So, dealing with burnout requires you to identify what it is about your current work/life situation that is causing some part of you to apply the brakes.
For me, it's been many different things, but it has included: both fear of failure and fear of success; working for too long on projects that seem destined to fail; working with people who have values I don't share; resentments about all kinds of things that are mostly outside my control (and therefore pointless).
My methods for identifying these issues have included various emotional awareness/healing techniques that allow us to learn about our own subconscious beliefs and behavioural patterns, and then to take steps to adopt more healthy behaviours by aligning our internal thoughts with our external activities.
Feel free to email me if you want suggestions of specific techniques that have worked for me (email in profile).
If you do anything over and over, you'll get sick of it. A well-balanced life is important. Start exploring other things in life that you find interesting; there is plenty to keep you occupied.
Once you have burnout, the only fix is to avoid whatever it is that's burning you out. Hopefully it won't require a total career change / hiatus, although for some people it does get to that point.
However, it does get tricky when your other hobbies also require you be on the computer as your job does (e.g., cryptocurrency trading, programming side projects, or editing images, making/editing videos, video games, etc.).
So, recently I've taken up gardening (got a nice piece of land) and brewing beer.
Also, going to the gym every other day or go out running. The exercise helps keep your mind and body at bay.
If you can't because you are a startup founder and it's not making enough money then you have some hard choices. Either ask for help from people that love you, get day job, or go into debt to get your sanity back.
At the end of your life the $2k that month off in Costa Rica cost you will be a pittance compared to everything else you've earned.
At the end of the month off evaluate your life.
Do you still like programming? If the answer is only "kinda sometimes" figure out what you actually like about it and what you hate about it and shift things around to match those.
Are you out of shape? Start biking to get around or get a running buddy. Try to get 15 minutes of heart pumping exercise every day and work towards at least one day a week with over an hour of heart pumping exercise. Do some strength training too. callisthenics is my jam since its super cheap and effective, but some people need social encouragement and take better to things like water polo.
Do you hate your wife? Fix the relationship. See a therapist. If your wife won't work to fix it leave her. Unfaithfulness isn't just cheating.
How's the diet? Cut the fucking soft drinks to 0 and start eating something flavourful, protein / fiber rich every day. I do savoury omelettes in the morning (fresh thyme, soy sauce, mushrooms, onions and jiggled eggs) but whatever it is make sure you have at least one meal every day that is low in carbs, medium-low in fat and high in fiber and protein.
Get a hobby that doesn't involve a screen or prolonged mental energy. Photography, weaving, carpentry, painting. Start small and set realistic goals.
Quit tabacco. Prolonged use raises latent anxiety.
The key thing though is to not to try to do this all at once. Come up with a plan and implement only one change at a time about 4 to 6 weeks between each change.
Good luck!
I did my best to illustrate that here: https://twitter.com/AndrewStellman/status/896405621494382593
Tangled, nasty, poorly maintained code is not an easy problem to fix. The first step is getting everyone on the team -- and especially the boss -- to recognize the real problem, and accept that fixing it will save more time than it costs.
I see context switches and time constraints as the issues that grind me.
I would like to add it's not only working in a horrific code base it's working in a horrific code base and getting a lot of push back on fixing it.
Telling PM's week after week that the backend will eventually keel over if we don't take some time to clean it up and being told there is no time to do refactoring or maintenance only time for features is very aggravating. Additionally watching outage after outage occur because of this and still being told "we need more feature work there is no time for refactoring" drove me up the wall.
Focusing on weekly or even daily tasks instead of thinking strategically and having time to learn and experiments drive alienation.
Some creative and unstructured work should be always part of our day.
(I'm talking work, not hobbies during spare time.)
- Work on shorter projects with clear goals and a clear end. Finish them and move on.
- Exercise is a priority more important than work. I can be flexible about when, but I never skip. Ever.
- If the source of burnout is never-ending support at your day job, take action. Alert your manager. Or start looking for a better job. Realize that no amount of money or security is worth the entirety of your life, attention, happiness & time.
- Work harder to identify and prioritize what you want. Recognize you can code every waking second and never finish what you want. So make sure you think more carefully about exactly what you want, and start figuring out how to spend your time on only what you want and nothing else.
- Make sure you're learning something new that you want to learn (and not something someone else wants you to learn.)
- Reserve time to socialize. Reserve time to get outside.
- If heading toward management is something that doesn't make you cringe and run, reflect on how you can improve the process that's burning you out. Can parts be delegated? Can you request assistance? Can it be done better? People problems and not software may be the source of your pain. Starting learning how to solve people problems. Read books about it, etc.
