I got laid off. Then I Noticed the Weeds.

How losing my engineering job led me to discover what really needed building

I sat in the parking lot, a box of my ink-stained notebooks and yellow-highlighted papers in the backseat. An unfinished sketch for a new type of prosthetic arm lay between the pages—smudged and folded. Almost noon. Shadows shortened on the steering wheel. My hands white-knuckled the steel gray wheel. I pinched the bridge of my nose and wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. I punched the car into drive. The entrance vanished as I turned the corner.

On the drive home, I saw the vines ensnaring utility poles. Weeds pushed through pavement and sidewalks like they had been waiting for a chance. Moss covered the retaining walls outside old buildings. They'd always been there, but I never noticed.

Nature doesn’t resist. It waits, finds the cracks, and grows through them.

It always wins.

The “looking for work” message sat on my desktop. Drafted. Ready to publish. But something held me back. Did I really love what I did—or was I wading through it, hoping for something to change? The job title was gone. But the skills weren’t. I still knew how to build. This time, I wouldn’t fight against nature. I’d build with it.

Instead of sending job applications to recruiters, I sent messages to engineers and technical founders struggling to explain their work. The gap wasn't building more but in bridging. Technical brilliance caged by jargon. Innovation suffocated by business ROIs. I spent more time translating ideas into clarity than actual engineering work. The skill sprouted through the cracks.

Job postings became discovery calls. Unemployment became self-employment. Instead of engineering for corporations, I helped technical teams communicate. Fewer layers. Direct impact. A grassroots effort. I wasn’t designing for scale; I was building for significance.

I used to think engineering was about solving big problems. Now I think it's about solving the right ones.

Someone has to close the gap between what we can build and why it matters. That gap?

That's where growth happens.