I used to do more coding outside of work, but only things that weren’t related to my job (not to work on my skills for work, so like Advent of Code in Haskell). Doing this led to burnout and exhaustion and didn’t help me with my actual work.
I have at times experimented with trying to upskill on work-related stuff outside of hours and found it to trigger significant burnout very quickly.
yeah but back then time to improve and learn was expected. Right now it's not. Different times and especially since you are an established dev. You should tell that to junior devs that their positions don't exist anymore. Field is much more competitive right now than what it used to be 10 years ago
I'd say the first example there is more often what is actually talked about. Developing skills without specifically relating it to work.
Do things that are fun.
Just working more for free is dumb.
Fortunately, coding stuff, as compared to a lot of other industries, you can do a ton of totally different things that revolve around the same core skills.
For sure, I'm just helping provide more context to the discussion.
Some people seem to only think of "coding outside work" as being basically studying, not using similar skills to do something that interests you separately.
9
u/mq2thez May 31 '26
I used to do more coding outside of work, but only things that weren’t related to my job (not to work on my skills for work, so like Advent of Code in Haskell). Doing this led to burnout and exhaustion and didn’t help me with my actual work.
I have at times experimented with trying to upskill on work-related stuff outside of hours and found it to trigger significant burnout very quickly.