> For a long time, I kept a simple programming rule: The language I'm playing at home should not be the same language I'm using at work. This allowed me to lear

> For a long time, I kept a simple programming rule: The language I'm playing at home should not be the same language I'm using at work. This allowed me to learn new things that later I applied in the work codebase. Though I've found this helpful in expanding what I can do, or how well I can do it, what I find using a different language at home than at work does best is prevent burnout. I can be reckless, and play with the language, because I don't have the tired patterns of my day trying to rigidly enforce best practices and cover all edge cases. My mind can relax and do the wrong thing if I want, and I don't have the autoformatter or linter in mind. I don't have a dozen rules that will spit red errors if I step out of line. Those things are all good for work. The application must be solid, and the user deserves stability. But when I'm hacking together a game for myself that I never intend to release, I just want to experience the fun side of programming without the hard part.