Is it part of the simulation that I have discovered that I was living in a simulation? If I have decided that I want to stray off from the simulation, how would I know I am just playing part of the simulation to live differently?
While it's very difficult at the moment to work on the app itself, I decided to just extract the search component to be reused elsewhere so I've started building Omnibar (https://github.com/vutran/omnibar).
My most popular one has to be an Alfred alternative I made back when I had to use both Windows/Mac for work. It was actually my first full Electron/React application so it may have been over-engineered like most side projects.
The original poster asked for recommendations in a particular language. If your recommendation is to learn a different language, it is irrelevant. What may not work for you, may work well for others.
There's many ways to do this, both offline and online. Attend local meetups and network and meet new people. The experiences you gain from meeting new people will eventually pay off either with a new job or transfer of knowledge which is invaluable.
You can also try contributing more to open source projects. Pick a project of your interest and just see where you can contribute. Employers love to see those who gives back to the community. For more on this, I recently wrote a quick piece that can hopefully inspire you and others who are interested in contributing to open source (https://medium.com/@tranvu/path-to-open-source-bec824af077d)
If you're specifically seeking for more freelance clients, one of the best way is to ask your people who you have worked with in the past. The majority of the consulting work I do stems from referrals. If you lack a network of connections, you can try some freelance gig sites such as Upwork.
I start projects very often and find myself using my scaffolding [tool](https://github.com/vutran/zel) for minimal dotfiles (which are downloaded from a repo) very often.
Also use it a lot for syncing dotfiles in my user directory between my work and home computers.
Slack accounts are separate for each team you join. A lot of people join a handful of public and private teams. This means we have to create an account each time?
I've been working on my Electron-powered desktop launcher (Alfred alternative) for the past year or so on and off. The idea is to eventually enable compatibility with existing Alfred workflows and also provide a rich DX for creating themes/plugins via the CLI tool that comes along with it.
Save for taxes. You can choose to pay quarterly to make it easier than paying a giant lump sum at the end of the yeaar Also, look into contributing to a SEP IRA (ask your accountant for more info).
Ask your ex-colleagues and coworkers for referrals. Many times my referrals are basically working as a consultant for past coworkers and their new companies.
Don't always work for the money. Give yourself some time to learn new stuff otherwise, you'll burn out and end up treating it like a regular job.
I would imagine for someone who is to come back to an old job, the staffing or team may have changed as well. There's a really high chance that your ex-coworkers may have left as well. I never gone back to a previous job but I do keep in touch with previous bosses/project managers/ex-coworkers in which lead to them hiring me as a consultant for a different company.
Same thing happened to me. I was eating Sunchips and then logged into Facebook to see an advertisement for Sunchips. Wouldn't be surprised that they're also watching us.