I’m 20, close to becoming a Rust compiler team member - what would you do in my place?

Hi everyone,

I don’t usually write posts like this (this is literally my first), but I need to share my story and hear from people more experienced than me.

For the past ~5 months, my life has basically been the Rust compiler. What started as a curiosity - fixing a diagnostic I randomly noticed while writing code - turned into an obsession. Since then I’ve merged ~70 PRs (currently thanks.rust-lang.org shows 88 contributions, in master and beta releases I'm current in top 50 contributors and get to top 360 of all time): stabilizing features, fixing ICEs, improving diagnostics, reorganizing tests, and much more. I’ve even started reviewing smaller PRs, and recently a compiler team lead told me I’m on track for membership in compiler team once I reach the 6 month contribution history (this 6 month gate is just a formality). At 20 years old, that feels surreal, especially since I don’t have formal work experience or an IT degree.

This is, without exaggeration, the most fulfilling thing I’ve ever done. Even if I don’t always see the end users directly, I know that every fix to diagnostics or every bug resolved makes the language better for countless people - and that’s incredibly motivating. I want nothing more than to keep doing this.

But here’s the reality: I’m in Russia, and the financial side is brutal.

* GitHub Sponsors doesn’t work here.

* Grants like the Rust Foundation’s hardship program aren’t an option either (I even reached out and confirmed that they can’t send funds to Russia right now).

* Sponsorships or contracting from abroad are basically blocked.

I’ve also tried applying to a few open source companies that work heavily with Rust, but so far I haven’t been successful. I suspect part of the reason is that my background is almost entirely open-source and compiler-focused, without the kind of “traditional” industry experience that recruiters usually look for.

I feel trapped between choices like:

* Do I step away, take a regular job, and accept that my compiler time will shrink to a side hobby?

* Do I keep grinding, hoping that somehow an opportunity opens up? (I don't really have much time for this in my current situation)

* Or is there some third path that I can’t see because I’m young and inexperienced?

Thanks for reading this far. Rust has given me more than I ever imagined, and I truly don’t want to disappear from the compiler work I care about. I just need to figure out how to make it sustainable.

Github page for those who wonder: https://github.com/Kivooeo/

P.S. I know I’m not entitled to be paid for open source, and I don’t want this to be a pity post. But right now I’m at a point where it’s hard to see a way forward, and I’d really appreciate hearing from people who’ve been through something similar - whether it’s turning OSS contributions into a career, balancing passion projects with survival jobs, or finding unconventional paths. (I guess it could be way easier to make it sustainable if I lived somewhere else than Russia)