Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Burnout Is Real

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 239 posts

Re: Burnout Is Real

#111

Post by itsbits »

me_me_me wrote: post #99
itsbits wrote: post #2

I wish I had any other interest apart from programming...

Cooking, baking, wood carving, writing a novel, lockpicking, maybe DIY (learn some plumbing, electician, tiling skills), glass blowing, drawing/painting, instrument... Get basic idea of entry level requirements, spend 20-50 hours practising move on if you don't like it by then. Pick something out of any profession and go at it. I am kind a thinking about shoe making or sawing/clothes making.

To be frank I was always trying to find something within computer. Like animations, illustrator paints which I realized not helping much.

Yea I need to find something which does not have lot of computer.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#112

Post by spicymaki »

mitchbob wrote: post #83
dudus wrote: post #8

I never doubted it was real. But I never really understood what it meant until I was deeply depressed and couldn't get up from bed to go to work anymore. Ended up leaving my job at a FANG and taking a year long sabbatical before rejoining the workforce in a lower/less stressful position for a company not on tech. Sometimes it's still depressing to think o took such a hit in my career. Bit when I remember what I felt…

I gave everything and had nothing left. That's it. Reminds me of the start of Allen Ginsberg's poem America, one of my all-time favorites: America I've given you all and now I'm nothing. America two dollars and twentyseven cents January 17, 1956. [1] [1] https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49305/america-56d22b4...

Wonderful poem. Thanks!

Re: Burnout Is Real

#113

Post by [deleted] »

carlosrg wrote: post #28
matthewh806 wrote: post #7

This seems like a load of bullshit to me. Some LinkedIn Lunatic level crap He starts off by telling us he's burnt out and then jumps immediately to discussing how he turned a hobby into a full time job... Sounds like a cycle. "Its not an ego trip" but I will spend 17 tweets talking about myself

You might need some time off yourself, seeing how an inoffensive Twitter thread made you so mad.

[deleted]

Re: Burnout Is Real

#114

Post by walterlb »

ricardo81 wrote: post #21
itsbits wrote: post #2

I wish I had any other interest apart from programming...

Also a programmer. Stepping away from the desk is often the best thing for me, not for long mind, just to smoke. Astounded by the number of times I have a programming problem and the solution just 'clicks' while I'm away from the screen. FWIW I'm not endorsing smoking, but removing yourself from the screen has benefits IMO. I don't have too many hobbies myself, and TBH love programming and staying on the steep learni…

Former smoker here, and I miss the time to relax/reset, plus the social aspect. Lately I've been taking small breaks to just sit outside, and this has some of the same benefits for me.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#115

Post by mosburger »

pelagic_sky wrote: post #32
fnord77 wrote: post #10

I think burnout is just depression. but what do I know

Ive had both. For me, they are very different. Burnout is not being able to make myself do a job I am completely capable of doing, which I once loved doing, to the point thoughts of self harm start to creep in. Depression is feeling worthless about everything and anything. With depression, I cannot do anything. With burnout, I can easily keep doing things, I just cant do that one thing.

for me they feed each other in a sinister feedback loop... burnout makes me incapable of doing my job, which makes me feel worthless, which makes me feel depressed, which makes me unable to do anything, which makes me more incapable of doing my job, etc.

It's a tough hole to get out of.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#116

Post by awelkie »

xhrpost wrote: post #97
analyst74 wrote: post #9

Personally, I find the biggest reason for burnout is lack of autonomy. The author seems to have found the same.

I feel like autonomy is getting really hard to find in tech. There's just only so many ways you can write a GET route. Then it will get shaped into what it "should" be via PR comments. It makes for good software development, but it just isn't very fun or fullfiling. I miss learning something new and having choice with how to do it, but that doesn't always make for a good product. Sure I can do side projects but I jus…

Alexis de Tocqueville wrote:

"À mesure que le principe de la division du travail reçoit une application plus complète, l’ouvrier devient plus faible, plus borné et plus dépendant. L’art fait des progrès, l’artisan rétrograde."

Or roughly "In a system of division of labor, the work improves but the worker suffers".

I feel like, as an industry, we've settled on a way of working that probably does produce quality software faster and more reliably, but it takes a toll on the engineers.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#117

Post by dudus »

agumonkey wrote: post #95
dudus wrote: post #8

I never doubted it was real. But I never really understood what it meant until I was deeply depressed and couldn't get up from bed to go to work anymore. Ended up leaving my job at a FANG and taking a year long sabbatical before rejoining the workforce in a lower/less stressful position for a company not on tech. Sometimes it's still depressing to think o took such a hit in my career. Bit when I remember what I felt…

Did you handle this alone or did you find some kind of burnout support group ? Restarting does feel super odd, a kind of lossless loss. I guess biology didn't like falls.

I've been on antidepressants daily and doing therapy weekly. The meds and therapy have helped immensely.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#118

Post by aeoleonn »

tluyben2 wrote: post #24
itsbits wrote: post #2

I wish I had any other interest apart from programming...

I didn't have any other interest at all. Programming is the greatest thing; you only need a computer (old/new/don't care) to Create New Things. I never did programming for the money; it accidentally made (a lot) of money. After covid + a horrible project last year, it seems I did kind of burnt out and after thinking almost 40 years that programming is the thing that keeps me happy, I don't like it anymore. Luckily, m…

Personally, I see programming as a mentally challenging pursuit of building & connecting modular things out of puzzle pieces.

Though I am getting bored of web development, I've recently started learning basic computer vision & machine learning and I have found that it new topics have lit a new fire of interest in my brain.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#119

Post by rpmisms »

72mena wrote: post #104
rpmisms wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel that. My wife and I have a rule: if our expenses go over what we could make working in fast food, we sell some stuff.

Would you mind sharing a bit more about that? I like how this rule sounds, but am wondering whether you live in a high-cost area or not. Having two incomes at the level of the fast-food industry seems somewhat limiting, but this depends on where you live and how frugal you are. In other comments I'm also noticing that having a mortgage is part of the need to stay in a high-paying job, so maybe renting can alleviate s…

Sure, I'm in WNY right now, planning to move to Knoxville or Memphis this year. Not super frugal in general, but I save about half my paycheck, wife invests most of hers. We have a house, two cars (only one of them is "nice"), and no kids. We own a house in the suburbs, bought it almost a year ago and have been fixing it up since.

Renting is pound-for-pound far more expensive than owning. We couldn't find an apartment we liked within our budget, so we bought a starter home instead. Owning also lets us recoup value when we sell. Buying an expensive house isn't something we want to do, so there's no need for us to pay $2500 a month for a McMansion with a quarter acre of golf course outside.

Re: Burnout Is Real

#120

Post by culopatin »

I don’t know how to frame this well and I apologize in advance.

But I think this idea of “oh wow burnout is real I’m so woke” is a privileged person problem. I don’t mean that burnout is a first world problem, but that this “Burnout is real” is.

I struggle to put my head in a place where I can be amazed that burnout is real and that I have to warn others of this “thing” as if it’s not part of millions of people’s lives all around. You must have had a really really privileged life to not have seen that someone who couldn’t afford college and took whatever job they could get without a degree has probably been burnt out for a long time. Or that maybe that lady working retail at Marshall’s is burnt out too, but they don’t have a choice. They are not going to be able to take a year off, or go do their hobby. They probably don’t even have money for a hobby.

To tell these people “Guys, guys, burnout is real! I saw it!” gets me to roll my eyes a little.

I understand most readers here are in tech and well paid and perhaps in that same position, but I had to point this out to share some perspective.

Post reply on HN