I have a soul-crushing job and I don't know what to do

"I feel I should know modern frameworks like Rails and Angular to have a better appeal but it would take months before I get proficient in them"

The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is today.

I had string of crappy jobs to get finally a good one. I worked at a dead end e-commerce company that's now defunct that provided its own in-house platform to sell to customers for e-commerce sites. It was miserable, everyone could see the company was on life-support, including the owners. The practices we used like editing code on live sites/servers was insanity. I forced myself to start using Git, making me the only one using version control and sneaking in best practices to hone in skills. I took what I could from the job to benefit me (taking on a project to make a mobile version of the platform). I hated the job as the work environment was toxic and it was affecting me outside of work. Even to this day, I have the occasional bad dream of being forced to go back to work for that company but having some sort of exit plan, even vague as mine helped enormously.

Picking a project and assigning it a tech stack is the best way I've found. Simply doing tutorials for the sake of tutorials takes superhuman dedication. My motivation grew also in parallel with the work conditions spiraling downward.

Long story short, I scored a job oodles better than the horrid job and make significantly more, and have happy coworkers and bosses that care. Plus, I've picked up a lot of skills here which I'd never been able to at my crappy job.

i could have written this. our "designer"/self-professed "front end guru" does everything wrong. everything. i've had to teach her what javascript callbacks, closures, constructor functions, and hoisting are. she's rolling her own "front end framework" (table-based layouts with a few breakpoints thrown in) and separates the code into dozens (dozens) of different CSS and JS files. i'm also getting paid shit wages. but i basically spend 90% of my non-work, non-sleeping time learning and creating things so i can have a portfolio. i don't have a CS degree, so i am taking OCW courses and MOOCs to fill in my knowledge gaps. i'm going to start building an app for a friend soon so i can put something on my github. i cannot rely on my "real" work to provide me with a meaningful portfolio. i recommend you do the same.

> I only took this job in order to buy some time and create some interesting things but this job barely leaves me any time to do so.

If your interest is in creating "interesting things," you should focus on the ways you can scratch this itch. If you go into your next job looking to "buy some time" you probably won't be any happier than you are now.

> I feel I should know modern frameworks like Rails and Angular to have a better appeal...

Software development is software development.

A lot of jobs, even at prominent/"hot" companies, primarily involve CRUD applications and mundane development tasks ("grunt work"). Proficiency in Rails or Angular might help you land a new job, but it's worth contemplating the very real possibility that the nature of the work at these companies won't be any more engaging to you just because your employer uses a framework du jour.

Your sentence "[...] out of 8 hours, I barely write code for 2 hours" contrasts with the next sentence: "[...] but this job barely leaves me any time to do so."

I am probably misinterpreting, but if you wanted to buy some time I would have thought this meant accepting this job to pay the bills, and then outside of work hours picking up other skills to create some interesting things, which sounds like the right way to build up your portfolio and skillset, especially if you've put in your required 8hrs/day in the day job.

I understand there are family commitments or other activities that may take up time, but in light of your implied situation (i.e. having to accept a less-motivating job to pay bills and buy time), you may want to consider either pushing for a new framework at work (which sounds like an uphill battle), or looking for another job.

You are not alone. I am in a similar situation. Best advice for learning new platforms is to come up with something you want to build and then learn the new framework by implementing the idea using the desired framework.

My plan to get out of my rut is to build my own self-sustaining startup that I am more passionate about.

Maybe find an open source project that piques your interest, dig into the source code and start helping them fix bugs and add enhancements. If you work 8 hours a day, you have about 20 hours a week of free time, so go for it.

Log onto github.com and click the "explore" link at the top, to get some ideas.

Beyond that, realize that most people don't have ideal jobs. It can take years of hard work to get to the point where you can pick your job, or even better, make your own job.

Everyone's had soul crushing jobs before; just grit your teeth and get through this, whilst looking around constantly for the next opportunity.

As a friend once said, opportunities don't usually knock on your door. They lie there quietly, waiting for you to go out and find them. Best of luck!

I feel for you, I really do. I've also had a string of "crap" jobs where I felt I was not doing anything of value.

Remember, you should always be looking. If you have time, do some small bit of pro-bono work for someone, perhaps a non-profit. Add them to your CV. Solve an interesing problem for them.

Look at companies you admire in your area, see what interests you, and come up with a way to solve a problem they are working on. Present this to a manager over lunch. Tell them you fancy working for them and you can bring some skills to the table.

Like Yoda said, there is no try, there is do or do not.

