Any hope for an ex doctor to get into coding? I find it a lot more fun and interesting than my old job but damn, the learning curve is steep. And the competition is fierce. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks ;)
I consistently have this dilemma. Initially, I was contributing more than required. Then when OT was denied, I continue to learn new frameworks. As it turns out, I have gotten so good at my job, the bottle neck has pushed to other people. I ended up just doing less during business hours.🤷🏻♂️ go figure. TC 120k, atlanta area. Put in only 8 hrs a day.
Preach brother! I've been fortunate to be in a senior position with influence over hiring decisions, you don't know how many candidates try to push how "passionate" they are about about coding but then show that they have no hobbies because they've been told that coding is the be-all end-all. Last guy we hired ended up leaving due to burnout after 6 months (a recent college graduate), even after I told him to clock out after eight hours. Turns out he would just go back to his apartment and code into the late hours of the night, then show up on little to no sleep. He would always tell me that the "successful" devs (i.e. influencers) had to live and breathe code. At first I thought it was humorous as most of the guys he listened to were RUclipsrs who probably gave up that life to make content full time, but then I saw just how damaging it was to new college graduates and people making a shift into development. Take time off, have other hobbies outside of coding. If your job believes you need to be coding 12-16 hours a day, probably time to start brushing up on your resume to find a better opportunity for work-life balance.
Good programmers do not sit at a computer 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Work-life balance and a healthy lifestyle is more beneficial to long-term career satisfaction and enjoying life. Dorian is the only person in this RUclips niche who understands and says the truth.
@@dagothodros641 your just getting used, either your really bad and you have to waste 2x,3x more time to finish yo tasks or your mentally challenged, the more you submit like a rat the more your going to be used
I code as a hobby. I have my construction job where I work 50-60 hours a week then I go home and write another 100 lines to add to what I did the day before. I do it to learn the languages rather than actually make something. I like to be able to read the source and understand whats going on. My off time is taking care of my son.
I've been working as a fullstack dev for 8 years now. In theory, I should start my shift at 12 and finish at 8PM, but in practice, I do absolutely nothing productive during that period. I only start coding when I feel like it, usually around 10PM - 2AM. On some days I don't work at all, on others I'm entranced and do it for 16 hours. The most important thing is not to force yourself - start working only when you want to. It should be a pleasurable activity, not something that you have to do no matter what. I realise that I'm privileged to have a job that allows it, and I sincerely hope that you - the reader - will also manage to find one like it. Avoid big corporations, shoot for smaller companies where everyone knows each other, or think about freelancing.
3:57 THANK. YOU. Literally the first person I've ever heard say it. I'm a full-time programmer and I've been asked on multiple occasions to research programming things outside of my working hours, which I never have because unless I feel personally motivated to do it, I'm not going to do it if I'm not being paid. I even got in trouble once for learning about tech I was asked to learn about by my boss because I did it during work hours. Learning for work is work, so why should I do it for free on my personal time? I am also expected to be coding non-stop for the entire workday without breaks, except lunch. My boss has literally counted the number of lines I write and demanded an explanation if it seemed like I didn't write enough lines for the given time period
There was one job I worked awhile back, where I did put in late hours, trying to make a good impression to the company and whatnot, aiming for a raise... I did get a raise, but it was nowhere near what I was hoping. It wasn't worth the time and effort I put in, and that thankfully soured me on the idea of putting in crazy hours on a salaried programming job. Since then, I've been pretty good about tracking my own time, calling out when things are going off the rails, and while there are exceptions (e.g. business trips), I generally stick to around 40 hours a week. I'm not a pain about it, and I might go over here or there, but I'll also go under here or there. I'm flexible where I need to be, but I also care for my time and the sacrifices that I *and my family* make when I need to work long hours, and that needs to be respected. Especially when you're on salary, even if your company puts in the lip service to "work time balance", it's you who needs to own it. I do own my own work-life balance - and my career has not suffered for it. I have a great job, I get paid well, and I can still have a life. I love the work that I do - but I try to ensure I love other things about life as well. I also coached at least one coworker, much my senior, into backing off of overworking. He was an indispensable team member, but he got caught in the trap of saying "yes" to everything, and staying long hours every day because someone might need his help. I coached him on exactly this - and he actually took it to heart, and some time later thanked me for connecting with him in this way and helping him find a healthier balance for himself. To the junior devs out there - this is a great career, but don't forget to take care of yourself. Enjoy software development, but also enjoy your life. 🙂
I personally love waking up grabbing some coffee/tea and working and/or reading about code or just looking over what I was working on the day before - but you are right people need to feel that they can walk away from it for a bit and enjoy life - great message
How long have you been professionally working as a developer? I think most developers were passionate about coding during college and the first couple of years of working. But then it slowly just becomes a regular job, a chore. Coincidentally, as you progress in your career, you write less code and do more mentoring and middle management.
The beginning reminded me of a “bumper sticker” quote that goes: “The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take.” And I think it’s true. I’ve never been a professional programmer, but in my work projects, I have noticed that the busiest people end up taking harmful paths and have to redo some part of their project.
I agree with this video 100%. I’m still learning as a Junior SWE but this was a big issue for me during my last three internships. For example, on the third one it was my first ever paid role even tho it was an internship. I was super excited and the company just raised 50 million - perfect company and perfect timing. But due to working waaaay past working hours I ended up resigning because I never experienced burnout while working and getting paid as a SWE. Thank God that situation happened early in my career, I vowed to always be self-aware and never go too hard or work past the required hours when it isn’t necessary. Fast forward today got my first time salary role as a SWE through a government contractor/agency and currently waiting for my security clearance to be cleared. Also, I’m on my 4th internship while I wait and sooo much better with avoiding burnout and not allowing my ego to hinder my work or communication with my team. If your a new dev out there and especially who’s self-taught like myself…TAKE YOUR TIME and TAKE BREAKS. Get off your phone and be cautious about what information you consume about SWE. Strive to be better than who you were yesterday and only focus on things YOU can control which is yourself. Because if you can’t keep your ego in check or be conscious enough to know your habits you might mistakenly get in your own way much like I did on my first real job/opportunity. Keep learning and moving forward because the journey never ends. Peace and much love!
damn, this feels good to hear. I had this same mentality but struggled with it because of all the other garbage code influencers saying I will fail if I don't code for x amount hours and so on.
Thanks for the message brother! I have been feeling down all day because of that. Thinking why I am not coding as other people does. Doing 8hr/s a day and then on weekends. Its true , programming ain't a lifestyle. Its time for me to rethink a lot of ways to feel joy rather than being disappointed all the time that you are not doing enough
I love when I see tech people on RUclips, they always say how much they love their job, and when their channel grows there's always a reveal" I'm doing youtube full time now!!!" 🤣🤣
It's good to see someone isn't really trying to say this profession isn't only about passion, 'cause let's be real: Not everyone getting into coding is passionate it about it (me included), and we wanna enjoy our lives in other things besides coding.
Man I'm not used to comment in YT videos but ... thank you so much....... you have no idea how this approach of the dev career was important for me... I have worked with IT for 12 years ( not as dev ) and I had that feeling that if I tried to move to dev area I'd always be mediocre, because of the fact that I do not think about technology every day... I have my my family, love to workout and take my dog out ..... this kind of activities that I as used to considered incompatible with a developer haha... now I really feel more confident and less afraid of trying... thanks again.
I relate to this so hard. I am so grateful to have found Dorain Develops as he and Joshua Fluke are the only guys who are absolutely real and authentic about coding.
I would say the activities you suggest make you a healthier and *better* developer. Now, you may still need to develop the development skills if they're significantly behind the curve compared to someone who went to school for computer science, but that's not an insurmountable barrier. You don't need to spend 60 hours a week developing to be a good developer. You don't need to do endless coding katas or things like that to be good. You *do* need to "care". If you have passion about the job and continue to improve, while you may start off as mediocre compared to those who studied this stuff in school for 4 years, you can get good if you do care about it and continue to improve. And about "passion", since that word gets thrown around a lot - passion doesn't mean living to work and nothing else. For me, passion is me clocking in at the beginning of my work day, me legitimately caring about the problems I'm trying to solve and continually trying to improve both the projects/products I work on and my own skills, but also me clocking out and having a life outside of work - whatever that may be - so that I don't burn out or go completely crazy from doing nothing but coding. Be passionate, do a great job, but at the same time, own your work life balance and don't be ashamed to have a life outside of work. I can't say you won't have an adjustment period or some pains as you try to ramp on dev, but if you give yourself time, you'll likely be able to do quite well.
I've heard the same from experienced developers, many of them say they'll only code after work if it benefits them, i think it's okay unless there's something you think it's worth learning, go for it
I spent minimum 16 hours a day programming for 5 years to learn as fast as possible. I only managed to land ONE job in the end that lasted for a few months and then I burned out HARD. It didn't matter that it was a really good job for one of the biggest game studios in the world and that I made more than six figures. And it was in the field I loved the MOST. Anticheat and DRM. In the end I just had to stop programming and get a new job, or else I would have gone crazy. Now I run my own business instead and will probably do that for the rest of my life. Can't see myself being a programmer drone / slave for a company again.
Yeah this is why i try to work almost exclusively with startups these days. More of a consistent + direct understanding of the team as humans, as well as more transparent work-load awareness across departments. At least when they are run well and still early stage
I’m glad I came across your video. It’s what I needed to hear. I’ve been struggling with burnout and only just bouncing back from it and enjoying work again.
I needed to hear this so much. Started working as a dev around 4 months ago and felt bad that I wasn't learning anything new outside of work and wouldn't be able to get better offers in the future. Perhaps I'll still be anxious about getting those offers, but I'll try to get them with what I'm currently learning in the job
Almost 2 years into my Dev career and this is some of the best advice you can get as a young dev. A healthy work life balance is not a benefit that is put in writing. Working remotely especially, it's hard to turn work off sometimes. I've found that making myself AVAILABLE at work is different than actually sitting at my desk coding. The best freedom is working when you want to and not when you have to but that also comes with experience as you will get better at your job. Side Note: There are so many good tech companies to work for that aren't FAANG (or whatever) that provide great benefits to be able to balance life and work. If anything FAANG companies hope that your desire to work for them will cloud your ability to balance work / life.
