[chadillac]

I've found the contrary to be true lately. I was a serial burnout case. I'd crank hard for 3 or 4 months and it'd take me 6 months to recover. I've found more recently that it wasn't the projects at home or at work, it was a lack of diversity. Doing the same thing when I got home that I did all day burned me out because it wasn't any different. Coming home and working of stuff I can't work on at work be it new languages, games, new ideas, whatever, just so long as it's different than what I did for 8 hours then I don't get burnt. Now the problem is I don't have enough hours in the day to do it all and working until 4 am and being up at 7 isn't sustainable.

[jonalmeida]

Quite true in terms of my work habits. At the end of the day, you want to learn something new, but you've given it 110% during the day that you can't get yourself to start a new hobby project.

In my case, I always seemed stuck back at the same mindset and mental "data structure" in my head, so it would be difficult to push it aside to make room for something new.

It might sound stupid, but it could also be the fear that I would lose said structure, and the next day would go entirely into rebuilding it.

[mattwad]

You missed his point. His ideal job would give you enough diversity that you wouldn't feel you had to get that from outside work.

[chadillac]

Right I get that, my job is diverse and it scratches that itch, but it does it for someone else's bottom line, I just collect a paycheck that doesn't reflect profits.

My point was even when you find that job, burnout is a thing and diversity between your work and personal projects seems to make pursuing your interests a sustainable process.

We work in an industry where we have the luxury of skinning cats in 1000s of ways, so get out of your comfort zone and sharpen your knife, it's quite enjoyable and rewarding.