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Programming is awesome, but so are lots of other things. I don't eat sushi for every meal either. I have seen so many developers exploited by people making a

Programming is awesome, but so are lots of other things. I don't eat sushi for every meal either. I have seen so many developers exploited by people making a bundle off their work with the explanation "I am doing what I love!" Instead, I think it is possible to create without working outside of work hours. I can learn on the job in a way that can be more context driven than reading disembodied books on technologies that will probably never be relevant for my craft. I don't know about anyone else, but I was always the kid who did the extra credit whether I needed the credit or not. I feel like we still sometimes get stuck in that attitude of needing to do everything in order to not be less-engaged than other people. As long as the community keeps rewarding those over-achievers we will be stuck trying to keep up with the Joneses.

bmj 14y ago
Yes, this. There are plenty of great environments to do what you love, and do it "safely." And there are plenty of poisonous environments where your love of your work will be used to abuse you. I highly recommend doing a stint in old school print/ad shop. I know really great artists who completely burned out very early because their love of their work turned into 48 hour days. I'm very sympathetic to the 501 cause--I generally don't work more than 8-9 hours a day, and my free time is spent with family and friends, but I do enjoy reading technical books (as well as many other types of books), and go through hacking-for-myself stints, too. There really is a middle ground here--it's not just two camps.