Life As A Bootcamp Dev - Week 13: Finding Productive Hobbies

Hi All!

As of recently, I found myself being pretty unproductive. A response to an interview I had intensely prepared for got pushed out and I had trouble staying motivated to keep sending job applications out.

So I took a break (asides from the two projects I was collaborating on!).

I did a number of things I normally don't do to take my mind off the interview in general, like watching TV and playing A LOT of video games.

I was convincing myself that I was just passing time until I would hear back from my interview.

If I got rejected, it was back to job applications, no problem!
If I got accepted, it was a whole new chapter of my life!

So I justified spending hours just killing time, for a couple days. And then the day came when I was supposed to hear back about my interview, and I was notified that the company was going to need another week.

Yeah, my "time killing" strategy wouldn't be reasonable for a WHOLE additional week. I wanted to find hobbies that I could improve at that I could potentially use in my coding projects that were also fun and relaxing. Here's three things I picked up:

1) I recently started learning piano. I loved putting sounds in my projects during my bootcamp, and I always wanted to learn to make my own music. My wife is an amazing piano player, so she had been teaching me the basics. It's been a blast!

2) I began practicing to make digital art using ProCreate. I always enjoyed throwing pictures/animations into my projects that came straight from my brain rather than the internet! I just practice by drawing whatever comes to my head. Here's a random drawing I made.

3) I started making small games using Unity. I've always been interested in world building and telling stories, I figured this would be something cool to explore that also lets me practice my coding AND design skills! Here's a snip from a simple number guessing game I made!

My Point: Do Something Small!

If you've also been hit by negative thoughts or just feeling crummy about your situation, it is totally okay to take a breather and take a break. In fact getting burnt out is way more unproductive than binging on something for a day or two.

Sometimes though, the best escape isn't actually doing nothing, but creating small things through activities you enjoy.

I usually feel guilty after watching 2 hours of TV, because I have "accomplished nothing".

But I usually feel happy after spending 2 hours drawing a silly picture, because I made a silly picture :).

I'll be getting back on this job application train now.