I have 6 years of work experience as a software engineer and here are my thoughts: I decided to quit my career as a programmer specifically because of the unhealthy culture surrounding the work/life balance that seemed to be the norm in the industry. I was tired of always bringing my work home with me and working weekends, yes I said WEEKENDS. I always felt drained after work and I felt like I never had any energy to socialize. It really does drain you. I have plenty of friends who were super proud of working 10-12 hour days and spending a chunk of their weekend smashing out code. This is what they had to do to be "successful." It's important to keep in mind that spending excess hours during the week (and sometimes weekends) to work on projects is "normal" and doesn't include those times when "the shit hit the fan" in a production environment. If you have been spending months working hard to finish your project, you have to work even harder to launch it to production. this can involve multiple days of effort and sleepless nights and you are expected to be available throughout the whole process. If you are able to work at a company with a solid system for delivering to production then you are quite blessed. Not every company knows how to do this well! Also lets not forget about the coding interview process which requires the purchasing and studying of one or more books to have any chance of getting accepted. I spent about a year of my career looking for a new job and ultimately succeeded in finding a company that had a better work/life balance. One year later I quit because of the same issues :)
You're scaring me, because I've already started my path to become a developer. In no way do I want coding to take over my life as you described. Is it really that difficult to find a good, healthy, balanced life with a company that respects your personal time? If so, what other position in IT is better?
@@michaelthomashamilton i tried ESL and video editing, decided they weren’t for me. I am working on getting into freelance writing ATM. Still a work in progress tbh. I’m also considering going back to school so i am figuring it out as i go :)
@@cosythe1st Haha, I worked in TEFL / ESL for several years. Taught in China and South Korea for a good chunk of the 2010s. It's a fun life, but the pay isn't great. I learned to code to leave TEFL lol. Now I'm also starting to think about doing something else. Just want something more laid back, where I don't feel like I have to be studying 8 hours a day plus coding.
Thank you as always for the great advice! As I've been pushing forward I have noticed this is a trend and realised to just focus on me, my growth at the rate I feel is best.
Absolutely love this. As a new developer preparing to enter the industry (migrating from my existing career in IT support to .NET development), I keep having to force myself to take breaks and I feel awful when I do. Granted I have kids, a wife, and a 9-5, but I do still basically spend the whole day working or coding outside of those responsibilities and the culture shift away from 24/7 crunch is what I think will make the biggest impact in reducing the exploitation rampant in programming (ESPECIALLY in game dev). Companies love how much programmers drive ourselves to the breaking point in pursuit of the appearance of being the big bad Neo/hackerman/zen code guru we often wish we were, and they absolutely take full advantage of it. They know that for the price of pizza in the office or convenience of working from home they can get us to grind our brains into mush, and we'll all fight for a spot to do it (Again, ESPECIALLY in game dev). It's a job. We all need to stay in that mindset.
Work balance is a critical topic. I usually only work coding and debugging for 2-3 hours daily. Plus, I only work 80% of Friday as my day off. So having a long weekend to relax and spending time in nature is gold.
@@Danuxsy Yea this is the coding part, the rest is planning meetings and stuff. This is pretty common in larger companies. Nobody should be coding 8 hours straight, that would be mental.
I'm a software engineer but I have hobbies - play music (guitar), do graphic design, gardening, gaming, running, volunteering, hangout with my friends, etc. I learned that some of the best developers I've met had amazing hobbies. Our lead software engineer was an actor, he did theatre on the weekends because he enjoyed it. While our other senior was a singer who did Opera. It's amazing what secret skills some of these devs had.
so I studied computer science, did a couple of projects back in 2001 as an intern, then later I joined IT as a career, until 2019 I was "forced" by my company to join their data analytics team as the company was transforming into data driven, so I had to do little coding using python and R to figure out that I missed a lot of technology all of these years, now I'm studying more material at 45 YO and planning to do some freelance jobs, but I always balance between my professional and personal lives, you will lose your family the same as losing your job if you neglect any, and of course I will always chose my family, Jobs will always come back!
I've been in the industry for 15 years now. I don't generally code in my free time unless it's something I specifically want to do, like build a website for a volunteer group I'm working with, or mess around with a raspberry pi to see what I can do with it. I spend my 8 hours a day coding, and if my employer needs me to learn something new for a job I do it on the clock. But you're absolutely right, this attitude definitely leads to burn out in the industry, and that isn't productive for the programmer, or the employer. Burning out an experienced developer means you need to replace them, and replacing senior people can be difficult. The company I work for burned out a ton of people a year ago, about 1/3rd of the team left, and they still haven't been able to really replace all of them, hell we have some contracts we've had to outsource or hire temp workers in because we cannot find resources with the experience we need at the level we need. But here is the other thing that these people pushing the eat/sleep/code narrative seem to perhaps not understand. The human brain isn't designed to be "on" for that long, and study after study has shown that even in an 8 hour work day, your work tapers off around the 5 hour mark anyway, and you get less and less productive over time. So even by the end of your 8 hours, your code will be worse than the code you wrote at the start of the day. And then if you just keep pushing it longer and longer, coding for all these extra hours, sure you can say you coded for that long, but is your work actually any good? Did you create a bunch of work you'll need to redo the next day anyway because it wasn't great code? Or did you do 8 hours of coding for something that would have taken you 3 hours the next day, because your brain is fried. It also ignores all the other non-coding aspects of these jobs. Can you be a team player? Can you deal with clients? Can you do the architecture work, or the design phase stuff that is logic based, where you're more likely to be sitting in a room with a whiteboard than at a computer? Because that stuff isn't coding, but it can be a part of being a coder. Not to mention that the whole mentality of "you need to work really hard to code" mentality is counter to what really makes for a good programmer. Every programmer I know agrees that the adage "Work smarter, not harder" is the right way to approach these things, yet people are telling you that you just need to work harder, and that's kind of the opposite way you should be approaching these things. Coding all day every day doesn't mean you're a GOOD programmer, or that your code is great and well done. Literally 2 weeks ago I got handed a project from someone who quit, which had no documentation with it, and he spent a week on it. I rebuilt the entire thing (because it was bad) in about a day. Was he a better programmer because he spent longer at it? No, he wasn't. I've seen massive codebases that could be optimized and reduce the line count, it was only as large as it was because it was poorly designed with repetitive elements that could have been made into functions. Time is not the same measure as quality. And in coding, quality is always more important than quantity.
The work toxicity problem is a US-wide issue, not just a software thing. I was coding from around 9am to 10-12 pm 6 days / week for a few months at one point. I got so, so, soooo slow and unproductive after awhile. I'd keep putting in hours but i saw less and less actually get done. Eventually I was just treading water trying to accomplish the most basic tasks in an entire 10 hour day. No one stays productive if they work that freaking hard, no matter how much they like it or w/e.
I've actually lost a couple of friends because they literally gave up their free time/life, like hanging out with family/talking to friends/enjoying life/playing games, to try and become what they perceive as 'successful'. I actually feel really sorry for people who think they need to code from the moment they wake up, to the moment they hit the pillow from exhaustion, especially if you're starting to distance yourself from friends and loved ones. It isn't natural, nor is it desirable when you're able to see through the façade.
Oh man, this was exactly the message I needed to hear right now. I've been pushing myself the past 2 years in ways that have probably shaved 5+ years off of my life expectancy and 10 years off my hairline. I've known a good way to counteract this stress this whole time but I haven't let myself do it. But you, my good sir, have inspired me to take up an old hobby. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a pipe to load and some munchies to acquire.
Coding may pay well but at the end of the day fiat currency is just that.. Yeah its nice to not have to worry about currency but sacrificing everything for a piece of some else'e bag it not usually worth your health..
Oh jeez, I can't agree with it more. I really can't help but trust all that (due to self esteem issues) I didn't know those people are called dev influencers. They make me feel like 💩 and amplify my own professional insecurities and feelings of inferiority. Because I totally have this image of successful dev embedded into me. Being on linkedin is a torture when you're reading job description requiring you to be like you describe in this video. But all it does - is make me feel totally worthless... And yes, I am prone to over-exerting myself and burning out. All combined with GAD - I think this is literally killing me slowly.
I agree with the messages and personal I do approach programming and life in that way (going on treks, smoking grass, not working outside my hours) but it also feels unnecessarily cynical to say "it's not a lifestyle" or "they're lying to you". Cus there are definitely people to whom this is a lifestyle and they seem to enjoy it. It doesn't have to be, and I would recommend trying new things, but my dad has spent most of his free time coding and maintaining open source libs and he wouldn't be lying if he said so as an influencer. I think these influencers are being pretty honest about that part of their life, and if that's what you enjoy then I'm glad you found the ultimate career for you.
This was a great video, I had it on while I was entering into my 12th straight hour of coding, but being a programmer I've learned how to multitask like a pro. ...Just kidding of course. Great video as always Dorian, being a programmer is not a lifestyle, it's a job. If you enjoy coding, then spend extra time coding, if you are doing it solely for the money then put in your 30 hours and spend the rest of the time doing what you love.
