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A former mentor gave me some valuable advice once about this that didn't make sense til years later. Basically, I got a computer science degree while working fu

A former mentor gave me some valuable advice once about this that didn't make sense til years later. Basically, I got a computer science degree while working full time minimum wage - in a very competitive program and high cost of living area. It was extraordinarily hard, orders of magnitude harder than anything else I've ever done, just trying to survive and not starve and somehow find the time to do well in my studies. He said something like "if you keep burning the candle at 110% like you have been for long, you'll find that you often can find something deep within you to keep going, but eventually, this can run dry, and it doesn't really regenerate. It takes something from you that you aren't going to get back." I don't mean minor stuff like, "oh I'm really tired today and I don't want to go to school." I'm talking like, very difficult coursework + stressful job + major life calamities and personal loss all compiling at the same time in a way that you just want to crawl into a pit and die, yet, you keep going - that kind of willpower/stamina whatever you want to call it. He was right. I think he was alluding somewhat to burnout, which I think is related but somehow different - I am not the same person I was before that endeavor, and don't feel I really ever "healed" from it. It's very difficult to describe. feels a little like anhedonia, like a part of me has been missing since then. When I get in similar circumstances now, I find it harder to summon whatever it was inside of me that "kept going." I expect I'm still healing because I'm only ~10 years removed from this, but, sometimes I'm not sure.

