I did not follow the path but built a new one

There is a concept called First Principles Thinking. It says instead of following assumptions, habits, or what everyone else is doing, break the problem down to its most basic truths and rebuild from there.

I was a software engineer for three years. I had a good job and a clear path ahead. The next step would be senior engineer, then tech lead, maybe management eventually. That is what everyone around me was doing, and for a while, I figured I would do the same.

Then a close friend of mine started losing their vision to glaucoma. And something shifted in me that I could not ignore. I kept thinking about vision, the eye, understanding why people lose their sight and what we can do about it. It consumed me in a way that software never did.

If I had followed conventional thinking, I would have looked for a job at a health tech company or joined a startup, something adjacent that let me stay in software while being close to the problem. That is what most people would tell you to do. "Use your existing skills. Be practical."

But first principles thinking asked a different question. What do I actually need to solve this problem?

I needed to understand imaging. I needed to understand the biology of the eye. I needed to be in a lab where this work was being done at the highest level. And to get there, I needed a PhD in biomedical engineering.

So I left. I walked away from a stable career in software engineering and went back to school. Five years of research, studying how light interacts with the retina, building imaging systems, publishing papers, working with NIH funded projects. All because I broke the problem down to its foundation and rebuilt from there instead of following the default path.

People questioned it. Why would you leave a good career to start over as a student? I understood their concern. It did not make sense on paper to a lot of people around me. But the path I was on was not going to get me where I actually wanted to go, and I think deep down I knew that.

I think most people stay on the path they are already on because the questions are uncomfortable. They inherit assumptions like "this is what people in my field do" or "this is the next logical step" and they follow them without ever asking whether those assumptions are actually true for them.

And honestly, I am still doing this. I finished the PhD and now I am thinking about whether to lean into AI or stay closer to imaging, whether the decisions I am making right now are truly first principles or just the next default step disguised as a choice. I do not have it all figured out. I am still very much in the middle of it, still flexible, still questioning. First principles thinking just gives you better questions. And right now, I am still asking them.