Have you burned out and recovered?
Are you in the process of burning out?
Anyone experiencing micro-burnout, like the usual kind of burnout and recovery cycle but condensed to weeks or days?
How are you all coping with this?
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Top comments (11)
I'm just finishing my bachelor's degree and last semester burned me out. I'm now working on my final project and it has been really difficult: I take a lot of time to do things and I don't really enjoy it because of the burn out. It got worse half-way and I took some days off (basically no computer and spent some time with my SO) and it helped me a lot. The deadline is in a week and I'm at a point where I don't even have energy to get out of bed. I can't really do anything else than finish the project and relax when it's all over. I'm almost there :)
I'm not sure if the pandemic is helping or making things worse.
Oh man João, that's a lot on your plate! Happy you took some time off.
I took a week off about a month ago and it truly was helpful. Feeling like I need to do that again very soon. I'm sure the pandemic is definitely making it worse, the fact that things are different than before also reduces energy.
Remember why you started your journey in the first place, imagine your end goal and all the success it will bring. Rooting for you and looking forward to hearing about you making it all the way across the finish line 💪
Thank you for you kind words, I really appreciate it.
I hope you figure it out while this temporary hurdle doesn't get out of the way. Wish you the best!
Currently, I am WFH. In my first job, I did stupid things like sleeping 8 hours in total the whole week because I wanted to finish before the deadline for my first project. Also, I was working as a freelancer and it was a complete mess. Lots of burnout everywhere I had times where I have to sleep 13-16 hours to compensate or taking 2 or 3 days off to recover. Lucky for me I met really great experienced software engineer who taught me that to be a software engineer you need to work as if you were on a marathon, not a sprint.
What works for me is really counter-intuitive and I discover it by doing several experiments with different methods, I am using the Pomodoro technique I do a heavy task 30 min (instead of 25 min) then I rest doing more lightweight tasks 5/10/15 min like checking the issue tracking platform of my projects, checking my emails, organizing meetings, watching a video or reading an article here in DEV.to, if I am getting stress I try to take a break do the dishes or cleaning my room, or repairing something inside my house, or playing guitar, or going out to buy things. I have never been burned out again and I am more productive than ever. By taking these breaks I found that it makes me think more clearly about what I am doing with the side effect that I am improving other aspects of my personal life. It is super-efficient.
As long as I stick to this regiment and by working 7 hours at most daily. I have to sleep for 7 hours to recover. And everything is super easy, however anytime I put 1, 2, or 3 more extra hours into work, everything falls apart and I start sleeping 8-10 hours my whole schedule moves, and I spend more time trying to fixing it than the extra effort.
Although many managers don't like this regimen, the industry needs to think more about the dangers of software developers working tired. It is more productive to add something well done than adding something bad done that down the road is going to cost more to fix it. And more bad things you gather together the cost of the project grows exponentially.
Thanks for sharing! Love what you are doing with the Pomodoro technique. I've actually tried using that but could not stick to it... maybe it was too regimented for me. But hearing that you also shifted to lightweight tasks for different intervals of time makes it sound much more interesting. I think I'm going to give it another shot and experiment with your approach 🤓. Thank you!
I do it by exercise, or going out in nature. Particular fishing. Being a developer its mostly software programming that I get burned out on. Funny if I start working on networking skills at home, with also tackling Ansible for configuration management. I find that programming burn out dimishes in a couple days.
Good point Nicholas, I definitely get burned out more quickly when doing something for longer periods of time without switching to something else. I often have research I want to do, and I noticed that if I switch between my regular day job to doing some research for a while it helps me preserve some energy and stay more engaged.
Thanks for sharing!!
I feel like it's daily for me now. I reach burnout mid-day and need to pivot to something that gives me some energy back - going on walks has been helpful. Still, by the end of the week, I feel floored and drained. Definitely spending more time lately monitoring my energy and emotions.
Whats the cause of the burnout?
What I think it is: 1) I'm introverted and alone-time energizes me, but given the current covid situation, and working from home, I have family around me most of the day. 2) Lots of zoom meetings, and no more hallway conversations with co-workers, or doing short meetings together while taking a walk -> which means less human interaction. There is a dichotomy here in the sense that these seem like contradictions.
I understand you.
My burnout comes from legacy spaghetti code and ongoing issues that are stopping me from working on that awful codebase that past me wrote it :)