Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#51

Post by jaquers » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:37 PM UTC

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #34

Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. It sucks, I don't wish it on anyone. Highly recommend taking some significant time off. Like, off , off, not "I'm behind at work and behind on my hobby projects and behind on home maintenance and behind on my personal exercise goals, gonna take 24 personal hours Mon-Weds next week, I should be able to renovate my guest bath in that time, it's needed work for 3 years". During th…

> Later, it optimizes the process to reward you earlier for just planning to do the thing - sketching, architecting, dreaming, writing task lists. Eventually, it gives you the same "I'm really proud of that accomplishment" reward for just watching someone on Youtube do it (you don't even have to look at all the off-camera drudge work).

I'm deep in the depths like OP and I can relate to this, like, a lot. Do you know of any literature or 'what to google for' regarding this sentiment/behavior?

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#52

Post by LordFast » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:37 PM UTC

Do whatever you feel like doing, or not doing.

I completely understand the background anxiety about not being in gear and moving towards something, but you don't control life. None of us do, and you're gonna be just fine.

Accept that there's nothing interesting right now, and just do whatever and go with the flow.

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#53

Post by joshxyz » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:38 PM UTC

Hmmm sir are you trying to be productive or trying to have a good time, it looks to me that your attachment to the outcome (of accomplishing xyz something) is hindering you in enjoying coding.

If its painting, you decide beforehand if its a commissioned work or not, and if not who the fuck cares if you finish it on 10 years because you keep getting distracted on your damn strokes and your dogs keep chewing your brush handles.

You may not finish that noncommissioned painting at all, but i guess cherishing each and every stroke of your brush and those moments with your dog is what matters.

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#54

Post by dageshi » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:42 PM UTC

I used to be a "grand project dreamer", believe me I know the feeling.

The feeling of reluctance I think is from your subconscious questioning whether half the stuff you think you need is actually required and then you're stuck wondering what exactly you do need whether you realise it or not.

I've found it much easier to avoid "architecting" and instead within a project pick 4-5 different starting points and try to incrementally move them along in parallel, that could mean doing a minor tweak in one section or building something more substantial in another.

This lets you gradually incrementally build things and when you get stuck you can move onto another area and give yourself some time to think about it, you don't end up giving up because you're only working on one thing and that one thing has to be done before the next thing and if you can't figure it out you'll never make any progress and arghhh!!

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#55

Post by casi » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:43 PM UTC

There is a reason people say “solve your own problems”. It’s a great motivation. You can’t put off real problems because they get bigger. You have to be the one who solves it, and you’ll solve it in the simplest, laziest way so you can get on with your “projects”. We often solve problems without even realising it and those are successful, creative, useful applications to share with others.

You can just watch tv, that’s ok. Maybe you’ll realise there’s an annoying sound the tv makes at 4 o’clock when it’s raining and it annoys you so much you investigate it and discover something we didn’t know about signal processing. Maybe you’ll jam your window open with a shoe so you can have a cool breeze whilst gaming and then discover a whole business in window jamming.

Count your unfinished projects as a great source of experience points for the next event in life.

And if you really want to “do” something then try make the dumbest, most useless, incomplete, consumption led piece of software you can. Prove that image of yourself to the rest of us. Make the most broken software ever written. I’d love to see it.

Need little, want less, forget the rules, be untroubled.

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#56

Post by croh » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:45 PM UTC

Argish wrote: post #9

cultus wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of sounds like depression or anxiety, which most everyone has to some extent now. Loss of interest in normal activities is a key symptom. I've heard that mental health professionals are still trying to figure out how much to pathologize the very bad but mostly normal responses people are having to 2020. Everyone that's having issues should talk to their doctor and/or see a therapist. They know what they are…

You can also buy a motorcycle. It's cheaper that therapists in the long term.

Riding motorcycle is kinda meditative atleast for me. I can ride hours (with slow speed). I don't plan trips ahead, just start with map and keep exploring green areas. On ride, I love to observe everything without involving also I like to feel my bike and listening its engine.

I guess gist is, do something you enjoy for hours without any goals or any pressure. It should make you tired at end of day. And then you will start feeling good.

In covid-era, luckily I picked up cooking as hobby and survived.

God, they should make a work week of 4 days. I am really jealous of europeans (spicifically scandinavian countries ) where work-life balance is highly prioritized

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#57

Post by sixdimensional » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:49 PM UTC

Hi the_only_law,

I don't want to suggest that what I have observed is scientific truth. Lately, I have been going to therapy regularly to try to work things out. I think it's helping, it certainly isn't hurting, to have a carved out time with somebody neutral to just think and talk.

Within that sentence is a pattern I have noticed in my life at least. I went through depressive periods a few times in my life for different reasons (and sometimes seemingly no reason). Divorce, losing a job and unexpected unemployment for a longer time frame, etc.