the-grump 2y ago
Have you tried something like an extended sabbatical? I went through a similar period near the end of my studies and can relate to your current disposition.
nh23423fefe 2y ago
I mean, if it was worth it, you would do it again right, because the alternative is worse?
- JohnMakin 2y ago
  I have asked myself this question a lot over the last few years - I don't know. I always want to say no, I wouldn't have done it. But, likely, the stress/instability of living with such a low wage would have caused irrecoverable circumstances at some point, so I guess whatever state I exist in now is probably better than the version of me that would exist had I not pursued my degree. I am the first generation from my dad's side, who descended from slaves, to get a college degree (or really HS degree if we only include my paternal lineage). So it was a big deal. For me though, my career hasn't been the blazing success I'd expected it to have been, and I didn't end up doing remotely what I thought I would do. I 10x'd my income from college within 5 years, which felt like a big deal, til inflation blew the crap out of that, my meager savings were all but obliterated due to a series of bad financial moves/timing, and I am starting to hit a ceiling where 2xing my salary in a few years is no longer a reasonable expectation. So, I feel stagnant and unsatisfied, and I guess in my worst moments I'd prefer to have never gone through it. My life's materially better, I'm not at risk of starving anymore, and I got some health problems fixed. yet, some of the best people I met while in college I tossed aside because there simply was no time for them + what I was trying to do, very honestly - so I am very alone now, and tossed aside things like settling down in favor of getting ahead, which was another thing I had to kind of give up for a while. But, I suspect, deep down, I would have done it anyway, or I wouldn't have ended up here. I didn't want to do it then either but I did, for whatever reason.
  - fpsvogel 2y ago
    Thank you for your honesty. What you said about tossing people aside for lack of time resonates with my experience in and after college. Recently I reconnected with someone who was a close friend early in college, before I switched to "I don't have time to hang out" mode. It turns out my friend also recently started slowing down after a hectic early career, and was open to reconnecting. It's not the same as back then—for one thing, we live in different states and can only occasionally visit each other in person. But still, it feels like something in me is patched up, even if not perfectly whole, which the busy years had torn apart. (Therapy has also helped a lot.) I don't want to assume anything about your situation, but if there is anyone from college that you did have a meaningful connection with back then, and if you're willing to risk the disappointment of finding that they are now too busy / not interested, you could try getting in touch with them to catch up. It could be that they too are done with their hectic years and looking to connect with people more. Maybe you've already tried this, but I'm mentioning it in case you haven't.
saulpw 2y ago
I relate to this. I don't know what it is either, but over the course of my 25-year career it's become impossible to summon that "will" within me. My brain just constantly asks "and what are we doing this for again?" which is anathema to sustained effort. I wonder if it's simple age; maybe this is just the energy of youth that evaporated. Or maybe it's becoming jaded; seeing how people will encourage their employees to burn it hard, for a modest reward that (in my experience anyway) often does not even materialize.
- zemvpferreira 2y ago
  Former founder now small-time entrepreneur and this resonates with me. I know what I’m capable of when I turn on the switch but I also know the sacrifices it entails. Not willing to go into that mode so someone else can profit in my behalf.
- ip26 2y ago
  The energy of youth seems impossible to separate from the optimism. I suspect you could find enormous stamina in older folks for a goal that can rekindle their optimism.
  - throwaway657656 2y ago
    It's not enough to have personal optimism you need a community/culture of optimists. ~10 years ago that was there in a big way for tech. It was peak YC prestige. HBO's Silicon Valley brought the start-up struggles/drama into the mainstream. Most people who worked hard were rewarded. Large in-person tech meetups provided a venue to share your success story. The tech industry now feels bloated, mundane, low-value/rent-seeking, or as a net-negative for society. It isn't fun to share your success since it comes off as boasting instead of inspiring. How I miss 2014. I was productive, optimistic, and energetic in a way I can barely comprehend now.
    - riehwvfbk 2y ago
      But the industry hasn't really changed, just the window dressing did. Was SV peddling addictive user-as-product products then? Of course. Did most employees never really have a chance of getting rich? Yeah. Was the area boring suburbia with old dilapidated buildings? Yes, same as today.
kolyder 2y ago
Thanks for sharing this. “Keep burning the candle at 110% … It takes something from you that you aren’t going to get back.” That’s something I’ve been feeling but haven’t been able to articulate after a prolonged sprint. It’s not quite burnout because it doesn’t erase your capability right away, but it takes a compounding toll.
- immibis 2y ago
  Neither does burnout - despite the name it's not like a lightbulb burning out after which it's impossible for it to produce more light. It's an emotional thing where you don't want to any more.
donjjju 2y ago
This really resonated with me. I taught myself programming while working full time minimal wage job, I spent a year or two learning then an additional 2 years job hunting. Then I got a job and kept grinding, working like crazy for 3 years. But with our current market, I've been out of work for a year. I need to keep fighting harder than ever, but I don't know if I have the strength anymore. I feel like I've lost something, I don't know if it comes back
munificent 2y ago
I feel this. About seven years ago, I was working full-time at an amazing but consuming job, raising a family, and surviving the pandemic. I was also writing every single day on a large textbook. Then within the span of about six months, my dog got sick and died, my mom got cancer, and a few friends and family members died unexpectedly. I kept writing every day while dealing with all of that. I literally wrote in the waiting room while my mom was getting CT scanned. I kept working on the book as the pandemic reared its head and politics went insane. I got through it all and finished the book, but I haven't felt the same since. It's like some nerve in my soul got burned to a cinder and is no longer able to fire. I've spent a lot of time in therapy which has been amazing, but I'm still not what I'd call all better. My hypothesis is that I spent so much time compartmentalizing emotions like anxiety, grief, sorrow, and hurt in order to keep moving forward that I got too good at stuffing them in a box. The only way to avoid being overwhelmed by them was to sever my connection to all of my feelings, which meant I lost access to joy, humor, whimsy, and passion too. I'm working to rebuild that connection, but it doesn't come back easily.
