Ask HN: Tips to relearn how to care about my job?

I've had a similar problem post covid - although I never had covid the after-effects of isolation have been somewhat hard to work through.

Surely others have dealt with this - but I actually did pretty okay throughout the lockdown in my okay sized room in NYC. My roommates paid rent but left for other states so I basically had an apt to myself. I got lucky enough to have a job as well - however, this instilled an odd kind of lazy malaise.

I've since left new york since everything worth doing in tech is remote - separated where I sleep and work etc. But it seems like my ability to properly get focused or excited about my work has completely atrophied.

My first step in solving this was using an app to track tasks that give me the most and take the most - so different kinds of "work" and things that "waste" time (youtube, web browsing etc).

I haven't found a solution but it's troubling to say the least. I initially was worried about not progressing as fast as I wanted to - now I've identified the issue is I rarely complete more than 3hrs of deep work per day. Or 6hrs of doing anything.

However, I've sort of accepted I'm an introvert - stopped trying to be "cool" for the right reasons and idk I have decent savings which feels good.

You don't have to care about your job. Most people have about four good hours of work in them. Just do your four hours, and take the rest of the day off. No job is worth burnout.

Find a job with similar pay but a goal you care (substantially) more about?

Don't.

Care about yourself.

If you're working on things that interest you and with people you enjoy interacting with and you're treated well by your employer, then your job with take care of itself.

If you're not, find a new job until that list is satisfied.

1.)Have kids.

2.)Work at doing something else, since you clearly don’t like what you’re doing. Looks like you’re already doing that, so just keep going. Could your physical activity and health be what’s affecting your mental state?

If you cannot care about the goal, then the goal is likely not really worthwhile. There was at one point where I exhausted myself for what was essentially an SEO app. I got to the point where sitting in front of the laptop and the thought of typing generated significant pain; my body freezes. That's burnout. I had nothing left to give. After that, I swore I would only look for work that I find worthwhile and purposeful. I identified some broad areas of social impact that felt meaningful for me (e.g. legal, healthcare, education, finance) and only looked for startups that were working within those areas. YMMV.

If you are young, and you have a good social safety net (family), then it is probably better to actively search for a different company, one where you feel that you are contributing meaningfully and purposefully.

If the only reason you are there is for the high income and the prestige of working there, but you do not feel you are contributing meaninfully, then forcing yourself to work through this will hollow you out. You'll wake up at middle age with a middle-age crisis. You might succeed with the prestige or wealth, and none of it means much. (Or you realize that your youth is ultimately ephemeral, and you can never get it back again). Further, at that time, you are much less likely to absorb the risk of changing your career -- dependents, tech-industry ageism, etc.

In this post-lockdown economic time and huge demand for workers, this is the time where it is favorable for employees. That window is still open, but it is closing. When it closes, we'll be left with lower demand for workers and higher inflation. The window for job mobility is open now and it won't last forever.

You may possibly be able to apply for a different job internally, but I suggest it is something you feel you can contribute meaningfully.

If you still insist on staying, you can try to get a mental-health leave until you come out of burnout. Take the time to find out what is really important to you. It is probably not status or prestige, even if it seems that way. If you're able to find the purpose within you, then that will be what gets you up in the morning; you might be tired, and even exhausted, and yet, purposeful and meanginful work makes it feel like it is worth it.

A lot of people will tell you to not care about your job, but I think this is wrong: life is better lived (and happier!) with passion.

There is no shortcut: you have to really care about what your job is doing, the people you are helping, the core mission. I love helping my employer make more money.

If you can't align with your job (ex: there is no price I can see myself optimizing/sellings ads-to-eyeballs), find another.

If you got a job at a high-status tech company in California, you can get another job at a different tech company. It's like complaining you got into Harvard and other Ivy League schools wouldn't want you.

If you want to work on something different, you can only do that by getting a different job, either in the same company or at another one. If you stay where you are, you know you won't get what you want, so you need to make a move.

