Thank you so much for taking the time to give a thought out, personal answer. At the risk of sounding really shallow, I think your AI example and this snippet

Thank you so much for taking the time to give a thought out, personal answer. At the risk of sounding really shallow, I think your AI example and this snippet describes me to a T. >A person with no taste of their own, who is unable to judge whether they like something or not, and who is at the mercy of the input of others to decide their direction is quite similar to this genetic algorithm. >Do you hear yourself? Do you see yourself? Do you SEE the product of your labors and enjoy them, or at least have an opinion on them? Or do you need others to see and hear for you? I don't remember the last time I made something because I enjoyed making it...and I've made a lot of stuff recently - from frameworks to sites to home automation sensors. I did not getting pleasure from making them - once they were made, I asked myself "what next?" or "how to monetize?" The entire making process lost its charm the minute that thought came up. >Impetus: Do you actually want to do the things you do? Or have you not found anything that you're truly passionate about yet? I know I enjoy coding for its own sake. I sometimes enjoying running when I'm in the zone. I'm not "passionate" about them but I feel if someone were to question their usefulness in front of me, I'd fight them on the subject. Does that make me passionate for coding and running? The voice in my head speaks to an audience and sometimes to the present me exhorting me to "show 'em!" I'm going to come back to your answer in future to see if I can read more into it than what I gleaned at first glance.