Ask HN: How do I figure out WTF to do?

[laidbutnotpaid]

hey there, bit of a rant I'm sure many can relate to.

I've been in tech a little while, almost 10 years. Most recently working in DevOps. I got laid off this week. I was kind of relieved. I somewhat liked this job but I found that frequently before I was just getting so damn bored and burnt out after 3-6 months. I can't stand daily standup, planning, retroactive, politics and all these things.

I've had a side business that's been doing ok but it isn't scalable. I thought about taking 3-6 months off to work on getting SOMETHING off the ground, but I don't quite know what that is. My other business proved I could do sales and marketing reasonably well. I thought about doing web design or some technical blog post writing, but neither of those are really even pulling my interest. If I don't have a clear direction on what business I'm going to get to take off, it just seems really stupid to take the time off work.

I feel like I'm going to eventually apply for jobs again, targeting a start in the new year. I don't want to run into those issues I've had in the past though of getting bored quick + the others.

Have you been in this kind of situation before?

[JakeAl]

That one thing you tell yourself, "If I was smart, I'd..." Do that and start right away.

Become a master of something you know better about today than you did when you started out. Seek out a mentor and ask them what that one thing is they would tell themselves to do so you can anticipate being here again. I've tried restarting careers 3 times and every time you lose your job you have to reassess your interests as well as skills because they change without you realizing it. That's why there's supposed to be growth path for individuals to move from individual contributor, to team leader, to supervisor to manager etc. It also helps the workers knowing they have someone who did it themselves and has been there too.

Right there with you. Been unemployed/self-employed for 8 years. Circling the drain can't get a job because I was working towards being a manager who worked their way up but never got the title and without it and the connections that come with it and keep getting discarded when the company pivots. Everyone else my age and experience became a manager and/or started their own company/studio and is all about schmoozing and has no time for anyone who can't bring them business or is competition for their own.

I like working in production, but unless you are the programmer doing all the work, it's not sustainable without an aggressive growth path.

[schappim]

>> "If I was smart, I'd..." Do that and start right away.

Great advice! I wondered what GPT-3 would do.

This is the output of the prompt "If I was smart, I'd":

   If I was smart, I'd know what to do
   If I was smart, I would've known better
   I'm not smart, I'm just a fool
   And I'm in love with you

[laidbutnotpaid]

Man, I really love that first bit of advice. You're right about interests changing, if I were to get a job again I think I want to do something low-level/backend/more dev oriented, possibly in golang for a company that makes a PaaS or hosting. Open to other industries/roles too but I wanna be closer to the dev side rather than DevOps (which feels like glorified sysadmin/server monkey a lot).

I have self confidence that is swinging between "I can do this, I can do anything, I can take something off the ground, I've made 10s of thousands of dollars in addition to my job! on the side! and I'm smart and capable." and "I am so dumb. Why would I try to take a shot like this, I don't even have a path or approach. What, I'm going to write blog posts every week? Or be a web designer? I'm mediocre at both of those. How could I ever do anything and make it happen and make it be profitable...I should just get a job and dip my toe in to this stuff...This self employment shit is so unrealistic and romantic."

Back to that first bit of advice, this is just me journaling to myself, and maybe I sound crazy and this is unrealistic

"If I was smart, I'd..."

- research industries and niches and pick one I'm interested in and can tolerate the people in it - talk to a load of people in that industry and learn their painpoints with some process they do daily - mock something up for them and have them help me develop it. just wireframe type stuff. - build real Software for them, quickly and leanly and get them to commit to paying. No crazy features or frameworks, just a bare MVP. - sell through outbound sales, make sure I have a big enough market and cost (which has to be backed by immense value) to support myself in ~6 months. - iterate - hustle like crazy

I realize the long slow SaaS ramp of death is a thing...and maybe this is all just so utterly stupid and naïve of me. But it is my gut reaction to that sentence hah.

[jameal]

I've been in a similar situation. I had many ideas of what to do next but none of them really stood out. Ultimately this is an exercise in creative problem-solving. Einstein said, "The thinking that got us to where we are is not the thinking that will get us to where we want to be."

Here's a practice that helped me: Daily walks, talking out loud to myself. Start with an open mind and try to summon your curiosity. Let go of getting to any specific outcome and just see what happens. If you do this on a regular basis (ideally every day) you will surprise yourself with what insights come up. If you can do it in nature, even better.

Also, talk with your friends who are good listeners. Tell them you don't want advice. There's something about saying it out loud and in front of other people that can give you added perspective. I'm happy to chat if you want. You can find my email in my profile.

[laidbutnotpaid]

Thanks, friend. I super appreciate that. I do take long walks and try to do them silently without podcasts from time to time, which does give some introspective value. I also journal but less than I should. Similar output from what you're suggesting. I might shoot ya an email.

[readonthegoapp]

i've been there. kind of am there. prob going to job again, ideally part-time or 4-day, but we'll see.

always trying to launch my own business, but i'm not so good at it.

whenever i'm not working a 9-to-5, i often feel a great amount of energy to do ALL THE THINGS, and I try many of them, and that part is great - it feels natural / normal / human.

as opposed to, how Adam Smith describes jobs in Wealth of Nations:

  “The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. ”

i listen to a lot of side hustle-type pods -- like Side Hustle School:

https://sidehustleschool.com/

the guy has one or two books too, i think. in one recent episode he said something along the lines of, "just start something, and other stuff may/will appear because.... that's just how the world works."

which sounds reasonable to me.