FYI, I switched over to working for non-profits, and while the money isn't as much, the jobs are more interesting to me and I have generally much more latitude to implement what I think will work (for me, always OSS/Libre). It's a good feeling to know you are making a difference.

If your job is a soul-crushing vise, take your soul out of it and put it somewhere else. There are a lot of people out there that do something they hate to pay the bills. They get their enjoyment out of life by doing something else after clocking out. People at your work have no interest in doing things better because they already emotionally divested themselves from the job. Just pretend that instead of writing awful code, you're just serving customers at the restaurant until your agent calls about an audition.

Reserve your passion, creativity, and imagination for the people who care, even if that's just you. Don't learn anything based on what you think other people might want to know. Learn what you need to know to do what you love. If you can't somehow telegraph to a prospective employer that you can invest your passion into something, it won't matter what you know. Bitter, jaded, burnt-out people don't get nice jobs.

Our first world problems are such a drag.

I think you can make most any coding job fun if you do it right. Are you interested in making things better? Adding CRUD? Bake in a better object layer to the data store. Front end developer a n00b? Just out do him with some nice Angular or jQuery on the next project. "Oh, I already added the UI stuff."

If you can't learn something just for the purpose of learning (and why are you putting that limitation on yourself - buck up) do it on your own time and then bring it to work. Make everyone else look bad. Make your employer happy. Then get good at the new shiznit so you can quit and get a better job.

Some times I think we are wired to believe we have to beg people's forgiveness for not being miserable. Medium term I'd suggest discarding this belief. Short term: on behalf of geeks everywhere, your local online watering hole hereby grants you permission to not be miserable.

Quit. There exist much better jobs out there. The hiring market for people with your skillset is the best it has ever been.

Level up. Portfolios are not, in fact, how most people get consulting gigs or jobs. This is believe due to availability bias by junior employees/consultants because portfolios are tangible and they have some sort of just world theory where the best gigs/jobs go to the people on the top of the ladder in programming skill. There is no one skill ladder. To the extent that there is, skill is not the primary driver of employment decisions.

P.S. The overwhelming majority of jobs are not in modern frameworks. Get good at Rails/AngulAr if they interest you or if you want to work in fields where they're the frameworks of choice. (Rails might be for Valley startups one of a few top contenders. I am insufficiently well acquainted with Angular to understand whether it is. Either way, neither will account for a full percentage point of LOC written in 2014.)

Also, if you haven't done so, I'd sit down and figure "What do I want to get out of my career?" and start optimizing for jobs which get you closer to those goals. This sounds obvious but some people don't do it. Do it. "A job which keeps a roof over my head and doesn't tax me mentally" is a perfectly valid answer but you don't seem to want that so don't continue to seek it out when you get up every morning.

I got addicted to solving problems. Every time I fixed one, I would get that little dopamine hit that told me I was doing a good job.

Then one day a buddy said, 'Yeah, but in your company there are problems that shouldn't need to be fixed.'

Completely changed my way of thinking and set me on the path to start looking for a new job.

Same sort of situation here at my job. Myself and a group of three other developers began meeting weekly after work to go over coding technology and to challenge each other. We will bring ourselves up to speed with or without the help of our company.

And that's the attitude you need to adopt. The relevance of your knowledge base is your responsibility. Fight for it. Defend it.

Apart from learning, try these:

1. Put yourself in situations where you can meet more tech people

Most (not some, most) of the work I've gotten came from a chance conversation with someone who was working at a place that needed the skills I have. So try to have more of those conversations. I live in suburban Ohio in the heart of the rust belt, so this can be done anywhere.

2. Try consulting instead of full time work.

A lot of businesses have problems, but can't afford a full-time coder. It also sounds like you don't want to be working full-time anyhow. Try doubling your rate and finding 2 clients who each buy 10 of your hours a week. This is much easier to do if you do number 1. Even better, charge a daily or weekly rate so you don't have to keep track of your hours. This also allows you to pay your taxes on April 15th every year, instead of having it deducted from your check, giving you more cash flow options and more runway.

3. Work Remotely

When you do 2, you can negotiate 3 pretty easily. A business that just needs you to fix javascript bugs on their website 1 day a week probably doesn't want to dedicate the infrastructure to have you in their office. This will save you even more time, energy, and stress by eliminating your commute.