Get unexpectedly laid off into a bad job market. Seriously makes you a better employee that really values a good job. Its been 8 years already and I still try much harder to delivery good work and please the boss.

Firstly, YOU ARE NOT ALONE! Beyond the Great Recession and the Great Resignation, i firmly believe i'm beginning to see the Great Malaise everywhere! Its not just here about jobs/careers, but many places that i look, and with many people that i speak.

With that out of the way, and at risk to your cognitive load (by adding something else to your life), have you considered taking up a hobby/interest that is unrelated to your profession, and unrelated to the EE and Sec. learning that you're doing? It might sound silly, but maybe you need to activate other parts of your brain - hence a hobby might do the trick. Alternatively, if you want to dive into your learning path...have you considered contributing your time or code, etc. to an open source project that is aligned with your security learning? This could get you some real-world experience in security, enable you to connect with a network of people for future (hopefully more fulfilling) job, help you feel good about donating time to some open source goodness...and ultimately distract you from your dayjob...at least until you're ready to jump. ;-)

This is called burnout, you don't fix it by doing more work - including self study.

Take a long weekend every few weeks, go to yosemite. Or fly to vegas and cut loose. Pick up golf or pickleball or whatever. Make some friends who aren't engineers and live a bit.

Then you can come back to work with a fresh mind and care enough to get your shit done well.

It is probably pretty dependent on your particular work situation, but if you have some freedom in your daily tasks, you could try inserting more interesting small things in amongst the grind.

For example in my job (quite dull) I automated some data collection, stored the data in a database, created a web app to present data from the database, ran it all on a server etc. None of it was anything my boss would have given me as an explicit task, but it was useful stuff that I could make a case for. It was also stuff I hadn't done before and was interested in learning how to do.

Granted, the weight of crappy project management decisions eventually became too much for me to put up with, but for a while I quite liked going in to work and setting up my mini-projects.

This (posting) is therapy .. and you can also pay for better quality / holistic therapy.

Observe your situation (gather details of the 'problem') & you'll likely naturally make some headway at resolving your difficulties.

Example:

Why did you take the job in the first place?

What excites you about the current job?

There are many reasons to be de-motivated. Something wrong about the job. Something about you. Something that's unconscious, for you, it seems currently. Focus on observing the flow:

* your sensory experience ("my butt really hurts today sitting in this chair")

* => thoughts ("this job requires that I spend a lot of time backing-up what I'm working on with evidence of progress, for the sake of my Manager's approval, and for my Manager's own upward-mobility")

* => evoked memories ("when I was young, Rob took my pencil and claimed I had stolen it from him in the first place")

* => feelings ("this job offends me")

* => and follow-on thoughts ("to be successful at this job I'm going to have to become a different person than who I am now, how am I going to do that, do I want to do that. I really prefer that people just trust me, and not require proof and evidence that I am Good at my Job.").

My mind often has a general Sense > Thought > Memory > Feeling flow in my experience.

It sounds like you're burned out. Take a vacation ASAP. Take that time to rest. Beyond vacations, make sure you take one day/week where you rest - actually rest. Eschew productivity on that day. This was called sabbath in the past and was connected with religion, but there's much to learn from that tradition of a weekly rhythm of rest to create a secular sabbath. Disconnect - turn off the phone, get away from screens, no social media. Get outside in nature. Hike, bike, row, etc. Let your mind wander. After you feel like you've entered that rested state for while, take some time to reassess your situation.

It's good that you're taking classes and are constantly learning, but consider that in this season of burnout those (vocationally related) activities could be contributing to the problem.

> Maybe therapy could help.

I think this is where I'd start. At times in my life I focused my efforts at solving my unhappiness by thinking I needed to change my job. In retrospect I mostly did that because I found it easier or more socially acceptable to say something like "I hate my job" than "I am lonely and depressed" (even when only thinking it to myself). Therapy was pretty good at working through some of this, at least for me.

