If you could time travel and meet your 21-year-old self, what would you say?

Focus on what matters. Don't be fooled by meretricious things.

Email page@cs.stanford.edu and ask if he needs a hand with his PhD project.

Stop dreaming and start working.<p>Meet more people who do interesting work instead of just reading about them.<p>Quit the job as soon as it becomes content free. Start up asap. Take more risks.<p>Write code. Talk to users. Build something people want.<p>Stop being afraid of bureaucracies, even the biggest ones.<p>Sadly I think I was told all of these things, other than the last one, by someone or the other. Usually not in person, but via an article I read. See point about meeting more people.

2001.09.26? Don't go to college, at least not for computer science as you planned. You'll grow to hate it, you will never work in the field, and the loans will haunt you.<p>Write more, love more, exercise more, run away. Far, far away. This is your 31 year old self speaking. I can't tell you any answers because there aren't any. But I can tell you what to look for, and that's purpose. It won't be found in absent minded busy work there. Get active. Get away. Get going. Now.