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People will tell you to take a break or find a hobby - but you may be like me and have to build stuff all the time I too build stuff all the time, but a new ho
by kls 15y ago
People will tell you to take a break or find a hobby - but you may be like me and have to build stuff all the time
I too build stuff all the time, but a new hobby is very good for breaking burn out, a lot of developers naturally crave learning, and burnout many times sets in when a developer starts to peak and realizes that learning new things in development take little effort. When you can pick up a new language in a week because you have picked so many up, the learning experience and reward mechanics are dampened to an extent.
For me when I notice the tell tale signs of burn out I set out to learn something completely new. piano, guitar, mechanics, making circuit boards, sewing, welding anything some of them I learn to a moderate level others I go pretty far in, some I drop after the burn out passes others I find that I am extremely interested in. The trigger for me and burn out is lack of challenge in learning so learning something completely new helps. For others it may be different but for me learning something new can snap burn out in as little as 30 days.
As well I am surprised that no one mentioned it but take vitamin D. As a profession that works inside many of us do not get a lot of vitamin D and it plays such a crucial role in depression which burn out is a moderate form of.
- holri 15y agoPeople eating healthy food and living a healthy livestyle (outside as much as possible especially during winter, go by foot instead of driving etc.) do not need any extra vitamins at all. If you need them you do something wrong. A healthy livestyle improves live much more than superficial vitamins can ever do.
- pyre 15y agoDepends on where you live. There are places like the Pacific NW that get very little sunlight, and going outside during the winter isn't enough to satisfy your Vitamin D needs.
- holri 15y agoIf the place you live makes you ill, change it.
- rwallace 15y agoEvery place on earth has its own endemic health hazards. You're going to need protection strategies wherever you live. As protection strategies go, taking vitamin D pills is unusually cheap, safe and effective.
- holri 15y agoSo for every place on earth a different pill? How about adjusting lifestyle to living conditions? Vitamin D pills are in no way a surrogate for outside activities. Those give you fresh oxygen, nature, exercise, sun and so much more than any superficial pill.
- DanBC 15y agoBut some places don't have enough sunlight for people to get adequate vitamin D, and some people (pregnant women; people with very pale skin; children under 5) don't get enough time in the sun to get vitamin D. Combine that with advice (which is perhaps being taken a bit too rigorously by some) to avoid skin cancer and you can understand that a few people are not getting enough vitamin D. It's great if someone can get 15 minutes of bright sunlight every day. But if they can't there's nothing wrong with a supplement.
- holri 15y agoVitamin D is no real vitamin but a hormone. There are risks in overdosage: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17014620 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17014620 I doubt that there a populated places in the world without 15 min sunlight a day.
- DanBC 15y agoPeople living in Scotland are at risk of too little vitamin D, especially during the winter months, especially if they are fair skinned or if they wear clothing which restricts sunlight (burqas etc). I agree that overdose is a risk. I'm not suggesting mega dosing with vitamin supplements. I'm suggesting that a few people (the few people who don't have access to 15 mins bright sunlight per day) would benefit from Vitamin D supplements. EDIT: (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-16255661 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-16255661) (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11355810 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11355810)
- dualogy 15y agoThere are no eggs, seafood or liver in the Pacific NW?
- pyre 15y agoThe parent post was saying that the only thing necessary to get enough Vitamin D was to 'just go outside.' I'm failing to see how this validates that premise. Attempting to eat more eggs/seafood/liver to gain more Vitamin D would seem not that far off from attempting supplementation if the only reason that you're eating them is for their Vitamin D content.
- eli_gottlieb 15y agoEven worse is the Northeast. 75% of everyone here is Vitamin D deficient.
- kls 15y agohttp://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=vitamin-d-deficiency-united-states http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=vitamin-d-d... We evolved spending most of our time outdoors for most of our history, only after the industrial revolution and now the information revolution did we gradually work more and more in doors. Vitamin D deficiency is at almost epidemic proportions. Short of switching careers to a road crew, Vitamin D deficiency should be very high on the list of suspects any time the symptoms of any form of depression are observed.
- holri 15y agoVitamin D deficiency is a symptom. What is missing is not vitamin D but sunlight. Giving superficial vitamin D is doctoring on ONE symptom not on the cause of multiple deficiencies. A correct therapy would be for example: * Do short ways (<2km) per foot. * Do medium ways (< 20 km) per bicycle * Do longer ways as a combination of public transport and foot. * Do programming in parks, outside cafe terrace or in the garden * Get a dog and go with him every day * Start jogging etc. There are lot of possibilities to change your modern life to a for the human race suitable lifestyle. Swallowing a pill instead of getting sun, fresh air and exercise is one way to burn out. It takes effort to change your live instead of swallowing a pill and costs more time in the short run, but it extends lifetime and saves illness time. Therefore it saves time in the long run and makes live happier. "I have not time to hurry", Igor Strawinsky
- jfoster 15y agoNew hobbies are also extremely helpful when it comes to looking for new things to build. If you pick something unusual enough, you will find areas that could really benefit from a hacker taking enough interest to build something for a while.