Broke joke

Expanding on that. Life is all about $$$. There’s a lot of bullshit on here about enjoying your life and all that. The reality is your worth is what cash you bring to the table - in business and in relationships. So be thankful you are in a hot industry and leetcode your way to some serious money.

Money is by definition a medium of exchange. If you don't have actual goals for what you want to exchange it for, it's pointless, pretty much by definition. Return on life satisfaction per income trails off at a ridiculously low number, like $80k, because beyond that you've removed all of the financial stressors on your life and are on average just running on a hedonistic treadmill of lifestyle inflation in which you are actively sabotaging your own wellbeing by following some primitive apelike impulse to recursively chase status that doesn't have any utility unless you have actual nontrivial goals for what to use it for. Plus you're never going to get actual "serious money" from being an engineer. At best you'll stack like $10M, maybe 25 if you're both the absolute shit and financially responsible, and you'll still be an irrelevant pawn in the real world at large, unless you bring a serious innovation to the world in a way where you directly capture value, which isn't a road you travel by showing people how good you are at whiteboarding. That said, getting your capital gains above your expenses is the only way to actually be free and is perfectly obtainable, so might as well grind leetcode, get rid of any financial worries and stack money for that.

It's mainly bills, gas and other necessary expenses though. I legit don't have much money for myself.

Housing is usually the biggest expense. Perhaps you could downsize, or if you live in an urban area, get rid of car, which cuts all gas/car payment/insurance/maintenance costs.