Thank you. We need to keep preaching work life balance and focusing on what really matters in life. Especially in America. The culture really needs to change
I want to start by saying that I TOTALLY agree with you, 100%. I do have a question, though. Imagine that at Company X the "Manager" decided that the Team needs to adopt a certain tech (like moving everything from WPF to Blazor, old projects included). Imagine also that the level of the Team is not stellar as they literally learned on the job and no one (saving 1/2 members) has a good grasp of coding conventions, architecture and how to properly code in general but until today the "it just works" philosophy well, just worked. Now, knowing that those 1/2 members knows their stuff, the Manager decided that they HAVE to train the other members. Without ANYTHING in return, just because "this is how we do in the Team". Am I wrong by thinking that this is super disrespectful towards those 1/2 members as the others SHOULD instead wake the F**K up and invest 1/2 hours a day to properly learn their trade? Aren't they being selfish by wanting a "training" and a "manual" of how to proper code delivered by the 1/2 guys that actually put in the hours, the sweat and the sleepless nights? Looking forward for answers here :) P.S. Great Video :)
This problem of social media amplifying real life exists in basically every aspect of your life. Blowing up beauty on social media for unrealistic expectations for women, unrealistic expectations for men, how careers should be - this is my day in the life, you have to do what I'll do or you're not worthy. People are projecting onto other people, and the truth is that a lot of it is just not real and heavily exaggerated. Keep going, take adequate breaks (if you're learning full time, I would say use the weekends and the evenings to cool off and enjoy yourself), especially if you're working as well, because you can easily burn out and just stop if you take it too far. Just try not to give up
So I'm finishing up a computer programming certification certificate thing over at my local college. I haven't really fallen in love with coding but I can do it. Could you please do a video on alternatives to being a coder after getting coding skills from institution and/or learning it yourself?
he has mentioned creating content and starting personal projects (either for portfolio or for passive income). sorry I don't recall the exact video but I think it was on his main channel.
You can get Jobs that use small amounts of coding. There is a course by google, automating It support tasks with Python. You can go into IT support and automate most your work. But keep looking for your passion. Maybe management would be better for you.
@@ruleaus7664 bruh don't be, there's a ton of shitty companies, you just have to get a new job from time to time until you find one of the few good ones. I have 5 years as a web dev, it took me some time, but atm I'm in a company that pays me well and it's pretty chill with the workload, I know it sound like a fever dream, but there's a couple out there, just eat shit on your first years and work your way up there.
Absolutely agree with, there ist the social media framing of being a developer on the other side there is the pure reality. I think many professionals like me agree with you
A lot of people talk a good job, but in reality they want millions for doing NOTHING! Programming took me YEARS to get used to and I'm STILL learning every day! You really have to love what you are doing to be at it every day, and it still can get very repetitive at times, and yeah burnout is always around the corner, especially if you are at it all the time. From when I first started programming to now, yeah the mindset and people programming has changed A LOT, mostly due to the fact we use this technology every day, be it your phone or laptop or games console etc, most now want to see if they can fit into that mold of, Well EVERYONE ELSE IS A DEV...I SHOULD BE ONE TOO! No that's just not the way to go, only do something if it HIGHLY appeals to you, not just because everyone else is doing it. Try it out as a hobby first, don't just quit your job one day and say I'm going to be a professional software developer, just because some money grabber on some site or YT says they can make you a Pro in 24hrs, NO just...NO! It takes YEARS and heavy discipline on certain subjects, and you might hate it, yes some people take to it quicker, but those kind of people are usually the academic type, who loves math and eats textbooks for breakfast, those guys will pick it up waaay quicker, unlike myself who got thrown into the deep end with C in my Electrical and Electronic Degree Course many years ago and my head almost exploded! There were no YT how to step by step stuff and KR C programming book was IT! And obviously the lectures and labs which you know had us programming robots and ONLY wanted us to build an 8 bit CPU in Verilog code, which I almost had a heart attack trying to do at the time, I mean you can build hardware FROM CODE, WHAT? Yeah Uni was hard, for me anyway and a lot of others it seemed as well, but still after some time and my intro to OOP and some softer..ok easier projects lol, I started to get used to it, but not overnight, it took me a looong time! But definitely health and life comes first! Programming should be secondary to your normal life, but hopefully enjoy programming when you do do it, as you most definitely should be doing projects and work you enjoy. If I had never checked out Mobile/Web/Games, and I was only doing the stuff I did at Uni at first, I most DEFINITELY would not be programming today, learning multiple ways to program, especially visually like games, saved me, but again programming 24/7 it's not the be all and end all! Nature is important and yeah probably from Uni microcontrollers for some solar/wind renewable projects for the future will come in handy, but that's the plan for the next stage in my life before my brain starts to get too forgetful, before my brain starts to get too forgetful. Lifes short...blink and you'll miss it! 😉✌🏽
I've had burnt out when I began coding, it's really hard to pull through. Honestly I've learnt almost a sense for when I can code outside of work and when I need to have a break. It's annoying though because legit I love doing stuff out of work to learn new things lol. But I would say, and I've had this conversation with other devs too, if you really want to be able to work on personal stuff properly what you really need is to not have a full time job.
It's always so nice to see your videos Dorian, I'm from Mexico, I'm a Husband, Father, and Employee and sometimes I just feel like you just said... I want to do so much and end up accomplishing almost nothing, leading me to burnout and frustration. But after watching this video I realized that Social Media and Influencers set a fake standard on what it really takes to be a programmer. Having a balance in life is crucial, knowing how to say no is vital, and stop fearing your boss might fire you because you said no to something, like learning something new after work hours. Thanks for saying all of this, for all the Devs I follow, you're the most authentic.
There are always two sides of the medal and I agree with you that the burn-out is real b*tch. But on the other side there may be layoffs (Meta and co.) and guess who is the 1st one to go.
Yeah, but I cannot imagine getting a junior position and advancing to regular if I didn't put in the work. I was changing my career from a different field to coding. I was working on my coding skills all the time. Now, as a senior dev I agree 100%, that you need balance.
Right now, I have a pretty low stress government job in IT, so I don't feel burned out at the end of the day, so I have the energy to learning code and do side projects. Right now, I want to keep it a hobby, because I'm enjoying it and I don't know if I would enjoy it as a job, although at the same time, I want to keep it open as an option...especially since my current job is literally making my brain turn to mush, so I feel I have to be learning this to keep my mind sharp.
Of course influencers are lying. Lying is pretty much in the job description of influencer. Be it about some product or about how exiting their life is.
Perfect timing now that we saw what Musk expects from devs at Twitter. I fully agree with you! Programming is mentally exhausting so we need time to recover. It's also constant creative problem solving and that works best if the brain is allowed time to work on it in the background while taking a break, going for a walk, taking a d**p or showering. Working long hours constantly is just not productive.
I've literally only seen social media post that imply programmers don't program at all so I really don't know what this video is talking about, but it certainly is another one ticked for the programmers don't program box
I'm trying to get my first job, but the problem is you can only find senior job openings. Which is kinda dumb, because senior devs are the ones who need job sites the least.
I was able to work for a Senior developer that on the side builds projects to sell to other companies and what he mostly does is manage the projects. He does what he needs to do at his work and latter for the side projects he just makes Github tickets and contracts it to other developers. He mostly doesn't program if it's not in his work
This is very very true! I started as a self taught developer on January if this year, on April i landed my first job, in still in it, I used to spend amor 18hrs a day coding, every moment of the day I used to be thinking on his to drive a pending issue, about a month ago I totally burned out I couldn't code at all, just to think about it made me sick I had to back off it for about 2 weeks I barely codes at all after that time I felt the same passion as before again, but now, I managed my time better, I do use dime of my free time to learn stuff but only 1 or 2 hours, and I do it only after my daughter goes to bed, for me, coding is awesome I really love it, but time never comes back and I love surrending time with my baby girl even more
I feel ya, but I have some specific circumstances where I have to be doing that all the time or at least most of the time and right now I'm not and that's a big problem.
Since I became a software engineer I don't code outside of work at all. Don't set the standards too high for yourself to the point where you're unhappy, I tried way too hard before I got the job to program all the time until I realised I was gonna be trained on everything I needed to know at work anyway.
I think you most likely lose more than you gain if you work till burnout, because recovering from burnout can take incredibly long. In some cases even years. I always hated this manipulative message "you need to be passionate about / identify with your job, give 200% (to your company/your masters)". But even though I never believed their manipulative messages, I got burned out because they put so much work on one person, doing all kinds of jobs at the same time, and all the other hundred bosses and customers push and guilt you. Sometimes it's not in our control. Now my goal is changing jobs till I find a somewhat okay environment. But it's easier said than done and also comes with a lot of stress. I know people in IT who have the exact opposite situation (even within the same company) with no stress, better pay, much lower expectations and "qualification". It's actually more about luck than people think. So try to not exploit yourself even harder for your owners. Unless you get something real out of it.
In my experience, there is a pretty big difference between company projects and side projects. Working in a corporate environment with project managers and cross-functional collaboration means that a lot of time is spent on coordination rather than building stuff. Moreover, even when you are building stuff, it has to go through a bunch of reviews leading to more overhead etc... When I work on side projects, it is generally an enjoyable experience because I control the whole codebase working on what interests me. So while I agree that it is not ok for a company to expect you to work on the company projects after you clock out, I'll also say that you probably do need to be leveling up on your own free time doing things that interest you. Just clocking and clocking everyday is likely a recipe for a stagnant career that is vulnerable in economic downturns.
It's really essential to build the ability to focus deeply. This trumps the amount of time you spend glued to the screen. You can build meaningful understanding in Breadth. It's not like other types of grind where you can just push through. You need to focus on form first. Once you understand one thing the right way it becomes a lot easier to learn other things because you build the right intuition around computational logic & modern software. I know people who post about how hard they work/study & `encourage` people to do the same & can only think of one person that's actually a skilled dev who does this(but he is also a raging jackass). The rest of them tend to be under-skilled/sloppy/in-scarcity. It's ironic because now when I network, boasting about work-ethic automatically raises a red flag in my mind about their skill-level. It's all low-tier job search level people in a `please-hire-me-I-have-no-self-respect` circle-jerk. It makes the industry more toxic for themselves because they have to live up to it after getting the job, but also acts as 2nd hand smoke for the rest of us.
For the past year I've been working almost non-stop on a long running project, and my great revelation of the past month or so is.... they're never gonna be satisfied with it. No matter what I give them on Monday, on Tuesday they'll want more. You have to pace yourself, because the business won't do it for you.
