5 ms·

What you describe there is laziness. Burnout is this weird concept that developers have invented to describe "I can't be bothered to keep going". 5 years, no da

by madaxe 15y ago

What you describe there is laziness. Burnout is this weird concept that developers have invented to describe "I can't be bothered to keep going". 5 years, no days off, one 5 day holiday per year, on call 24/7 for the duration, and I'm just fine. Depressed and exhausted, yes, but the work keeps flowing in and the code keeps flowing out, which is all that matters. I guess what I'm getting at is that people have forgotten that work is supposed to be hard. You're supposed to work your nuts off until you lose all track of time. "Free time" is a misnomer, because every moment that you're not working, you're costing yourself time, and time is precious, and should therefore be spent working. If you can't hack back-to-back 80+ hour weeks, you need to keep throwing yourself into them until you can.

derwildemomo 15y ago
That code you're writing in the 79th hour must be of astonishing quality! Seriously, I don't see how anyone can be productive after, say, 50 hours or so..
- madaxe 15y ago
  Lots of caffeine, and flogging myself as hard as I can to keep going.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - qdog 15y ago
    Seems like you are joking. My observation has been that people working more than 8 hours a day for more than a week only overproduce for a very short time. 16 hour work days general degenerate into spending most of the early day fixing bugs from the day before, tiring you out so when you get those 'fixed' you spend the rest of the day introducing 'new' bugs, then repeat the next day. There are certainly some companies with a culture of overwork, but the people that actually produce the most are not always the ones who work 16 hour days. I have worked with a lot of people who believe working hard is 'good enough', but I'd never hire them. You have to be able to actually produce something, or you're wasting your time. It's a tough balance to find sometimes.
hobbes 15y ago
"...I'm just fine. Depressed and exhausted, yes..." I can't decide if your post is a joke or if your lifestyle is the joke.
- madaxe 15y ago
  It's good to know that HN is going down the same drain that reddit went down. Since when did hard work and dedication to one's tasks become a bad thing?
  - baseonmars 15y ago
    when they result in depression and exhaustion >_<
  - _delirium 15y ago
    I don't think there's ever been a monolithic work-to-the-bone culture among hackers, whether at HN or elsewhere. It's definitely one part of hacker culture (and engineering culture more generally, which is full of billion-hour-shift "war stories"), but there's always been a strong opposition to that culture as well, of the "work smarter, not harder" variety, and of course lots of gray areas in between. Some people really thrive on 80-hour workweeks, but if you don't (and I'd say most people don't), there's no particular reason to hold them up as a good thing. If you're starving and have to do it to keep from being homeless, then grit your teeth and do it, sure, but if someone's unhappy with their situation and has options, a rational solution is to look into those options...
  - artmageddon 15y ago
    When it has a profoundly adverse impact on your life. It's okay to put the keyboard down to go outside and play.
  - kayoone 15y ago
    What you describe is that you basically have no life at all, so whats all the work for if you dont even enjoy it and instead feel depressed and exhausted ? Sounds like a sad life.
  - 15y ago
MJR 15y ago
Depressed and exhausted, yes, but the work keeps flowing in and the code keeps flowing out You call that just fine? This is not fine. This is not healthy and this is the attitude you should be fighting against. If you honestly think that you are a better person and you produce your best work when you're exhausted and depressed, you should probably get some other opinions on that, because I have a strong feeling that the people around you will disagree - whether that's co-workers or family members.
- madaxe 15y ago
  It's fine once you adjust your value system to recognise that work is life, and that everything else is basically irrelevant. No family to speak of (apart from the ones who expect a monthly cheque from me (brother, aunt, mother)), co-workers are employees, so not appropriate for me to talk about it with them!
  - manuscreationis 15y ago
    This has to be a well-executed joke... Or someone who has severely lost track of perspective. You know it's done well when you really can't tell.
    - skore 15y ago
      I'm going with "lost track of perspective" here. I've heard the same tune too many times to keep thinking that all those people are really very good dead-pan comedians.
    - TheCapn 15y ago
      My interpretation is that he's too shy to ask for help. Most manic depressants are just that, depressed, they hide in their hole and someone has to dig them out (possibly themselves). Posting self-loathing material is subtle for someone to come along and pick up their shoulders. They know what they're doing is unhealthy or irregular but won't outright admit it because it shows weakness. "My life sucks but I march on and continue to produce acceptable deliverables" is a pride thing. tl;dr - start slowly, admit that you can improve your life and STILL churn out those code snippets and you'll find yourself happier!
rfrey 15y ago
Depressed and exhausted, yes, but the work keeps flowing in and the code keeps flowing out, which is all that matters. Consider adding "deluded" to the initial list.
singular 15y ago
That is a very unethical comment. Not impressed. The last thing somebody who is suffering from burn out and possibly depression needs to hear is that it's their own fault for being lazy. It only leads to making the problem deeper + worse, and can be a very dangerous mindset. I'd be careful to consider whether it's the right course for you too, given you report feeling exhausted and depressed. Even if so, and you see it as necessary e.g. in the early stages of a startup, don't presume to think your situation is everybody else's. And even still, be careful with it.
