Ask HN: Post Burnout Ideas

I know how this feels. After a few bouts of burnout over my ~20 year career, I'm not convinced we fully recover from all of it. I think each bout leaves some permanent damage, along with increased risk of subsequent bouts. I made a similar comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22164678

The best general advice I can give is don't push anything. If you're not feeling motivated to engage in a side project, no problem, don't pursue one right now. Give things time and see how you feel after 2-6 months. Other general advice - reduce work hours if you can, exercise regularly, and relax. Morning/evening walks combine the latter two well.

Learning something new can also help combat burnout fogginess. I've found courses in something of interest work well (search Coursera, Udacity, Udemy, etc.). What I like about these is they're smaller in scale and more self contained than an open-ended side project. They allow you to commit time and energy in small chunks and at your own pace, but still leave you with something valuable in the end. E.g. over the years I've taken courses in Vue, Svelte, TypeScript, and a couple math refreshers. All enjoyable and worth while IMO.

Negative experiences tend to produce learned behaviors and reactions that we’re not aware of. These can be overcome, but it takes effort to identify them and implement deliberate changes in our behavior. There are various ways of doing this from self-guided books to professional therapy. It’s not exactly “damage” in the sense that it’s permanent or unaddressable, though. Viewing it as such can hamper recovery.

I guess veterans etc. who suffer throughout their lives with it just aren’t sufficiently resilient?

I mention this because pointing to the physicality of psychological conditions often induces a sense of fatalism that often isn't warranted per se, and can become some sort of self-fulfilling prophecy.

Again, this does not mean people should just pull themselves up. It does suggest that people could in principle learn coping mechanisms (through therapy etc.) to a degree that allows for leading a fulfilling life, even with PTSD manifesting physically in the brain.

The bits that won’t go away are the dread, the insomnia, the constant anxious waiting for the sky to fall. I think I’ve pared off the behavioural bits over the years and have largely addressed them - but my mind continues to wrestle with intangible beasts.

My cousin has just qualified as a psychedelic therapist, so later this summer he’s visiting and we’re going to try breaking the cycle.

Sustained and elevated stress causes damage to the whole body, not just the brain. If understanding what you experienced as brain damage helps you accept how things happened and how things are, then all the more power to you.

But if there is something in your thought patterns that you want to change, but feel hopeless that your brain is damaged, I recommend trying to find another framing aside from "damage".

I'm in a somewhat similar situation to you, but replace the 3 years with 10 years. I had many periods of 'minor' burnout along the way that I ignored or ploughed through, which in hindsight was a pretty big mistake.

Around August last year I just couldn't continue. I wasn't sleeping, I was frequently run down, and I was self-medicating more and more with drugs and alcohol. It eventually got to the point where simply opening my laptop would elicit a fight or flight response.

I was lucky enough to be in a secure enough financial situation to largely take 6 months off. If you're in a position to do this, I highly recommend it.

I uninstalled gmail, slack, etc. from my phone. I considered getting a dumb phone, but settled for turning off push notifications for everything instead. I went away with my girlfriend for a week and left all my tech at home except for my kindle (literally the first time I've been disconnected for more than a couple of days in probably 20 years). I exercised as much as possible and spent time in nature going for walks, etc.

I've been back at it part time for the last few months. Gradually I felt the feelings of burnout being replaced with feelings of boredom, which is hopefully my brain's way of saying that it's starting to repair itself and ready to slowly return to work.

I'm still nowhere near back to peak productivity, but I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that I may never get back there. I'm 36 and probably would have dropped dead of overwork by 50 if I kept up the tempo of the last 10 years anyway.

I'm not 'cured' by any means, but I believe things are slowly getting better.

My advice to you is to be kind and patient with yourself. Try not to stress about not having a side-project, and instead just focus on self-care for a while. Someone posted this on HN a few weeks back and it really hit close to home for me: http://www.robinhobb.com/blog/posts/38429

And yeah - very powerful piece of writing. She's a published fantasy author and I'm going to try one of her novels (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77197.Assassin_s_Apprent...)

Anyway. Five years on, haven’t worked since other than very lightweight consultancy. Live in the woods.

