Really? 15 and already feeling bad about younger producers?
...well sorry to be unpleasant here, but that feeling is gonna get only worse with age. There's always gonna be some kid somewhere with more talent and luck than you have. Always. You have to learn to live with that. Forget about "making it". It might happen and I wish you it will, but chances are it won't. In that case, you better have some other reason to love this hobby. ...so you don't give it up and don't go crazy.

For me, it's when someone actually likes a track I made. It doesn't have to be masses of people. If there is one guy that likes the track. One person the track speaks to, I feel happy.

That's the fun of floating point. It actually really shifts the decimal point to preserve given number as precisely aspossible.

I think what happens in daw when you gain something is, that it tries to multiply the samle value by gain amount. It probably takes those numbers, loads them into SSE vector and sends it to CPU for computing. Modern CPUs have so called FPU coprocessors, which are blocks dedicated just to dealing with floating point operations. Those probably find out how much decimal point shifting is needed and try to preserve the precision while doing so. That's why you didn't end up with quantized stair hills, but neat sinewave at the end. It just shifted decimal point, leaving the "values" themselves almost intact.

Going to sleep is basically non-negotiable by 1am as I have a full-time job.

I do too, and I really wish I was able to force myself into being that reponsible, (bittersweet) lol.

Here's a thought:

If you listen to tracs from 80-90's, they tend to be a bit muddy. Tracks from early 00's start to be less muddy. Today's tracks are in lot of cases really high-end heavy with clear, present, but no so much owepowering bass. I wonder why is this. Only thing I was able to come up with was that mix/master engineers might have always took the "average speaker" as a target. In walkman day, that probably was sh**ty plastic Sony headphones, in 00's I don't know ... Porta Pro's? And today dunno, Apple headphones?

...this hought brought me even further. You see, eventhough that scientific "mix on flattest speakers possible" approach is nice and neat, it doesn't work like that, does it? Flat speakers are hard to enjoy music on (so I heard, lol) and in reality you can't even manufacture a completely flat speaker. Also on majority of monitors, you find little shelf eq at the back, so you can fit it to your needs.

Also, though not while mixing music unfortunately, I've worked with few pairs of Genelecs, Klein & Hummels, Neumans and Yamaha's. ...and though nicely close, they still sound different from each other. That makes me think that somewhere while designing those speakers must be some kind of crucial listening test. Isn't it possible, that there is a little fluctuation going on? That speakers from one decade will have a bit more highend, speakers from another will have a bit more bass? That would explain why music from different time periods sound differently frequency-balance-wise.

Oooh, you're the best!  Thanks!

I don't think it's connected at all, tbh. I've seen successful people who sample without premission and/or use stolen software as well as unsuccessful ones like that. I've also seen unsuccessful people with everything legal and so on. Cold truth is that it's just about talent, courage and luck. Everything else is secondary. Articles like this are just trying to explain that "luck" part to desperate readers.

Let me put a twist on this. I believe THuztle is right. It all starts with your mindset. But it's definitely not so black and white.

Through last 6 years I kinda got used to having very little positivity in life. Got really numb. Nothing really mattered, because I knew if I continue to screw up everything, I'll stay moreless wherever I am now.

Lately though, few really cool musical things happened. Stuff that gets you lock yourself in car, smile like crazy, hit the wheel and almost scream "yessss". ...especially after so much "numb time".

...but then reality stroke back. Same as before. Grey, with not much to be happy about. But now it's different, because I know i CAN have better mindset. But it's not happenning. As always. But this time I care and it kills me. Daily. Which ironically ends with even worse mindset than the numb one...