Ask HN: How do you find what you're good at and make money? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How do you find what you're good at and make money?

18 pointsgiantg28 comments

I used to be a moderately high performer in just about everything - grades, sports, hobbies, college jobs, and even my first few years of professional life. Now I seem to be below average in most of those things. Like I'm in some sort of extended burnout across almost every category of life.

The most concerning part is my job. I've been getting a roller coaster of reviews for years. I'll get a good rating one year and a bad one the next. How can I find a job I'm actually good at? I'm a midlevel dev with about 12 yoe. I guess I should also mention I'm autistic.

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It depends on how you operate as a person. It seems like you're already good at programming if you have 12 YOE.

The important question to ask yourself is: Do I enjoy the _process_ of working on something or do I enjoy the _product_ of working on something?

For me, I've found time and time again that it doesn't matter what I work on, I care most about the outcome. I will suffer through extremely difficult problems because I just really want the outcome. But others (probably most people) enjoy the process of work. However, tons of programmers tend to hate tedium and like the product of their work. But if you really enjoy the process you might like a "meditative" task like data cleaning or saddle stitching leather or something.

The next question to ask yourself is: what do I want? I've only ever made money from making things and doing things I specifically want, not something I'm trying to make for other people.

Importantly as a programmer, you don't necessarily need to make some app that does something you want. When I was in college I wanted a cool domain name. Was too expensive. I contacted the registrar selling the domain and asked how to get it cheaper. They had an affiliate marketing program where you could get $20 for everyone who signed up for the free domain name promo (seriously I don't know what they were thinking). I posted on /r/efreebies a few times and made over $1,200 in a few days just posting a link. I wanted a domain name, I tried a bunch of ways to get the domain name, I stumbled upon a way to make money, I got the domain name.

Another important thing is to just try out a bunch of different things you might be interested in. Think generative art is cool? Try it. Think Census Data is cool? Visualize it. Think USB drivers are cool? Write one.

The only thing that really works is the tedious, frustrating task of trial and error with your curiosities. Once you really find something you're interested in you can expand it into a career and get a job doing what you want.

Grades and ratings come from people who Need something from you.

From time to time, you have to think about what your Needs are (cause they change with time). Money/Status/Job etc begins to have meaning when its in service of those Needs.

People who haven't spent time thinking about what matters to them, end up trying to meet the Needs of whatever others throw in their lap.

Listen to your innermost voice. If you truly believe that making money is important, then the first thing you should learn is how to awaken your curiosity. In different industries, different lifestyles, languages, and backgrounds, you can discover many problems. But this requires you to be observant enough to notice them.

Nowadays, we are often distracted by things that are developing rapidly, but I think this is not a good thing. We should be open and accept ourselves and our natural instincts to live our lives.

I do have curiosity and notice quite a few problems. Translating that into a career is more difficult. I need to make money since I have a family to support. It would be nice if I could do that in a job I'm good at instead of one that seems unsable.

This book by a Stanford professor attempts to answer this question:

https://designingyour.life/

If you’re autistic, inquire with a psychologist about autistic burnout. As someone on the spectrum myself, it can be very taxing to fit in with neurotypical people and workplaces which can greatly affect one’s performance. The cyclical pattern of your performance reminds me of my own.

Did they have any solution for you? I'm aware of autistic burnout and I do think it's a contributor. However, I'm not aware of anything I can do to fix it other than to look for a different job. It doesn't seem like there's anything I can change at my current one.

I’m working through it currently with my doctor, but unfortunately I have really crappy insurance. ASD is kind of a catch all for a group of symptoms that likely have a broad range of causes, like IBS, but in my case we suspect elevated blood serotonin levels are causing sensory processing issues by way of depressing the filtering action of the thalamus, due to mitochondria dysfunction, causing the CNS to be overwhelmed with information which reduces processing capacity. Since you appear to be high functioning, I would suggest getting your blood serotonin levels checked and working with a doctor familiar with ASD.

To address your original inquiry, I have found that the thing I value most is just time spent with family and loved ones. I bounced around through several careers and in the end, whatever pays the bills and allows me to provide for a lifestyle outside of work and spend the most time with loved ones is what I value the most.

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