This is a submission for the 2026 WeCoded Challenge: Echoes of Experience
The most toxic job I ever had didn't break me.
I've had only one job...
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This is painful to even read. And it's not really your fault either, because I don't know a single developer who had a perfect plan from the start.
I call plans "documented dreams." They can guide you, in a way, sure, but they don't guarantee anything, and sometimes they don't even hold up. Our work is just too complex for that. It's more like building something while simultaneously figuring out what you actually want to build.
Thanks for sharing such a personal experience.
I've learned to call them "intentions" but your documented dreams sound better.
That’s white interesting! I agree that Intentions feel likely more grounded while “documented dreams” captures the ambition behind them.
Thanks for sharing this anyway!
Oh, dear. I'm sorry to read that your stress turned into physical symptoms. It's interesting, though, how we can rationalize something ("the pay is good", etc.), and then feel something completely different.
It was awful. But that was my wake up call. That forced me to act.
Recently, I learned therapists/psychologists called that being out of "congruence:" What we think, say, and do are different to each other.
what got me is how clean it sounds right before it breaks good salary remote learning stuff nothing feels wrong then suddenly bathroom skipping meals and your body is just done like wait what
This really resonates with me. When your health starts to suffer, that’s already more than enough reason to change your job. Or at least change something.
At the end of the day, no one is going to cry over us at work… (okay, to be fair, I once had a boss who actually did when I told him I was leaving — but he pulled himself together after five minutes 😄)
If the worst happen, they will mourn for a day (max two) and open a vacancy right after that. :/
the golden handcuffs burnout is underrated as a career risk. toxic jobs are visible - you know you need to leave. but the comfortable job where you're stagnating? that one sneaks up on you. I had a similar stretch where everything was objectively fine - good pay, good people, no drama - but I stopped learning and stopped caring. by the time I noticed, I'd lost two years. the lesson I took was to treat learning velocity as a leading indicator, not just pay
Great point about learning as indicator. That's my case too.
yeah it becomes invisible until you try to switch jobs and realize your resume stopped growing. the pay kept going up so it felt fine. I started tracking "did I learn something new this week" as a yes/no. simple but it makes the stagnation obvious before it costs you two years
What strikes me reading this thread is how much pressure we put on individuals to “have a career plan,” when the truth is far less tidy.
Most careers aren’t the result of a plan.
They’re the result of contact with reality.
A plan assumes:
But that’s not the world most of us actually live in.
What looks like a “plan” in hindsight is usually:
The people who say “I followed my plan” often lived in stable conditions long enough for the story to make sense afterward.
The people who didn’t?
They still built careers—just not ones that fit into a neat narrative.
And now we’re entering a decade where even the illusion of stability is disappearing.
Anthropic’s new “Observed Exposure” study shows:
That means the old model—“pick a path, climb the ladder, stay the course”—is breaking down for reasons that have nothing to do with personal discipline or planning.
So maybe the real lesson isn’t:
“Have a career plan.”
Maybe it’s:
Build the ability to adapt when the environment shifts—because it will.
Some people learn that through toxic jobs.
Some through burnout.
Some through layoffs.
Some through life events that force a complete reset.
Some through the changing nature of work itself.
But the through‑line is the same:
Careers aren’t linear. They’re iterative.
And the skill that matters most isn’t planning—it’s resilience.
That’s the part we don’t talk about enough.
"A sound plan makes us all heroes, the absence of a plan, idiots." Chess Grand Master Kotov, quoting a mysterious chess sage (taken from the book "How to Reassess your chess" by Jeremy Silman).
The point of a plan is not that it works out exactly the way you planned. The point of a plan is to not run on autopilot, but make decisions with intention and purpose behind them. That's why I fully agree with having a plan. Even more than having steps outlined to follow, the real point of a plan for me is understanding the purpose of the steps, the why behind them. If you know what your endgame is, you can adapt any plan as needed to keep you pointed at the endgame. It's like in chess: If you have a clear target in mind, and your opponent plays an unexpected move, you can still adapt your plan to go after your target.
Also, I think plans don't have to be like either you plan your whole career or you plan nothing. There can be plans only for certain phases of your life. Right now I live alone and want to learn in my job from using coding agents to do my daily work, thus positioning me well for an agentic future. And I want to spend time online, reading about other people's experience, learning from them and sharing my own experience.
That is my plan for this phase of my life. But if I meet the right person this phase of my life might transition into a relationship phase, and then my plans might have to change (probably would have to change quite a bit). So it's good to recognize that life moves in phases, and sometimes it's enough to have a plan for the phase you're in currently.
