this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2024
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I definitely have moments like this too. I have been reflecting more lately and trying to decide if the feeling is temporary or permanent. I have been pondering what else I would do. Are you considering a career change, and if so, what would you do instead? I don't know if I could transition to something else without going back to school, and it would kill me a bit inside to take out more student loans.
What has been working for me is not trying to make software my life or my identity. I don’t get home from work just to work on my side project, or my app, or my Arch install, or even watch videos about coding and shit. I hang out at my pond, play with my pets, play with my son, chill with my wife, work on the yard, or just watch/play something that catches my interest.
It’s like we all have a unique user’s manual for our unique bodies and minds, but we don’t get a copy of it and have to do some reverse engineering to figure out what works. Then you have to have the compassion and empathy for yourself to do the things that increase your happiness instead of doing the things that you’re “supposed” to do.
That's solid advice. I think I have my identity wrapped up too much in my career, so when I dislike my job, I feel unsatisfied in life. I will try to see it as means to an end more than who I am.
Awesome to hear! It’s easier said than done (like always) because I think sometimes we don’t even realize when we’re doing it.
In the first year of COVID my position got eliminated at the company I’d worked at for 16 years. I’d had different positions within the company, but that place was basically my entire career until then.
That shock to the system, coupled with the fact that several months later I realized I was the same person with the same loved ones, finally flipped some switch in my brain that I didn’t even realize was there. Then the next job I got was fucking horrible and served to weld that switch in its new position, lol.
So now I have a good job with good coworkers, and I appreciate that fact every day, but that’s not going to erode the healthy boundaries and mental compartmentalization.
That's the conversation I was having with my therapist this week. I don't know. I've always massively struggled with this. Thinking about it sends me into a spiral.
As of now the plan is to look for other opportunities in industry. Some training is fine but I would like to avoid loans. I don't have anything specific yet, but public sector is likely part of it. I'm less motivated to help people as I am to make certain people miserable. Countries have started to track job quality ("job quality"), it's data worth looking at.
Depending on how that goes I have other thoughts but nothing that is sucking me in. Maybe I'll give up entirely and become a vagrant. I also have a viable non-expiring business idea that would de-employ a certain group of people I don't like. I'm not ready for either of those yet.
In the meantime I have a bucket list of things that I'm working through. It helps me feel like my life has forward momentum despite what's happening with my career (it's also opening up new doors I didn't see before, eg acting). Between that and therapy my job feels often feels like something I'll deal with later.
All devs turn 40 and quit their job, buy a cottage near the forest and start growing their own vegetables anyway, so you just need to stick to it for a few more years.