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I was overwhelmed at first. Every time a Show HN would pop up, I was amazed at how individuals could deliver on so much alone. So I accepted these things: - Th

I was overwhelmed at first. Every time a Show HN would pop up, I was amazed at how individuals could deliver on so much alone. So I accepted these things: - There will always be people who are better than you, in any field. I see it as a positive and a great learning opportunity. - There will never be time to learn everything you want to learn. The question I try to answer is: Am I doing the best I can at the moment? Of course, this can also lead to complacency.

yeswecatan 9y ago
Complacency may be a blessing at this point. For years I had the mindset that it's a bad thing.
- gorbachev 9y ago
  Do what makes you happy / keeps you and your family fed. If complacency does that for you, then it's good. If not, it's not.
  - kinleyd 9y ago
    Pith instruction. I don't think it can get much more succinct than that.
  - RugnirViking 9y ago
    > Do what makes you happy / keeps you and your family fed. The issue is for many people these two seem to be opposites
codyb 9y ago
And then you need to realize that if you spend a bit of time every day doing a little something, you'll be able to deliver some pretty big things over time. The hardest part, I find, is starting. But once I do, boy is it a lot of fun to keep that ball rolling! There's nothing so enjoyable as hacking away at something and seeing those incremental changes fall into place.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  > The hardest part, I find, is starting. To me the hardest part is finishing. To start stuff is very easy for me but to actually grind away at something day after day until it is finally done is very hard.
  - codyb 9y ago
    Thanks for saying this Jacquesm. I've read several of your articles over time so to receive unexpected correspondence from a respected engineer is, to say the least, very cool. You're absolutely right. I find that one of the biggest contributions towards my feelings of burnout is the fact that, when it comes to software engineering, not much is ever truly finished. A lot of us work for places where the product is never actually finished. When we work in environments where there is always another ticket to complete, it can be hard to feel as if there is actually an end in sight to much of anything. My father is an accomplished woodworker/graphic designer/renaissance man, he's built things such as book cases, stained glass windows, picture frames for his gorgeous nature shots taken across the United States, and even (when I was younger) a cedar stripper canoe. Sometimes I very much long for the feeling that he has when he has completed a project. One he can run his hands along. We're not afforded that luxury as software engineers. We work on some of the most complex projects ever to be known to man. Projects with millions of lines of code that are never truly secure, complete, or tangible. When we step away from the keyboards, there is nothing in meat space which exists as proof of our work. That being said, when I have the pleasure of working on my own terms, in my own office, I find nothing more satisfying than hacking away at my own projects. I am not sure if that is true for every engineer but when I have the luxury of being able to spend a couple of hours researching Git branching strategies because that is something I think will not only make my project more maintainable but me a better engineer, I just love it. I am consistently humbled by our profession. Every single thing I'm assigned to seems to me to be easy in my mind, and it absolutely never is. (Of course I refuse to stay comfortable and take on everything I can). I guess at the end of the day, if you don't enjoy the journey which may never end (and is more likely than not to be endless), it may not be the field to devote your time to. But if you can enjoy being constantly overwhelmed by the myriad of options for your development environment, databases, servers, and front end frameworks, then there really is nothing so sweet as hacking away at a project you can call all your own.
losteric 9y ago
The internet solved discoverability but gave us the problem of consciously avoiding information, learning about the right things at the right level and accepting some ignorance in favor of specialized deeper understanding. Personally, I forward everything from HN's front page, every tech-relevant subreddit, major tech companies and software projects, roughly 30 blogs, Twitter, and blogs/changelogs for every project/service I depend on (for work or side projects)... all straight into my email. Rules automatically curate emails into prioritized / categorized folders. Setting up those rules was my solution to information overload - reviewing rule relevance is the same as measuring how my attention investment tracks against long-term learning goals. One process for managing my work, personal life, and interests :) 10 minutes a day is enough to follow every personally relevant development. I do a deeper hour-long review of lower priority content at least once a week, but my email is an effectively infinite backlog of interesting-possibly-relevant information.
- ferdterguson 9y ago
  > I do a deeper hour-long review of lower priority content at least once a week, but my email is an effectively infinite backlog of interesting-possibly-relevant information. As a zero-inbox kind of person this is terrifying. It's already enough effort to keep up with the new journal articles every day. I use my morning commute to do that and my evening commute to unwind and read the more interesting stuff.
  - losteric 9y ago
    I don't think you understand, my inbox is almost always at zero :) This folders and rules was my strategy for balancing the need to be hyper-informed, well-organized, and not-overwhelmed... only uncategorized content shows up in my inbox. My "High Priority" folder has subfolders for friends, family, bills, and other things that have to be kept at 0. The "Low Low Priority" folder has folders for online store emails that useful a couple times a year for discounts when I need a new shirt or something, auto-deleted after 14 days. In between is everything, nicely triaged and categorized. It's really more of a personalized private ad/tracker-free mobile and cli-compatible individual media aggregation service - perfectly managing the flow of the internet into my brain :)

yeswecatan 9y ago

Complacency may be a blessing at this point. For years I had the mindset that it's a bad thing.

