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So this guy: - Changed his major overnight from whatever it was to computer science after writing a Hello, World program - Left "so-called higher education" t

So this guy: - Changed his major overnight from whatever it was to computer science after writing a Hello, World program - Left "so-called higher education" to work at a real-life job "without even thinking about it twice" - Quit real-life job to be a bartender and chef - Quit doing that after getting girlfriend pregnant to 'go back to the "real world" to get a job' - Quit that to build a house and work on a farm Every life event he describes here is a movement to extremes out of frustration or anxiety from what he was currently doing. I'm sure there's much more to this story, but if anything, this is an example of how peace of mind can't be found on either ends of a see-saw.

kleer001 12y ago
thanks for saving me from reading this article, the author sounds like a waffly idiot
jakejake 12y ago
I think this is the result of the relative ease of getting programming work and good salaries. It attracts a lot of people who are not really in it for the love. Some of those people are going to feel like their soul is being sucked out. This guy is one of them which explains his extreme reactions. I personally would rather work at the shittiest programming job than go out and work on a farm. But that's just me.
- untog 12y ago
  Man, I love programming but there are times after sitting at a desk for seven hours then spending another hour at the gym to get exercise that I feel like modern life makes no damn sense. It's moments like these that the idea of working on a farm, doing something real with my hands, sounds really great. But who am I kidding.
  - jerf 12y ago
    You may want to consider "life-hacking" your exercise routine. There's a lot of evidence coming in lately that suggests that an hour is far more time than you need to be spending for health, if you do different things. (I'm not in love with using the term life-hacking, but, alas, it really is the best fit for the concept in question. Still, it need not be done as a fad or because it is "cool" in a certain set... it can simply be a useful way of improving yourself.)
    - leppr 12y ago
      So much this. Sometimes little life hacks can have big (positive!) consequences. For example, two weeks ago I picked up the muscle-a-day routine and already I'm feeling way more focused and energized. The concept is very simple, today is butt-day so any time I'm not thinking about anything in particular I contract my glutes. It's really a fantastic concentration and fitness exercise that keeps you focused until the end of the day when your attention begins to drift, and restores the balance between your over-stressed mind and under-utilized body.
    - untog 12y ago
      I know there's more I can do, but that's sort of besides the point. The mere fact that I need to 'hack' my life seems like an indicator that something is wrong.
      - jerf 12y ago
        My point is that there's actually probably less you can do to obtain similar results. And part of my point was not to let the terminology stop you too much. I don't know a great word for the concept that doesn't have trendiness (the most obvious, mere "self-improvement" or "self-help", has its own baggage!), but the fact it's got a silly word in it doesn't mean it's a bad idea, nor does the fact some people go way overboard with it show it's a bad idea.
- jofer 12y ago
  While I agree that programming attracts a lot of people that aren't in it for the love of the craft, I disagree with most of your sentiment. I see a creative person who struggles with having to focus on someone else's agenda. Most non-developers see programming as tedious, mind-numbing work that involves zero creativity. Most people who have never worked on a small farm or built a table/shed/house/whatever think of the manual labor as tedious, mind-numbing work that involves zero creativity. Both working on a farm and programming are surprisingly creative professions. I grew up on a farm, and farming requires a love of creating and building and an incredible amount of creativity. ("Big agriculture" is a bit different. I'm referring mostly to single-family operations, though many of those are quite large.) In both, you have to love building things from the ground up. You have to be willing to get your hands dirty and put up with occasional tedium, be it fixing a particularly annoying corner-case or riding a tractor for 12 hours. In both, you have to solve complex problems with limited resources under time pressure. (The things I've seen my grandfather fabricate or fix with random broken junk and an arc welder are simply mind-blowing.) Most farmers I know embody the "hacker culture" more than most self-proclaimed "hackers" I know. I'd argue that going back and forth is less of an extreme than you'd think.