- JohnMakin 2y ago
  > My hypothesis is that I spent so much time compartmentalizing emotions like anxiety, grief, sorrow, and hurt in order to keep moving forward that I got too good at stuffing them in a box. The only way to avoid being overwhelmed by them was to sever my connection to all of my feelings, which meant I lost access to joy, humor, whimsy, and passion too. You know, actually, I think this is what it is too. I had a terrible therapist for ~7 years that always tried to get me to avoid/mitigate uncomfortable emotions but I always felt it was making the issue worse. When I broke away from therapy in favor of things like meditation/philosophy, in some sessions, I felt ancient grief/pain bubbling up in ways that were overwhelming, but always felt way better afterwards. This isn't easy to do though and is taxing in itself. Some people need substances to do it, or hypnosis. I do think it's something to do with this though.
  - TeMPOraL 2y ago
    Thank you for starting this subthread, and writing clearly about this. I too find it resonates strongly with my situation. > in some sessions, I felt ancient grief/pain bubbling up in ways that were overwhelming, but always felt way better afterwards. For me, the major reason I might have excessively compartmentalized things[0] was that whenever I let myself feel the grief/pain/uncertainty - and early on, I was trying to process them instead of avoiding them - it would be overwhelming, excruciating, and never made anything better. After a year or two of what felt like inexhaustible supply of the same painful emotions, of nothing really changing or looking like it was about to, I finally took the opposite course, and ended up more-less where you and 'munificent are. Took almost a decade to get to that point, and it's what you and others describe in this subthread. Some kind of emotional detachment. The emotions are there, but mostly weak, and most of the time I feel like I'm just observing them, and occasionally fighting them when they get too strong, too close to me. "Severed connection" seems like a very good analogy. I'm still afraid of revisiting the past, because I can't afford becoming non-functional for a year or two, like it happened the first time around. There's this part of me, that source of motivation, somewhere - but it feels like it's on life support, in a coma, waking up every other year for a few moments. Meanwhile, when someone asks me what I like, or what I'd like to do, I draw a blank. It's not anhedonia, but something else - something that shuts down my brain whenever this question gets asked (or I ask it myself). -- [0] - And developed what I feel is like instinctive fight-or-flight response around negative emotions: solve the problem or run away, but get rid of the emotion and do it NOW NOW NOW!
neilv 2y ago
You have to figure out when do to that 110% or more. Not only for whether it's ever worthwhile in your role and how you benefit, but also for pacing. For example, if you're a startup cofounder, in a good team, and you win big if the startup wins big, then you might put in that 110% frequently -- but you save your superhuman 200% bursts for emergencies, so that you can reliably put in close to 100% every day, not start making fatigued huge mess-ups. For another example, if you're a series B startup hire, being paid below-market, with 0.01% stock options that will never be worth exercising, and the founding team turns out to be bad at everything except raising ZIRP money and beer-pong-- then you should still do right by your good teammates, and also be professional in general, but don't spend years burning yourself out at 110% while watching the dysfunctional company just urinate away everyone's contributions. Spend that extra 10% energy of yours in searching for a better situation.
- DullPointer 2y ago
  This is good advice in general, but feels like it’s missing the point of what it’s replying to. Concretely, it assumes a lot of agency. The words “major life calamities and personal loss”, were key words that really change the amount of agency it’s reasonable to assume.
  - neilv 2y ago
    I have actually done something like the situation that the earlier commenter described, and would still go back and give this advice to myself of back then. I could add more examples that touch on these extreme situations, but I was trying to give examples familiar to most of HN.
    - DullPointer 2y ago
      Fair enough. Do you think you could have taken that advice then? Even if taking it negatively impacted loved ones (in the short term at least)? Personally, I just don’t know how to make that kind of decision well beyond a certain point.
nonameiguess 2y ago
This is the curse of counterfactuals you can't answer. I was pretty directionless in my younger years, but reasonably smart and driven. I was in the Army and in my late 20s and decided to get into software and went back to school full-time while still serving in the Army. Possibly somewhat predictably, I also went through a divorce at the same time. But I was awake at 3 AM or so every single day, studying for several hours, going to work, studying at lunch, coming home, studying some more, on and on for a few years, and that was all I did. It was work of some sort, nonstop, with no other concerns. It "worked." I got through the program, re-skilled, left the Army, at this point have quadrupled any salary I ever earned before getting into software. But beyond that basic brutality of the experience of being mentally on at all waking hours on all days, and those waking hours often being well beyond 16, I ended up going through severe spinal degeneration in my mid 30s, obviously exacerbated if not outright caused by sitting too much, that ended in three surgeries in the span of 16 months, several years of intermittent disability and forced bed rest, cerebrospinal fluid leakage, an inability to walk without assistance for a while. I ultimately got through it and seem to be basically okay in my mid 40s. Was it worth it, though? I have no idea. I'll certainly never do anything like that ever again. Physical health has become and will remain for the rest of my life my number one priority. I might deprioritize eating properly, sleeping enough, and consistently working out for a few weeks or even months here and there, but for years at a time? Never again. It's not just the severity of the experience itself. I'm not even sure the experience itself is all that bad. You get so high on the feeling of productivity and accomplishment that the difficulty of what you're doing barely even registers, and time flies when you're occupied nonstop. But I have no way of ever knowing how much it contributed to effectively losing half a decade of my life to a level of physical disability that doesn't normally happen to a person before they turn 70, during what was supposed to be the prime of my life. It's possibly the reason I don't have kids. My wife at the time left me and by the time I remarried, I was in such bad shape that I couldn't even pick up my cats, didn't feel capable of raising a child when I couldn't even consistently get out of bed, and decided a vasectomy was a better option at that point. Again, I have no way of ever knowing if this would have happened anyway, but assuming the answer is even maybe no, was it worth to give up the chance of having kids to burn a little bit more brightly when I was 28? Fuck no, that isn't worth it.
