As of yesterday (20th of March) I’m no longer employed at Canonical. It’s a strange feeling leaving after 6.5 years there.

Being part of that company become part of my identity. I quickly learned how to explain what does company do and got a deep satisfaction when people actually knew Ubuntu.

The biggest influence on my personal life, started and greatly helped by Canonical was a chain of events which brought me to Barcelona. It’s hard for me to imagine myself living there or even deciding for the move if not for freedom and security which my job gave me.

First time I come to Barcelona was because of Canonical and the last all-hands meeting, the last one before the company become too big. During all those years, from time to time, I’ve heard rumors that there will be a next one, but it never happened.

That first visit planted in me something, which after about two years, turned into...

Photo by Tim RT

I’m always amazed, when after setting out to travel to a distant place I actually arrive there, and in most of cases, at the expected time.

It’s not that I feel especially inept to handle travel or any mishaps on the way, nor because I just thrown myself at the mercy of lady luck never planning anything. On the contrary, I do plan and I almost always know exactly where and when I should be next.

Admittedly, sometimes I do tempt my fortune with only rough estimates. An example of which is getting on time at the airport. The amount of time I prepare for it is (almost) always correct. And even if, on the way, it turns out that I have left myself too little time, I was able to course correct on the way.

Only case of being late for plane, by 10 minutes, was quickly solved by paying little bit for a next flight and caused only slight anxiety. In the end I arrived at my...

When I think about a topic in my head, when I ponder it for some time, it’s always so clear, so well defined. All the major points for and against are obvious. The picture is lucid and it seems it would be just a matter of sitting at the keyboard and pouring all of it on the virtual paper.

But when I actually sit and try to write, words are not coming. The previously clear thoughts start to get fuzzy. My mind fights back any attempts to extract previous thinking out of it into something which can be communicated to others.

It’s not limited to writing. In conversations with my friends, it’s the same problem.

At that point I start to doubt if I have some thinking problem, if my day to day thoughts are not focused enough, and the fact that I perceive them so clearly is just an illusion. I start to think that I lack some kind of discipline to turn my swirling thoughts into an effective...