  - Kurtz79 12y ago
    "I see a creative person who struggles with having to focus on someone else's agenda." But if he loved/liked programming and the problem is just not working on something of his liking, nothing prevents him from either finding another more endearing programming job or working on his own thing. I believe the parent spot-on: not everyone is into programming because it is his/her own calling in life, for many people it's just a mean to an end (making a living) which has the benefit of being somewhat more creative and commanding an higher pay than many other jobs. And by all means, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it, it is clear that the blogger was unhappy with his life (while he was clearly happy when doing something else rather than programming in the past), so it wasn't his thing really, I wish him all the best with his new adventure.
    - capisce 12y ago
      > nothing prevents him from either finding another more endearing programming job or working on his own thing. Risk and lack of a safety net prevents people from working on their own thing.
- benologist 12y ago
  Programming is the next manual labor and like all the other manual labor that preceded it most people don't need to be deeply passionate about their role in the assembly line. Like current manual labor it will generally not be considered skilled work, even though it is now.
  - polynomial 12y ago
    This is a bold if not entirely surprising prediction. Would love to see some citations both supporting and countering.
    - benologist 12y ago
      When we talk about driverless cars replacing taxis we really mean programmers replacing taxi drivers in aggregate. The cars are a constant, if you're responsible for a fleet of them you are just a better taxi driver.
      - sah2ed 12y ago
        Such programmers will rely heavily on automated tools and will have to follow a clearly defined process because driverless cars will always involve human life. The cost of a simple misconfiguration is extremely high. Besides, I fail to see how this can be considered manual labor or even the possibility of allowing average programmers to fill such positions.
        benologist 12y ago
        We are the elite right now, our skillset is hard and the work we do is hard and we don't want to believe everyone can do it. Definitely not "average programmers" as you mention! And maybe we have a little while longer to be the elite, but already children can build websites and applications so our days are numbered, soon everybody can know what we know and do what we do and as you mention, tools will be better as well and that empowers them to be closer to us too. It takes a bunch of programmers to keep a fleet of servers running, vehicles will be maintained by programmers too, but it takes less programmers and less good programmers with every advance we make.
- secstate 12y ago
  I couldn't agree more. As I was reading this post I was really trying to sympathize with the author's trouble of finding contentment in his work. But as a software dev who's very nearly a "code monkey" in his 40 hours, I also live in a rural setting where my wife and I raise heritage hogs for pork. I also find time to volunteer with the local Code for America brigade and interface with folks in the government and non-profit area on a regular basis. My son and I also go up to a hacker club in the city where folks are always building something cool. Perhaps rather than monoculturing your life, the lesson here is to diversify on a daily basis?
  - aaron_m04 12y ago
    That's a good lesson, but putting it into practice requires a job where you are not pressured to work 10-12 hour days and weekends.
maratd 12y ago
> if anything, this is an example of how peace of mind can't be found on either ends of a see-saw Well, there are different personality types out there. This may be "peace of mind" for him. Personally, I split my time between the "real world" and getting my "hands dirty". I think it's important to have both at the same time, so you don't end up see-sawing between the two.
- leothekim 12y ago
