| > What do they do after that? They get a life. You know, a partner, a different hobby from programming, some kids. Imagine you are 35, have kids (and care to spend time with them) and you have to train your body or it will break down so you must go to gym even if you don't like it. You have to sleep good or you'll crash. Compare that when you're 22, no kids, no need to exercise, young energy, can sleep bad, you want to change the world(overworking), programming is also your hobby, etc. > I'm 30 and missed my chance to be a kid prodigy in programming or math and clearly not happening now. To be good at math olympiad you have to train for it (a math olympiad professor told me). You can't just be "smart". It's like HackerRank, you just have to study HackerRank to pass HackerRank. > Is there an area where you can be good at as you get older and what is the old man's game options as a programmer? You can be good at specializing (example I like backend, dbs/search-engine, performance) or managing. |