djeastm 2y ago
I believe this is simply the aging process. We all want to peg it to something specific we've done, but I've never met a person who doesn't feel this way at some point in the middle of their lives. Our bodies are just like every other living thing in that they get less and less efficient after the initial bloom.
- ip26 2y ago
  Then why does the dwindling inner reserve seem to line up so neatly to completed objectives? E.g. you successfully emerge from the dark period, but are unwilling or unmotivated to grind through another. The end of a struggle is not usually conveniently timed to match your age.
  - Kinrany 2y ago
    One explanation is the need to complete the objective compensating for age.
- jaredhallen 2y ago
  I agree, although I don't know that it's specifically a chronological function. I'm starting to think of aging as just an accumulation of abuse and trauma. Maybe that's physiological - sun exposure, broken bones that didn't heal quite right, whatever. But it's also mental. The parent comment is a great example, but there are basically an unending number of them. Loss of family or friends. Financial struggles. Mental illness. It all just adds up.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
selimthegrim 2y ago
Thank you for writing this. This is how I feel about 10.5 years into my PhD praying the job market comes through for me.
redleggedfrog 2y ago
That mentor was very, very wise. I've had the same thing happen to me twice now. It happens outside the realm of career as well. For me it was a baby in the NICU and the rest of my life still needing serious attention as well. Something changes in your brain maybe. It's sad because while often 'stamina' will gain you things, this feels like a loss without a gain.
- zellyn 2y ago
  How did you recover?
  - robotresearcher 2y ago
    Baby in NICU has as the best case outcome that you go home with a baby. So you get to recover by ... having a new baby at home. We were tired for maybe seven years.
    - jackvalentine 2y ago
      I feel this. A year of horrors such as surgery before their due date and constant re-admissions even though they haven’t been an inpatient for a year now I still mourn the person I was before.
brian-armstrong 2y ago
I agree entirely with this post. Considering that it is posted on HN which has very much promoted the startup hustle lifestyle for so long, this feels a bit like the buyer beware that comes 15 years after the fact. Something to consider for anyone who wants to give everything in exchange for 0.001% equity in a B2B blockchain fart app.
- JohnMakin 2y ago
  This is a good point other commenters have alluded to, and funny enough, my very first job out of school taught me this lesson - I was hired by a professor in my 2nd to last quarter, in a startup <10 people that was mostly his PHD students. It felt exciting, and this was like, peak startup era - we didn't have a bad product, just a bad/nonexistent way of monetizing. I had some equity but not enough to be working/stressing as hard as I was with how it played out. Of course, it fell apart in the most obnoxious way possible. We assumed we'd be receiving a series B, that didnt appear, and then tried to monetize aggressively at the last second, got some buyout offers that would have been life-changing money for me at that time, that for whatever reason the founders/board would not accept, boom, no paycheck 6 months later followed by a few months of being shopped around for no pay, basically held hostage, then collapse. I am kind of glad it happened, I laugh at equity offers or "bonuses" now from startups. The one piece of equity that has cashed on me in my career so far was in the very very low 5 figures. Lol. Less than a cost of living adjustment when averaged over the course of that employment.
CobaltFire 2y ago
I'm fairly exhausted today, but I've shared on HN before that I absolutely feel this. I was in the military in a high stress role (about 20 years in), nursing an autistic child through chemotherapy, and still being a parent to my other child and supporting my wife. Notwithstanding the other intense stress I went through in that career, I feel that I used something up making it through that. If you want more of the story feel free to look through my comments; I've talked about it in more depth a few times.
disambiguation 2y ago
> I am not the same person I was before that endeavor, and don't feel I really ever "healed" from it. It's very difficult to describe. Ironically this describes it perfectly in a way that no single word can. It's somehow more than burnout, it's an actual alteration. I've tried to come up with a psychological explanation. It's something like the brain recognizing a very large pattern, or more specifically a dead end. The mind consists of feedback loops that must tie back to rewards. Modern work is so abstract from the rewards, computer programming even more so. I think we grow up developing our psyche like some list of rules we cobble together over time, but it's not a unified theory. Eventually the brain realizes it's working harder and harder with no tangible payout, the contradictions in the rules accumulate tension. Life somehow tricks you into spinning your wheels at full speed, nothings really happening, you're not sure how you got there, and you don't really have an exit plan. Then it all comes crashing down.
Buttons840 2y ago
I was also finishing a CS degree (at WGU), and had a very stressful job. I started having chest and stomach pains, then I got shingles, then I was diagnosed with celiac disease, all in a very short time. I quit the job, finished my degree, and still struggle with the chest pains and celiac disease. So I feel this. I pushed through the stress for a time, and it took something from me--goodbye delicious gluten.
justanotherjoe 2y ago
Maybe the stakes is just lower now? But anyway, yeah I can relate. It's like the mind has renewable and unrenewable 'stores'. The unrenewable ones are just buildups of life experiences that you can transmute into work in a certain way. But once you harness it, it's done. Probably.
antman 2y ago
I mostly agree but I have interpret it differently. There are three reasons for "keep going" no matter what. First extreme adversity, second extreme expectations, third extreme few dimensional discipline due to childhood reasons. Burn out, depression, emptiness come out due to perceiving unfairness with respect to the outcomes. Even if someone ends up overcoming adversity or overachieving, the serotonin response just isn't there, because that is not how it worked in the first place. If you look at a static point in there will always be grievances, if you look at an imaginary future there will always be grievances but if you have been mentored to look this as a movie, see where you started, and you see what you have ended up achieving it will be a lot brighter. Most of the people do good with their lives.
Justsignedup 2y ago
3 years later after my burnout and I still don't have the same energy and drive.

