Working Hard With No Regrets(gbayer.com) |
Working Hard With No Regrets(gbayer.com) |
While I did my PhD I've often worked multiple days without a real sleep in between, because some problems were so interesting to me. At those times I would wake up in the night, think about how I can more effectively implement something, and then spend the remainder of the night hacking on the problem. I didn't even really consider this as work, but more as side-project for which I have infinite time and for which I'm getting paid for.
On the other hand, there are also some dull works you have to do as a research assistant, such as writing project reports, so that the funding agency continues to send you money. When working on those kinds of things it often took less than 8 hours until brain fog set in and forced me to work on more interesting things. If writing those reports would have been a full-time job I'm sure I wouldn't even have handled standard 9-to-5 work without going crazy.
I've been in the same situation as described in the OP, but I would call it "working hard at something new". That may entail more work, but man, once you nail it, that's a great feeling. You're not going to get that when you go from 100 support tickets/day to 1000 or even 10,000 - or something similarly routine.
Often, once I actually explain what I was doing during that 120hr week or all-nighter my friends typically respond: "Oh, that's pretty cool. I wish I did stuff like that."
I'm not saying friend and family aren't important, but I think this quote from the OP sums it up:
>However, sometimes I do get caught up in chasing my dreams and forget to make time for friends and family.
I'm a hacker. I don't enjoy hacking for 18 hours straight because I feel tired and groggy unless I take drugs.
I work better when I'm rested and focused. Everybody does.
It's one of the most rewarding (and rare) experiences of a hacker-entrepreneur. Sometimes you don't get this unless you've been head-down, balls-out. When I'm meandering through a problem instead of pouring everything into it, I rarely get these sorts of "eureka" moments.
If you're going to bed, that's not what I'm talking about. The blog post speaks about working on 3 hours of sleep.
Sometimes you don't get this unless you've been head-down, balls-out.
See this is what I'm talking about. This idea that you're not a "real hacker" unless you enjoy staying up all night.
or ovaries-out, i suppose?
One kind is the steady craftsman kind who gets up at 6, works three hours, takes a coffee break, works more, and continues in this fashion until he has reached his limit for one day. The other one is the crazy artist kind who mulls over a task for days until he suddenly gets inspired and taps right into the zone and works for hours or days nonstop and gets amazing things done.
Both kinds generally get the same amount of work done on the final page, they just divide the effort differently.
I've always observed that hacking, for me, is just like that artist's work: I gotta do my work when I'm in the flow. All I can do is give myself enough rest afterwards when it's over.
I've observed that when I'm rested and theoretically focused I might not get nothing done. I can pretend to be working but I just don't get it, get anything, or get anything done. I might consider myself a lazy ass of a procrastinator but luckily I know that is only one half of the truth. Sometimes it happens that I just code for 12 hours or 24 hours straight while hunger and consciousness of time gradually slip away, and that means I get lots, lots, and lots done—even when I'm technically tired as a sloth but still in the zone.
A day-to-day work of a programmer is, thus, to work out a routine that splits your work in two halves. The boring tasks that require not much creativity are best done while not in the zone (and still you'll waste hours and hours and hours on nothing). The creative process of making is best reserved for when you've got the flow and then it means business, baby, and working like hell as long as it lasts.
Phew!
Also, you might be surprised by how many artists have a strict routine, and dedicate themselves to a regular pattern of practice. Twyla Tharp wrote an entire book on the subject:
http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Habit-Learn-Use-Life/dp/07432...
My oversimplified view of the world is that there's a 2x2 matrix: {need to work hard, don't need to work hard} x {doing what you love, doing what you don't love}. you're obviously in (1,1). i think the goal is to avoid (1,2) at all costs. i imagine that most people's jobs are in (2,2), which is fine and better than (1,2).
Work and family/friends are big priorities in my life. I don't see what the issue is. I think most folks piss too much time away on hobbies, seeing the latest movie, filling their lives with material crapola, unnecessarily long commutes and other pointless "filler". If you keep those things under control, I think there is time for both work and "love"/relationships.
I've learned my mind doesn't actually want to stay up all night. I had to optimize my own process.
if you sleep early, ok. but when you're awake, do you want to spend all your time hacking? then you have the passion. if not, then not. that's my point: it's what you want to do with your waking hours, not which hours your prefer to sleep.