Replacing existing employees is expensive. You understand the code, the business, the processes, the knowledge network (who knows what), etc.. Hiring someone straight off the street to replace you, even if they on paper have same technical skills, is a huge cost.
Thus, given a rational manager, if you are willing to quit your job over this you have a lot of leverage.
You can make your negotiating position even stronger by:
1. Living below your means, so you have lots of savings in the bank.
2. Getting a job offer you're willing to accept that does have this benefit, then going to your employer and asking them to counter it.
3. Pointing out the ways this will benefit your employer.
There's a couple chapters about this in my book, The Programmer's Guide to a Sane Workweek (https://codewithoutrules.com/saneworkweek/), but it's similar negotiating dynamic to part-time job, except much easier to get, so this blog post may also be relevant: https://codewithoutrules.com/2018/01/08/part-time-programmer...
though it can be very productive, it certainly comes with it's own set of downsides; - working from home, you'll never get "home from work". in the end, at least in my case, it caused me to work outside working working hours more often as my home became my office. - the occasional brainstorm with your colleauges becomes a chore resulting in skipping those and writing worse code / having more debate over code reviews. even though there are quite a few video conferencing applications around, brainstorm sessions tend to be more effective / productive while having a walk / a coffee / etc together (my $0.02).
so yeah, when your work environment is the cause of burning you out, working from home is a short term solution, finding a better environment the long term one if you'd ask me
Also, there are a lot of comments here that basically amount to "stimulate your dopamine receptors with novelty more often." I would argue the opposite is what you want to be doing. Stop doing anything that has a high reward for little effort. Socialize in person instead of on social media. Learn to cook instead of eating out. Take up a sport instead of watching sport on TV. Use a boring language you already know to build a product that solves a real problem instead of learning a new language by building a toy product that accomplishes nothing. Etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67Vp7fTgQ3g
... at the minimum - it'll fire you up. His stuff is great for motivation.
2nd step, because long-term burnout (chronic burnout) is real: Exercise + Hobbies + Family
...Make time or you WILL fail everyone in the long run - the literature on this is fairly established if I am not mistaken (sorry no refs).
- if you can't afford, find a part-time low-stress job paying just your bills and try to slow down
- have interesting hobbies meeting people from outside tech purely for fun; if they become stressful in any way disengage without explanation and move away
- do saunas
- eat well, figure out which food makes you feel good long-term
- drink a lot of water
- get fit but don't train up to first symptoms of exhaustion, or you'd make your burnout way worse
- relax as much as you can
I had a friend who was driven to hospital by his bosses and stayed there for >6 months while cutting contact with the outside world completely. You don't want to go that far.
I'd apply that same skepticism to pop-psychological advice.
It's also possible you're not actually burned out, but that this is a natural part of the ebb and flow of your emotional state. This isn't to say "just power through," but if you're a bit sick of it, you may find you naturally recover.
Ie. I may be weeks and weeks in networking code and get it to a reasonable point but then get fed up, and move to 3D graphics code, then on to the caching system and then back to the networking code and so on. None of these sub-systems are complete in 1 sitting, but taking this iterative approach gives me a few things:
- the change brings variety to the mind, which prolongs the burnout.
- every "round" of work, I will learn something, thereby building my knowledge bit by bit. It is good to consume this knowledge bit by bit, giving time for it to be absorbed, which this approach allows for.
- it means that at any one time, I have a good "overall" view of the state of the entire product.
- i notice things that I did not when working on that sub-system the first time. Fresh pair of eyes, almost.
Well, the disadvantage I suppose is that it is probably not the most efficient manner to work, but it keeps me relatively sane. Progress feels slow, but then there are moments where multiple sub-systems come together at the same time, and those are very rewarding.
Actually, sometimes, when I tired writing code, I will just go hangout with my friends, have some little chat or something.
Other hobbies also helps, like photography, cooking or just staring at sky, watch the cloud floating by. If you have a small astronomical telescope, then you can even see the stars (Well, plants actually and nebula if you do photography).
The key point is: Don't just write program, have some life. Good life will eventually give you better code in return.
https://hn.algolia.com/?query=burnout&sort=byPopularity&pref...
Other hobbies, and keeping the screen off when I'm at home helps too.
Also, lots of working out and meditation. It helps to keep life in perspective. Humans have pass many great filters and your life is better almost all who came before you.
It's working for me better than any other thing I tried in the past. And obviously (?) we didn't even do it for helping me deal with burnout.
Slow down. Let things take time. Learn to say things took longer than planned. People who are not devs will not understand why you need rest sometimes.