[hebleb]

Man, I've coded a fair amount in my free time, and have even created a couple of money making side-projects, but I just can't grind leetcode no matter how often I try. That plus the rejection after doing long on-sites drains me for days afterwards. I've come to the conclusion that even though I may be missing out on those top salaries, FAANG just probably isn't for me

[xyzelement]

I think recognizing that "something isn't for me" (vs is bad) is a great and mature point of view, I deeply respect that. Some thoughts beyond that:

By the time you frame something as "grinding" - it's going to suck. If I were you, I'd ask why does it feel that way? For example, is it because you don't have a good foundation in algorithms fundamentals -- if so, would it help your career to learn those, anyway? Is it because you don't enjoy problem solving or aren't a structured problem solver -- if so, is there something to learn there? Or is it because you framed something that could potentially be fun as an adversarial grind to begin? (BTW, I am not saying any of the above is true or likely - I am just suggesting one "next step" type thing since this question seems interesting to you)

Similarly, being deeply impacted by rejection -- is that a thing that would serve you to evolve over time? As you become more senior and ambitious, you are likely going after harder opportunities and your rejection / fail rate will go up and that's normal and good. Is there room for reframing how you deal with fails?

[allarm]

> Is there room for reframing how you deal with fails?

What would be your advice? How do you personally deal with fails? It feels shitty every time it happens, regardless of the amount of reframing or whatever else I put into my mind.

[xyzelement]

The unsatisfying answer is - that you have to figure out why it cuts you so deeply to begin with to really make sense and fix it. But I can provide some hopefully actionable things in the process:

- Recognize that interviews (and other things, like dating) is a high value endeavor but the failure raise of any given encounter is high. Go in wanting the job and doing your best, but recognize that the answer to any one of them is likely "no" for many reasons external to you as well as your actual match for the job. This is what they mean by "it's a numbers game."

- Especially if you already have a job and are just interviewing looking to grow, treat it like an experiment. "What can I learn by preparing for and doing the interview? How can I make it more enjoyable for myself? Is there a way to think of it as an interesting challenge/puzzle rather than adversarial?"

- Recognize that the feeling of failure is different than the reality of failure (eg: you are feeling like shit but in reality everything is fine, you're no worse off than if you hadn't tried, and in fact you're better off because you did try.) This is a thing in general - recognizing that our feelings are "louder" than reality allows us to tone down those feelings.

Does that help?

[singleshot_]

Hello stranger,

I have printed out the last substantive paragraph of your comment and taped it to my monitor.

I don’t know what, if anything you had to go through to learn this. And I figure that in my heart, I probably knew it already. But reading it once every few hours will probably do me some good. Thanks for that.

[xyzelement]

Thank you so much for making this comment. I would be beyond happy if this is helpful to you.

A few other thoughts on the subject of the paragraph that resonated with you.

A yoga teacher told me a long time ago to draw a distinction between how I feel and what I am. In English, we say "I am angry" or "I am sad" etc. - where our words literally describe us being that emotion. A more useful frame is "I have an anger", "I have a sadness" etc. It acknowledges that you may have a feeling but that feeling does not define you. Basically, the recognition that how you feel isn't reality.

Further reinforcing this point is the idea that we acknowledge that feelings can be inappropriate. EG: if someone loses their shit in anger over something trivial, we don't go "wow this is clearly a bigger issue that we thought", we just say this person is overreacting. Or if someone is anxious about something benign like flying or public speaking, we don't say "oh those must be really dangerous things", we say "it's unfortunate that this anxiety is limiting you and making you unhappy."

Likewise I think with failure. Failure in general is a bad thing - if you fuck up that can have real bad consequences for you and your community, so it makes sense for fucking up to feel bad. But reality is that most failure isn't material in this way (you and everyone are fine) but it can still feel as if it was. So recognizing that just like anger or fear can be obviously disproportionate to the stimulus, so can this feeling. Having that perspective is an important step towards keeping it in context and diminishing the sting.

Another thing is to realize that your failure is contextualized to a calculated risk you chose to take on. You decided that interviewing for ambitious jobs (in this example) should make your life better eventually. The fact that you decided to do that is a success. The fact that you then failed at a particular interview is totally within success criteria of the larger endeavor.

In general, there's something to be said for not taking ones' self too serious. The fact that you think or feel something is the beginning of the story, not the end. I find that a lot of religious growth comes from/entails recognizing that "just because you want/feel/fear/etc something - that's not the end-all-be-all"

This is probably now too much vs what you will find useful but I wanted to share!

[singleshot_]

I mean, I wouldn’t say I was looking for a guru exactly, but I guess I found one. Bookmarking your user page.

[allarm]

It does. Thank you.

[jedberg]

> How do you personally deal with fails?

When it comes to interviews, there are two types of fail:

1. The kind where I walk out saying to myself, "Yeah I couldn't answer those technical questions, so I probably don't deserve this job because I'm not ready yet".

2. The kind where I feel that I answered everything right. I realize that when it comes to those fails, there are so many factors out of my control that it's probably not my fault. Maybe one of the interviewers was having a bad day. Maybe they had one specific answer in mind and I didn't get, and I don't want to work with someone so inflexible anyway.

There are a thousand reasons that have little to do with you as to why you may not get a job. Just knowing that should make you feel better.