It could be. The clarity I'm speaking about came more from being led deeper into areas that I'd never had a need to explore in my job. E.g. How computers truly

It could be. The clarity I'm speaking about came more from being led deeper into areas that I'd never had a need to explore in my job. E.g. How computers truly work, physically and mathematically, the specifics of scheduling algorithms used in operating systems, the utility of bit masking in assembly... I never had a need for any of that. To your point though, I may not have appreciated it when I was 18-22. I think I might have just gone through the learning motions, like when you learn the fundamental theorem of calculus; it doesn't immediately strike you as how amazing it is unless you've got the mind for that sort of thing (I don't) or you have a teacher that forces you to pause. In any event...