You take seems to be "I like some parts of programming/SE but not other parts". I like: - Designing and architecting software - Writing new code (e.g. new pr

You take seems to be "I like some parts of programming/SE but not other parts". I like: - Designing and architecting software - Writing new code (e.g. new project or feature) - Refactoring and rewriting existing code - Automation: finding new ways to do things faster and eliminate mechanical processes (not just new tools, but knowledge, e.g. learning algorithms so that when I see a need for one I just up an existing library or snippet instead of re-discovering it myself) - Using Linux and command line tools (related to automation, but also setting up big servers and processes is cool) I don't like: - Debugging - Writing "hacky" code (prefer to write code which should last long and be maintainably) - Testing - Sprint/agile and other long processes - Certain languages (e.g. JavaScript) and I really don't like: - Working on projects where the code quality is bad - Anything mechanical which can't be automated for some reason Anyways the point is that different people like working on different things, a decent number of people like doing most of the things which you hate and vice versa. So you sgould try to the right job and position where you can work more on the stuff you like, and less on the stuff you don't like. It's not software engineering which is the problem, it's certain parts of software engineering, and while you like can't entirely avoid all of those parts, in the right company I'm sure you can focus less on them and more of the parts you do like. Or, you can always try to get some easy job for the sake of getting paid, and do side projects and open-source work