This is true. I work in Sweden, so its a bit more restricted to what someones boss can say and demand. I've always worked on sideprojects during my sparetime and still do. But when i worked with code for 8 hours, then went home to work with a project on my own as well, my head couldnt relax to sleep. If your brain can't shutdown when you are about to sleep due to coding, then you better stop or cut down the work on those sideprojects, cause you will go straight into a burnout.
My current job is really understanding tho, they have a learning day once a month and "guilds" to spread information between the developers, during the work-hours.
Thank you. I also was like that on my first job. After work I was done. But these youtubers always are saying you need to work on side projects, it's a lifestyle blablaba. Also like you said unfortunately some of these companies are expecting that you do this in your free time as well otherwise you're not a match for this job.
Work/life balance is very important but I think there's no escaping working overtime (either at work or outside of work) when you're new to the field. The sheer amount of knowledge you have to have in order to compete to get a job in tech is daunting. Plus after you join you'll be expected to get up to speed quickly and contribute; some companies have a 60-90 day eval period where they can let you go if you don't meet their expectations. However it does get better when you're more experienced; you can work faster and contribute more without spending so much time on tasks, so don't lose hope. But with all the layoffs people are gong to be on edge and putting in extra hours just so they don't get canned if their company starts laying off people.
I thought I was the only one who felt this way - I've been feeling alienated from the developer community for all my 7.5 years of being a programmer because of this. While it's true that you should be doing some learning and practice in your own time in order to keep up with the demands of your job, especially in the beginning as a junior, you're still allowed a personal life outside of work. It's a similar epidemic in the UI/UX design world as well I've noticed.
Glad that you feel the same as I do.Right now I am learning React and at an advance level it is complicated enough to frustrate you for days.Glad that I picked up logo designing as well.Now everytime I get lost i calm myself with designing .
Software Development and the IT industry as a whole is a very competitive field. There's a big difference in the skill gap and a huge difference in results based on that. If you're passionate about it, it absolutely makes sense to invest extra time as you can really see results if you aim for higher paying and more difficult jobs. If you're not that interested and you just treat is a job you might fall behind people that develop their skills in their free time and that's alright. It's a choice everyone gets to make and it's also not a final choice, there could be periods when you have the extra time and periods when you'd rather do something else. Also just working on own projects or trying out new frameworks doesn't necessarily make you better in the long term, after a certain point it's just a waste of time. Learning higher level concepts such as modeling, architecture design, project management usually have higher returns of investment once you're technically proficient.
Dorian, it's so fantastic, I'm on another part of our planet, I'm watching your video and recognise my own thoughts. Thanks for your content, It helps me a lot!
It's like being a car mechanic. You're not working on cars on your weekends. Sure, you'll apply your skills when your or your family's or your friend's car is having issues, just as I will use my coding skills to fix my problems, if I feel like it. Banging out a bunch of scripts and some automation can make life easier, but it's not what I do all the time with my own time just because I'm a programmer.
I've been a professional software engineer for coming on to 17 years now, I recently started to use Twitter and the "Programmer Influencer" space sometimes I find bizarre, competitive and cringeworthy. Great video, as the video ended, I opened an email from a programming influencer promoting his new learning platform encouraging daily learning as a prerequisite - daily learning is fine if you want to do it but I feel this email sets a false precedent that it is required especially since the influencer claims they learn something new every single day. A well timed example of what you were saying in this video.
Man I just started to learn coding and I just realized I really push myself hard because when I skip a day not coding I feel so depressed because after all what we want is MONEY in order to buy our TIME (FREEDOM). But u just made to realize too that I am human not robot.
I think this is a larger issue than just programming to be honest. I've been a philosophical stoic since well before I knew that it was an actual philosophy and I've always been extremely clear and accepting about what it is I do and why I do it, to such an extent that I frequently piss off my friends because I often ask them to explain why they agree with me. But the thing is, while it's important to know how to put your emotional state on hold to deal with a problem, a core part of actually being okay with doing that is also understanding when you shouldn't do it. If you're just constantly trying to be the perfect stoic, always trying to work work work with no emotion, you're just gonna spiral. It's not about denying your emotions, it's not about leaning into them, it's not even about ignoring them, it's about controlling them. If you have worked for a month straight non stop, always having SOMETHING crucial weighing on you, take a bloody break. Being able to do that is a skill people need, I firmly believe that, but being capable of doing something is entirely uncorrelated from whether or not you should do that thing constantly. You CAN stick your dick in a metal fan but I'd not recommend you did that once, letalone 24/7 for a month straight. You don't forge a metal by endlessly funneling heat into it until it's hotter than the sun and a literal plasma, you forge it by getting it to where it's workable, then working with it. No hotter, no colder. That balance is one I've seen very few people understand, and even less reach.
Spot on! To expand on the entrepreneur angle, I've heard a really great point that your aim shouldn't be to have two jobs, but rather you're trying to make the side gig your main job. Your side gig might be an area you're more passionate about too (or at least, ideally, it'll become more lucrative). I am personally aiming to become an indie developer, but I know it takes a handful of games to gain an audience. I see the ideal that I'm putting in 20 hours a week towards that on top of my main 40 hour/week developer job, although I struggle to put even 1 hour in, unless I'm feeling particularly inspired. Hopefully, one day, it can be my main job and I can have that creative outlet. Hope others can relate.
I've known a lot of programmers that complain constantly about their crazy crunch time schedules. Thing is... I see them on Steam and Discord, and in person, and posting on various sites all the time. They really aren't "working" the hours that they think they're working.
I've been working on the mobile game sector for nearly 8 months now and I am completely, utterly, absolutely exhausted. I started to have trouble sleeping because of anxiety about my job, put on 30 pounds of weight and deteriorated my romantic and other relationships because of never ending work hours. Sure, I am a better developer and financially more stable compared to 8 months ago but these doesn't change the fact that I feel like shit. Constant deadline preasure, getting compared to my peers put on deadly amount of stress on me. I fucking don't know what to do.
That video is fundamental. It's *very* important that this kind of thing is said and heard by people in this industry, because companies are taking this "programming is a lifestyle!" slogan and using it to exploit and screw people up. It's perverse. Also, it's crazy how people take the "programming is just a job" phrase like some sort of insult. I mean, it's a *GOOD* thing to have a job! Jobs are essential! There's nothing _bad_ about seeing a job as a job! Also, from a purely pragmatic point of view, it's important to have hobbies and activities outside of coding, because that keeps your brain oxygenated and healthy! Not only are you exercising your ability to experience the world and know how it works, but you can also use those activities to develop abilities that, indirectly, make you a better programmer. I tend to think of software design in a very spacial thing, like objects that connect in space, and I *need* to have experiences in my day to day life that help me improve that kind of thinking. It makes me a better professional. But other than that, your lifestyle should be whatever you want it to be. I consider myself primarily an artist, a music enthusiast, and a writer. Programming is a thing that I know I can do well and I can live off it, but I'm so much more than that. And I know I'd be a worse programmer if I tried to turn it into a "lifestyle". It wouldn't work.
I code to provide a life for myself and my family, not just to code. I left blue collar work because it ate my life away. It's a wonder I got hired I guess but I'm very happy where I'm at. I guess it comes down to the people you work for too.
I had this lifestyle as I had multiple projects going on at once. Past few weeks, I get less and less done, currently I just force myself to sit and get a few lines in, it's extremely inefficient.
depends on what you love, I love developing. I've done it since 1988 and I never stop the problem solving process for my own personal projects. But when it comes to coding at a job, I don't can give a shit less about the menial work it isn't like the retrocoding challenges and etc.
I had burn out with 29 in IT industry, after overworking and overestimating myself. I thought I could work day and night, eat and sleep bad, without consequences, but nope, the body will strike at some point.
The worst thing about these programmer influencers is that, consciously or inconsciously, they are selling that being where they are and having the >100 k annually salary is the real success, i am from Colombia and the salary of a junior software developer is about 500$ per month, juniors are getting overwhelmed because they dont think they can gain those >100 k, the most sad thing about it, is that these influencers only want to feed their own ego
It's ok to take a day off and it's ok to not code all the time!
Amen!
you are saving new comers!!
I think that overdoing something will limit you in anything you do.
Any hope for an ex doctor to get into coding? I find it a lot more fun and interesting than my old job but damn, the learning curve is steep. And the competition is fierce. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks ;)
I consistently have this dilemma. Initially, I was contributing more than required. Then when OT was denied, I continue to learn new frameworks. As it turns out, I have gotten so good at my job, the bottle neck has pushed to other people. I ended up just doing less during business hours.🤷🏻♂️ go figure. TC 120k, atlanta area. Put in only 8 hrs a day.
Preach brother! I've been fortunate to be in a senior position with influence over hiring decisions, you don't know how many candidates try to push how "passionate" they are about about coding but then show that they have no hobbies because they've been told that coding is the be-all end-all. Last guy we hired ended up leaving due to burnout after 6 months (a recent college graduate), even after I told him to clock out after eight hours. Turns out he would just go back to his apartment and code into the late hours of the night, then show up on little to no sleep. He would always tell me that the "successful" devs (i.e. influencers) had to live and breathe code. At first I thought it was humorous as most of the guys he listened to were RUclipsrs who probably gave up that life to make content full time, but then I saw just how damaging it was to new college graduates and people making a shift into development.
Take time off, have other hobbies outside of coding. If your job believes you need to be coding 12-16 hours a day, probably time to start brushing up on your resume to find a better opportunity for work-life balance.
Preach ! … any openings for internships 😅 In you’re job
Reminds me so much of that hustle culture bullshit. It's unhealthy and is detrimental to any real meaning you can find in life.
I mean... isn't that what ALL firmas want?? A bot without personality??
@Lazarus he is not s boss
@Lazarus no, most human resources labourers don't even have any idea of their job.
Good programmers do not sit at a computer 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Work-life balance and a healthy lifestyle is more beneficial to long-term career satisfaction and enjoying life. Dorian is the only person in this RUclips niche who understands and says the truth.
Never going to make it kid. I've been in this game for 8 years, kids like you don't last. I put in the time, I work hard and play even harder.
