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Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

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Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#101

Post by wtd »

ranty wrote: post #29

You've not burned out, you've matured as a programmer. You can see all the crap for what it is so now try and make a difference... Champion the cause of code that's legible - and that doesn't mean covering it in syntactic sugar. Legible code makes it damn obvious what it does and how it does it. Sometime find the "power take off" for a tractor ... that's what you're trying to do. You can also champion the cause of no…

I agree. You need to take it to the next level, and don't just consider software and coding projects. We all love to hate on 'management' in companies of all sizes, but the world would be a better place for all of us if managers had your deep technical expertise. You'll be of more value to the company architecting the solution (or preventing the next $100k screwup), and matching people to the right places, than you were coding.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#102

Post by fidz »

grecy wrote: post #27

I got to the same point a few years back.. so I quit my job, sold all my stuff and drove a $6000 Jeep Wrangler from Alaska to Argentina for 2 years. [1] I've just been back at a desk for 4 years, but am again burnt out so now I quit again, and I'm driving around Africa for 2 years starting in a couple of months. Get out and live, I say! [1] theroadchoseme.com

Pretty cool. Btw, how was your feeling when you spent your money for this? (Given the fact that those are your money you get from your job)

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#103

Post by n0us »

ZenoArrow wrote: post #77
n0us wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The two happiest days in a boat owner's life are the day he/she buys his boat and the day he/she sells it. Trust me, you don't want to build a boat. But I get the sentiment.

I know this is a commonly used meme, but I don't buy it, I know quite a few people who enjoy sailing, including those that own boats.

I love sailing, the meme is that boat upkeep is very difficult and there are many commonly unforeseen costs both monetary and time related.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#104

Post by grecy »

fidz wrote: post #102
grecy wrote: post #27

I got to the same point a few years back.. so I quit my job, sold all my stuff and drove a $6000 Jeep Wrangler from Alaska to Argentina for 2 years. [1] I've just been back at a desk for 4 years, but am again burnt out so now I quit again, and I'm driving around Africa for 2 years starting in a couple of months. Get out and live, I say! [1] theroadchoseme.com

Pretty cool. Btw, how was your feeling when you spent your money for this? (Given the fact that those are your money you get from your job)

I've never been happier to spend money in my life!

I honestly felt like I was spending money to live, rather than to die slowly by going to work.

I spent roughly $1200 a month on the trip [1], and prior to leaving, simply to go to work every day in Calgary I was spending that much monthly. So it really was a great feeling to be spending no more money, but to be really alive every day.

[1] Full breakdown - http://theroadchoseme.com/the-price-of-adventure

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#105

Post by NumberCruncher »

Thanks to HN I discovered the homepage of Derek Sivers [1] and the book "So Good They Can't Ignore You" by Cal Newport [2].

He sais that a great job has to offer you great creativity, impact, and control over what you do and how you do it. IMHO this is why so many people are mesmerised by startups. Anyhow, if you miss one or more of these three traits in your current job than you have to find an other one which fits better to you.

Read the book! I hope it will help you as much as it helped me!

[1] https://sivers.org [2] https://sivers.org/book/SoGood

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#106

Post by taphangum »

pm24601 wrote: post #94

Software is just a tool. A crescent wrench is just a tool. A paintbrush is just a tool. Don't fall in love with a tool, fall in love with using the tool to make the world a better place. If you are not making the world better, then you are missing the whole point.

The best answer.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#107

Post by netheril96 »

godzilla82 wrote: post #74
n0us wrote: post #21

Assuming you have some money saved up, go on amazon, buy some books, anything you really like that isn't tech; philosophy, history, literature, music theory, whatever makes you tick. Find a job far away (figuratively) from a computer screen. Manual labor, crewing on someone's yacht, working at a ranch, being a ski instructor, (preferably not something like fast food). But take some time off. Write code for what you w…

I have no experience and dont fancy myself to be capable of giving life advice, but I think the manual jobs you mentioned "crewing on someone's yacht, working at a ranch, being a ski instructor" are based on some glamor you associate with those jobs. After some time you will come to know the unglamorous aspects of those jobs and you will be back to square one. For example, a few days back I read an article by an airl…

Well, perhaps after he realizes how other jobs are even more boring and tiring, he would suddenly find software engineering enjoyable again?

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#108

Post by cholantesh »

ak39 wrote: post #90
yankoff wrote: post #22

Try diving deeper into real CS, there is the entire world of things that can revive your passion. If you mainly were focused on building CRUD apps and websites it's not surprising to get bored and burned out. Get out of your typical routines and try finding challenging stuff to do. Some ideas: * Figure out how to write AI for games. A simple example would be, how to write a bot that finds shortest path out of labyrin…

An Ode to "CRUD" Apps: There's nothing unexciting or less complicated or challenging about producing good CRUD [sic] applications. I don't understand the industry cynicism towards producing good quality "bread and butter" software for any vertical market. It takes years of experience to learn good (relational) data modeling. It takes years of dedicated attention to assemble tried, tested and efficient user interface…

>architecting reliable and efficient reporting solutions is hardly easy.

A billion times this! In retrospect, it's kind of funny that at my previous engagement, I was doing things which were kind of unusual to me and yet I was feeling bored and depressed. Now I'm back squarely in the CRUD world and learning so much. It's one thing to write applications that perform these tasks, it's a whole other ballgame to make those applications performant, scalable, and a delight to interact with.

Re: Ask HN: I am 30+ and bored with life and the software industry, what do I do?

#110

Post by tuyguntn »

I am not in your situation, younger than you. HNers already advised you with lots of technical things to do in next days/month, my advise would be (if you dont have) get married and have a child, you will be amazed how little child can make you relax after stressed workday.

What you get:

* Family who is waiting for you at home

* Happy weekends

* Rest, visiting places with them and take a rest

and lots of other things, also visit your parents, make them happy, remember about old days and be with them

P.S: I am not native speaker, probably made lots of mistakes and my text sounds like robotic, sorry

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