I've been thinking about this a lot since I first heard this story about Feynman. I've been in this industry now for 25 years and there have been three times when I wanted to quit. During the first two, in the back of my mind I still knew I wasn't going to and shouldn't. I'm working in an industry doing what I wanted to do since I was ten years old.
The third came this time last year. I had lost a parent (not to due to COVID), my business had failed (also not due to COVID), and then COVID hit so my prospects seemed low for employment. I found a contract with someone who turned out to be easily one of the most unethical people I had ever worked with.
Little of this had to do with technology but, compounded, I found myself in such a deep state of burnout that the thought of picking up my computer made me sick. I genuinely didn't want to work in technology anymore once that contract had ended. I was trying to decide whether I wanted to go back to school for something else or try to get on at Costco. The problem with going back to school is, I couldn't really pinpoint anything I wanted to study so I had all but made my mind up that when things opened back up I was going to put my application in at Costco. Hard work for lower pay but I have more respect for Costco than I do for a lot of companies in my industry. At least Costco solves a real problem and is beloved by their customers. They're not pretending to be innocent to fomenting sedition while making a buck off of abusing peoples privacy.
Fast-forward to around December and I had found employment back in tech. This company provides a quality service that directly benefits real people. I had quite earnestly tried to avoid it, though. It will go down as the oddest interview I've ever had because I was basically trying to talk them out of hiring me but to their great credit, they did anyway. Due to the nature of the job, I have a lot of leeway in deciding how to solve problems since I'm responsible for all of the code. I needed a simple log server for the various scripts that were running. I looked at all the Open Source options and found they offered way more than I needed so I decided to write my own. Almost all of the code I work with is PHP so I started writing it in that.
One Friday night after work I thought, "Hm, I wonder how hard it would be to port this to Clojure?" I had a little experience with Clojure from a contract I worked on a year prior while trying to bring some much needed cash into my business at the time. I could see the power and beauty in it but, still, coming from languages that descended from C, the syntax was foreign enough that it was tough going at first. I suspect that contract ended because they didn't think I was picking it up fast enough for their needs. I don't blame them.
Anyway, I found that I had actually picked up enough Clojure during that contract that my fingers started flying across the keyboard porting my log server. It was... so - much - fun! I was playing with programming again! I was exploring and learning and, importantly, being productive and solving a real problem.
Now, let's not kid ourselves, this log server isn't some sexy blockchain-containerized-whatever. It isn't a product that is ever going to be sold for millions of dollars. It isn't going to change the world or disrupt any industries. It is very simple and pretty much only helps me and one other person at the company. You know what? That's really great to me.
I've learned a lot over the years about burnout but they were really reinforced in a big way last year. It's important to step away from the computer and you need to do so frequently. We get weekends and vacations for a reason. Use them! Get outside when you can. Get some exercise in whatever ways you enjoy most. Eat good, healthy food with people you enjoy being around. (social distancing notwithstanding) Have a hobby that is not related to your job. I love technology and playing with it can be fun like a hobby but the fact is that it's not because my livelihood depends on it.
So far, 4-5 months later, that log server written in Clojure is still cranking away dutifully. I get a little smile each day when I check the latest logs to see if anything needs my attention.