@@dagothodros641 your just getting used, either your really bad and you have to waste 2x,3x more time to finish yo tasks or your mentally challenged, the more you submit like a rat the more your going to be used
yesss
And good programmers do not have time and desire to do youtube.
@@last_samurai6690 would you say the same thing for conference because between doing conference and RUclips there isn't a big difference
I code as a hobby. I have my construction job where I work 50-60 hours a week then I go home and write another 100 lines to add to what I did the day before. I do it to learn the languages rather than actually make something. I like to be able to read the source and understand whats going on. My off time is taking care of my son.
You’re an awesome dude❤ I bet you are an incredibly awesome programmer
Mad respect to you! Many IT people just drown in their jobs and never bond with their kids...
@@hej2800 I heard IT workers aren't people person
I've been working as a fullstack dev for 8 years now. In theory, I should start my shift at 12 and finish at 8PM, but in practice, I do absolutely nothing productive during that period. I only start coding when I feel like it, usually around 10PM - 2AM. On some days I don't work at all, on others I'm entranced and do it for 16 hours. The most important thing is not to force yourself - start working only when you want to. It should be a pleasurable activity, not something that you have to do no matter what. I realise that I'm privileged to have a job that allows it, and I sincerely hope that you - the reader - will also manage to find one like it. Avoid big corporations, shoot for smaller companies where everyone knows each other, or think about freelancing.
3:57 THANK. YOU. Literally the first person I've ever heard say it. I'm a full-time programmer and I've been asked on multiple occasions to research programming things outside of my working hours, which I never have because unless I feel personally motivated to do it, I'm not going to do it if I'm not being paid. I even got in trouble once for learning about tech I was asked to learn about by my boss because I did it during work hours. Learning for work is work, so why should I do it for free on my personal time? I am also expected to be coding non-stop for the entire workday without breaks, except lunch. My boss has literally counted the number of lines I write and demanded an explanation if it seemed like I didn't write enough lines for the given time period
Is your boss Elon Musk?
There was one job I worked awhile back, where I did put in late hours, trying to make a good impression to the company and whatnot, aiming for a raise... I did get a raise, but it was nowhere near what I was hoping. It wasn't worth the time and effort I put in, and that thankfully soured me on the idea of putting in crazy hours on a salaried programming job.
Since then, I've been pretty good about tracking my own time, calling out when things are going off the rails, and while there are exceptions (e.g. business trips), I generally stick to around 40 hours a week. I'm not a pain about it, and I might go over here or there, but I'll also go under here or there. I'm flexible where I need to be, but I also care for my time and the sacrifices that I *and my family* make when I need to work long hours, and that needs to be respected. Especially when you're on salary, even if your company puts in the lip service to "work time balance", it's you who needs to own it.
I do own my own work-life balance - and my career has not suffered for it. I have a great job, I get paid well, and I can still have a life. I love the work that I do - but I try to ensure I love other things about life as well.
I also coached at least one coworker, much my senior, into backing off of overworking. He was an indispensable team member, but he got caught in the trap of saying "yes" to everything, and staying long hours every day because someone might need his help. I coached him on exactly this - and he actually took it to heart, and some time later thanked me for connecting with him in this way and helping him find a healthier balance for himself.
To the junior devs out there - this is a great career, but don't forget to take care of yourself. Enjoy software development, but also enjoy your life. 🙂
You described all the jobs in the first paragraph
The ones that project the most usually are trying to not only convince you, but also themselves.
Happens in all forms of life. Great vid bro!
I personally love waking up grabbing some coffee/tea and working and/or reading about code or just looking over what I was working on the day before - but you are right people need to feel that they can walk away from it for a bit and enjoy life - great message
aye I'm the same
How long have you been professionally working as a developer? I think most developers were passionate about coding during college and the first couple of years of working.
But then it slowly just becomes a regular job, a chore. Coincidentally, as you progress in your career, you write less code and do more mentoring and middle management.
Same I like to look over what I was working on yesterday over breakfast, but I don’t spend the whole day on the computer
The beginning reminded me of a “bumper sticker” quote that goes:
“The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take.”
And I think it’s true. I’ve never been a professional programmer, but in my work projects, I have noticed that the busiest people end up taking harmful paths and have to redo some part of their project.
I agree with this video 100%. I’m still learning as a Junior SWE but this was a big issue for me during my last three internships.
For example, on the third one it was my first ever paid role even tho it was an internship. I was super excited and the company just raised 50 million - perfect company and perfect timing. But due to working waaaay past working hours I ended up resigning because I never experienced burnout while working and getting paid as a SWE.
Thank God that situation happened early in my career, I vowed to always be self-aware and never go too hard or work past the required hours when it isn’t necessary. Fast forward today got my first time salary role as a SWE through a government contractor/agency and currently waiting for my security clearance to be cleared. Also, I’m on my 4th internship while I wait and sooo much better with avoiding burnout and not allowing my ego to hinder my work or communication with my team.
If your a new dev out there and especially who’s self-taught like myself…TAKE YOUR TIME and TAKE BREAKS. Get off your phone and be cautious about what information you consume about SWE. Strive to be better than who you were yesterday and only focus on things YOU can control which is yourself. Because if you can’t keep your ego in check or be conscious enough to know your habits you might mistakenly get in your own way much like I did on my first real job/opportunity.
Keep learning and moving forward because the journey never ends. Peace and much love!
damn, this feels good to hear. I had this same mentality but struggled with it because of all the other garbage code influencers saying I will fail if I don't code for x amount hours and so on.
Absolutely true. Thanks Dorian to revealing this important topic.
Thanks for the message brother! I have been feeling down all day because of that. Thinking why I am not coding as other people does. Doing 8hr/s a day and then on weekends. Its true , programming ain't a lifestyle. Its time for me to rethink a lot of ways to feel joy rather than being disappointed all the time that you are not doing enough
programmers will be replaced with neural networks in the coming years anyway
I love when I see tech people on RUclips, they always say how much they love their job, and when their channel grows there's always a reveal" I'm doing youtube full time now!!!" 🤣🤣
It's good to see someone isn't really trying to say this profession isn't only about passion, 'cause let's be real: Not everyone getting into coding is passionate it about it (me included), and we wanna enjoy our lives in other things besides coding.
I didn't like it first then I fell in love with it and now I know about 7 diff langs (this includes the shell) started to love c++ too
Touching a little bit of grass..or smoking a little bit if grass.. I felt that! Found your channel last week and been loving the videos🙌
Man I'm not used to comment in YT videos but ... thank you so much....... you have no idea how this approach of the dev career was important for me... I have worked with IT for 12 years ( not as dev ) and I had that feeling that if I tried to move to dev area I'd always be mediocre, because of the fact that I do not think about technology every day... I have my my family, love to workout and take my dog out ..... this kind of activities that I as used to considered incompatible with a developer haha... now I really feel more confident and less afraid of trying... thanks again.
greetins from brazil
I relate to this so hard. I am so grateful to have found Dorain Develops as he and Joshua Fluke are the only guys who are absolutely real and authentic about coding.
I would say the activities you suggest make you a healthier and *better* developer. Now, you may still need to develop the development skills if they're significantly behind the curve compared to someone who went to school for computer science, but that's not an insurmountable barrier.
You don't need to spend 60 hours a week developing to be a good developer. You don't need to do endless coding katas or things like that to be good. You *do* need to "care". If you have passion about the job and continue to improve, while you may start off as mediocre compared to those who studied this stuff in school for 4 years, you can get good if you do care about it and continue to improve.
And about "passion", since that word gets thrown around a lot - passion doesn't mean living to work and nothing else. For me, passion is me clocking in at the beginning of my work day, me legitimately caring about the problems I'm trying to solve and continually trying to improve both the projects/products I work on and my own skills, but also me clocking out and having a life outside of work - whatever that may be - so that I don't burn out or go completely crazy from doing nothing but coding.
Be passionate, do a great job, but at the same time, own your work life balance and don't be ashamed to have a life outside of work. I can't say you won't have an adjustment period or some pains as you try to ramp on dev, but if you give yourself time, you'll likely be able to do quite well.
Yeah not every company needs a "rockstar coder".. Some just need someone to show up and get the job done without being hacked immediately.
I've heard the same from experienced developers, many of them say they'll only code after work if it benefits them, i think it's okay unless there's something you think it's worth learning, go for it
I spent minimum 16 hours a day programming for 5 years to learn as fast as possible.
I only managed to land ONE job in the end that lasted for a few months and then I burned out HARD.
It didn't matter that it was a really good job for one of the biggest game studios in the world and that I made more than six figures.
And it was in the field I loved the MOST. Anticheat and DRM.
In the end I just had to stop programming and get a new job, or else I would have gone crazy.
Now I run my own business instead and will probably do that for the rest of my life.
Can't see myself being a programmer drone / slave for a company again.
You have programmed more in 5 years than me in 2 lifetimes. I'm not even kidding.
You're lying through your teeth
Hey my friend, I am trying to learn how to code myself, and start a new business, what do you recommend doing as a business?
Yeah this is why i try to work almost exclusively with startups these days. More of a consistent + direct understanding of the team as humans, as well as more transparent work-load awareness across departments.
At least when they are run well and still early stage
I’m glad I came across your video. It’s what I needed to hear. I’ve been struggling with burnout and only just bouncing back from it and enjoying work again.
I needed to hear this so much. Started working as a dev around 4 months ago and felt bad that I wasn't learning anything new outside of work and wouldn't be able to get better offers in the future. Perhaps I'll still be anxious about getting those offers, but I'll try to get them with what I'm currently learning in the job
Almost 2 years into my Dev career and this is some of the best advice you can get as a young dev. A healthy work life balance is not a benefit that is put in writing. Working remotely especially, it's hard to turn work off sometimes. I've found that making myself AVAILABLE at work is different than actually sitting at my desk coding. The best freedom is working when you want to and not when you have to but that also comes with experience as you will get better at your job.
