[codyb]

And then you need to realize that if you spend a bit of time every day doing a little something, you'll be able to deliver some pretty big things over time.

The hardest part, I find, is starting. But once I do, boy is it a lot of fun to keep that ball rolling! There's nothing so enjoyable as hacking away at something and seeing those incremental changes fall into place.

[jacquesm]

> The hardest part, I find, is starting.

To me the hardest part is finishing. To start stuff is very easy for me but to actually grind away at something day after day until it is finally done is very hard.

[codyb]

Thanks for saying this Jacquesm. I've read several of your articles over time so to receive unexpected correspondence from a respected engineer is, to say the least, very cool. You're absolutely right.

I find that one of the biggest contributions towards my feelings of burnout is the fact that, when it comes to software engineering, not much is ever truly finished. A lot of us work for places where the product is never actually finished.

When we work in environments where there is always another ticket to complete, it can be hard to feel as if there is actually an end in sight to much of anything. My father is an accomplished woodworker/graphic designer/renaissance man, he's built things such as book cases, stained glass windows, picture frames for his gorgeous nature shots taken across the United States, and even (when I was younger) a cedar stripper canoe.

Sometimes I very much long for the feeling that he has when he has completed a project. One he can run his hands along. We're not afforded that luxury as software engineers. We work on some of the most complex projects ever to be known to man. Projects with millions of lines of code that are never truly secure, complete, or tangible. When we step away from the keyboards, there is nothing in meat space which exists as proof of our work.

That being said, when I have the pleasure of working on my own terms, in my own office, I find nothing more satisfying than hacking away at my own projects. I am not sure if that is true for every engineer but when I have the luxury of being able to spend a couple of hours researching Git branching strategies because that is something I think will not only make my project more maintainable but me a better engineer, I just love it.

I am consistently humbled by our profession. Every single thing I'm assigned to seems to me to be easy in my mind, and it absolutely never is. (Of course I refuse to stay comfortable and take on everything I can).

I guess at the end of the day, if you don't enjoy the journey which may never end (and is more likely than not to be endless), it may not be the field to devote your time to. But if you can enjoy being constantly overwhelmed by the myriad of options for your development environment, databases, servers, and front end frameworks, then there really is nothing so sweet as hacking away at a project you can call all your own.

[jacquesm]

I actually try to teach the companies I work with. I call it 'never ending ticket queue syndrome'. What I try to tell them - and which usually clicks - is that the ticket queue is not supposed to be a tredmill, but a series of roads going to an intermediary spot where you can get off the road for a bit. The shorter the ticket queue (or at least the visible portion of it) the better. Sticking your 12 year product roadmap and a couple of hundred unsolved issues the majority of which will likely be forever pushed back because of higher priority items in a company wide visible queue is an excellent recipe for burn-out.