- madaxe 15y ago
  Actually, I just wanted to see if, on a thread about Burn-out, anyone would recognise it when they see it. Evidently, not. I'm in the fun dichotomy of knowing damned well that I'm at the end of my tether, burned-out beyond belief, and not having the time or energy to do a bloody thing about it. I work, from the moment I wake to the moment I fall asleep on my laptop, to the moment I'm woken 20 minutes later by a client phoning or raising a support request, I've pushed friends and family out of my life completely, and I'm slowly but surely becoming an aggressive asshole who views anyone who doesn't spend their entire life as working as worthless. These aren't my values. They don't even remotely reflect who I am as a person, or who I was, at any rate, but I'm helpless to do anything about it, as someone has to do all this crap, and I'm not prepared to inflict it on any of the guys we employ, as I'd rather fuck my life up than someone else's.
  - manuscreationis 15y ago
    Step away, man. It seems like you can't, but trust me. Step away. If an organization rests solely on the shoulders of one man, it isn't running properly, and it needs to be fixed sooner rather than later. Step away
    - madaxe 15y ago
      Aye, there's the rub. I'm desperate for us to hire someone else to at least share the devops/project management/administrative/account management burden with me, however my business partner runs the design side of things, and therefore doesn't see the problems (I never get to sleep, I don't feel like it's permissible for me to do anything but sit in the office waiting for the next crisis), just the symptoms (me being snarky and irritable), therefore assumes the problem is with me, rather than the fact that I'm doing way too much. Aware of the problem, aware of a resolution, no path to it, however, so I'll probably just keep on cranking until I finally, completely and utterly, unmistakably, lose it.
mitsche 15y ago
"Free time" is a misnomer, because every moment that you're not working, you're costing yourself time, and time is precious, and should therefore be spent working. Yeah, right. Because we all know that the one thing most people regret on their deathbed is not having spent more time at work. I like working just fine. In my "free time" I'd rather make music, write in my journal, see friends or go on dates, cuddle with a beautiful woman and smell her hair or maybe just take a stroll through nature and get a sense for the hardly fathomable Universe I am a part of. I don't know you. But your posting makes it seem like you are working hard in order to distract yourself from the fact that you're a pathetic philistine. I hope I'm wrong, for your sake.
- madaxe 15y ago
  See my comment in reply to singular. I used to be passionate about the arts, passionate about enjoying nature, good company, good food, travelling, enjoying life, and all the rest that matters. I've flogged it all out of myself, as if I don't, it just depresses me that I don't get the time to do the things I love. Instead, I've convinced myself that the only thing to love is work, which my slowly but surely insane-turning mind rails against, continually, as I've ended up finding it impossible to care about anything, either way.
  - mitsche 15y ago
    I see. Your situation is more complicated then and not wholly of your choosing. This is something to be sorted out, and I hope you'll manage to do so sooner than later. Take care.
csomar 15y ago
Burnout is this weird concept that developers have invented to describe "I can't be bothered to keep going" You are not serious, or you haven't been through a burnout. A burnout is probably not due to a lot of work, but to bad conditions/results/consequences. You can get burnt out without working (or working too little), and burn out is more than "I can't keep going". It's a mind disturbing thing and can be quite serious and lead to a depression.
matwood 15y ago
5 years, no days off, one 5 day holiday per year, on call 24/7 for the duration, and I'm just fine. You mention hard work, but I would argue you are really not working that hard. Working hard (either physically or mentally) like you say you do is simply not sustainable long term. I have known people who have put themselves in the hospital through burnout. Sleeping at the office 6 days/week, living on vending machine food, and the stress of the whole thing is physically dangerous. This doesn't even address the quality of their work which went down over time. It's similar to the overtraining concept when weight lifting. If you are only playing with the pink weights then it's easy to workout for hours each day, every day. Start messing around with real weight on the same schedule and your body will eventually start regressing. It simply does not have time to fully recover from each workout. I believe this also happens with tough mental work. Keep in mind this isn't talking about a crunch time or short stints of crazy work. Burnout comes from long runs of working at a non-sustainable pace.
savusika 15y ago
> I'm just fine. Depressed and exhausted, yes If you actually thought about what you write, I could belive you. Or even bothered to read what you just wrote. Depression isn't normal.
runjake 15y ago
You must be young. Not that there's a problem with that, as the young usually innovate and put a lot of youthful energy into progress. As you get older and/or start a family, the thought of 80+ hours a week becomes laughable and even dread-inducing. If work is hard, I'm probably going to look at a different career. Hard implies suffering and unpleasant obstacles to me. If it's challenging however...
danshapiro 15y ago
Why was this downvoted? Because people disagree with it? I do too, but it does appear to represent a legitimate answer to the OP's question.
- chc 15y ago
  It's almost certainly downvoted because it's hazardous to your health.

