Learn new things, sure. If you're a company willing to hire someone with aptitude to learn, might as well hire younger only because they're generally much cheap

Learn new things, sure. If you're a company willing to hire someone with aptitude to learn, might as well hire younger only because they're generally much cheaper. To you, and any experienced person I know, I say, jobs and opportunities come from your network - the who you know, not necessarily what you know. People who've worked with you in the past (assuming they liked what you did), are the best source of opportunities. Yes, it may entail doing things you may not like, like networking, coffee, etc, but the ROI is pretty decent compared to talking to recruiters who have no idea what Java8 is and how fast you could pick it up.