Still wake up at 0430 every morning in a panic. Still grind my teeth. Still flinch every time I hear my phone. Incapable of being kind to myself.

There’s a point of no return, beyond where the brain damage is irreparable. You can learn to live with it, but you can’t ever get rid of it.

I’m damaged, but functional - managed to build a house with my own hands this spring, while writing an ISO27k1 ISMS, while living off grid - I don’t just sit around on the couch - hell, don’t have a couch.

So yeah. Coping rather than being cured is the best many can hope for - and I’m just about coping.

Is it maybe about accepting a permanent shift in your mindset? The body made it very clear to you that your priorities did a lot of harm. I can't find how peak productivity is humane and wouldn't strive for it (again). If this involves a change of everything than this is it.

Side note: People in tech have weird expectations put on them, as if the day job isn’t enough, you have to constantly prove your cred doing a million side-projects. All apparently open source so any random can grab your work or alternatively so you can be seen to "give back". My dentist, doctor, plumber, carpenter friends etc don't have this issue.

For myself: the drive, and the creativity, only come back if I stop working for an extended period of time (weeks). I need a lot of idle time and some boredom before I feel creative again, let alone want to touch a keyboard, but if I wait long enough it always happens.

I promise you the creativity and desire is still there. It could be more that the current job (or something else) is suppressing it, and less that you haven’t recovered something you lost.

For me it was first weeks, and then months. And as for the last time, took six years.

It is hard to know what you want if you don't know what you are and what you want to be. During my six months long seek vacation I had a very small side project because for me the issue was not the technical aspect but the stress that you always had to perform. I was working for a mobile gaming company and on top of your job you had to play, find bugs, join stand-ups, communicate on slack... This was all fake for me and stressed me out to the point of no return. In the end it was just faking enthusiasm.

I am not like that. I love what I do, but when I am off I am off and please leave me alone. Some companies push you to always have an opinion and what is the problem with not having one from time to time? What is the problem with just doing something else in your free time? If I want to have a side project I will. If I don't, I will be doing something else.

To cut my rant short what really helped me was to recognise my problem and through professional help I could accept myself for what I am. Don't overdo, take your time to know where you are and where you want to go and get back when you are ready. If it helps reduce the amount of working hours and try to enjoy you free time.

If you don't enjoy side projects any more, don't force it.

Better side projects would be something offline like improving your personal fitness, learning a new (non-computer) hobby, leveling up your cooking skills, and other real-world skills.

Forcing side projects on top of a day job is a recipe for returning to burnout.

What I think you need is a meaningful, collaborative effort.

It doesn't necessarily have to be anything "useful". You just need a community with a common goal.

Volunteering seems to work great here, but I've seen people pick up co-op games, team crocheting or collaborative art.

It appears that the real recovery is the friendships you made along the way.

As a result, I'm super familiar with that cold, dead, leaden feeling of not caring about anything, not really able to feel any of the excitement and buzz that I know, intellectually, I should be able to feel. It is taking a long old while to return back to a position of health, and while that's happening the only thing I've really had to draw on is grit, determination, and a sort of psychotic single mindedness.

I'm now in a much MUCH better place than I was before, but I've been able to keep pursuing my side project (and hopefully eventual startup), and able to keep making some kind of progress ... but it's really only been sheer bloody-mindedness that's kept me going. (I'm hella stubborn when I want to be).

Happily I'm feeling a lot better now, and progress is definitely picking up again now that I can actually smell the victory that's so tantalisingly close to being in my grasp.

For purely code stuff, I tend to learn a new language when I don't want to program anything. I particularly like ones with non-mainstream philosophies as they provide a different perspective on the craft. I don't do much with the languages I learn but it usually kicks me back into regular coding.

You can reduce stressful problems by automating them away. So I would just start with your own problems, going step by step and focusing on low maintenance and immediate benefits. I would set very low expectations and always be aware of the risk you are taking for your health. Maybe you will get better in the future to push something to the next level. Worst case, your own life got easier.

If you really want one, I recommend doing something physical, with your hands. Like woodworking, cooking, pottery, whatever.

That seem to be a good counterbalance to the thought-heavy tech jobs most of us on HN have.