  > Well, there are different personality types out there. This may be "peace of mind" for him. I'd agree with this if he didn't sound so reactionary. Leaving a software job to work on a farm is great if you're making a deliberate choice from a solid mental state. He makes it sound like he's doing this (and every other choice he described) because he'd otherwise be going out of his mind. It's disturbing to read in a way because he doesn't sound like he has full agency over his current decision.
  - ky3 12y ago
    he doesn't sound like he has full agency over his current decision. There's a finished sheen to his prose, so I give him the benefit of doubt that he's merely caricaturizing his situation. Actual life stories are quite dull, you know, as opposed to say, the movies. And on the topic of differing sensibilities, it's curious that you find it "disturbing to read." We are left wondering why.
    - leothekim 12y ago
      If he's caricaturizing himself on his own web site like this, then it's absolutely disturbing. It's disturbing to me that, in abandoning his current reality to embrace a new one, he idealizes his next step in a way that repeats a pattern of psychosis. It's not at all clear he is actually in reality in moving to his next decision. It'd be far less disturbing if he were listing his reasons as "I've been looking forward to doing this for a long time, and this is fulfilling a lifelong dream" or "I've been talking with my wife and kids, and we can't wait..." or "This is going to be hard, but we're giving it a go...", i.e. reasons that connect with his current reality instead of running away from it. Instead, he demonizes his current life and, to reconcile "a new fire inside of me that I can’t hold back", he characterizes his decision as "A journey with a larger purpose. A journey that will feed me in ways money cannot. A journey that will breed true Life." These are ego-driven, black-and-white, rhetorical reasons. Nothing about his next move guaranteeing any of what he's hoping for. And this time, he's bringing his children along with him.
thebouv 12y ago
I wonder if he'll post a follow-up blog where he bounces back yet again to programming when he realizes how back-breaking, if not soul-sucking, farming is. Or maybe he'll start blogging about and writing software for small family farming? There's an audience for it so maybe he can find the middle of that see-saw?
ripb 12y ago
>Every life event he describes here is a movement to extremes out of frustration or anxiety from what he was currently doing. I'm sure there's much more to this story, but if anything, this is an example of how peace of mind can't be found on either ends of a see-saw. He has balls, I'll give him that, and I don't see any problem with changing things - even very large things like ones career - in order to find what makes you happy and makes your life feel fulfilling. I'm finding that I don't have that in me. The thought of leaving a well paid, comfortable and regularly challenging job in software development, even if it's not the passion that fuels life for me personally, for a future of uncertainty is far too daunting for me to take action and "try something new". Maybe that's deeply seated in how I perceive myself and others to judge those who do try, and sometimes fail at trying, their hand at other things along the way? I don't know, but at this point in life I commend anyone who tries to break the mold we've been pretty much set into since we were teenagers.
grimmdude 12y ago
Of course, life is an ever changing thing. I don't suppose you've kept the same job for your whole life? Even the things you love can become a chore. I completely sympathize with this guy and applaud him for making changes he feels will make his existence more full. Grass is always greener can be one way of looking at this, another way is that he's LIVING HIS LIFE.
jrochkind1 12y ago
Perhaps peace of mind can't be found by making the "right decisions" at all, but only by learning to find peace of mind in your circumstances, and not being afraid of change. This guy sounds like he's doing okay.
nether 12y ago
Reminds me of the people who "chuck it all" and travel the world for a year or two, then return home to find everything the same, as if they had never left.
danneu 12y ago
There was once a boy named Milo who didn't know what to do with himself — not just sometimes, but always. When he was in school he longed to be out, and when he was out he longed to be in. On the way he thought about coming home, and coming home he thought about going. Wherever he was he wished he were somewhere else, and when he got there he wondered why he'd bothered. Nothing really interested him — least of all the things that should have. — The Phantom Toolbooth
heurist 12y ago
I'd think of it more as a binary search. Big jumps first, small jumps when you're honing in on something that works.

