And rather than face that question, most of us silence it. The world gives us a thousand ways to look away scrolling, work, the version of success that keeps us too busy to think. We numb the purpose question with secular distractions. But eventually the question comes back: what is our destination? Is it just marry, have children, get rich, and die? Or is there something beyond all of that? Is there something worth dying for?

The worries we carry

I know the weight of it. How do I get a job? What's the point of education when even the educated are struggling? What kind of work should I even be doing? I won't pretend I don't think about these things. I won't pretend I don't want a good life.

But as a Christian, I've been learning slowly to change my perspective. Paul writes in Philippians about counting his achievements, his credentials, his whole success, as loss for the sake of knowing Christ. And here is the extraordinary part: he was writing that letter from jail. Not from a comfortable room with all his problems solved. From prison. And he writes about joy. About peace. About knowing God. That still stops me.

"What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord."— Philippians 3:8

ነገር ግን ይጠቅመኝ የነበረውን ሁሉ አሁን ለክርስቶስ ስል እንደ ጕድለት ቈጥሬዋለሁ። ከዚህም በላይ ለርሱ ብዬ ሁሉን ነገር የተውሁለትን፣ ወደር የሌለውን ጌታዬን ክርስቶስ ኢየሱስን ከማወቅ ታላቅነት ጋራ ሳነጻጽር፣ ሁሉንም ነገር እንደ ጕድለት እቈጥረዋለሁ፤ ለርሱ ስል ሁሉን ዐጥቻለሁ፤ ክርስቶስን አገኝ ዘንድ ሁሉን እንደ ጕድፍ እቈጥራለሁ፤ - ፊልጵስዩስ 3:7-8

For a long time, I believed happiness was somewhere ahead of me. past the next goal, the next version of my life I hadn't built yet.

Not because life was bad. By most measures, it was going well. I had things I'd worked hard for. People I loved. And yet the happiness I'd promised myself the deep, settled, arrived kind still felt like it was waiting somewhere else.

Somewhere along the way, I absorbed a version of happiness that was really just dressed-up dissatisfaction. The "I'll be happy when..." trap. When I buy a nice car. When I get rich. When things calm down. When I finally figure myself out.

The problem is the goalposts never stop moving. You hit one goal and your mind has already quietly set a new one. The arrival never comes because the destination keeps shifting.

_"Rejoice in the Lord always." _— Philippians 4:4

ሁልጊዜ በጌታ ደስ ይበላችሁ፤ ደግሜ እላለሁ ደስ ይበላችሁ! ፊልጵስዩስ 4:4

That word used to slide right past me. Joy, real joy, isn't a reward waiting at the finish line. It's something you can choose right now, in the middle of the mess.

I don't say any of this to be hypocrite. I say it because realizing it was the most freeing thing that ever happened to me.

King Solomon's testimony

I know how it sounds when someone says money doesn't buy happiness especially coming from someone who hasn't had a lot of it. I've even seen the TikTok: someone says money can't buy happiness, and the reply is, "then I'll rent it." It lands because our whole perspective has been shaped by the assumption that more is more.

But then there is King Solomon. God blessed him so extraordinarily that Scripture says no one before him or after him could compare in wealth, in honor, in everything (1 Kings 3:10-14). He had 700 wives, 300 concubines. He built, planted, created. He denied himself nothing his eyes desired.

Ecclesiastes 1:1-3 The words of the Teacher, son of David, king in Jerusalem: “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?

በኢየሩሳሌም የነገሠው፣ የዳዊት ልጅ፣ የሰባኪው ቃል፤“የከንቱ ከንቱ፤” ይላል ሰባኪው፤ “ሁሉም ነገር ከንቱ፣ የከንቱ ከንቱ ነው።” ከፀሓይ በታች ከሚለፋበት ተግባር ሁሉ፣ ሰው ምን ትርፍ ያገኛል? መክብብ 1:1-3

"I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure... Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind."— Ecclesiastes 2:10–11

ዐይኔ የፈለገውን ሁሉ አልከለከልሁትም፤ ለልቤም ምድራዊ ደስታን አልነፈግሁትም፤ ልቤ በሠራሁት ሁሉ ደስ አለው፤ ይህም የድካሜ ሁሉ ዋጋ ነበረ። ሆኖም እጆቼ የሠሩትን ሁሉ፣ ለማግኘትም የደከምሁትን ድካም ሁሉ ሳስብ၊ ሁሉም ከንቱ፣ ነፋስንም እንደ መከተል ነበር፤ ከፀሓይ በታች ምንም ትርፍ አልነበረም። መክብብ 2:10-11

If Solomon at the absolute peak of human wealth and pleasure concluded that it was all meaningless, then what am I expecting to find at a fraction of what he had? I'm nowhere near King Solomon's wealth. So who am I to think the things that couldn't satisfy him will satisfy me?

Don't trust the lie. We waste our lives chasing what the richest man who ever lived already tested and found empty.

The only answer that holds

Everything points to the same place. All the searching, all the questions about purpose and direction and what makes life worth living they all come to an answer, and that answer is Jesus. Who reorients your eyes from flesh things to eternal things. Who is the only one who can make you a gifter of peace and joy while you yourself are in the middle of economic pressure, family pain, or whatever else you're carrying.

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. Not as the world gives do I give to you."— John 14:27 ሰላምን እተውላችኋለሁ፤ ሰላሜን እሰጣችኋለሁ፤ እኔ የምሰጣችሁ ዓለም እንደሚሰጣችሁ አይደለም። ልባችሁ አይጨነቅ፤ አይፍራም። ዮሐንስ 14:27

What Jesus describes is something else entirely a steadiness that doesn't require your circumstances to cooperate. That's what I'd been missing while I was busy running.