Side Note: There are so many good tech companies to work for that aren't FAANG (or whatever) that provide great benefits to be able to balance life and work. If anything FAANG companies hope that your desire to work for them will cloud your ability to balance work / life.
I have 6 years of work experience as a software engineer and here are my thoughts:
I decided to quit my career as a programmer specifically because of the unhealthy culture surrounding the work/life balance that seemed to be the norm in the industry. I was tired of always bringing my work home with me and working weekends, yes I said WEEKENDS. I always felt drained after work and I felt like I never had any energy to socialize. It really does drain you. I have plenty of friends who were super proud of working 10-12 hour days and spending a chunk of their weekend smashing out code. This is what they had to do to be "successful."
It's important to keep in mind that spending excess hours during the week (and sometimes weekends) to work on projects is "normal" and doesn't include those times when "the shit hit the fan" in a production environment. If you have been spending months working hard to finish your project, you have to work even harder to launch it to production. this can involve multiple days of effort and sleepless nights and you are expected to be available throughout the whole process. If you are able to work at a company with a solid system for delivering to production then you are quite blessed. Not every company knows how to do this well!
Also lets not forget about the coding interview process which requires the purchasing and studying of one or more books to have any chance of getting accepted. I spent about a year of my career looking for a new job and ultimately succeeded in finding a company that had a better work/life balance. One year later I quit because of the same issues :)
Coding is nice, but living a life is nicer ;)
You're scaring me, because I've already started my path to become a developer. In no way do I want coding to take over my life as you described. Is it really that difficult to find a good, healthy, balanced life with a company that respects your personal time? If so, what other position in IT is better?
Just wondering, since you quit programming, what did you transition to?
@@michaelthomashamilton i tried ESL and video editing, decided they weren’t for me. I am working on getting into freelance writing ATM. Still a work in progress tbh. I’m also considering going back to school so i am figuring it out as i go :)
@@cosythe1st Haha, I worked in TEFL / ESL for several years. Taught in China and South Korea for a good chunk of the 2010s. It's a fun life, but the pay isn't great. I learned to code to leave TEFL lol. Now I'm also starting to think about doing something else.
Just want something more laid back, where I don't feel like I have to be studying 8 hours a day plus coding.
Thank you as always for the great advice! As I've been pushing forward I have noticed this is a trend and realised to just focus on me, my growth at the rate I feel is best.
Absolutely love this. As a new developer preparing to enter the industry (migrating from my existing career in IT support to .NET development), I keep having to force myself to take breaks and I feel awful when I do. Granted I have kids, a wife, and a 9-5, but I do still basically spend the whole day working or coding outside of those responsibilities and the culture shift away from 24/7 crunch is what I think will make the biggest impact in reducing the exploitation rampant in programming (ESPECIALLY in game dev). Companies love how much programmers drive ourselves to the breaking point in pursuit of the appearance of being the big bad Neo/hackerman/zen code guru we often wish we were, and they absolutely take full advantage of it. They know that for the price of pizza in the office or convenience of working from home they can get us to grind our brains into mush, and we'll all fight for a spot to do it (Again, ESPECIALLY in game dev).
It's a job. We all need to stay in that mindset.
Work balance is a critical topic. I usually only work coding and debugging for 2-3 hours daily. Plus, I only work 80% of Friday as my day off. So having a long weekend to relax and spending time in nature is gold.
What you only work 3 hours per day? wtf
@@Danuxsy Yea this is the coding part, the rest is planning meetings and stuff. This is pretty common in larger companies. Nobody should be coding 8 hours straight, that would be mental.
I'm a software engineer but I have hobbies - play music (guitar), do graphic design, gardening, gaming, running, volunteering, hangout with my friends, etc.
I learned that some of the best developers I've met had amazing hobbies. Our lead software engineer was an actor, he did theatre on the weekends because he enjoyed it. While our other senior was a singer who did Opera. It's amazing what secret skills some of these devs had.
so I studied computer science, did a couple of projects back in 2001 as an intern, then later I joined IT as a career, until 2019 I was "forced" by my company to join their data analytics team as the company was transforming into data driven, so I had to do little coding using python and R to figure out that I missed a lot of technology all of these years, now I'm studying more material at 45 YO and planning to do some freelance jobs, but I always balance between my professional and personal lives, you will lose your family the same as losing your job if you neglect any, and of course I will always chose my family, Jobs will always come back!
I've been in the industry for 15 years now. I don't generally code in my free time unless it's something I specifically want to do, like build a website for a volunteer group I'm working with, or mess around with a raspberry pi to see what I can do with it. I spend my 8 hours a day coding, and if my employer needs me to learn something new for a job I do it on the clock.
But you're absolutely right, this attitude definitely leads to burn out in the industry, and that isn't productive for the programmer, or the employer. Burning out an experienced developer means you need to replace them, and replacing senior people can be difficult. The company I work for burned out a ton of people a year ago, about 1/3rd of the team left, and they still haven't been able to really replace all of them, hell we have some contracts we've had to outsource or hire temp workers in because we cannot find resources with the experience we need at the level we need.
But here is the other thing that these people pushing the eat/sleep/code narrative seem to perhaps not understand. The human brain isn't designed to be "on" for that long, and study after study has shown that even in an 8 hour work day, your work tapers off around the 5 hour mark anyway, and you get less and less productive over time. So even by the end of your 8 hours, your code will be worse than the code you wrote at the start of the day. And then if you just keep pushing it longer and longer, coding for all these extra hours, sure you can say you coded for that long, but is your work actually any good? Did you create a bunch of work you'll need to redo the next day anyway because it wasn't great code? Or did you do 8 hours of coding for something that would have taken you 3 hours the next day, because your brain is fried.
It also ignores all the other non-coding aspects of these jobs. Can you be a team player? Can you deal with clients? Can you do the architecture work, or the design phase stuff that is logic based, where you're more likely to be sitting in a room with a whiteboard than at a computer? Because that stuff isn't coding, but it can be a part of being a coder.
Not to mention that the whole mentality of "you need to work really hard to code" mentality is counter to what really makes for a good programmer. Every programmer I know agrees that the adage "Work smarter, not harder" is the right way to approach these things, yet people are telling you that you just need to work harder, and that's kind of the opposite way you should be approaching these things. Coding all day every day doesn't mean you're a GOOD programmer, or that your code is great and well done. Literally 2 weeks ago I got handed a project from someone who quit, which had no documentation with it, and he spent a week on it. I rebuilt the entire thing (because it was bad) in about a day. Was he a better programmer because he spent longer at it? No, he wasn't. I've seen massive codebases that could be optimized and reduce the line count, it was only as large as it was because it was poorly designed with repetitive elements that could have been made into functions. Time is not the same measure as quality. And in coding, quality is always more important than quantity.
The work toxicity problem is a US-wide issue, not just a software thing. I was coding from around 9am to 10-12 pm 6 days / week for a few months at one point. I got so, so, soooo slow and unproductive after awhile. I'd keep putting in hours but i saw less and less actually get done. Eventually I was just treading water trying to accomplish the most basic tasks in an entire 10 hour day. No one stays productive if they work that freaking hard, no matter how much they like it or w/e.
I've actually lost a couple of friends because they literally gave up their free time/life, like hanging out with family/talking to friends/enjoying life/playing games, to try and become what they perceive as 'successful'.
I actually feel really sorry for people who think they need to code from the moment they wake up, to the moment they hit the pillow from exhaustion, especially if you're starting to distance yourself from friends and loved ones.
It isn't natural, nor is it desirable when you're able to see through the façade.
Oh man, this was exactly the message I needed to hear right now. I've been pushing myself the past 2 years in ways that have probably shaved 5+ years off of my life expectancy and 10 years off my hairline. I've known a good way to counteract this stress this whole time but I haven't let myself do it. But you, my good sir, have inspired me to take up an old hobby. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a pipe to load and some munchies to acquire.
Coding may pay well but at the end of the day fiat currency is just that.. Yeah its nice to not have to worry about currency but sacrificing everything for a piece of some else'e bag it not usually worth your health..
Oh jeez, I can't agree with it more. I really can't help but trust all that (due to self esteem issues) I didn't know those people are called dev influencers. They make me feel like 💩 and amplify my own professional insecurities and feelings of inferiority. Because I totally have this image of successful dev embedded into me. Being on linkedin is a torture when you're reading job description requiring you to be like you describe in this video. But all it does - is make me feel totally worthless...
And yes, I am prone to over-exerting myself and burning out. All combined with GAD - I think this is literally killing me slowly.
I agree with the messages and personal I do approach programming and life in that way (going on treks, smoking grass, not working outside my hours) but it also feels unnecessarily cynical to say "it's not a lifestyle" or "they're lying to you". Cus there are definitely people to whom this is a lifestyle and they seem to enjoy it. It doesn't have to be, and I would recommend trying new things, but my dad has spent most of his free time coding and maintaining open source libs and he wouldn't be lying if he said so as an influencer. I think these influencers are being pretty honest about that part of their life, and if that's what you enjoy then I'm glad you found the ultimate career for you.
This message should be shared as much as possible. Preach bra
This was a great video, I had it on while I was entering into my 12th straight hour of coding, but being a programmer I've learned how to multitask like a pro.
...Just kidding of course. Great video as always Dorian, being a programmer is not a lifestyle, it's a job. If you enjoy coding, then spend extra time coding, if you are doing it solely for the money then put in your 30 hours and spend the rest of the time doing what you love.
Thank you. We need to keep preaching work life balance and focusing on what really matters in life. Especially in America. The culture really needs to change
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 thank you to be honest and real in front of a camera
I want to start by saying that I TOTALLY agree with you, 100%.
I do have a question, though.
Imagine that at Company X the "Manager" decided that the Team needs to adopt a certain tech (like moving everything from WPF to Blazor, old projects included). Imagine also that the level of the Team is not stellar as they literally learned on the job and no one (saving 1/2 members) has a good grasp of coding conventions, architecture and how to properly code in general but until today the "it just works" philosophy well, just worked.