the-grump 2y ago

Have you tried something like an extended sabbatical? I went through a similar period near the end of my studies and can relate to your current disposition.

nh23423fefe 2y ago

I mean, if it was worth it, you would do it again right, because the alternative is worse?

JohnMakin 2y ago
I have asked myself this question a lot over the last few years - I don't know. I always want to say no, I wouldn't have done it. But, likely, the stress/instability of living with such a low wage would have caused irrecoverable circumstances at some point, so I guess whatever state I exist in now is probably better than the version of me that would exist had I not pursued my degree. I am the first generation from my dad's side, who descended from slaves, to get a college degree (or really HS degree if we only include my paternal lineage). So it was a big deal. For me though, my career hasn't been the blazing success I'd expected it to have been, and I didn't end up doing remotely what I thought I would do. I 10x'd my income from college within 5 years, which felt like a big deal, til inflation blew the crap out of that, my meager savings were all but obliterated due to a series of bad financial moves/timing, and I am starting to hit a ceiling where 2xing my salary in a few years is no longer a reasonable expectation. So, I feel stagnant and unsatisfied, and I guess in my worst moments I'd prefer to have never gone through it. My life's materially better, I'm not at risk of starving anymore, and I got some health problems fixed. yet, some of the best people I met while in college I tossed aside because there simply was no time for them + what I was trying to do, very honestly - so I am very alone now, and tossed aside things like settling down in favor of getting ahead, which was another thing I had to kind of give up for a while. But, I suspect, deep down, I would have done it anyway, or I wouldn't have ended up here. I didn't want to do it then either but I did, for whatever reason.
- fpsvogel 2y ago
  Thank you for your honesty. What you said about tossing people aside for lack of time resonates with my experience in and after college. Recently I reconnected with someone who was a close friend early in college, before I switched to "I don't have time to hang out" mode. It turns out my friend also recently started slowing down after a hectic early career, and was open to reconnecting. It's not the same as back then—for one thing, we live in different states and can only occasionally visit each other in person. But still, it feels like something in me is patched up, even if not perfectly whole, which the busy years had torn apart. (Therapy has also helped a lot.) I don't want to assume anything about your situation, but if there is anyone from college that you did have a meaningful connection with back then, and if you're willing to risk the disappointment of finding that they are now too busy / not interested, you could try getting in touch with them to catch up. It could be that they too are done with their hectic years and looking to connect with people more. Maybe you've already tried this, but I'm mentioning it in case you haven't.

saulpw 2y ago

I relate to this. I don't know what it is either, but over the course of my 25-year career it's become impossible to summon that "will" within me. My brain just constantly asks "and what are we doing this for again?" which is anathema to sustained effort. I wonder if it's simple age; maybe this is just the energy of youth that evaporated. Or maybe it's becoming jaded; seeing how people will encourage their employees to burn it hard, for a modest reward that (in my experience anyway) often does not even materialize.

zemvpferreira 2y ago
Former founder now small-time entrepreneur and this resonates with me. I know what I’m capable of when I turn on the switch but I also know the sacrifices it entails. Not willing to go into that mode so someone else can profit in my behalf.
ip26 2y ago
The energy of youth seems impossible to separate from the optimism. I suspect you could find enormous stamina in older folks for a goal that can rekindle their optimism.
- throwaway657656 2y ago
  It's not enough to have personal optimism you need a community/culture of optimists. ~10 years ago that was there in a big way for tech. It was peak YC prestige. HBO's Silicon Valley brought the start-up struggles/drama into the mainstream. Most people who worked hard were rewarded. Large in-person tech meetups provided a venue to share your success story. The tech industry now feels bloated, mundane, low-value/rent-seeking, or as a net-negative for society. It isn't fun to share your success since it comes off as boasting instead of inspiring. How I miss 2014. I was productive, optimistic, and energetic in a way I can barely comprehend now.
  - riehwvfbk 2y ago
    But the industry hasn't really changed, just the window dressing did. Was SV peddling addictive user-as-product products then? Of course. Did most employees never really have a chance of getting rich? Yeah. Was the area boring suburbia with old dilapidated buildings? Yes, same as today.

