You know how airlines offer $5 death insurance in case your plane crashes—something you would laugh at and never buy because – honestly – what are the odds? Except this time, against all odds, my plane actually crashed.
I graduated from Yale in May and was looking forward to joining one of the fastest growing AI companies. I started recruiting early on before senior year because the sense of security allowed me to explore other things. I thought that it would buy me some time while I tinker with my side projects.
Senior year of college was perhaps the best year of my life. I lived life to the fullest, building fun projects and choreographing contemporary dance pieces, knowing that I don’t need to worry about recruiting since I have the offer in my pocket. Scale AI gave me an offer in October 2024 and after rounds of negotiation, I signed the offer with them on November 23, 2024, the morning before I left New Haven for the Harvard-Yale game at Boston. I turned down my competing offers and stopped recruiting since then. I could have continued to recruit, but I wasn’t trying to collect all the offers in the world. Scale was the perfect fit for me. I knew that I want to work in a fast-paced, high-growth environment with ambitious entrepreneurs to build the future. Location was really important to me too. Having done international internships, I know that my heart belongs to NY (or SF). I am a gladiator, and NY is Rome. The offer came with the option to choose either city. I spent weeks thinking about it. I love both cities and it was a really tough decision. I eventually chose NYC because I wanted to live with my Yale friends. We spent months looking for an apartment together and landed on a high-rise unit overlooking the Hudson River. We were very lucky and look forward to hanging out.
Around late June, Meta invested $14.3 billion in Scale AI, taking a 49% stake in the company. I was disappointed that Alex Wang left as a part of the deal. I think he is a great CEO. I didn’t foresee any problem with this. Scale was still hiring very aggressively at the time.
A company is never the same after a major event. On July 17th, I woke up to the news that Scale laid off 14% of the company. Jason Droege, CEO of Scale AI, explained that "we ramped up our GenAI capacity too quickly over the past year". The Gen AI business sector took the biggest hit in this corporate restructuring. My guess is that many companies stopped doing business with Scale for the fear that Meta will have access to their private data. I was a bit worried so I texted my Scale manager that day. He said that everything was fine. I was relieved and looked forward to seeing him soon.
A day later, at 12:19 PM PST, I received an email with the subject line Update on your role at Scale.
Oh no, I thought to myself.
I panicked. I immediately opened Discord to text the incoming cohort. Our offers were all rescinded. I DMed a few colleagues. We were all going insane.
You know that feeling when your world suddenly falls apart and you can’t believe it’s real? The reality took a few hours to sink in.
Scale being sold to Meta wasn’t all that surprising but what were the chances that Meta wanted to buy Scale NOW AND the company would undergo corporate restructuring AND specifically the Gen AI business would be hit the hardest AND Gen AI just happens to be my team AND it is all happening at this time right before I join? There are so many and’s, or unions, in this set that I thought the probability was miniscule.
I avoided my parents because I couldn't tell them. I hadn’t sat down at the dinner table with them for days for the fear that I would have to tell them. I didn’t want my worry to become theirs. The first person I reached out to was my mentor at Sequoia Capital, who was incredibly helpful and reassured me that I would be ok, even though I really couldn’t believe him that I would be at the time. In moments when the ground feels like it’s shifting, having even one steady voice can make a difference. Someone who lends you their conviction until you can find your own again.
That night, I went out for a drive. I needed to get out of the house. I put the car on autopilot to drive itself to a random park nearby. In the car, I couldn’t hold back my tears. I cried because I was so scared. I didn’t know what to do. I could barely see the road. The GPS of my life was gone, and I had to chart the path myself. Part of my fear was the uncertainty, another part was financial obligation. Burning savings is a scary thing. I really don’t want to do that. Scale’s compensation was very competitive. Without Scale, I could no longer afford my apartment rent. I missed the hiring pipeline for so many other opportunities I would have applied to if I hadn’t signed with Scale. I stopped recruiting seriously and didn’t even bother applying to roles I desperately want now. I also turned down multiple offers for Scale that I couldn’t go back to.
It was too late. What should I do?
“When you find yourself trapped in a swamp… you must get out before you hit the bottom.” – Vincenzo
Maybe it was time to take the leap to be a founder. I have always wanted to be a founder, to build a product that people love, to change the way we think and work. Suddenly, there was nothing holding me back. There were no classes that I had to spend time on, no exams to prepare for, no club meetings to attend. I could finally delve deep into one of my side projects. But when this option was here, and I actually had to make the leap, it felt so scary. Am I really going to go full time on my not profitable apps that I was just making for fun? I am just a generalist. I’ve never been afraid of anything, but for the first time in a long while, I felt fear. It was like that split second before a roller coaster plunges — the exhilarating rush of anticipation turning into panic. But roller coasters are fun because you know you’ll be fine. I didn’t feel like I will be fine.
I called a friend and explained my situation.
“What’s your upside, what’s your downside, and what’s your runway?”
I thought about it, and frankly, I didn’t have too much downside. My runway was long enough that I wasn’t going to starve tomorrow. Most of my fears were just illusions. And besides, I’ve always approached life like an optimization problem.
For most of my life, I wanted to be a robot. I used the laws of physics to perfect myself. If the faster an object moves, the slower time moves for it, then maybe I could slow down time by moving faster. I put this theory into practice: thinking fast, moving fast, reacting fast. To squeeze more productivity out of every minute, I paired tasks that used different parts of the brain, drank nootropics, chased “Silicon Valley elixirs,” and was a fan of premium water even before Saratoga became a meme.
But I’m not a robot. I’m not perfect. And for the first time, I’m okay with that.
For years, I treated emotions like bugs in my operating system. I measured my worth in output, in how many things I could do in the smallest unit of time. Losing the job offer forced me to slow down, to feel things I outpaced.
So many students are obsessed with hyper-productivity because we’ve been raised in an environment where every minute feels like it has to count toward something measurable. We grew up in a gamified world — grades, rankings, competitions, internships — where output was the scoreboard. For me, it wasn’t just external pressure. I genuinely loved optimizing. That mindset worked — for a while. It got me into Yale, landed me prestigious internships, and set me up for a smooth launch. But all of a sudden, my momentum slammed into a wall. I was disoriented. The cost of running life on a treadmill is that we’re built for constant motion — and when the system crashes, we have no idea how to reboot.
I’ve stepped off the conveyor belt. From here on out, there’s no autopilot. I have to take the wheel myself and be ready to pivot. It’s a strange feeling, liberating and unnerving all at once, because every decision from here on out is mine, and so are the consequences. I don't know exactly what I’ll do next, but I’ve handled enough unexpected turns to know I can navigate the next one.