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Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

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Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#41
post #15

Now, whenever I’m coding, it just feels like an enormous effort to get anything done. Perhaps it always was, but in the past you were brute-forcing the solution to the problem by throwing more hours at it and now you're not.

No, there definitely is a difference. It is so large that one doesn't have to measure it. But if you were to measure it then it would be something like 5-10x reduction in focus time available per day/week. You cannot possibly compensate for that by spending more time on work/projects.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#42
Thank You for sharing.

I had the really same experience (except only 13 years in). What I found helpful is having autonomy over the project. Having the autonomy allows me to achieve better results with less effort. Maybe that is something that could help you as well.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#45
Yes, I have. I quit my job and worked on my own project for a while.

You have to be doing something you are interested in, and have full control over, so you can rediscover what programming used to be like for you.

Take things slowly, and your capacity for work and motivation will increase over time. In the beginning you will still have days where you can’t bring yourself to work, but just allow yourself those days, and eventually you will recover.

There is a section on burnout in this talk that I found helpful: https://youtu.be/CCVVLAs9mJU

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#47
post #36
post #30

Take long holidays. 6 months minimum traveling around. if you have a family, or a tight mortgage - I'm sorry for you. As I don't have a straight answer. but 6 months away from keyboard is a strict minimum. It worked for me every time.

> It worked for me every time. How many times? I am trying to cope with the recurrent nature of burnout.

If burnout is recurring, might I suggest therapy to figure out why you keep burning out.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#48
I'm still pretty young so this might not apply, but I tried to skip university and make it as a freelancer. Worked out fine money wise, but got severe burn out working on a project that I shouldn't have taken on in the first place, but needed the money.

I recovered fine, but it was pretty brutal. For a while I couldn't even look at code without getting nauseous and a having a splitting headache. I'm not exaggerating here, it was like I had lost the ability to comprehend code at all. Code was just meaningless symbols randomly arranged without any rhyme or reason.

What helped eventually is about ~6 Months of completely distancing myself from Programming. No programming for work, no programming for fun, not keeping up with current developments, nothing. I was fortunate enough to be able to afford this, but I truly believe that a 6 month long hard brain reset was needed. Wouldn't have worked in 3 months. Other comments here echo a similar sentiment and you'll find other blog posts and personal experiences on the internet with the same conclusion.

On the upside, coming back after 6 months and discovering that I stopped getting physically ill trying to code was an amazing moment. I fell in love with programming all over again. Only this time I learned to listen to my body and started prioritizing health and happiness over a steep career and financial success.

Honestly I don't think many people would be impressed by my professional output (especially not on this site), but I can honestly say that I've never loved it as much as I do now and I can rest easy knowing that it's sustainable and doesn't negatively impact my mental health.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#49
I burned out like 15 years ago.

I was lucky that I had money to quit working completely for about a year and go backpacking.

When I started again, I did so in a different company but in the same field.

The biggest change I made and which I think was key to find a balance was to enforce boundaries.

Before I had a job that had lots of midnight on-call wake ups and no set hours.

In the new place I forced myself to show up at the office at 9am so I could walk out at 5pm without anyone having anything to grumble about. This was not the norm in the company but as I started doing that from day one, it was accepted.

Whenever anyone asked me to stay late I referred them to my manager for them to approve paid overtime. Most of the time the discussion stopped there, but there were a few times when they decided to pay.

It's incredible how much time for yourself and friends-family is left over when you clock-off at 5pm always.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone managed to find enjoyment in their work after burnout?

#50

I am inclined to say that burnout is so widespread because we are managing engineers badly. Try to manage artist, designer, song writer, actor, or stand up comedian and they will burn out as well.

Give more OKRs and JIRAs for the song writers...

Schedule regular one on one with an actor!

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