kolyder 2y ago

Thanks for sharing this. “Keep burning the candle at 110% … It takes something from you that you aren’t going to get back.” That’s something I’ve been feeling but haven’t been able to articulate after a prolonged sprint. It’s not quite burnout because it doesn’t erase your capability right away, but it takes a compounding toll.

immibis 2y ago
Neither does burnout - despite the name it's not like a lightbulb burning out after which it's impossible for it to produce more light. It's an emotional thing where you don't want to any more.

donjjju 2y ago

This really resonated with me. I taught myself programming while working full time minimal wage job, I spent a year or two learning then an additional 2 years job hunting. Then I got a job and kept grinding, working like crazy for 3 years. But with our current market, I've been out of work for a year. I need to keep fighting harder than ever, but I don't know if I have the strength anymore. I feel like I've lost something, I don't know if it comes back

munificent 2y ago

I feel this. About seven years ago, I was working full-time at an amazing but consuming job, raising a family, and surviving the pandemic. I was also writing every single day on a large textbook. Then within the span of about six months, my dog got sick and died, my mom got cancer, and a few friends and family members died unexpectedly. I kept writing every day while dealing with all of that. I literally wrote in the waiting room while my mom was getting CT scanned. I kept working on the book as the pandemic reared its head and politics went insane. I got through it all and finished the book, but I haven't felt the same since. It's like some nerve in my soul got burned to a cinder and is no longer able to fire. I've spent a lot of time in therapy which has been amazing, but I'm still not what I'd call all better. My hypothesis is that I spent so much time compartmentalizing emotions like anxiety, grief, sorrow, and hurt in order to keep moving forward that I got too good at stuffing them in a box. The only way to avoid being overwhelmed by them was to sever my connection to all of my feelings, which meant I lost access to joy, humor, whimsy, and passion too. I'm working to rebuild that connection, but it doesn't come back easily.

JohnMakin 2y ago
> My hypothesis is that I spent so much time compartmentalizing emotions like anxiety, grief, sorrow, and hurt in order to keep moving forward that I got too good at stuffing them in a box. The only way to avoid being overwhelmed by them was to sever my connection to all of my feelings, which meant I lost access to joy, humor, whimsy, and passion too. You know, actually, I think this is what it is too. I had a terrible therapist for ~7 years that always tried to get me to avoid/mitigate uncomfortable emotions but I always felt it was making the issue worse. When I broke away from therapy in favor of things like meditation/philosophy, in some sessions, I felt ancient grief/pain bubbling up in ways that were overwhelming, but always felt way better afterwards. This isn't easy to do though and is taxing in itself. Some people need substances to do it, or hypnosis. I do think it's something to do with this though.
- TeMPOraL 2y ago
  Thank you for starting this subthread, and writing clearly about this. I too find it resonates strongly with my situation. > in some sessions, I felt ancient grief/pain bubbling up in ways that were overwhelming, but always felt way better afterwards. For me, the major reason I might have excessively compartmentalized things[0] was that whenever I let myself feel the grief/pain/uncertainty - and early on, I was trying to process them instead of avoiding them - it would be overwhelming, excruciating, and never made anything better. After a year or two of what felt like inexhaustible supply of the same painful emotions, of nothing really changing or looking like it was about to, I finally took the opposite course, and ended up more-less where you and 'munificent are. Took almost a decade to get to that point, and it's what you and others describe in this subthread. Some kind of emotional detachment. The emotions are there, but mostly weak, and most of the time I feel like I'm just observing them, and occasionally fighting them when they get too strong, too close to me. "Severed connection" seems like a very good analogy. I'm still afraid of revisiting the past, because I can't afford becoming non-functional for a year or two, like it happened the first time around. There's this part of me, that source of motivation, somewhere - but it feels like it's on life support, in a coma, waking up every other year for a few moments. Meanwhile, when someone asks me what I like, or what I'd like to do, I draw a blank. It's not anhedonia, but something else - something that shuts down my brain whenever this question gets asked (or I ask it myself). -- [0] - And developed what I feel is like instinctive fight-or-flight response around negative emotions: solve the problem or run away, but get rid of the emotion and do it NOW NOW NOW!

neilv 2y ago

You have to figure out when do to that 110% or more. Not only for whether it's ever worthwhile in your role and how you benefit, but also for pacing. For example, if you're a startup cofounder, in a good team, and you win big if the startup wins big, then you might put in that 110% frequently -- but you save your superhuman 200% bursts for emergencies, so that you can reliably put in close to 100% every day, not start making fatigued huge mess-ups. For another example, if you're a series B startup hire, being paid below-market, with 0.01% stock options that will never be worth exercising, and the founding team turns out to be bad at everything except raising ZIRP money and beer-pong-- then you should still do right by your good teammates, and also be professional in general, but don't spend years burning yourself out at 110% while watching the dysfunctional company just urinate away everyone's contributions. Spend that extra 10% energy of yours in searching for a better situation.