by madaxe 15y ago

derwildemomo 15y ago

That code you're writing in the 79th hour must be of astonishing quality! Seriously, I don't see how anyone can be productive after, say, 50 hours or so..

madaxe 15y ago
Lots of caffeine, and flogging myself as hard as I can to keep going.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- qdog 15y ago
  Seems like you are joking. My observation has been that people working more than 8 hours a day for more than a week only overproduce for a very short time. 16 hour work days general degenerate into spending most of the early day fixing bugs from the day before, tiring you out so when you get those 'fixed' you spend the rest of the day introducing 'new' bugs, then repeat the next day. There are certainly some companies with a culture of overwork, but the people that actually produce the most are not always the ones who work 16 hour days. I have worked with a lot of people who believe working hard is 'good enough', but I'd never hire them. You have to be able to actually produce something, or you're wasting your time. It's a tough balance to find sometimes.

hobbes 15y ago

"...I'm just fine. Depressed and exhausted, yes..." I can't decide if your post is a joke or if your lifestyle is the joke.

madaxe 15y ago
It's good to know that HN is going down the same drain that reddit went down. Since when did hard work and dedication to one's tasks become a bad thing?
- baseonmars 15y ago
  when they result in depression and exhaustion >_<
- _delirium 15y ago
  I don't think there's ever been a monolithic work-to-the-bone culture among hackers, whether at HN or elsewhere. It's definitely one part of hacker culture (and engineering culture more generally, which is full of billion-hour-shift "war stories"), but there's always been a strong opposition to that culture as well, of the "work smarter, not harder" variety, and of course lots of gray areas in between. Some people really thrive on 80-hour workweeks, but if you don't (and I'd say most people don't), there's no particular reason to hold them up as a good thing. If you're starving and have to do it to keep from being homeless, then grit your teeth and do it, sure, but if someone's unhappy with their situation and has options, a rational solution is to look into those options...
- artmageddon 15y ago
  When it has a profoundly adverse impact on your life. It's okay to put the keyboard down to go outside and play.
- kayoone 15y ago
  What you describe is that you basically have no life at all, so whats all the work for if you dont even enjoy it and instead feel depressed and exhausted ? Sounds like a sad life.
- 15y ago

MJR 15y ago

Depressed and exhausted, yes, but the work keeps flowing in and the code keeps flowing out You call that just fine? This is not fine. This is not healthy and this is the attitude you should be fighting against. If you honestly think that you are a better person and you produce your best work when you're exhausted and depressed, you should probably get some other opinions on that, because I have a strong feeling that the people around you will disagree - whether that's co-workers or family members.

madaxe 15y ago
It's fine once you adjust your value system to recognise that work is life, and that everything else is basically irrelevant. No family to speak of (apart from the ones who expect a monthly cheque from me (brother, aunt, mother)), co-workers are employees, so not appropriate for me to talk about it with them!
- manuscreationis 15y ago
  This has to be a well-executed joke... Or someone who has severely lost track of perspective. You know it's done well when you really can't tell.
  - skore 15y ago
    I'm going with "lost track of perspective" here. I've heard the same tune too many times to keep thinking that all those people are really very good dead-pan comedians.
  - TheCapn 15y ago
    My interpretation is that he's too shy to ask for help. Most manic depressants are just that, depressed, they hide in their hole and someone has to dig them out (possibly themselves). Posting self-loathing material is subtle for someone to come along and pick up their shoulders. They know what they're doing is unhealthy or irregular but won't outright admit it because it shows weakness. "My life sucks but I march on and continue to produce acceptable deliverables" is a pride thing. tl;dr - start slowly, admit that you can improve your life and STILL churn out those code snippets and you'll find yourself happier!

rfrey 15y ago

Depressed and exhausted, yes, but the work keeps flowing in and the code keeps flowing out, which is all that matters. Consider adding "deluded" to the initial list.

singular 15y ago

That is a very unethical comment. Not impressed. The last thing somebody who is suffering from burn out and possibly depression needs to hear is that it's their own fault for being lazy. It only leads to making the problem deeper + worse, and can be a very dangerous mindset. I'd be careful to consider whether it's the right course for you too, given you report feeling exhausted and depressed. Even if so, and you see it as necessary e.g. in the early stages of a startup, don't presume to think your situation is everybody else's. And even still, be careful with it.