Now, knowing that those 1/2 members knows their stuff, the Manager decided that they HAVE to train the other members. Without ANYTHING in return, just because "this is how we do in the Team".
Am I wrong by thinking that this is super disrespectful towards those 1/2 members as the others SHOULD instead wake the F**K up and invest 1/2 hours a day to properly learn their trade?
Aren't they being selfish by wanting a "training" and a "manual" of how to proper code delivered by the 1/2 guys that actually put in the hours, the sweat and the sleepless nights?
Looking forward for answers here :)
P.S. Great Video :)
You’re so right man. Big up for you and thanks for speaking it up 👍🏻
This is actually a great video. Previous videos I have seen from you a while back were very discouraging to become a software developer.
This problem of social media amplifying real life exists in basically every aspect of your life. Blowing up beauty on social media for unrealistic expectations for women, unrealistic expectations for men, how careers should be - this is my day in the life, you have to do what I'll do or you're not worthy. People are projecting onto other people, and the truth is that a lot of it is just not real and heavily exaggerated.
Keep going, take adequate breaks (if you're learning full time, I would say use the weekends and the evenings to cool off and enjoy yourself), especially if you're working as well, because you can easily burn out and just stop if you take it too far. Just try not to give up
So I'm finishing up a computer programming certification certificate thing over at my local college. I haven't really fallen in love with coding but I can do it. Could you please do a video on alternatives to being a coder after getting coding skills from institution and/or learning it yourself?
he has mentioned creating content and starting personal projects (either for portfolio or for passive income). sorry I don't recall the exact video but I think it was on his main channel.
You can get Jobs that use small amounts of coding. There is a course by google, automating It support tasks with Python. You can go into IT support and automate most your work. But keep looking for your passion. Maybe management would be better for you.
Man, I'm worried about going back to get an associates in computer programming now. The way some developers describe it sounds terrible.
@@ruleaus7664 bruh don't be, there's a ton of shitty companies, you just have to get a new job from time to time until you find one of the few good ones.
I have 5 years as a web dev, it took me some time, but atm I'm in a company that pays me well and it's pretty chill with the workload, I know it sound like a fever dream, but there's a couple out there, just eat shit on your first years and work your way up there.
Thanks for the information and the content you put out. It's a blessing🙏
Love you & the honesty. Keep up the good job. God send.
I personally dont code at all outside of work. I like coding, but I enjoy a lot of other things way more as a hobby. Great video
Absolutely agree with, there ist the social media framing of being a developer on the other side there is the pure reality. I think many professionals like me agree with you
A lot of people talk a good job, but in reality they want millions for doing NOTHING!
Programming took me YEARS to get used to and I'm STILL learning every day!
You really have to love what you are doing to be at it every day, and it still can get very repetitive at times, and yeah burnout is always around the corner, especially if you are at it all the time.
From when I first started programming to now, yeah the mindset and people programming has changed A LOT, mostly due to the fact we use this technology every day, be it your phone or laptop or games console etc, most now want to see if they can fit into that mold of, Well EVERYONE ELSE IS A DEV...I SHOULD BE ONE TOO!
No that's just not the way to go, only do something if it HIGHLY appeals to you, not just because everyone else is doing it. Try it out as a hobby first, don't just quit your job one day and say I'm going to be a professional software developer, just because some money grabber on some site or YT says they can make you a Pro in 24hrs, NO just...NO!
It takes YEARS and heavy discipline on certain subjects, and you might hate it, yes some people take to it quicker, but those kind of people are usually the academic type, who loves math and eats textbooks for breakfast, those guys will pick it up waaay quicker, unlike myself who got thrown into the deep end with C in my Electrical and Electronic Degree Course many years ago and my head almost exploded! There were no YT how to step by step stuff and KR C programming book was IT! And obviously the lectures and labs which you know had us programming robots and ONLY wanted us to build an 8 bit CPU in Verilog code, which I almost had a heart attack trying to do at the time, I mean you can build hardware FROM CODE, WHAT? Yeah Uni was hard, for me anyway and a lot of others it seemed as well, but still after some time and my intro to OOP and some softer..ok easier projects lol, I started to get used to it, but not overnight, it took me a looong time!
But definitely health and life comes first! Programming should be secondary to your normal life, but hopefully enjoy programming when you do do it, as you most definitely should be doing projects and work you enjoy. If I had never checked out Mobile/Web/Games, and I was only doing the stuff I did at Uni at first, I most DEFINITELY would not be programming today, learning multiple ways to program, especially visually like games, saved me, but again programming 24/7 it's not the be all and end all!
Nature is important and yeah probably from Uni microcontrollers for some solar/wind renewable projects for the future will come in handy, but that's the plan for the next stage in my life before my brain starts to get too forgetful, before my brain starts to get too forgetful.
Lifes short...blink and you'll miss it! 😉✌🏽
I've had burnt out when I began coding, it's really hard to pull through. Honestly I've learnt almost a sense for when I can code outside of work and when I need to have a break. It's annoying though because legit I love doing stuff out of work to learn new things lol.
But I would say, and I've had this conversation with other devs too, if you really want to be able to work on personal stuff properly what you really need is to not have a full time job.
Straight up. The burn out is crazy.
It's always so nice to see your videos Dorian, I'm from Mexico, I'm a Husband, Father, and Employee and sometimes I just feel like you just said... I want to do so much and end up accomplishing almost nothing, leading me to burnout and frustration. But after watching this video I realized that Social Media and Influencers set a fake standard on what it really takes to be a programmer. Having a balance in life is crucial, knowing how to say no is vital, and stop fearing your boss might fire you because you said no to something, like learning something new after work hours. Thanks for saying all of this, for all the Devs I follow, you're the most authentic.
There are always two sides of the medal and I agree with you that the burn-out is real b*tch. But on the other side there may be layoffs (Meta and co.) and guess who is the 1st one to go.
Yeah, but I cannot imagine getting a junior position and advancing to regular if I didn't put in the work.
I was changing my career from a different field to coding.
I was working on my coding skills all the time.
Now, as a senior dev I agree 100%, that you need balance.
Right now, I have a pretty low stress government job in IT, so I don't feel burned out at the end of the day, so I have the energy to learning code and do side projects. Right now, I want to keep it a hobby, because I'm enjoying it and I don't know if I would enjoy it as a job, although at the same time, I want to keep it open as an option...especially since my current job is literally making my brain turn to mush, so I feel I have to be learning this to keep my mind sharp.
Thanks Johny :)
Of course influencers are lying. Lying is pretty much in the job description of influencer. Be it about some product or about how exiting their life is.
Perfect timing now that we saw what Musk expects from devs at Twitter. I fully agree with you! Programming is mentally exhausting so we need time to recover. It's also constant creative problem solving and that works best if the brain is allowed time to work on it in the background while taking a break, going for a walk, taking a d**p or showering. Working long hours constantly is just not productive.
He asked them for a 40hr week, they were doing from 4 to 2 hrs a day.
You and Chris Hawkes are a few of the only channels that keep it real. Keep it up!
I've literally only seen social media post that imply programmers don't program at all so I really don't know what this video is talking about, but it certainly is another one ticked for the programmers don't program box
I wasn't aware that this was an image pushed through social media. But I mostly stay off of social media anyway. Glad I missed out on that "trend".
Good video, bro! We really need to enjoy life while we can.
I'm trying to get my first job, but the problem is you can only find senior job openings. Which is kinda dumb, because senior devs are the ones who need job sites the least.
I was able to work for a Senior developer that on the side builds projects to sell to other companies and what he mostly does is manage the projects. He does what he needs to do at his work and latter for the side projects he just makes Github tickets and contracts it to other developers. He mostly doesn't program if it's not in his work
This is very very true! I started as a self taught developer on January if this year, on April i landed my first job, in still in it, I used to spend amor 18hrs a day coding, every moment of the day I used to be thinking on his to drive a pending issue, about a month ago I totally burned out I couldn't code at all, just to think about it made me sick I had to back off it for about 2 weeks I barely codes at all after that time I felt the same passion as before again, but now, I managed my time better, I do use dime of my free time to learn stuff but only 1 or 2 hours, and I do it only after my daughter goes to bed, for me, coding is awesome I really love it, but time never comes back and I love surrending time with my baby girl even more
I feel ya, but I have some specific circumstances where I have to be doing that all the time or at least most of the time and right now I'm not and that's a big problem.
Since I became a software engineer I don't code outside of work at all. Don't set the standards too high for yourself to the point where you're unhappy, I tried way too hard before I got the job to program all the time until I realised I was gonna be trained on everything I needed to know at work anyway.
I appreciate this. Seems like you were compelled by self awareness and accountability. And you wanted to share it.
I think you most likely lose more than you gain if you work till burnout, because recovering from burnout can take incredibly long. In some cases even years.
I always hated this manipulative message "you need to be passionate about / identify with your job, give 200% (to your company/your masters)".
But even though I never believed their manipulative messages, I got burned out because they put so much work on one person, doing all kinds of jobs at the same time, and all the other hundred bosses and customers push and guilt you. Sometimes it's not in our control. Now my goal is changing jobs till I find a somewhat okay environment. But it's easier said than done and also comes with a lot of stress. I know people in IT who have the exact opposite situation (even within the same company) with no stress, better pay, much lower expectations and "qualification". It's actually more about luck than people think. So try to not exploit yourself even harder for your owners. Unless you get something real out of it.
At work I write code like 1-2 hr a day, rest is meetings or answer questions.
When learning coding it’s good being consistent but don’t overdue it.
In my experience, there is a pretty big difference between company projects and side projects. Working in a corporate environment with project managers and cross-functional collaboration means that a lot of time is spent on coordination rather than building stuff. Moreover, even when you are building stuff, it has to go through a bunch of reviews leading to more overhead etc...
When I work on side projects, it is generally an enjoyable experience because I control the whole codebase working on what interests me. So while I agree that it is not ok for a company to expect you to work on the company projects after you clock out, I'll also say that you probably do need to be leveling up on your own free time doing things that interest you. Just clocking and clocking everyday is likely a recipe for a stagnant career that is vulnerable in economic downturns.
