Side projects are the only reason I'm able to continue working professionally precisely because they are not work. Everything about them is different from work.

Side projects are the only reason I'm able to continue working professionally precisely because they are not work. Everything about them is different from work. Programming is a great hobby and in my experience turning it into your job destroys it as a hobby. Working on a side project is to find a new avenue for programming as a hobby, so they you can continue programming for money because that's the most feasible way to make money as a programmer, but can also program freely without project managers, conflicting requirements, deadlines, slow/non-communicative/differently-visioned colleagues/customers/bosses on your side projects.