I’ve represented my country and competed abroad. After burning out racing, I weirdly couldn’t enjoy it as a hobby anymore.

Perfectionism was definitely a factor. The main thing for me was the lack of learning new stuff.

When you’re a beginner, the initial steep learning curve can be really fun. Then it flattens out once you’re an expert.

Maybe you could build a side project in a new language - or even step away from coding for a while and learn something completely different.

Video games allowed me back into the mode of thinking without any sense of external requirement. It was all on me to decide how deep I went and for how long. Eventually I played until I achieved boredom after over 900 hours. (Not all at once! Over months.)

From that point of boredom I could see how much energy I had channeled into something pointless, and realized I had recovered. Then I started channeling that work into home renovations and other tangible efforts. Even coding for family projects!

But I never got the motivation back to code for profit again. I’m done with that part of my life.

I think it's okay for you to not be interested in doing side projects anymore, there's a lot more to life and the world than programming; and, if your heart wants to venture outside of it, then let it! You might find another, wonderful passion :)

And after 2 years of surviving, I feel that I lost a lot of time

The best things I've found to cope with burnout are tasks that can't be optimised, are unimportant, and low-medium intensity. Just going for a walk is a good way to start, as is helping friends and family with things they need to do.

Spending months in front of a TV watching Star Trek doesn't help, nor does attempting to invent a new, marketable product. It has to be somewhere in the middle.

- Stop using social media. People posting how excited they are will drag you further down

- Give yourself time. Don’t force it. Time will mend things

- Go out into Nature. Leave your phone at home

Trying to have fun over getting results.

Maybe getting into some different things that involves new people and subjects.

Also consider getting involved with an existing project if you're having writer's block. Lots of stuff out there in need of some help.

Having time off, ideas came back.

Go running, lift weights, do calisthenics, join a team sport.

Whatever. Pick something you enjoy of course! Just go out and do physical stuff for the pure fact of physical stuff.

Learn to relax. Go outside, hike, sunbath, swim, read good books ( literature ) or try to volunteer.

In my experience, side projects require much more mental effort than initially thought. At different stages of life, we have different levels of available bandwidth.

I was not really burnt down but I noticed I started to loose enthusiasm for “The Craft” (of programming). Surprisingly, what reignited the spark was starting to watch and interact with people livecoding on Twitch. I don’t know what it was, maybe watching people doing THEIR side projects in a playful and relaxed environment make me rediscover the fun aspects of programming.

Seems like you’re putting the cart before the horse. I’d only start worrying if I actually had something I wanted to build but couldn’t muster the gung-ho to do it because of burnout.

As it stands, it just seems like you have better uses for your time.

I see a lot of comments here have already echoed this same sentiment.

You could just keep making money at faang until there’s an idea that calls you.

I changed jobs and have been working the longest time on my current side project. One of the most important things is that I don't need to do it today. I can have a week of leave from my side projects if i want.

It's working on it consistently that works, without overworking myselve.

Question is: what do you care about?

Is it about the technology it earning money from them? If you want to earn money from them without caring about the learning part, it's not actually a passion.

All of my side projects from the time are extremely uninspired.

Though, as it turns out, software is eating the world, and every analog hobby I've picked up eventually wants to become a computer hobby. You can choose to resist this entirely, or give in a bit. The analog part is still there waiting for you whenever you're tired of starting at rectangles.

(Example A: FM synthesis ideas should obviously be reimplemented in python... Oh wait, super collider exists, and now this cheap USB game pass I had lying around is an FM synth. But I've still got a small pile of synths to play with.)

(Example 2: Birds are cool. Eventually I found my way into bird song id with machine learning, but I can now always justify a long walk in the woods as field research...)

Avoid competitiveness and "getting ahead" -- pursue mastery the same way a zen gardener does. It's very enjoyable to be good at useless things.

Writing software without purpose is boring. Writing software to earn a living frequently aligns with business objectives, but not your own. It can absolutely wear you down.

Before worrying about your love for software, find your calling. What you want to breathe into the world. Whether you use software or not to get there won't matter.

And it's totally fine if you don't do any of this. Life doesn't have rules, and you don't have to fit a mold.