Dealing With Burnout As A Developer

I felt lost🤦‍♂️. Looking at my code editor was such a turn-off. I was tired. All I wanted to do was wrap up in a ball and sleep till it all goes away. I didn't know why I was feeling this way. I loved coding, I always have since I started about 5 years ago but it suddenly just felt worthless. Sometimes I just wanted to cry and make it stop😖. But I'm a young man and "Men don't cry", so I had to bottle it up and put up a bold, happy face.

This is how I felt experiencing my first ever period of burnout. Maybe it just wasn't burnout as one of my Twitter friends told me. She said maybe I'm just tired from working too hard. I guess she was right. I was working hard. But I thought working hard is what people do to be successful in life? Why was it making me unhappy instead?🤔

I reached out to my friends on Twitter for help. I'm so happy and blessed to have a community like Tech Twitter🥰. Many responded to my tweet with a similar response - YOU NEED TO STOP! I certainly felt like I needed to stop because I don't want to keep doing something that makes me unhappy. Honestly, I doubted if I really loved coding at all. They told me to do the things I loved while taking time off. That sounded like a good plan🙂.

I couldn't wait for the weekend to arrive so I could get turn everything off. I didn't open my code editor or Twitter for the next 4 days. Probably the best 4 days I had in 2022 so far🤔(no offense to my Twitter sweethearts😅). There are a few things I remember doing which were I think were key to getting my motivation back.

Getting Back To My Hobbies

Hobbies are a great way to get my mind off things. One of my favorites is drawing. I used to draw a lot a few years back but I haven't completed a single drawing since 2020. I missed it so it was definitely one of the things I went back to in my time off. I'm into realistic portrait drawing which usually takes a long time to complete. I definitely felt rusty and uncoordinated as I started my first portrait in a long time. Definitely going to take me a couple of weeks or more to complete. I don't think the portrait is going to look good but I'm just happy to stoke my pencils on paper😊.

I watched a lot of movies too. Top of the list was Spider-Man: No Way Home😁. I'm totally a Marvel fanboy. I love almost all Marvel movies. Watched a couple of comedy movies as well. Spent some lazy time on Facebook Watch (they got some really nice videos to kill time, to be honest, 🤷‍♂️).

At this point, I started feeling a little happier again but then I still felt something was not right.

Talking To My Best Friend

It's crazy to think I call her my best friend and we had not spoken to each other in months. As a matter of fact, we were not even on speaking terms🤦‍♂️. We kinda had a heated argument some months ago and it ended with us parting ways( I guess ). She has always been my go-to person when I want to talk about feelings (which doesn't happen often for me because I'm an introvert). I felt I really needed to patch things up with her so I sent a text.

We had an amazing conversation😊. She was 100% honest with me and told me things I didn't even understand fully about myself. It was incredible to know someone else was listening to me - someone else cared🤯. I don't think I've told anyone about this before but I have massive insecurity issues. I've always felt people barely cared about my story and that people only had time for me when they needed something from me. Not exactly sure how I ended up this way, but it is what it is🤷‍♂️.

It was really cool to know I meant something to someone. That conversation reminded me why I even considered her my best friend in the first place. She made me understand I shouldn't be afraid to make connections with people and how valuable relationships can be. I'm trying to do better, to be honest. It still isn't easy for me but I'm trying to be more outspoken and meet more people(especially through Twitter).

Watching Other People's Stories

I think this was the final boosting factor for me. I was already feeling much better, doing things I love, and fixing my relationship with my best friend🥰. Now all I needed was to fan the flames to fuel my passion for coding once again.

When I was curious about the coding world, one of my biggest influencing factors, was programmer stories from Youtube. It motivated me to see living proof that being a self-taught developer is absolutely possible. Stories like that warmed my heart and that is why I was drawn to them once again. Hearing the stories of people making it in tech and living the life they wanted was all I needed and then...

TimoTech Was BACK!!🥳🥳💪

My passion for coding came back and I revisited my plans for the year. I had to make some adjustments to suit my goals and then I dived straight into building projects again.😁

Thank you so much for sticking with me through this story. I really appreciate that you took out time to read this. So the 3 things I would like you to take away from this if you ever get burned out is that

Stop coding, and start doing the things you love more

Spend time with friends and family. Don't be so lost in code, that you neglect and potentially destroy the beautiful relationships in your life

Draw inspiration from other people's stories.

Alright, it's time for me to stop rambling now. If you've experienced burnout or you just want to connect with me you can reach out to me on Twitter and we can talk about your story. It should be fun. Thanks for reading again and I'll see you next time!✌️