Of course, there are jobs that aren't right for a person. Talking to someone might help you sort out whether that's the case.

Here's some good advice on what not to do, which you might be doing:

https://experimentalhistory.substack.com/p/excuse-me-but-why...

Your problem is not that your "mental state is affecting your ability to learn effectively" as if you were a robot created only to work and learn. Look at yourself with some dignity and compassion.

I think you need to answer what it is you like about your career, independent of your job. Like, I just simply love understanding problems to the point that I can identify a solution that makes it easier for everyone to understand. That's independent of my job, but I get good-enough satisfaction if my job allows me to scratch that itch.

If your job isn't allowing you to express what you love about your career, then you have something to go on in terms of changing your job. But if you're finding you actually don't love your career, that that would imply a different path entirely.

Have you considered working for a company with goals that you find more meaningful? For me working in biotech has provided that, but you need to find what's right for you. Don't spend your life working on "clones of other similar products with a slightly better price point". Your words!

Therapy probably couldn't hurt either, but you should make your career move soon if you can. Burnout takes a long time to recover from. Personally I burned out from working long hours and it took years to recover from, even though I was enjoying my work and found it meaningful. Don't overwork yourself.

As other commenters have said, this could be burnout. In my personal experience, improving from burnout requires two things: an extended break from anything mentally demanding (preferably more than a month, but at least a few weeks), and a change in circumstances when you return (whether it’s a different team, different job, different project, etc). Both are necessary. If you just take a holiday without changing up your work, then you’ll spend the whole time dreading returning to the usual grind. It’s important to have something different to look forward to when you return. While you’re away, you can think about your work and whether you genuinely find it rewarding.

A lot of people go through this. I’ve been through it twice, and both times it felt like it hijacked my brain. It probably feels like you’re doing something wrong or you’re a bad employee, but most likely you’re just in a temporary rut.

I was in a similar situation 10 years ago, but in a less well-paid job :) I happened on a musician's talk about how to be a productive musician. He was saying that his most important suggestion was to "write everyday". It seemed obvious that musicians should write music everyday. But he meant writing your thoughts everyday on paper. (I am not a musician btw) I took that to heart and started writing in the mornings. The practice helped me to construct, then re-construct, my work and career from first principles.

That being said, "my current mental state is affecting my ability to learn effectively" sounds like you're in some distress. It will not hurt at all to seek help.

The suggestions for taking a break or seeking therapy are great ones.

Fundamentally, there isn't much overlap between the work that we get paid to do and the work we find meaningful. Unless you work for a non-profit that's saving the world, there just isn't.

What to do? Well, one thing I've considered is that once I am fully ready to retire, I do part time software development and give half my earnings to a deserving charity. I get back a few days out of my week, and the knowledge that my donations are doing far more for a charity than my volunteering could ever do, and as a bonus I get to keep half to pursue my hobbies. I think that would be a win win for everyone if you could swing it.

I've been in your shoes and will suggest something different than the consensus here.

Instead of sitting around learning (taking online classes) actually DO something.

  - Create something with your own hands that gives you satisfaction.

  - Write a journal everyday to give yourself a sense of accomplishment.

  - Use those new EE skills to make a circuit that performs some small task to automate your daily life.

Sitting around and learning without applying the knowledge is a drain of your precious time.

Create, don't consume.

Take a vacation Try to move internally saying that you need a new challenge

Obligatory recommendation whenever burnout comes up: Get a copy of The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron and work your way through it. It was originally designed to help blocked creatives but it’s helped all kinds of different people escape ruts.

Having been in similar places emotionally more than once, the one thing that helped significantly was hard exercise (running, weight lifting). Another trick that helped a little was facing the work I dreaded at a set time first thing in the morning, e.g. going in early to a coffee shop and grinding through work for like an hour.