kleer001 12y ago

thanks for saving me from reading this article, the author sounds like a waffly idiot

jakejake 12y ago

I think this is the result of the relative ease of getting programming work and good salaries. It attracts a lot of people who are not really in it for the love. Some of those people are going to feel like their soul is being sucked out. This guy is one of them which explains his extreme reactions. I personally would rather work at the shittiest programming job than go out and work on a farm. But that's just me.

untog 12y ago
Man, I love programming but there are times after sitting at a desk for seven hours then spending another hour at the gym to get exercise that I feel like modern life makes no damn sense. It's moments like these that the idea of working on a farm, doing something real with my hands, sounds really great. But who am I kidding.
- jerf 12y ago
  You may want to consider "life-hacking" your exercise routine. There's a lot of evidence coming in lately that suggests that an hour is far more time than you need to be spending for health, if you do different things. (I'm not in love with using the term life-hacking, but, alas, it really is the best fit for the concept in question. Still, it need not be done as a fad or because it is "cool" in a certain set... it can simply be a useful way of improving yourself.)
  - leppr 12y ago
    So much this. Sometimes little life hacks can have big (positive!) consequences. For example, two weeks ago I picked up the muscle-a-day routine and already I'm feeling way more focused and energized. The concept is very simple, today is butt-day so any time I'm not thinking about anything in particular I contract my glutes. It's really a fantastic concentration and fitness exercise that keeps you focused until the end of the day when your attention begins to drift, and restores the balance between your over-stressed mind and under-utilized body.
  - untog 12y ago
    I know there's more I can do, but that's sort of besides the point. The mere fact that I need to 'hack' my life seems like an indicator that something is wrong.
    - jerf 12y ago
      My point is that there's actually probably less you can do to obtain similar results. And part of my point was not to let the terminology stop you too much. I don't know a great word for the concept that doesn't have trendiness (the most obvious, mere "self-improvement" or "self-help", has its own baggage!), but the fact it's got a silly word in it doesn't mean it's a bad idea, nor does the fact some people go way overboard with it show it's a bad idea.
jofer 12y ago
While I agree that programming attracts a lot of people that aren't in it for the love of the craft, I disagree with most of your sentiment. I see a creative person who struggles with having to focus on someone else's agenda. Most non-developers see programming as tedious, mind-numbing work that involves zero creativity. Most people who have never worked on a small farm or built a table/shed/house/whatever think of the manual labor as tedious, mind-numbing work that involves zero creativity. Both working on a farm and programming are surprisingly creative professions. I grew up on a farm, and farming requires a love of creating and building and an incredible amount of creativity. ("Big agriculture" is a bit different. I'm referring mostly to single-family operations, though many of those are quite large.) In both, you have to love building things from the ground up. You have to be willing to get your hands dirty and put up with occasional tedium, be it fixing a particularly annoying corner-case or riding a tractor for 12 hours. In both, you have to solve complex problems with limited resources under time pressure. (The things I've seen my grandfather fabricate or fix with random broken junk and an arc welder are simply mind-blowing.) Most farmers I know embody the "hacker culture" more than most self-proclaimed "hackers" I know. I'd argue that going back and forth is less of an extreme than you'd think.
- Kurtz79 12y ago
  "I see a creative person who struggles with having to focus on someone else's agenda." But if he loved/liked programming and the problem is just not working on something of his liking, nothing prevents him from either finding another more endearing programming job or working on his own thing. I believe the parent spot-on: not everyone is into programming because it is his/her own calling in life, for many people it's just a mean to an end (making a living) which has the benefit of being somewhat more creative and commanding an higher pay than many other jobs. And by all means, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it, it is clear that the blogger was unhappy with his life (while he was clearly happy when doing something else rather than programming in the past), so it wasn't his thing really, I wish him all the best with his new adventure.
  - capisce 12y ago
    > nothing prevents him from either finding another more endearing programming job or working on his own thing. Risk and lack of a safety net prevents people from working on their own thing.
benologist 12y ago
Programming is the next manual labor and like all the other manual labor that preceded it most people don't need to be deeply passionate about their role in the assembly line. Like current manual labor it will generally not be considered skilled work, even though it is now.
- polynomial 12y ago
  This is a bold if not entirely surprising prediction. Would love to see some citations both supporting and countering.
  - benologist 12y ago
    When we talk about driverless cars replacing taxis we really mean programmers replacing taxi drivers in aggregate. The cars are a constant, if you're responsible for a fleet of them you are just a better taxi driver.
    - sah2ed 12y ago
      Such programmers will rely heavily on automated tools and will have to follow a clearly defined process because driverless cars will always involve human life. The cost of a simple misconfiguration is extremely high. Besides, I fail to see how this can be considered manual labor or even the possibility of allowing average programmers to fill such positions.
      - benologist 12y ago
        We are the elite right now, our skillset is hard and the work we do is hard and we don't want to believe everyone can do it. Definitely not "average programmers" as you mention! And maybe we have a little while longer to be the elite, but already children can build websites and applications so our days are numbered, soon everybody can know what we know and do what we do and as you mention, tools will be better as well and that empowers them to be closer to us too. It takes a bunch of programmers to keep a fleet of servers running, vehicles will be maintained by programmers too, but it takes less programmers and less good programmers with every advance we make.
secstate 12y ago
I couldn't agree more. As I was reading this post I was really trying to sympathize with the author's trouble of finding contentment in his work. But as a software dev who's very nearly a "code monkey" in his 40 hours, I also live in a rural setting where my wife and I raise heritage hogs for pork. I also find time to volunteer with the local Code for America brigade and interface with folks in the government and non-profit area on a regular basis. My son and I also go up to a hacker club in the city where folks are always building something cool. Perhaps rather than monoculturing your life, the lesson here is to diversify on a daily basis?
- aaron_m04 12y ago
  That's a good lesson, but putting it into practice requires a job where you are not pressured to work 10-12 hour days and weekends.