4. Structure your time better

Set constraints on yourself for doing what you need to do, when you need to do it. If you're coding 2 hours a day, then set aside 3 hours of your day where you don't do anything but code. No email. No web surfing (other than what you need to code). No phone. If you have meetings, schedule them consecutively. Let your brain be in meeting mode for 3 hours, then go grab some lunch, then come back to the office and put your brain in code mode for 3 hours. This way, you can even have time to multi-task (answer emails, talk about local sports team, read HN) at the beginning and end of the day. This takes some discipline, but you'll get more done if you have full chunks of time dedicated to one thing.

5. Say "No" more

You can't do 4 without doing 5. Don't be rude, just explain that you're busy with something else and that you can discuss at the next meeting you have scheduled. Put headphones on while you're coding and gently set boundaries with your co-workers that you're not available for chit-chat when your headphones are on. I've found that music without lyrics is best for coding. I have a John Williams station on Pandora that I use all the time, here, have a listen: http://www.pandora.com/?sc=sh216294333998280127&shareImp=tru....

Finally, don't give up hope. In my experience, it's easier to find a good job once you know what you don't want. It sounds like you have a good idea about that, so make sure to ask questions at your interviews, sales calls to make sure they aren't making the same mistakes.

Good luck!

I found myself in a very similar situation to you. I was working at a job that I didn't really like and knew that learning Rails was something that, on my own, would take many months to get proficient at before getting good enough to get a job. The way I broke out of my slump was to attend App Academy. I used the opportunity to really dive deep into Rails, and javascript, but also to meet a bunch of really great new people in a new place. (I had some previous web dev experience but no Rails and very little javascript and it was still absurdly useful :))

I was in a similar situation once. Here's the algorithm I came up with to get myself out:

1. Figure out what you want to do.

This is the most important step. You currently have a job, so you have time to really think about this and figure out a solid answer. The answer doesn't have to be an emotional epiphany where you find your so-called "passion", but it has to be a concrete goal. For me, it was more of a recovery of the idea that I wanted to apply my programming and computer science skills to interesting and difficult real-world problems. With that in mind, I looked at the place I was currently working at, and saw that I wasn't going to be able to achieve my goal there. So, I looked around and found another opportunity that was more along the lines of what I wanted to work on.

2. Figure out what skills you need to pursue your goal.

So, when I found the new job that I wanted, I interviewed for it, and got rejected. I asked for feedback, and I was told that my data structures and algorithms knowledge wasn't good enough. I suppose if I had followed my own advice, I'd have realized this before I applied. After stagnating at my old job, and foolishly taking a team lead position, my skills had certainly atrophied. However, the interview failure was exactly the kind of real feedback/wake up call that I needed.

3. Work on improving your skills so that you are ready to actively pursue your goal.

After failing the interview, and getting some feedback, I set to work rebuilding my data structures and algorithms knowledge. I bought a copy of Cormen, et al., and brought it everywhere. At work, I would go off and hide somewhere for an hour a day, and study some part of the textbook. At home, I worked on a core data structures and algorithms library in C. I'd get up an hour before work, and write unit tests or fix bugs. I'd use the evening to hack on new code for the library. I was pretty exhausted after work, and I had three kids, one of whom was only a few months old, but I pushed myself ahead because I had a goal, and I didn't want to be stuck in my current job any more.

4. Don't give up in the face of failure. Keep the dream alive.

After 5 months of study, and writing the data structures and algorithms library, I decided it was time to apply again for the new job I really wanted. I explained in a cover letter what I had done since the first interview rejection to address the feedback I'd received, why I really wanted to work at the company, and how I thought it lined up with my career goals. Within a week, I had heard back from the company, and scheduled another interview with them. Three weeks later, it was my first day on the job!

It was terrifying to apply for a second time. I had no backup plan. My current job at the time was starting to suck more, and I wasn't enjoying being a team lead, so something was going to have to change, one way or another. My life at home was exhausting, too, with the new baby and two other kids knocking around. But my wife was on board with my whole plan, and tried to give me the time to do the work I needed. It helped that we had friends and family who were struggling to find jobs - there's nothing like seeing other people hurting to give you a realistic perspective on your own life, what you have, and where your life should be going.

On the other side of all this, I've made it my mission to be continuously studying, cramming it in wherever and whenever I can. I never want to be back in that hole of skills atrophy. Also, at the start of every year, I make an assessment of where I'm at goal-wise, and I make a study plan for the year, including a substantial project to work on in my spare time that will help me get to where I think I need to be. Resist the urge to hop from one thing to the next. Focus on something, and master it before moving on to something else.

Good luck!

I'm the worst for not taking my own advice but I've often heard it delivered to me in one form or another when I've been in these similar situations... so here it goes:

What do you like to do? Do more of that.