This created gaps in my career life, and each time I had a gap, there was carryover effect from the event that triggered it, which I needed to get through. The first few times it happened, I didn't realize that I actually needed the gap, to have time to process. I didn't realize that my brain, although depressed, well... it almost felt like it was doing what it was doing on purpose. Almost like, to force me to rest and sleep and sort of stagger aimlessly through the world for a while.

Only one time when this happened, before I was getting therapy, I saw that things were going sideways again and I was going to have a gap. This time, I prepared myself for it by telling myself that, if I was aimless, bored, did nothing, etc that it was OK. That I would allow myself to do that for a reasonable period of time until I started to feel better, and then after that I could do whatever I wanted.

I guess what I'm saying is, I let it happen consciously and gave myself time. I let that time be carved out to take a break.

After about 6 months went by, I am not sure what exactly changed, but something changed and I just started feeling better. It wasn't any one specific thing, but I was sitting there and started to get the natural inclination to just go start toying around again, this time even with some different and new subject areas, learning some new stuff and soon enough that transitioned into maybe starting my own business.

I was so excited and had begun the process, when, about two weeks into doing it, a job offer I knew nothing about appeared. I took a hard left turn and took the job because it sounded interesting, and my story continued.

I want to reintroduce the world to the word sabbatical [1] - rest from work. Carving out time, or taking advantage of the gaps. Rest with intent.

Depression is real. When life takes a toll there are chemical changes in the brain. Therapy and medication could be necessary and so if you need help, the advice is always to seek professional help. Don't suffer alone if you need help.

If, like me, you find a way to process it safely on your own, as I did in the last 6 month gap, you may find your way through.

If it is of any help, think on what a sabbatical is and if you can swing it, try it. It does not mean you must do nothing at all, take a break, learn something if you like, but don't push yourself to do anything that feels like "work".

I genuinely believe and have even considered starting some kind of non-profit support organization to help people learn about, organize and implement a sabbatical. I may still do it, after realizing that this is an area where we are really suffering as humans and where we need support.

Best wishes on your journey, be safe, and good luck.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabbatical

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#58

Post by severak_cz » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:53 PM UTC

I had exactly the same problem. My job is basically same CRUD over and over, sometimes spiked with some legacy-code-wtf-moments.

Then I got slowly into eletronic music and one day I got idea I could code my own VST instruments. This opened whole new chapter of software development for me.

My advice is - do something very different in your pasttime. I still don't find web development to be interesting field. But weirdly enough, I started some small webs for myself (social network, POS) and I find rewsults useful and interesting.

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#59

Post by KineticLensman » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:53 PM UTC

AlwaysRock wrote: post #47

Rooster61 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was just about to type this. I've noticed as I get older both literally and career wise, I enjoy guiding where the code goes and letting more jr members work towards those goals while helping to improve their programming/soft eng practices. It's very rewarding.

God bless you. When a senior engineer is willing to help us early career folks it really helps.

Something I learned during my career is that if you support and mentor the competent driven youngsters, the good ones will look out for you when they pass you on the career ladder. Rather then treading on your fingers.

Re: Ask HN: Losing all interest in programming, what now?

#60

Post by dkarl » Thu, Dec 10, 2020, 3:57 PM UTC

I think you're dealing with more than one thing here, including maybe some unrealistic expectations. It's hard to have a hobby that is the same as your profession. A hobby often needs to function as a relief from the pressures and annoying bullshit of work, and an outlet for pent-up creative energy. When programming starts to feel like pressure and bullshit at work, programming at home will make you feel like there's no escape. When there's no pent-up creative energy, and you keep trying to squeeze some out, it will make you feel inadequate and unworthy.

It also sounds like one aspect of programming you enjoy is the ego gratification. Unfortunately, this is very hard to manage as you become more experienced and more sophisticated. It is easy for your standards to go up and impossible for your increase in capacity to keep up. Early in your career, you can learn something really cool and put it into practice right away, because you are learning small things. As you develop, your knowledge compounds and accelerates, and you start to realize that there are big, cool projects that you could implement in their entirety with high confidence. It's kind of a curse, to be able to look at a complex web app, or a 3d game, and know that you could implement the entire thing, top to bottom, in a way that would be perfectly tailored to your desires and would arm you with a bunch of really cool skills, except it would take you years of hard work. Something like that only works as a hobby if you enjoy the process. If you're only in it for the results, get ready to exercise an extreme amount of patience and humility... and that doesn't sound like it makes for a very fun hobby, either.

As for what you should do now, I think that for a while you should put your productive energy into your career. Forget about hobbies, just play video games or rewatch old movies or whatever the hell you feel like doing when you're tired and lazy. Accept the challenge of being the best you can at your job. Turn it into a game. Let winning this game be your creative, productive output. It's okay. You don't have to be doing something elevated or glamorous at every single point in your life. Obsessing about where the present moment will lead you is a recipe for depression and stagnation. Sometimes it's more important to be engaged in what you're doing than to think about how cool it is or where it will lead.