maratd 12y ago

> if anything, this is an example of how peace of mind can't be found on either ends of a see-saw Well, there are different personality types out there. This may be "peace of mind" for him. Personally, I split my time between the "real world" and getting my "hands dirty". I think it's important to have both at the same time, so you don't end up see-sawing between the two.

leothekim 12y ago
> Well, there are different personality types out there. This may be "peace of mind" for him. I'd agree with this if he didn't sound so reactionary. Leaving a software job to work on a farm is great if you're making a deliberate choice from a solid mental state. He makes it sound like he's doing this (and every other choice he described) because he'd otherwise be going out of his mind. It's disturbing to read in a way because he doesn't sound like he has full agency over his current decision.
- ky3 12y ago
  he doesn't sound like he has full agency over his current decision. There's a finished sheen to his prose, so I give him the benefit of doubt that he's merely caricaturizing his situation. Actual life stories are quite dull, you know, as opposed to say, the movies. And on the topic of differing sensibilities, it's curious that you find it "disturbing to read." We are left wondering why.
  - leothekim 12y ago
    If he's caricaturizing himself on his own web site like this, then it's absolutely disturbing. It's disturbing to me that, in abandoning his current reality to embrace a new one, he idealizes his next step in a way that repeats a pattern of psychosis. It's not at all clear he is actually in reality in moving to his next decision. It'd be far less disturbing if he were listing his reasons as "I've been looking forward to doing this for a long time, and this is fulfilling a lifelong dream" or "I've been talking with my wife and kids, and we can't wait..." or "This is going to be hard, but we're giving it a go...", i.e. reasons that connect with his current reality instead of running away from it. Instead, he demonizes his current life and, to reconcile "a new fire inside of me that I can’t hold back", he characterizes his decision as "A journey with a larger purpose. A journey that will feed me in ways money cannot. A journey that will breed true Life." These are ego-driven, black-and-white, rhetorical reasons. Nothing about his next move guaranteeing any of what he's hoping for. And this time, he's bringing his children along with him.

thebouv 12y ago

I wonder if he'll post a follow-up blog where he bounces back yet again to programming when he realizes how back-breaking, if not soul-sucking, farming is. Or maybe he'll start blogging about and writing software for small family farming? There's an audience for it so maybe he can find the middle of that see-saw?

ripb 12y ago

>Every life event he describes here is a movement to extremes out of frustration or anxiety from what he was currently doing. I'm sure there's much more to this story, but if anything, this is an example of how peace of mind can't be found on either ends of a see-saw. He has balls, I'll give him that, and I don't see any problem with changing things - even very large things like ones career - in order to find what makes you happy and makes your life feel fulfilling. I'm finding that I don't have that in me. The thought of leaving a well paid, comfortable and regularly challenging job in software development, even if it's not the passion that fuels life for me personally, for a future of uncertainty is far too daunting for me to take action and "try something new". Maybe that's deeply seated in how I perceive myself and others to judge those who do try, and sometimes fail at trying, their hand at other things along the way? I don't know, but at this point in life I commend anyone who tries to break the mold we've been pretty much set into since we were teenagers.

grimmdude 12y ago

Of course, life is an ever changing thing. I don't suppose you've kept the same job for your whole life? Even the things you love can become a chore. I completely sympathize with this guy and applaud him for making changes he feels will make his existence more full. Grass is always greener can be one way of looking at this, another way is that he's LIVING HIS LIFE.

jrochkind1 12y ago

Perhaps peace of mind can't be found by making the "right decisions" at all, but only by learning to find peace of mind in your circumstances, and not being afraid of change. This guy sounds like he's doing okay.

nether 12y ago

Reminds me of the people who "chuck it all" and travel the world for a year or two, then return home to find everything the same, as if they had never left.

danneu 12y ago

There was once a boy named Milo who didn't know what to do with himself — not just sometimes, but always. When he was in school he longed to be out, and when he was out he longed to be in. On the way he thought about coming home, and coming home he thought about going. Wherever he was he wished he were somewhere else, and when he got there he wondered why he'd bothered. Nothing really interested him — least of all the things that should have. — The Phantom Toolbooth

heurist 12y ago

I'd think of it more as a binary search. Big jumps first, small jumps when you're honing in on something that works.