Ask HN: What kept you at your job through the great resignation?

[n4kana]

First time poster. I’ve been seeing a lot of “why I left my job” posts. They read like postmortem justifications/rationalizations.

I too faced extreme pressure through the pandemic but I decided to stay with it for 3 reasons.

1 - Beat Saber. I worked out every morning through the pandemic playing beat saber and became very good in the process. It was a much needed outlet during that time.

2 - my small company has historically done right by me. Despite growing pains from a 15 person company to a 30 person company and being fired from an enormous job that same year in 2021, I knew that there wasn’t a company in my construction consulting field that would have my back better than this one. The pay is a bit lower too, but I’m senior there and I barely have justify my asks. That’s worth a lot.

3 - psychedelic medicine. I journeyed for the first time in December 2021 and I’ve modestly continued to explore that space. It’s given me a tool to reinvent myself. A lot of thinking about my work had become entangled in unhelpful patterns. A lot of problems at work can have simple solutions but it’s even easier to tell stories about how I can’t change it. The archetypal story of salvation from outside your circumstances. The American dream is more or less “fuck this shit - I’m going to America”. My family has been here for generations but that remains a very seductive narrative. The alternative I’m discovering is “I’m going be here even when it gets bad because I belong here”. I’m getting plugged into botany and wild food sources around me which deeply connects me to the land and plants like a community. Psychedelic medicine is probably the most important thing that kept me at my job. However, it’s a double edged sword - you can get the opposite result.

[anonthrowaway1]

Not sure this will be relevant to you but I didn't leave my job because it's my first one doing "software engineering" (started Q1 2021) job but my boss seems happy to pay me and never talk with me or assign work. Before I started I felt some things seemed odd, but I was happy to gain employment so accepted an offer. Pay is much lower than I'd expect even as a Jr. SWE in my area and especially vs SF Bay Area but I was happy to be hired and now I'm happy to basically be paid to do nothing for months now. I do feel a bit anxious about the lack of assignments, and I wonder how hard it will be to find a job after this. I think I know how to code at a workable-level, but it's very discouraging to be resume filtered so regularly I assume for having a piss-poor resume / no degree.

Re: plants as a grounding exercise, I would recommend people do this anyway even if they don't have a spiritual awakening or psychedelic experience, it's a lot of fun to learn about plants, in a way they become an addition to your friend group or at least, you can feel friendly about them, for instance there are many plants I know along my walking routes, and it feels nice to see and greet them. And a lot like dogs, they're not judgmental. Naming or learning the names of things can really help me be with them on their own, at least for plants, I might just look past them and not at them.

[incomingpain]

I get paid well-ish. I could probably get a huge pay increase but I have good relationships with those I work with. I get treated well and am given lots of time to work on my open source projects.

Current project working on today. Major upgrade to my threatfeed. I'm going to accept low confidence data, start storing this in a db and figure out rules that would elevate low confident entries into high confidence.

[EddieDante]

First-time poster/commenter here.

The devil's honest truth is that inertia kept me at my job. It isn't a great job, but it isn't a terrible one. I get paid reasonably well for where I live, I'm not being abused or exploited to an egregious degree, I'm not getting serious pressure to go "back to the office", and the tech interviewing process is still too onerous compared to keeping the job I have to make looking for a "better deal" worthwhile.

You see, I didn't need Sarah Jaffe[0] to tell me that "work won't love me back". I knew my job was mostly bullshit before I had ever heard of David Graeber[1]. I'm one of the lastborn of Generation X and I wasn't so tightly glued to my Nintendo that I couldn't see and hear how capitalism had fucked over my parents. They poured their hearts and souls into their work, and what did they get for it?

Well, my mother's a cripple and my father died before he could start collecting Social Security, and none of the "friends" they thought they had made at work could be bothered to fart on their behalf, let alone actually give a shit.

So, my approach to work is that of Edmond Dantes:

> "Perhaps what I am about to say will appear strange to you gentlemen, socialists, progressives, humanitarians as you are, but I never worry about my neighbor, I never try to protect society which does not protect me -- indeed, I might add, which generally takes no heed of me except to do me harm -- and, since I hold them low in my esteem and remain neutral towards them, I believe that society and my neighbor are in my debt." ~Alexandre Dumas, /The Count of Monte Cristo/ (trans. Robin Buss)

I am not and will never be grateful to "have a job". My employers should be grateful I'm willing to work for them, and they can express their gratitude in legal tender. My intellect is for rent, but my heart and soul are mine alone and not for sale. You can pay me to work for you, but don't expect me to give a fuck.

[0]: https://workwontloveyouback.org/

[1]: https://www.strike.coop/bullshit-jobs/