Don't Burn Yourself Out - Your Developer Journey Will Take Time

Transcript is auto-generated and may contain errors.

Hey folks, I'm going to go to LinkedIn for a it's a message, but I guess it's a question. It says, uh, how do you how do you always find yourself energetic and happy while contributing to the tech field? And I responded to this person and, um, I figured it'd be good to like just make a video about this because I don't know, I feel like I feel like it's important to talk about. And uh the short answer is like I absolutely do not always feel happy and energetic to contribute to the tech field. And I actually think that's okay and normal. I say this because like I actually get a lot of enjoyment and fulfillment out of, you know, trying to make videos to help people or, you know, uh posting online for software engineers, writing newsletter articles, like you name it. like I I get a lot of fulfillment out of that and a lot of enjoyment, but it's not it's not always happy.

It's not always something I'm energized about. And um and I do think that that's normal. I wanted to talk about this because like I guess with you know with social media it's it's easy to kind of um to see one side of it, right? So, I've tried to be pretty transparent on code commute like when I've been going through, you know, pretty severe burnout, especially earlier in 2025. I tried to like make it very clear and I I wanted to do that because I mean a couple reasons. One, I want the transparency to come through. Uh, two is like I know that that's having an effect on me in terms of how I'm delivering content and like h my outlook on life and things like that. Like I know that when I'm feeling burnt out like that that I'm a pretty sour person to be around.

And I, you know, I don't want to be like that. But it's one of those things like I I always go back to like awareness being one of the most important things, right? If we have awareness of these things, then we can have a decision about whether or not we're going to take some action or whatever. But if we're not even aware, then it's really difficult to try making positive change. So when I saw this question come in, I was thinking like, you know, I'm assuming that they're asking this because what they perceive of how I interact with, you know, people online, people in tech, that kind of stuff that I'm always trying to help. I have a a positive outlook and that it's like, you know, something that energizes me that I'm happy about and like that's the goal, right?

That's my goal is so that I do this kind of stuff and it is energizing for me and it does feel good and it makes me happy, but there are days where like absolutely not. And it's not because I don't know, it's not like because the tech industry like I hate it one day or something or it's just like sometimes I'm I'm just overwhelmed. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed with work. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed with trying to make YouTube videos. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed with the stuff I'm coding at home. like I it's something that I try to work on, something that I try to make sure I don't get to those points, but that's kind of the reality. There's there's just times where I have a lot going on and I'm not energized to do certain things.

I've had periods over the past few months where like the weekend will come and you know, say I've been busy all week and I'm like, man, I just really want I want some time where I can really feel productive about the things I do care about, right? Like I want to, you know, I want Friday to come uh write my newsletter article, wake up early on a Saturday and like crush YouTube videos in terms of like creating them and stuff like that. And then it's like Friday end, you know, I finish work and I'm like I barely have energy to write a newsletter article. It's like and it's not like it's hard. Takes time, but it's not like hard. And then I wake up on Saturday and I'm like I slept in and like I have no motivation to do any of these things and I'm not I'm not feeling energized to go create YouTube videos on anything.

And then I'm like, "Okay, well, you know, if you're not creating content, like you should you should work on Brand Ghost, right? Like you got to do that because like that's that's a path forward. So like do something for Brand Ghost." And I'm like, I just I don't want to. And it's weird because those are things that I want. Like I want to be able to make content. I want to help. I want to work on Brand Ghost. I want that to be successful. But there are times when I just, you know, my sort of like my gas tank is empty, so to speak. And and I think that that's normal. It's not something that I want to happen all the time. And certainly it doesn't. But I think that it would be, you know, disingenuous to to try and convince people that, you know, 24/7 I'm feeling like, man, like it's so awesome making content and trying to help people and like I wake up at 5:00 a.m.

and like that's the first thing I think about. No, man. Some days some days suck, some weeks suck, some months suck. But I I think that that's I think that that's normal. I think that's human. And I think that what I try to do in my life is try to minimize those things or try to understand when that's happening. And there are sometimes where I'm trying my best and something unexpected comes up and it is like, you know, extra time and energy spent on things that I wasn't planning for. And that really, you know, eats away at me and then I find myself in a shitty spot. but it's not permanent. And so I wanted to share this because um again transparency I think that's helpful. And then the other side of this is like how do we make this like a helpful lesson for people?

And I was thinking because I was doing a podcast interview with uh someone yesterday at the uh you know sort of end of the workday and we were talking about you know people getting into tech and um a lot of the time that people when they're trying to you know they're trying to skill up they're trying to like they're trying to make a change in their life because they're like hey I need to go invest in learning in this or like uh you know boot camp or anything else where it's like I I need to get to the sort of the the positive change in my life sooner. I need to do that because I need to get on the other side of whatever I'm experiencing so that I can improve my life. And and I can totally relate to that. I can appreciate that because I feel like that's a very human thing to like be like, okay, like I see this goal.

I know I need to work towards that and like how do I do that most efficiently, right? Like I don't think any of us are like what's the least effective way to do this? We want we want the result faster. But the the reality is that like if we don't have sustainability in how we approach these things, we burn out, right? And it's that's going to happen for different people doing different things at different points in their lives. And some people will say, "Hey, I'm going back to that thing to try it again." And that's awesome, right? But ideally, we want to minimize the number of times like we fail or give up on something just to return to it later or, you know, never return to something at all. That's sort of like the worst outcome. That's like that's like a true failure is to like is to not go back and revisit it and to try again.

So, I I share this with you because for people that are trying to, you know, they're like, I need to go spend all this as much time as I can to like try and and do the things so I can, you know, practice uh coding or lead code or like interviewing or like just building things because I I need to be able to change my life for the better. Like I I can really appreciate that. And at the same time, I want you to like to be kind to yourself that when you have a day where you're like, "That's not it, man." Like, try to get awareness of that before it happens so you can pace yourself a little bit better. Um, I don't know.

I think that's sort of the message I just wanted to deliver today which was like you know set your goals you know work your ass off towards them but at the same time just be kind to yourself too because you are human and you know not every day is going to be productivity at 110%. So hope that helps and uh you know I don't think that this person sent this message to me on LinkedIn hoping for like a video or something. I think they were just kind of curious or wanted to start a conversation, but I thought there was a bit of a lesson kind of buried in there. So, just a friendly reminder for folks, if you have questions that you want answered on Code Commute about software engineering career stuff, just leave a comment below or go to codemute.com and you can submit stuff anonymously.

And of course, you can just reach out to me on any social media platform. You can, you know, tweet at me or comment on something or just send me a message if the platform has DMs. Uh, sometimes I don't notice them right away, but I try to follow up. So, hope that I can help in some way. That's my goal. Does make me feel good, but I don't have energy for it every single day. So, try my best. See you in the next one. Take care.