Definitely agree. If you're thinking that you're missing out on life then make the change, go down a tangential path. Do not go through life bitching & whining that you didn't make the most of an opportunity.
Take the sabbatical and go to Europe for 6 months. If it turns out to not be what you expected, so what, you've learned something and grown.
There will always be someone who does something better than you, regardless of whether it is related to programming or not. Some people have more of an aptitude for a particular skill than you but that doesn't mean you're a failure, nor is it something to get depressed about. Rather than dwell on the knowledge that someone is better than you at something you enjoy, use it inspire & motivate yourself to improving your own ability.
Interesting article, but annoyed that it doesn't feature Norway in the country comparison. The Norwegian start-up market may be small, but it is growing.
When I was 7 my parents gave me a Commodore VIC-20 and after tiring of playing games, I wanted to make my own. Started out with copying game listings out of magazines in basic, then moved on to assembly, pascal, and then C.
Fast forward 30-ish years and I've been a developer for over 20 years coding games to enterprise applications and everything in-between.
To me its more a calling rather than a concious choice to be a programmer, like joining the seminary. now I spend my time mentoring younger developers and tinkering with new languages and things.
Similar path: I'm 30-ish as well and we had a C-64. Starting playing with it when I was 4 or 5, copying code out of code books before I could even really read. Also making lots of simple programs that would flash colors and fill the screen with "I AM AWESOME!".
The university of Liverpool has a number of decent online programmes in cooperation with laureate international.
I'm currently on the MSc Web sciences & Big Data programme.
I was in Dublin for the last summit and I have to say that it was a great experience. Highly recommend it. Also node conf europe is interesting http://nodeconfeu.com/#welcome