Thanks for your article, it really helped me think more clearly about my own plans at the moment.
Exactly! Even if the plan goes sideways (most likely since we don't control everything), it gives us direction. I think I briefly eluded the idea of "intention" instead of plan in my post. Working on a follow-up post for next week.
Love this idea.
You're welcome. Glad my words could help!
This one hits a bit too close… sometimes the jobs we love the most are the ones that teach us the hardest lessons.
You don’t really see it while you’re in it, but later it all makes sense in a different way.
Definitely one of those reads that stays with you.
Yes, I only connected the dots after recovering.
Thanks. Glad you like it :)
The "frog in a pot" analogy for a good job hits the hardest. When a place is toxic, the anger gives you the energy to leave. But when it's "comfortable enough"—good pay, remote, no overtime—it acts like a sedative. You stop auditing your growth because there’s no immediate fire, and that’s when the stagnation starts rotting your health.
It’s a paradox: the lack of pain is often more dangerous long-term because it kills the urgency to evolve. No career "plan" is worth a permanent stomach ulcer. Glad you're prioritizing your health now—the company will have your job posting up before your obituary is even printed.
Sad, harsh, but true.
It’s a tough realization, but honestly, it’s not a failure. It is something many of us only understand much later, if at all.
You were moving with the information and awareness you had at the time. That’s not a mistake, that’s being human.Marcus Aurelius wrote that we act according to what we believe is right in the moment. Growth just changes what “right” looks like over time.
What stands out here is not the pain tho... it’s the clarity you have now. Thanks for sharing that clarity.
Great lines!
Sometimes, we need to hit a wall to get clarity.
The toxic job taught you lessons. The good job burned you out. That paradox is so real and so undertalked about. Comfort is its own kind of trap it removes the urgency to grow, and by the time you feel the damage, you've already paid the price. The frog doesn't jump because the water never feels like it's boiling.
Yes, it's the worst.
This hit hard. The way you described that moment when your best job becomes the source of your deepest lesson is so relatable. I think many of us chase the 'perfect job' only to realize that growth often comes from discomfort, not comfort. Thank you for sharing this. It's a reminder that sometimes the hardest lessons are the ones that shape us the most.
Great relatable writeup. For me it’s when it is comfy you became more lazy and static, starting moving only when things get hot. I wish i was moving always with the same rythm even if everything is as comfortable as possible i could become a superhuman lol
That's the sign I look for these days.
I think society in general has created a way where you keep comparing.. like if you have a decent job, you are too comfortable. if you have a toxic job, go towards startup and keep hustling. seen a lot of toxic clients myself so I understand this very well
Very interesting read. "Not having a career plan was my biggest, most painful, and expensive mistake" This statement is something i would not hope for anyone, i think you would agree with me on that. I am a 19 year AI undergraduate, i do not have the clearest career path, but i am happy i have a passion in the field i am studying and i have been able to identify streamlined path in said field(I am guessing that is what a career path is....who knows!).
A "plan" sounds like complicated. I should have called it an intention or direction. Yes, you're right about already identifying a path. That will point you to the right jobs, subjects, and connections to make.
Hey! I recently quit my career too. I was miserable, and obviously no new money is coming. The best thing I felt while leaving was the feeling “I don’t know what I am going to do next, but I sure know what I am NOT going to do”.
Our career is never truly our own decisions, it is influenced mostly by what we see others do, speak, and react regarding the context. And it is true for anything we have in life. The pressure of others’ opinion is always there, I don’t know if that has been the case for you.
I hope you are taking care of your health. There is absolutely nothing more important than your well-being, in fact a career/job is there to ensure you can invest in a healthy life. I hope you are doing good! All the best! And don’t worry.
Yes, most of the time, it's easier to answer what we don't want.
We can always influence it ourselves, change paths. But you're right, most of it is being around the right people at the right time.
Absolutely!
Nice lesson!
Overworking always is painful 😬
Saludos desde Bolivia!
Overworking...and being bored are both painful in their own ways
Gracias! Saludos, hermano, de vuelta hasta Bolivia 👋
Great lesson — your story shows how important it is to set boundaries and not lose yourself in a job.
I carefully read your post.
For us, the developers, getting job is difficult.
But maintaining it is more difficult.
But the life is the continuous of challenges.
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This is a really practical take. The memory/context management piece is something I've been wrestling with too — especially when building autonomous tools that need to maintain state across sessions.