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> For one thing, choosing writing as a way of making a living can nurture insecurity and doubt—especially for those, like myself, who are early in their careers

> For one thing, choosing writing as a way of making a living can nurture insecurity and doubt—especially for those, like myself, who are early in their careers. For me, at least, publishing a story is like handing in an exam essay, an invitation for strict judgment by both the intended audience and my peers. I think people in tech tend to underappreciate the benefits of being able to just do the job and enjoy a (comparatively) lesser-stressful life with enviable benefits. Programming is creative endeavour too, but, no one is asked to build a product that succeeds in the market; that's the job of management. Being a writer, or a musician, on the other hand, entails a perennial anxiety over the success of whatever you're doing. How will you ever know if your next thing will be liked or not? How will you know if you should continue working on your project when it starts to feel like an incoherent mess? I have moments of self-doubt too but I am confident that I won't suddenly cease to be a decent programmer who gets things done. For many creative people who do it full time, it means fighting the monster every day.

Sorreah 9y ago
That is not my experience at all, and I believe the term imposter syndrome is widely used by others in the industry.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
  - ilanco 9y ago
    Get rich quick on hacker news?
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
jokoon 9y ago
You can be creative for your own self, and not for others. You don't always need to show your creations. That removes the success anxiety. You should not try to be liked by others, it's very unproductive. Or at least it should not be your primary concern. Even if people say they don't like your creation, it doesn't matter as long as you like it. Nobody cares about your sleeping position, and if somebody criticizes it (unless it's a doctor), you already know their opinion doesn't matter because 1) evolution works by listening to our feelings 2) you can't know the absolute truth about anything 3) there are many diverse opinions out there. It applies to creativity as well. Only time and long term execution will tell if what you do matters (and to be honest, it does not matter anyway). But ultimately your cannot apprehend your work and the expectations of people. People are not able to tell you what they want, so it's not worth it to listen to them. I like to think creativity works in the realm of evolution and natural selection. It's impossible to predict what will work or not.
- grasshopperpurp 9y ago
  I agree with a lot of this, and I think it's helpful to remember that people perceive things differently. In much the same way that cilantro tastes like soap to some people, certain images, tropes, and turns of phrase will not resonate with some people - no matter their quality. If the work is of high quality, it will resonate with some people/some groups - in your lifetime, if you're fortunate. Take your work seriously, but don't take your art seriously. Do the best you can, experiment, test your limits, but at the end of the day, have perspective. Even if you reach the highest level of your craft, you're still just you. If you spend time developing yourself, trust your instincts and creativity, and you're a brutal self-editor, you should put out work representative of where you're at as a person/artist. To my understanding, that's all you can do.
amelius 9y ago
> Being a writer, or a musician, on the other hand, entails a perennial anxiety over the success of whatever you're doing. How will you ever know if your next thing will be liked or not? I'm sure most musicians don't care about that. It's big media that thinks this way, and coincidentally produces mostly stuff that real music-lovers find crap.
- deckiedan 9y ago
  "Most" musicians (at least, all the ones I know personally) spend most of their time freelance teaching, doing relatively dull studio/session/gig work freelance (with all the stress and uncertainty that entails), practicing several hours a day just so they don't degrade, gig work at clubs/pubs/etc. and only occasionally managing to find time to do anything truly creative and new-new. Re-arranging crappy piano scores so they fit a scratch band they've been asked to work with, figuring out how to stretch the tiny school budget into buying a less awful keyboard... If they do have time and energy to put into 'green field' music production, there may be some stress over whether or not it's liked, but realistically they're mostly doing it because the concept of the album inspires them so they can't sleep at night because the melody is stuck in their head.
eeZah7Ux 9y ago
> no one is asked to build a product that succeeds in the market Except startup owners and many others. Even in many large companies an unsuccessful product can lead to teams being let go or reassigned to do boring work. Also, stack ranking... > Being a writer, or a musician ... perennial anxiety That's the tradeoff for doing a really creative job. I love the creativity of development but nobody will read our code in public in 500 years from now. > I won't suddenly cease to be a decent programmer Burnout happens to do that.
taneq 9y ago
> Programming is creative endeavour too, but, no one is asked to build a product that succeeds in the market; that's the job of management. Really? Maybe in really large companies, but even then, management just decide what product to build. It's still the engineers that build it.

Sorreah 9y ago

That is not my experience at all, and I believe the term imposter syndrome is widely used by others in the industry.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
- ilanco 9y ago
  Get rich quick on hacker news?

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

jokoon 9y ago

You can be creative for your own self, and not for others. You don't always need to show your creations. That removes the success anxiety. You should not try to be liked by others, it's very unproductive. Or at least it should not be your primary concern. Even if people say they don't like your creation, it doesn't matter as long as you like it. Nobody cares about your sleeping position, and if somebody criticizes it (unless it's a doctor), you already know their opinion doesn't matter because 1) evolution works by listening to our feelings 2) you can't know the absolute truth about anything 3) there are many diverse opinions out there. It applies to creativity as well. Only time and long term execution will tell if what you do matters (and to be honest, it does not matter anyway). But ultimately your cannot apprehend your work and the expectations of people. People are not able to tell you what they want, so it's not worth it to listen to them. I like to think creativity works in the realm of evolution and natural selection. It's impossible to predict what will work or not.

grasshopperpurp 9y ago
I agree with a lot of this, and I think it's helpful to remember that people perceive things differently. In much the same way that cilantro tastes like soap to some people, certain images, tropes, and turns of phrase will not resonate with some people - no matter their quality. If the work is of high quality, it will resonate with some people/some groups - in your lifetime, if you're fortunate. Take your work seriously, but don't take your art seriously. Do the best you can, experiment, test your limits, but at the end of the day, have perspective. Even if you reach the highest level of your craft, you're still just you. If you spend time developing yourself, trust your instincts and creativity, and you're a brutal self-editor, you should put out work representative of where you're at as a person/artist. To my understanding, that's all you can do.

amelius 9y ago

> Being a writer, or a musician, on the other hand, entails a perennial anxiety over the success of whatever you're doing. How will you ever know if your next thing will be liked or not? I'm sure most musicians don't care about that. It's big media that thinks this way, and coincidentally produces mostly stuff that real music-lovers find crap.

deckiedan 9y ago
"Most" musicians (at least, all the ones I know personally) spend most of their time freelance teaching, doing relatively dull studio/session/gig work freelance (with all the stress and uncertainty that entails), practicing several hours a day just so they don't degrade, gig work at clubs/pubs/etc. and only occasionally managing to find time to do anything truly creative and new-new. Re-arranging crappy piano scores so they fit a scratch band they've been asked to work with, figuring out how to stretch the tiny school budget into buying a less awful keyboard... If they do have time and energy to put into 'green field' music production, there may be some stress over whether or not it's liked, but realistically they're mostly doing it because the concept of the album inspires them so they can't sleep at night because the melody is stuck in their head.

eeZah7Ux 9y ago

> no one is asked to build a product that succeeds in the market Except startup owners and many others. Even in many large companies an unsuccessful product can lead to teams being let go or reassigned to do boring work. Also, stack ranking... > Being a writer, or a musician ... perennial anxiety That's the tradeoff for doing a really creative job. I love the creativity of development but nobody will read our code in public in 500 years from now. > I won't suddenly cease to be a decent programmer Burnout happens to do that.

taneq 9y ago

> Programming is creative endeavour too, but, no one is asked to build a product that succeeds in the market; that's the job of management. Really? Maybe in really large companies, but even then, management just decide what product to build. It's still the engineers that build it.