[frontman1988]

Take a break, go travel or do anything you want. Scuba dive in the Great Barrier Reef before it disappears, visit Maldives before they sink or climb some mountain. The best answer to your problems won't be found online, it will most likely come from within you.

[josephferano]

I know it sounds cliche to recommend that you travel, but I want to offer my personal anecdote;

Since I got serious into computers in 2011, I haven't really had a long layoff, at most a week or two away from my computer. In July I finally got a chance to take an extended break. In August I did a 1 week meditation retreat thinking it would help reset things, and while it did help, I noticed when I got back to programming, my stress and anxiety wasn't completely gone, but it was at least more manageable.

Then in September, I stopped using my computer, and just traveled with my family for 2 months. Went to 4 different countries. Still kind of traveling but I'm now back to programming. Now that I've returned, I am noticing changes in the beliefs, interests, and pursuits I had just 3 months ago. One curious thing that happened was that I was strongly opposed to a certain programming platform, and a few weeks into my return from holiday, I'm enjoying picking it up. I believe this happened because my long continuous streak of programming never gave me a chance to "cleanse" some of the emotional triggers that would influence my decision making. If you don't take a break, the triggers keep reinforcing themselves.

In order to weaken the stress inducing triggers, you have to take a proper break; no more computers. Take a couple of months off, if your finances allow for it. Go have fun, but don't keep engaging with the thing that has caused you some much stress. I strongly believe you will come back to your computer refreshed and you will be able to interact with your machine in a much more neutral way. This in turn will allow you to make better decisions without any baggage influencing them.

[laidbutnotpaid]

I love that. Yeah, I haven't traveled nearly as much as I should. Haven't even been out of the country (USA). I'm going to apply for my passport, probably not going to Europe tomorrow but maybe even some time here in the states to places that are new would be refreshing.

[navjack27]

Stop working. Play retro video games

[laidbutnotpaid]

solid advice honestly

[slickdork]

I recommend checking out https://80000hours.org/ -- it may not matter what you do day to day, as much as it matters why you do it and what it effects outside of your life.

[aaronrobinson]

Stop consciously thinking about what comes next and go and do some of those things you wish you could do when you were working. Do lots of exercise, it’s mind cleansing. If you feel like doing something go for it, otherwise don’t. Making use of the break by using it to be ready to work again will exacerbate the routine fatigue you’re describing.

[vladsanchez]

I just listened to [Ali Abdaal : Digital Nomad Playbook](https://youtu.be/bH4RKOqAe-w) where he shares ideas that clarify your perspective.

Essentially, build something that creates residual income, you have the technology advantage.

[recvonline]

Tipp: Research „SMO“ companies (SMO = self managed organization).

I started to work for one and it makes a difference! Bo more bullshit meetings or middle management! They are still rare, but if you don‘t care which industry you are working in, you may find some!

[ineedausername]

You are bored of work?

And you think you need to do something about it?

Has anyone told you that for 99.9% of humans, work is something boring and oftentimes unpleasant? I'm sorry but how old are you?

[laidbutnotpaid]

I know work is going to be boring sometimes. I know there is going to be drudgery and pain and monotony. Well aware of all of those facts. There's maybe somewhere between that regular boringness and pain we have to put into our work and me waking up for a job every day and thinking to myself "I'm wasting my life."

[culopatin]

Find a cause you care about and work in that. Renewable energy, biotech, software for research, medical, get the point? If you’re building software for pushing paper you’re not going to feel good in the long run.

[hotpotamus]

I'd be really happy with boring and unpleasant, exciting and unpleasant has been more of my experience with work and I have to say that it seems like a worse combination.

[ilovhn]

:-) we all been there

[kbrannigan]

Make teaching videos for posterity. Show environment setup How to deploy an app What technologies you use Common issues.

I'd watch every bit.

But you might wanna to take breaks from tech to freshen up.

[laidbutnotpaid]

I actually like that idea a lot. I've done a few in the past on various topics and even applied for CBT Nuggets once (training company). I convinced myself after a while I hated video editing but with all this new free time it doesn't seem like that much of a pain xD

[damascus]

I've found a 2-step process helped me a great deal. The first is to identify the general broad areas that work best. This video by The Futur was really helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2SqqjRn_c0 It helps you find the overlay in Things You Are Good At, Things You Enjoy, Things that Help the World, and Things that Pay Well. In that venn diagram center you'll find the areas that are likely to be the highest successes for you long term.

After that, I took a page from Sam Harris' "Moral Landscape" to think about my 'journey' topographically. I know that where I am standing now isn't good.. and thanks to Ikigai above I have some vague ideas of where I'd like to head next.. but I don't know how to get there. So I just start walking. I JUST DO SOMETHING. Basically I'm just trying to get a 'better view' of my destination. This first step might be wrong, but at least that should give me some new insight to course-correct. Repeat until it works. Its not a sexy answer, but its an effective one.

[gravitate]

> bored and burnt out

Boredom is something we all face, but the trick is to have some itch, then scratch it, then you'll never be bored.

As for burnout, it's been discussed here plenty of times, and I would recommend searching HN's Algolia search engine to help you out. There's plenty of tips on what to do about burnout and how to recover from it.

[piotr-yuxuan]

The response to « how to find out? »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOPZuXh-f5M

[_ah]

This is funny, but off topic and not helpful.

[laidbutnotpaid]

agree but it did make me smile