Ask HN: How do I get the spark back for working with computers? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How do I get the spark back for working with computers?

6 pointscgb2235 comments

When I was a teenager I used to be obsessed with computers. I installed Ubuntu on my laptop and would tinker with it endlessly and was willing to suffer through any lack of compatibility though sheer passion for learning more.

I would read those big books that go through all the Linux commands and configurations for hours straight, and retain most of it.

Coding, while something at first I struggled with, I could also do for hours because every new thing I learned about it was exciting and helped make what I was doing feel more real. Sometime around College, I think that spark I felt left. Coding started feeling like a chore. Classes were hard, and weren’t really project based, just academic with maybe some short labs.

I tried to push through this, since I figured “of course I don’t like this now, college makes it feel like work” but figured that once I was a professional, it would go back to being joyful.

I worked at a few local startups in college to help pay for school and those varied from exciting to demoralizing (it was my first job after all) to just stressful (one had a pretty toxic culture. It was like nobody wanted to be there with each other around).

After college, I worked in a different field for a few months to see if I was more passionate about something non-technical and it turned out I hated that as well.

So I went back to coding, but the spark I had as a teenager just never came back.

Now in my head of course I want to be the guy who can go deep on a code base and find something wrong, or of course I want to read books on things I think are exciting like cryptography, or Linux. But when I do those things now, they feel like a chore. Reading takes a while, I recall less than before, learning a new language isn’t exciting, it’s tedious.

How do I get that excitement back? I _loved_ computers. I still in my head love them too. But the practice of that love now just feel like work, and that kills me inside.

(Seems like I'm writing this to myself too.)

https://letterstoanewdeveloper.com/2020/04/20/you-should-pla...

Off the top of my head:

- play a lot more without any expectation, don't be afraid to leave a trail of mistakes and unfinished projects

- make sure you are healthy, eating and exercise, lots of sleep

- make sure you allocate time to playing and not be distracted by other things

- watch a bunch of youtube videos on computing, programming

- play play play

- don't try to force getting that excitement back, so play a little each day and if bored, do something else

- if you are worried about wasting your time playing, look back and see what you have accomplished over the last week. Know that another week will pass and you can decide to fill that week with tinkering or not.

- be in a relaxed state when you want to learn something

If you're like me, the spark is gone forever.

The spark comes from believing that by learning these technologies you can build awesome stuff as a respected part of a team. In reality, we are subject to the whims of management and assigned boring/impactless work. Our expert opinions are not respected, not because they are wrong but simply because they do not fit with management's ideas. You might have big ideas and want to make great products, but instead you are told to think like everyone else and take shortcuts.

Even working on projects at home can lose their appeal if they aren't original.

Learning becomes harder as one ages, I think. Concentrating also becomes harder with so many distractions.

I think best way to learn anything computer related is to make something. I started learning docker, I took my projects and containerized them. That way I learned what I needed in the order that I needed. Makes it much easier to learn than just listening to lectures in monotonic voices or reading books.

You have to grow up a bit I guess.

Nothing is stopping you from doing what you need to do outside of work. I’m super interested in doing some 3D compositing stuff, so much so I day dream about it.

Part of life is figuring this out, that particular internal monologue you have has to be shut up mostly because it’s an articulation of an immature emotion (mostly teenage and post teenage 20s, all the way to the end of your 20s often).

Your pre teens and 30s is full of I do whatever the fuck I want. If you are beyond the melancholy years, fill us in, there might a be second cycle of coming down the line for all of us (40s, 50s). I pray not, I can’t handle the neuroticism of those years.

Personally, I think as soon as you attach monetization to something, the incentives and spark for it turns into "work" or a "job". Unless performance or competition is inherently part of the task eg. sports, we have to find ways to enjoy doing something without measuring the output or ROI from it.

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