DullPointer 2y ago
This is good advice in general, but feels like it’s missing the point of what it’s replying to. Concretely, it assumes a lot of agency. The words “major life calamities and personal loss”, were key words that really change the amount of agency it’s reasonable to assume.
- neilv 2y ago
  I have actually done something like the situation that the earlier commenter described, and would still go back and give this advice to myself of back then. I could add more examples that touch on these extreme situations, but I was trying to give examples familiar to most of HN.
  - DullPointer 2y ago
    Fair enough. Do you think you could have taken that advice then? Even if taking it negatively impacted loved ones (in the short term at least)? Personally, I just don’t know how to make that kind of decision well beyond a certain point.

nonameiguess 2y ago

This is the curse of counterfactuals you can't answer. I was pretty directionless in my younger years, but reasonably smart and driven. I was in the Army and in my late 20s and decided to get into software and went back to school full-time while still serving in the Army. Possibly somewhat predictably, I also went through a divorce at the same time. But I was awake at 3 AM or so every single day, studying for several hours, going to work, studying at lunch, coming home, studying some more, on and on for a few years, and that was all I did. It was work of some sort, nonstop, with no other concerns. It "worked." I got through the program, re-skilled, left the Army, at this point have quadrupled any salary I ever earned before getting into software. But beyond that basic brutality of the experience of being mentally on at all waking hours on all days, and those waking hours often being well beyond 16, I ended up going through severe spinal degeneration in my mid 30s, obviously exacerbated if not outright caused by sitting too much, that ended in three surgeries in the span of 16 months, several years of intermittent disability and forced bed rest, cerebrospinal fluid leakage, an inability to walk without assistance for a while. I ultimately got through it and seem to be basically okay in my mid 40s. Was it worth it, though? I have no idea. I'll certainly never do anything like that ever again. Physical health has become and will remain for the rest of my life my number one priority. I might deprioritize eating properly, sleeping enough, and consistently working out for a few weeks or even months here and there, but for years at a time? Never again. It's not just the severity of the experience itself. I'm not even sure the experience itself is all that bad. You get so high on the feeling of productivity and accomplishment that the difficulty of what you're doing barely even registers, and time flies when you're occupied nonstop. But I have no way of ever knowing how much it contributed to effectively losing half a decade of my life to a level of physical disability that doesn't normally happen to a person before they turn 70, during what was supposed to be the prime of my life. It's possibly the reason I don't have kids. My wife at the time left me and by the time I remarried, I was in such bad shape that I couldn't even pick up my cats, didn't feel capable of raising a child when I couldn't even consistently get out of bed, and decided a vasectomy was a better option at that point. Again, I have no way of ever knowing if this would have happened anyway, but assuming the answer is even maybe no, was it worth to give up the chance of having kids to burn a little bit more brightly when I was 28? Fuck no, that isn't worth it.

djeastm 2y ago

I believe this is simply the aging process. We all want to peg it to something specific we've done, but I've never met a person who doesn't feel this way at some point in the middle of their lives. Our bodies are just like every other living thing in that they get less and less efficient after the initial bloom.

ip26 2y ago
Then why does the dwindling inner reserve seem to line up so neatly to completed objectives? E.g. you successfully emerge from the dark period, but are unwilling or unmotivated to grind through another. The end of a struggle is not usually conveniently timed to match your age.
- Kinrany 2y ago
  One explanation is the need to complete the objective compensating for age.
jaredhallen 2y ago
I agree, although I don't know that it's specifically a chronological function. I'm starting to think of aging as just an accumulation of abuse and trauma. Maybe that's physiological - sun exposure, broken bones that didn't heal quite right, whatever. But it's also mental. The parent comment is a great example, but there are basically an unending number of them. Loss of family or friends. Financial struggles. Mental illness. It all just adds up.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

selimthegrim 2y ago

Thank you for writing this. This is how I feel about 10.5 years into my PhD praying the job market comes through for me.

