and intellectually independent”. Self-sufficiency means we are not dependent on others to fulfil our needs, both physically and emotionally. If we strive to be like this, does that mean we should no longer need others?
In Seneca’s letter On Philosophy and Friendship, he asked the question: Does a self-sufficient person need friends? If someone is already emotionally and intellectually independent, what would friendship bring to that person’s life?