madaxe 15y ago
Actually, I just wanted to see if, on a thread about Burn-out, anyone would recognise it when they see it. Evidently, not. I'm in the fun dichotomy of knowing damned well that I'm at the end of my tether, burned-out beyond belief, and not having the time or energy to do a bloody thing about it. I work, from the moment I wake to the moment I fall asleep on my laptop, to the moment I'm woken 20 minutes later by a client phoning or raising a support request, I've pushed friends and family out of my life completely, and I'm slowly but surely becoming an aggressive asshole who views anyone who doesn't spend their entire life as working as worthless. These aren't my values. They don't even remotely reflect who I am as a person, or who I was, at any rate, but I'm helpless to do anything about it, as someone has to do all this crap, and I'm not prepared to inflict it on any of the guys we employ, as I'd rather fuck my life up than someone else's.
- manuscreationis 15y ago
  Step away, man. It seems like you can't, but trust me. Step away. If an organization rests solely on the shoulders of one man, it isn't running properly, and it needs to be fixed sooner rather than later. Step away
  - madaxe 15y ago
    Aye, there's the rub. I'm desperate for us to hire someone else to at least share the devops/project management/administrative/account management burden with me, however my business partner runs the design side of things, and therefore doesn't see the problems (I never get to sleep, I don't feel like it's permissible for me to do anything but sit in the office waiting for the next crisis), just the symptoms (me being snarky and irritable), therefore assumes the problem is with me, rather than the fact that I'm doing way too much. Aware of the problem, aware of a resolution, no path to it, however, so I'll probably just keep on cranking until I finally, completely and utterly, unmistakably, lose it.

mitsche 15y ago

"Free time" is a misnomer, because every moment that you're not working, you're costing yourself time, and time is precious, and should therefore be spent working. Yeah, right. Because we all know that the one thing most people regret on their deathbed is not having spent more time at work. I like working just fine. In my "free time" I'd rather make music, write in my journal, see friends or go on dates, cuddle with a beautiful woman and smell her hair or maybe just take a stroll through nature and get a sense for the hardly fathomable Universe I am a part of. I don't know you. But your posting makes it seem like you are working hard in order to distract yourself from the fact that you're a pathetic philistine. I hope I'm wrong, for your sake.

madaxe 15y ago
See my comment in reply to singular. I used to be passionate about the arts, passionate about enjoying nature, good company, good food, travelling, enjoying life, and all the rest that matters. I've flogged it all out of myself, as if I don't, it just depresses me that I don't get the time to do the things I love. Instead, I've convinced myself that the only thing to love is work, which my slowly but surely insane-turning mind rails against, continually, as I've ended up finding it impossible to care about anything, either way.
- mitsche 15y ago
  I see. Your situation is more complicated then and not wholly of your choosing. This is something to be sorted out, and I hope you'll manage to do so sooner than later. Take care.

csomar 15y ago

Burnout is this weird concept that developers have invented to describe "I can't be bothered to keep going" You are not serious, or you haven't been through a burnout. A burnout is probably not due to a lot of work, but to bad conditions/results/consequences. You can get burnt out without working (or working too little), and burn out is more than "I can't keep going". It's a mind disturbing thing and can be quite serious and lead to a depression.

matwood 15y ago

5 years, no days off, one 5 day holiday per year, on call 24/7 for the duration, and I'm just fine. You mention hard work, but I would argue you are really not working that hard. Working hard (either physically or mentally) like you say you do is simply not sustainable long term. I have known people who have put themselves in the hospital through burnout. Sleeping at the office 6 days/week, living on vending machine food, and the stress of the whole thing is physically dangerous. This doesn't even address the quality of their work which went down over time. It's similar to the overtraining concept when weight lifting. If you are only playing with the pink weights then it's easy to workout for hours each day, every day. Start messing around with real weight on the same schedule and your body will eventually start regressing. It simply does not have time to fully recover from each workout. I believe this also happens with tough mental work. Keep in mind this isn't talking about a crunch time or short stints of crazy work. Burnout comes from long runs of working at a non-sustainable pace.

savusika 15y ago

> I'm just fine. Depressed and exhausted, yes If you actually thought about what you write, I could belive you. Or even bothered to read what you just wrote. Depression isn't normal.

runjake 15y ago

You must be young. Not that there's a problem with that, as the young usually innovate and put a lot of youthful energy into progress. As you get older and/or start a family, the thought of 80+ hours a week becomes laughable and even dread-inducing. If work is hard, I'm probably going to look at a different career. Hard implies suffering and unpleasant obstacles to me. If it's challenging however...

danshapiro 15y ago

Why was this downvoted? Because people disagree with it? I do too, but it does appear to represent a legitimate answer to the OP's question.

chc 15y ago
It's almost certainly downvoted because it's hazardous to your health.