Agreed. 24 years doing this shit. It's a marathon, not a sprint.
"What other job is like that?" Music. Your description sounds almost exactly like the professional music field. Probably other arts too.
It's really essential to build the ability to focus deeply. This trumps the amount of time you spend glued to the screen. You can build meaningful understanding in Breadth. It's not like other types of grind where you can just push through. You need to focus on form first. Once you understand one thing the right way it becomes a lot easier to learn other things because you build the right intuition around computational logic & modern software.
I know people who post about how hard they work/study & `encourage` people to do the same & can only think of one person that's actually a skilled dev who does this(but he is also a raging jackass). The rest of them tend to be under-skilled/sloppy/in-scarcity. It's ironic because now when I network, boasting about work-ethic automatically raises a red flag in my mind about their skill-level. It's all low-tier job search level people in a `please-hire-me-I-have-no-self-respect` circle-jerk. It makes the industry more toxic for themselves because they have to live up to it after getting the job, but also acts as 2nd hand smoke for the rest of us.
For the past year I've been working almost non-stop on a long running project, and my great revelation of the past month or so is.... they're never gonna be satisfied with it. No matter what I give them on Monday, on Tuesday they'll want more. You have to pace yourself, because the business won't do it for you.
This is true. I work in Sweden, so its a bit more restricted to what someones boss can say and demand.
I've always worked on sideprojects during my sparetime and still do.
But when i worked with code for 8 hours, then went home to work with a project on my own as well, my head couldnt relax to sleep.
If your brain can't shutdown when you are about to sleep due to coding, then you better stop or cut down the work on those sideprojects, cause you will go straight into a burnout.
My current job is really understanding tho, they have a learning day once a month and "guilds" to spread information between the developers, during the work-hours.
Love your videos man keep speaking your mind out! Just subscribed.
Thank you. I also was like that on my first job. After work I was done. But these youtubers always are saying you need to work on side projects, it's a lifestyle blablaba. Also like you said unfortunately some of these companies are expecting that you do this in your free time as well otherwise you're not a match for this job.
Work/life balance is very important but I think there's no escaping working overtime (either at work or outside of work) when you're new to the field. The sheer amount of knowledge you have to have in order to compete to get a job in tech is daunting. Plus after you join you'll be expected to get up to speed quickly and contribute; some companies have a 60-90 day eval period where they can let you go if you don't meet their expectations.
However it does get better when you're more experienced; you can work faster and contribute more without spending so much time on tasks, so don't lose hope. But with all the layoffs people are gong to be on edge and putting in extra hours just so they don't get canned if their company starts laying off people.
I thought I was the only one who felt this way - I've been feeling alienated from the developer community for all my 7.5 years of being a programmer because of this. While it's true that you should be doing some learning and practice in your own time in order to keep up with the demands of your job, especially in the beginning as a junior, you're still allowed a personal life outside of work. It's a similar epidemic in the UI/UX design world as well I've noticed.
It's even worse in gaming industry because "You're doing what each coder is dreaming of ? Isn't it ?". Crunch or quit ? So toxic ....
Glad that you feel the same as I do.Right now I am learning React and at an advance level it is complicated enough to frustrate you for days.Glad that I picked up logo designing as well.Now everytime I get lost i calm myself with designing .
React advance level, will u be able to provide important point to go through learning about advance stuff.
Software Development and the IT industry as a whole is a very competitive field. There's a big difference in the skill gap and a huge difference in results based on that. If you're passionate about it, it absolutely makes sense to invest extra time as you can really see results if you aim for higher paying and more difficult jobs. If you're not that interested and you just treat is a job you might fall behind people that develop their skills in their free time and that's alright. It's a choice everyone gets to make and it's also not a final choice, there could be periods when you have the extra time and periods when you'd rather do something else. Also just working on own projects or trying out new frameworks doesn't necessarily make you better in the long term, after a certain point it's just a waste of time. Learning higher level concepts such as modeling, architecture design, project management usually have higher returns of investment once you're technically proficient.
Dorian, it's so fantastic, I'm on another part of our planet, I'm watching your video and recognise my own thoughts. Thanks for your content, It helps me a lot!
It's like being a car mechanic. You're not working on cars on your weekends. Sure, you'll apply your skills when your or your family's or your friend's car is having issues, just as I will use my coding skills to fix my problems, if I feel like it. Banging out a bunch of scripts and some automation can make life easier, but it's not what I do all the time with my own time just because I'm a programmer.
I've been a professional software engineer for coming on to 17 years now, I recently started to use Twitter and the "Programmer Influencer" space sometimes I find bizarre, competitive and cringeworthy. Great video, as the video ended, I opened an email from a programming influencer promoting his new learning platform encouraging daily learning as a prerequisite - daily learning is fine if you want to do it but I feel this email sets a false precedent that it is required especially since the influencer claims they learn something new every single day. A well timed example of what you were saying in this video.
Man I just started to learn coding and I just realized I really push myself hard because when I skip a day not coding I feel so depressed because after all what we want is MONEY in order to buy our TIME (FREEDOM). But u just made to realize too that I am human not robot.
I think this is a larger issue than just programming to be honest. I've been a philosophical stoic since well before I knew that it was an actual philosophy and I've always been extremely clear and accepting about what it is I do and why I do it, to such an extent that I frequently piss off my friends because I often ask them to explain why they agree with me. But the thing is, while it's important to know how to put your emotional state on hold to deal with a problem, a core part of actually being okay with doing that is also understanding when you shouldn't do it.
If you're just constantly trying to be the perfect stoic, always trying to work work work with no emotion, you're just gonna spiral. It's not about denying your emotions, it's not about leaning into them, it's not even about ignoring them, it's about controlling them. If you have worked for a month straight non stop, always having SOMETHING crucial weighing on you, take a bloody break. Being able to do that is a skill people need, I firmly believe that, but being capable of doing something is entirely uncorrelated from whether or not you should do that thing constantly. You CAN stick your dick in a metal fan but I'd not recommend you did that once, letalone 24/7 for a month straight.
You don't forge a metal by endlessly funneling heat into it until it's hotter than the sun and a literal plasma, you forge it by getting it to where it's workable, then working with it. No hotter, no colder. That balance is one I've seen very few people understand, and even less reach.
Spot on! To expand on the entrepreneur angle, I've heard a really great point that your aim shouldn't be to have two jobs, but rather you're trying to make the side gig your main job. Your side gig might be an area you're more passionate about too (or at least, ideally, it'll become more lucrative). I am personally aiming to become an indie developer, but I know it takes a handful of games to gain an audience. I see the ideal that I'm putting in 20 hours a week towards that on top of my main 40 hour/week developer job, although I struggle to put even 1 hour in, unless I'm feeling particularly inspired. Hopefully, one day, it can be my main job and I can have that creative outlet. Hope others can relate.
I've known a lot of programmers that complain constantly about their crazy crunch time schedules. Thing is... I see them on Steam and Discord, and in person, and posting on various sites all the time. They really aren't "working" the hours that they think they're working.
steam and discord turn on automatically when you turn the PC on. They're probably working lol.
Modern day sweat shops. Conditioned to be guilty for not working 24/7, on call , unsustainable goals etc...
I've been working on the mobile game sector for nearly 8 months now and I am completely, utterly, absolutely exhausted. I started to have trouble sleeping because of anxiety about my job, put on 30 pounds of weight and deteriorated my romantic and other relationships because of never ending work hours. Sure, I am a better developer and financially more stable compared to 8 months ago but these doesn't change the fact that I feel like shit. Constant deadline preasure, getting compared to my peers put on deadly amount of stress on me. I fucking don't know what to do.
That video is fundamental. It's *very* important that this kind of thing is said and heard by people in this industry, because companies are taking this "programming is a lifestyle!" slogan and using it to exploit and screw people up. It's perverse. Also, it's crazy how people take the "programming is just a job" phrase like some sort of insult. I mean, it's a *GOOD* thing to have a job! Jobs are essential! There's nothing _bad_ about seeing a job as a job!
Also, from a purely pragmatic point of view, it's important to have hobbies and activities outside of coding, because that keeps your brain oxygenated and healthy! Not only are you exercising your ability to experience the world and know how it works, but you can also use those activities to develop abilities that, indirectly, make you a better programmer. I tend to think of software design in a very spacial thing, like objects that connect in space, and I *need* to have experiences in my day to day life that help me improve that kind of thinking. It makes me a better professional.
But other than that, your lifestyle should be whatever you want it to be. I consider myself primarily an artist, a music enthusiast, and a writer. Programming is a thing that I know I can do well and I can live off it, but I'm so much more than that. And I know I'd be a worse programmer if I tried to turn it into a "lifestyle". It wouldn't work.
I code to provide a life for myself and my family, not just to code. I left blue collar work because it ate my life away. It's a wonder I got hired I guess but I'm very happy where I'm at. I guess it comes down to the people you work for too.
I had this lifestyle as I had multiple projects going on at once. Past few weeks, I get less and less done, currently I just force myself to sit and get a few lines in, it's extremely inefficient.
depends on what you love, I love developing. I've done it since 1988 and I never stop the problem solving process for my own personal projects. But when it comes to coding at a job, I don't can give a shit less about the menial work it isn't like the retrocoding challenges and etc.
I also do art and it's the same way.
So it is basically like the "Influencers" who posts perfect posing pictures of them and tag them with "just got up, uh mornings amirite?".
I had burn out with 29 in IT industry, after overworking and overestimating myself. I thought I could work day and night, eat and sleep bad, without consequences, but nope, the body will strike at some point.
The worst thing about these programmer influencers is that, consciously or inconsciously, they are selling that being where they are and having the >100 k annually salary is the real success, i am from Colombia and the salary of a junior software developer is about 500$ per month, juniors are getting overwhelmed because they dont think they can gain those >100 k, the most sad thing about it, is that these influencers only want to feed their own ego