gorbachev 9y ago
Do what makes you happy / keeps you and your family fed. If complacency does that for you, then it's good. If not, it's not.
- kinleyd 9y ago
  Pith instruction. I don't think it can get much more succinct than that.
- RugnirViking 9y ago
  > Do what makes you happy / keeps you and your family fed. The issue is for many people these two seem to be opposites

codyb 9y ago

And then you need to realize that if you spend a bit of time every day doing a little something, you'll be able to deliver some pretty big things over time. The hardest part, I find, is starting. But once I do, boy is it a lot of fun to keep that ball rolling! There's nothing so enjoyable as hacking away at something and seeing those incremental changes fall into place.

jacquesm 9y ago
> The hardest part, I find, is starting. To me the hardest part is finishing. To start stuff is very easy for me but to actually grind away at something day after day until it is finally done is very hard.
- codyb 9y ago
  Thanks for saying this Jacquesm. I've read several of your articles over time so to receive unexpected correspondence from a respected engineer is, to say the least, very cool. You're absolutely right. I find that one of the biggest contributions towards my feelings of burnout is the fact that, when it comes to software engineering, not much is ever truly finished. A lot of us work for places where the product is never actually finished. When we work in environments where there is always another ticket to complete, it can be hard to feel as if there is actually an end in sight to much of anything. My father is an accomplished woodworker/graphic designer/renaissance man, he's built things such as book cases, stained glass windows, picture frames for his gorgeous nature shots taken across the United States, and even (when I was younger) a cedar stripper canoe. Sometimes I very much long for the feeling that he has when he has completed a project. One he can run his hands along. We're not afforded that luxury as software engineers. We work on some of the most complex projects ever to be known to man. Projects with millions of lines of code that are never truly secure, complete, or tangible. When we step away from the keyboards, there is nothing in meat space which exists as proof of our work. That being said, when I have the pleasure of working on my own terms, in my own office, I find nothing more satisfying than hacking away at my own projects. I am not sure if that is true for every engineer but when I have the luxury of being able to spend a couple of hours researching Git branching strategies because that is something I think will not only make my project more maintainable but me a better engineer, I just love it. I am consistently humbled by our profession. Every single thing I'm assigned to seems to me to be easy in my mind, and it absolutely never is. (Of course I refuse to stay comfortable and take on everything I can). I guess at the end of the day, if you don't enjoy the journey which may never end (and is more likely than not to be endless), it may not be the field to devote your time to. But if you can enjoy being constantly overwhelmed by the myriad of options for your development environment, databases, servers, and front end frameworks, then there really is nothing so sweet as hacking away at a project you can call all your own.

losteric 9y ago

The internet solved discoverability but gave us the problem of consciously avoiding information, learning about the right things at the right level and accepting some ignorance in favor of specialized deeper understanding. Personally, I forward everything from HN's front page, every tech-relevant subreddit, major tech companies and software projects, roughly 30 blogs, Twitter, and blogs/changelogs for every project/service I depend on (for work or side projects)... all straight into my email. Rules automatically curate emails into prioritized / categorized folders. Setting up those rules was my solution to information overload - reviewing rule relevance is the same as measuring how my attention investment tracks against long-term learning goals. One process for managing my work, personal life, and interests :) 10 minutes a day is enough to follow every personally relevant development. I do a deeper hour-long review of lower priority content at least once a week, but my email is an effectively infinite backlog of interesting-possibly-relevant information.

ferdterguson 9y ago
> I do a deeper hour-long review of lower priority content at least once a week, but my email is an effectively infinite backlog of interesting-possibly-relevant information. As a zero-inbox kind of person this is terrifying. It's already enough effort to keep up with the new journal articles every day. I use my morning commute to do that and my evening commute to unwind and read the more interesting stuff.
- losteric 9y ago
  I don't think you understand, my inbox is almost always at zero :) This folders and rules was my strategy for balancing the need to be hyper-informed, well-organized, and not-overwhelmed... only uncategorized content shows up in my inbox. My "High Priority" folder has subfolders for friends, family, bills, and other things that have to be kept at 0. The "Low Low Priority" folder has folders for online store emails that useful a couple times a year for discounts when I need a new shirt or something, auto-deleted after 14 days. In between is everything, nicely triaged and categorized. It's really more of a personalized private ad/tracker-free mobile and cli-compatible individual media aggregation service - perfectly managing the flow of the internet into my brain :)