Easier said than done, I know. It comes off as an awfully curt way of suggesting that you throw out your entire life and reorganize it in a way that you can toy with your passions in pure bliss every waking moment. For those of us with families, mortgages, and responsibilities outside of work such advice seems useless.

But it's not entirely useless. You just have to do more of that thing which excites you. It won't replace the drudgery of your current job (or any possible job you can get thereafter). But if you aim to spend a few hours a week on it for the sake of being happy and doing interesting things you might find an opportunity to make it your thing.

Share your passion with others. Show them what you're up to. Aim to make a little progress each week. Keep it small. Finish one thing at a time. Don't leave dangling threads. Yadda yadda.

The flip side of asking yourself this question is that you have to be honest in order to make progress. You may not actually like programming. Or perhaps what you do like programming is so niche that there isn't an industry for it (notice how few postings there are for BF programmers?). It's okay to enjoy programming as a hobby. Maybe you're actually a carpenter in a world obsessed with gizmos and you'd be better off spending the majority of your days planing and staining wood. Fiddle with computers and neat programs at night. That sort of thing.

You're not living in a Kafka-esque dystopia. There are ways to get out of your rut. You just have to shift your perspective and be willing to do something about it.

When I need to learn something I first brain-storm a small project to work on. Doesn't have to be great or solve any world problems. Maybe it's just something for you. But in that project, be determined to use whatever framework you've set out to learn.

For me, I also have a coding blog (eonjava.com) where I will write an article on whatever I am working on. I have several articles right now that I am working on at once. I try to write them as if I am speaking to someone who has no previous knowledge of the topic so this forces me to learn it from the ground up. It might be worthwhile to start a blog and take this same tactic.

shubhamjain, I'm sure you are a good developer and will be able to turn this around. :)

I was in the same situation for more than four years. The only reason I stayed for so long was at the time my career wasn't very important to me -- my main focus was my band, and even though it was infuriating, my horrible job afforded me the time and money to be able to focus on music.

When the time came for me to think about moving on, I did a few different things. First off, I went to udemy.com and brushed up on my framework skills. At the time I was a front end developer, so I too courses in jQuery and Angular.js, then took a refresher course in Java. From there I started doing volunteer development work for local non-profits so I could round out my portfolio.

After that, my job hunt was pretty easy. All-in-all my ramp up took about 6 months or so, and it lead to me getting a job that I love.

Not to sound harsh, but you seem to have an unrealistic expectation about how rewarding a given job should be. The _vast_ majority of working folk do it for the pay check, then clock out at the end of the day and proceed to the part of their lives where their heart resides. Think about all the folks who works in retail, or food services, or manufacturing, not to mention agricultural workers, dish washers, maids etc. The notion that your career should reflect your passion is classist nonsense peddled by career counselors in upper middle class high schools and psychologically seductive but ill-conceived internet memes. You have a job that probably pays higher than the median national salary and doesn't expose you harsh physical conditions or toxic chemicals on a regular basis. Have some perspective and be grateful for what you have.

That being said: If you want a job that it is personally fulfilling to you on a reliable basis, then you need to take some risks. I would recommend either 1) starting your own company (it is your baby so you will care) or 2) freelance consulting (so you can pick your work).

Some of the points you're making dont seem to make sense. For instance you say you dont have time to make interesting things but then say you only program 2hrs out of the day. What are you doing those other 6hrs? And what about side projects outside of work?

Another key point that lead to crud work is a lack of experience. If your fresh out of school most job offers you'll get will be fairly crud type work until you've shown your able to handle more.

Education can also play a role in this. If you have a bachelor's or no degree experience will be your best friend. If you have a master's or phd you can generally get into some more exciting positions out of the gate.

Where else are you looking for work besides hn hiring / freelance threads? Those aren't even close to the best resources for finding great jobs.

> "I have never been good at learning new frameworks for just the purpose of learning"

Could not agree more with this statement. When I get into a software project really deeply, my work ethic is insane. Obsessive. As I need new technologies, I learn and assimilate them quickly because I'm so motivated to get to the end point. There's never been a tech I've given up on when plowing through a project -- well, maybe OpenCV.

Anyway, I've tried, as the OP has, to teach myself Rails or Django or whatever on the side as a "resume builder" and have lost interest each time. I just don't care enough to learn the not-totally-necessary tech to a degree that would actually do me any good in a job interview if I'm not doing it as part of a passion project where it is required.

From the other angle, when I get an idea and want to build it really fast, I don't have the patience to force myself to learn a new language or tech when, fuck it, I can just do it in Java or whatever.

Catch 22.

quit.