redleggedfrog 2y ago

That mentor was very, very wise. I've had the same thing happen to me twice now. It happens outside the realm of career as well. For me it was a baby in the NICU and the rest of my life still needing serious attention as well. Something changes in your brain maybe. It's sad because while often 'stamina' will gain you things, this feels like a loss without a gain.

zellyn 2y ago
How did you recover?
- robotresearcher 2y ago
  Baby in NICU has as the best case outcome that you go home with a baby. So you get to recover by ... having a new baby at home. We were tired for maybe seven years.
  - jackvalentine 2y ago
    I feel this. A year of horrors such as surgery before their due date and constant re-admissions even though they haven’t been an inpatient for a year now I still mourn the person I was before.

brian-armstrong 2y ago

I agree entirely with this post. Considering that it is posted on HN which has very much promoted the startup hustle lifestyle for so long, this feels a bit like the buyer beware that comes 15 years after the fact. Something to consider for anyone who wants to give everything in exchange for 0.001% equity in a B2B blockchain fart app.

JohnMakin 2y ago
This is a good point other commenters have alluded to, and funny enough, my very first job out of school taught me this lesson - I was hired by a professor in my 2nd to last quarter, in a startup <10 people that was mostly his PHD students. It felt exciting, and this was like, peak startup era - we didn't have a bad product, just a bad/nonexistent way of monetizing. I had some equity but not enough to be working/stressing as hard as I was with how it played out. Of course, it fell apart in the most obnoxious way possible. We assumed we'd be receiving a series B, that didnt appear, and then tried to monetize aggressively at the last second, got some buyout offers that would have been life-changing money for me at that time, that for whatever reason the founders/board would not accept, boom, no paycheck 6 months later followed by a few months of being shopped around for no pay, basically held hostage, then collapse. I am kind of glad it happened, I laugh at equity offers or "bonuses" now from startups. The one piece of equity that has cashed on me in my career so far was in the very very low 5 figures. Lol. Less than a cost of living adjustment when averaged over the course of that employment.

CobaltFire 2y ago

I'm fairly exhausted today, but I've shared on HN before that I absolutely feel this. I was in the military in a high stress role (about 20 years in), nursing an autistic child through chemotherapy, and still being a parent to my other child and supporting my wife. Notwithstanding the other intense stress I went through in that career, I feel that I used something up making it through that. If you want more of the story feel free to look through my comments; I've talked about it in more depth a few times.

disambiguation 2y ago

> I am not the same person I was before that endeavor, and don't feel I really ever "healed" from it. It's very difficult to describe. Ironically this describes it perfectly in a way that no single word can. It's somehow more than burnout, it's an actual alteration. I've tried to come up with a psychological explanation. It's something like the brain recognizing a very large pattern, or more specifically a dead end. The mind consists of feedback loops that must tie back to rewards. Modern work is so abstract from the rewards, computer programming even more so. I think we grow up developing our psyche like some list of rules we cobble together over time, but it's not a unified theory. Eventually the brain realizes it's working harder and harder with no tangible payout, the contradictions in the rules accumulate tension. Life somehow tricks you into spinning your wheels at full speed, nothings really happening, you're not sure how you got there, and you don't really have an exit plan. Then it all comes crashing down.

Buttons840 2y ago

I was also finishing a CS degree (at WGU), and had a very stressful job. I started having chest and stomach pains, then I got shingles, then I was diagnosed with celiac disease, all in a very short time. I quit the job, finished my degree, and still struggle with the chest pains and celiac disease. So I feel this. I pushed through the stress for a time, and it took something from me--goodbye delicious gluten.

justanotherjoe 2y ago

Maybe the stakes is just lower now? But anyway, yeah I can relate. It's like the mind has renewable and unrenewable 'stores'. The unrenewable ones are just buildups of life experiences that you can transmute into work in a certain way. But once you harness it, it's done. Probably.

antman 2y ago

I mostly agree but I have interpret it differently. There are three reasons for "keep going" no matter what. First extreme adversity, second extreme expectations, third extreme few dimensional discipline due to childhood reasons. Burn out, depression, emptiness come out due to perceiving unfairness with respect to the outcomes. Even if someone ends up overcoming adversity or overachieving, the serotonin response just isn't there, because that is not how it worked in the first place. If you look at a static point in there will always be grievances, if you look at an imaginary future there will always be grievances but if you have been mentored to look this as a movie, see where you started, and you see what you have ended up achieving it will be a lot brighter. Most of the people do good with their lives.

Justsignedup 2y ago

3 years later after my burnout and I still don't have the same energy and drive.