The first time I sat down in a computer studies class, the lesson was about how to turn the computer on. And, just as importantly, how to turn it off correctly — because back then you couldn’t just walk away and let the computer time-out into sleep mode. Not only that, but there was also an order in which it had to be shut down.
This was the early 1990s. Computer studies had just been introduced to contribute towards the final school certificate/diploma for the first time, and I’d chosen the subject. The decision wasn’t because I had a clear picture of where it was all going, nobody really did at the time, but that essentially computers were going to be everywhere sooner or later. So, I thought it would be something worth knowing.
What followed in those early classes was an education in patience as much as anything else. Learning what an operating system did. Learning what code was. And then, as a kind of proof that we were actually in control of this machine and not the other way around, typing hundreds of lines of code letter by letter, carefully and methodically, just to produce a simple animated animal that looked more like a bunch of monochrome Rubik’s cubes blinking across the screen. No shortcuts. No copy and paste. Line by line and hope you didn’t miss anything.
It felt like possibility. It also felt like the future, even if none of us could have described exactly what that future looked like.
What Came After
If you’re Gen X, you already know the timeline because you lived it.
The early home computers, the Commodore 64, the chunky machines that loaded games from cassette tapes and took several minutes to do it, if they loaded at all. Then the floppy disk, first the large (actual) floppy kind and then the smaller, harder version that wasn’t floppy at all. The desktop computer that arrived in the home and sat on a dedicated desk because it was big enough to need its own space. DOS commands. Windows. The CD-ROM, which felt miraculous. The dial-up modem with that particular sound it made we’ll never forget, and the frustration of waiting for a webpage to load while someone in the house picked up the phone. Yes, a phone plugged into the wall.
Then the mobile phone. The bricks at first that got smaller, then a flip, then a slide, and eventually a glass rectangle that contained more computing power than anything sitting in those early classrooms combined. Laptops – computers that became portable. Email replacing letters. Search engines replacing Encyclopaedia Britannica gathering dust in the garage. Streaming replacing the video shop.
And now, AI that can write, design, edit, research, and generate a year’s worth of content in an afternoon.
Every single one of those transitions required learning. Not optional learning — necessary learning, because the tools kept changing and falling behind wasn’t really an option. Gen X didn’t grow up with any of this. We grew up alongside it, which is a different thing entirely, and we adapted at every turn, largely without tutorials, without YouTube guides, without a choice.
The capability and adaptability are real. We haven’t lost these qualities.
The Part That Stings a Little
Here’s the honest observation, and I’ll speak for myself as much as anyone.
Somewhere in the middle of all that adapting, a whole new economy quietly built itself, and a significant number of us were too busy running the traditional playbook to notice until it was already well underway.
In the last few years, I’ve watched teenagers monetise YouTube channels using AI. Watched young people build simple clothing brands from their bedrooms and sell hoodies to an audience they built on their phones. Watched people in their twenties and thirties generate genuine income from digital products, ecommerce stores, and online education — income that doesn’t require a commute, a manager, or a fixed number of hours traded for a fixed amount of money.
There’s a particular feeling that comes with watching that, if you’re honest about it. Not quite envy, not quite regret — more like the realisation that while you were heads down in the traditional arrangement, sacrificing time for money in the way you were always told was the right way to do it, an entirely different arrangement became available. And you missed the memo.
The traditional playbook isn’t wrong, exactly. It’s just written for a world that’s been changing faster than the playbook has.
What Gen X Actually Has
Here’s the reframe, and I mean it genuinely rather than as consolation.
The young people building income online have energy, easy capability, and a native fluency with the tools. What most of them don’t have yet is thirty years of accumulated knowledge, hard-won professional credibility, the ability to solve complex problems under pressure, and a clear understanding of what matters — as distinct from what merely feels urgent.
That combination of experience and adaptability is not common, and in an online economy that rewards genuine expertise and authentic voice, it’s more valuable than ever.
The question isn’t whether the opportunity exists. It clearly does, and it’s expanding, not contracting. The question is whether you’re willing to learn the new layer of skills required to access it — which, given that you’ve already done exactly that multiple times across the last three decades, is a question with a reasonably obvious answer.
You taught yourself how to operate a machine that turned on with a light switch, not a fingerprint scanner. You navigated every subsequent transition in technology thrown at us. Adding a new set of skills to that history isn’t starting over — it’s continuing a theme of resilience and adaptability that our generation was built on.
The Practical Reality
Multiple sources of income are no longer a luxury or an aspiration — for a growing number of people across the globe, they’re a strategy. Digital products, online education, affiliate partnerships, ecommerce — these are genuine, scalable income streams that don’t require a physical location, a large upfront investment, or anyone’s permission.
Some people are using them to supplement an existing income while they build. Others have replaced their nine to five entirely. Both are possible, and the distance between starting and building something meaningful is shorter than most people assume when they’re standing on the outside looking in.
The tools exist. The platforms exist. The education exists — proper education, from people who have built the ‘laptop lifestyle’, and not just the endless free content designed to keep you watching without getting moving.
We’ve been here before. New technology, unfamiliar landscape, a learning curve that looks steeper than it turns out to be once you’re on it.
The difference this time is that what’s on the other side isn’t just a new skill. It’s a new opportunity entirely — one where your time, your knowledge, and what you build with them can work in your favour for a change.
Where to Start
If this is landing, the next logical step is simply to find out what’s available and whether it fits where you are right now.
That’s what this platform is built around — practical guidance for men who are ready to move forward, not just think about it.
[Launch You — discover what’s possible for people just like you and me →]
Matt Bathie is the founder of Plan Pivot Prosper and the creator of Break the Script — a six-pillar framework for midlife professionals ready to identify the mental patterns holding them back and build something of their own.