As you grow your brain optimizes off fruitless ideas. You think total control of one part will be the ultimate because younger your perspective is narrow and you focus all on it.

When I was in college I thought being a flawless typist would make me a better programmer.. (mind you I had trouble mastering dynamic programming, advanced abstractions or semantic subtleties).

I find these exhausting too now, and actually that's why I'm jaded by tech. The vast majority of things in the late 10 years felt like a planet scale tweak (phone has tilting backgrounds, css animations, ..). Deep inside I knew it was just marketing and nothing substantial.