What God taught me about happiness

God taught me to be happy through the Provider himself not through the blessings. I have found joy in what I already have. But more surprisingly, God has shown me happiness by not giving me things I was convinced I needed. Things I was certain would make me happy. He withheld them, and in the withholding, taught me something I couldn't have learned any other way.

What I found

I started noticing contentment. It's not the same thing as happiness. Happiness is loud and temporary feeling.

I also found meaning, which turns out to be a far more reliable companion than happiness. Meaning doesn't depend on how you feel in the moment. It shows up in hard things too.

And I found peace not the world's version, but the kind that doesn't require everything to be sorted first.

I still have hard days. I still want things. I'm still a work in progress which I think is true of everyone being honest. But I've stopped measuring my life against an imaginary future version of it.

If you're living right now with all your goals in front of you placing your happiness on people's opinions, on likes, on money, on the life you're building I'm not here to tell you those things are worthless. I'm here to say try the peace of Christ alongside all of it. Open your heart. Pray. You'll see how God takes over and provides in ways that reorder everything.

The happiness I was chasing was never behind the next thing. It was always here, in the mess and the ordinary and the imperfect middle of a life still being lived.

For a long time, I didn't have a way out of that feeling. I just waited for it to pass. It always did but it always came back.

How I started

About nine months ago, when i was at university, I watched a YouTube video about journaling. I don't remember which one. I don't remember the exact day. What I remember is that I opened my notebook which i write bible studies on and just started writing about my day how I spent it, what I felt, what happened.

I fell in love with writing that day. because it cured something in me that nothing else seemed to touch the stress, the overwhelm, the constant background hum of anxiety. When I wrote, it went quiet.

The people who showed me the way

I didn't invent this idea on my own. I was inspired by people who wrote openly and honestly about their lives and thinking. Ali Abdaal talked about writing as a way of thinking out loud. And then there was Dagmawi Babi's blog something about the way he wrote made me feel like I could do it too. That encouraged me to start something of my own.

The fears that almost stopped me

When I thought about writing publicly, my brain had a lot to say about that. Here is the honest list of everything that stood between me and my first blog.

• Why would anyone read my thoughts?
• What will I write? everything has already been said by others.
• What will my family and friends think?
• What if my article is bad?
• What if my grammar is wrong?

Every single one of those fears felt completely real. Some days they still do. But the thing that finally moved me was a shift in perspective I stopped writing for an audience and started writing for myself. And once I did that, I realized something nobody is watching as closely as i think they are. Everyone is too busy living their own life to spend time judging yours.

The first real step came when I started a Telegram channel April 24, 2025. I had found tech communities where people documented their journeys openly, and it inspired me. So I started posting my random thoughts, ideas, memes things from inside my head. The channel was private at first. Then one day, for a reason I dont know I made it public. Some friends congratulated me. Some encouraged me. It was nothing like what I feared. It was the opposite.

What writing actually does for me

1. It processes my thoughts. When something is bothering me, writing about it transforms it. I understand it better after writing than I did before.
2. It makes me self-aware. I can identify what I'm feeling and why.
3. It builds focus. Writing requires you to follow one thought to its end.
4. It documents my life. I can look back and see who I was, what I felt, what I was figuring out.
5. It helps professionally. Writing publicly, even in small ways, teaches you how to communicate ideas, build a voice, and show up consistently.

The tools I use

My first choice has always been a notebook and pen. Less distracting than any device. On my PC I use Notion all blog posts start there before they go anywhere else. I used Day One on my phone to capture moments with photos, and looking back at old entries is something else. even though I barely open it now. And then there is my Telegram channel my go to for posting my random thoughts and good for documenting my journey.

My journaling has never been consistent. There are weeks even months where I don't write a single word. The path is not a straight line. But I always come back, because I always feel the difference when I don't write. That absence is its own kind of answer.

Alright. Let's start from the beginning.

who am I?

I am Robel Abebe. 20 years old, born and raised in Addis Ababa and still very much here. Most people who know me call me Robi and honestly I love that. I dont know why.

I am a self-taught developer who tries to work into everything. Fullstack, mobile, whatever catches my eye and what i wanted to build. I am not really the type to stay in one lane.

how did I get into all this?

During the Covid lockdown, our neighbors got wifi. That might sound like normal but for me it was everything. It was the first time in my life I had unlimited access to the internet. My cousin had gotten me a PC around that time too.

Here is the thing. I genuinely believed I could not become a software developer by teaching myself. Then I found a YouTube video from Evangadi Tech and it was an eyeopener for me. I started coding purely as a hobby.

tho It was not a straight line. School pulled me back and the learning curve went up and down so badly.

Now I am channeling all of that into personal projects and figuring out what I actually want to build in this field.

what really changed me?

If you want to understand me you have to know this. At grade 11, I genuinely encountered God for the first time. Not religion. God. That moment changed my personality, my values and my whole direction. I will share the full story in another blog but it is honestly the reason I am who I am today.

What keeps me going is not willpower or discipline. It is the Grace of God. Not even my love for Him but His love for me. Even on the days I fall short I have seen enough to know that he keeps me moving.

am I one of those perfect students?

Far from it. I was the guy who studied the night before the exam and somehow still pulled decent grades in school. Then university came along and humbled me real fast. Academically it has not gone the way I planned and that has been one of the biggest learning curves of my life so far.

But I have come to believe that failure teaches you things success just cannot(actually i read that on a book Ego is the enemy by Ryan holiday which is one of the best book i read).

what do I do when I am not coding?

YouTube, music, watching football. That is pretty much the rotation. I have been trying to build a reading habit too even though it is still a work in progress if I am being honest. And I have been journaling for the past 9 months which has been surprisingly good for me.

why am I even writing this?

This is not here to teach you something. It is just for sharing who I am (I don't care whether you care or not).

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