
Ask HN: How do you keep motivated if nobody supports you? - mrcabada
http://cabada.mx/mylife.html
======
david927
Since you're asking, I will tell you what I would do, and what you will think
is blasphemy: I would take your dad's offer. I would start working with him.

I'm sure you're a very good coder; don't get me wrong. But despite what you'll
hear, there are a lot of them out there. If you think you're the best
programmer around, it just means you haven't looked very hard.

Remember, software is never an end but always a means to an end. A bridge
isn't metal and concrete, it's something that connect places. Software is
about solving problems, and sometimes creating new bridges where no one
thought to connect before. It's all in the service of something. In other
words, stop learning how to make the metal and concrete of bridges and look up
from your computer and learn what you could connect with them. (Yes, get off
of your computer. Turn it off. Go at least a week without looking at it -- try
to go a month or two.)

Learn what your dad does, learn how the business is run, and then find
efficiencies and ways to make it better using software. You'll be making money
and opening your mind.

You're 26 and good at software, and you're ambitious. That's great. But take a
break. Step away. I have a sense that what's stopping you is you. Change who
you are and you might just find the way that was blocked before opening up.

Since you're asking, that's what I would do.

~~~
giancarlostoro
I am 26 and I gotta say I agree. I only just got my first real programming
job. It took me knowing the right person, and they spoke to someone who got me
hired before I knew it. So take your dads job, meet new people, network.
People are fascinated by technology, and software development touches many
many fields from law enforcement (forensics), to medical, all the way to
farming, and many more. Your dad could even use a bit of sprucing up for his
business maybe?

You could change his business to be modernized and sneak in some software
development into it at some point? :) Just be wise about it, don't just break
his company for yours haha, you might even learn a lot for your own business
from and he could fund you once he sees how genuine your work is. Worse case
you go back to programming with new business knowledge. Who knows you might
even meet business minded people your age who could benefit your startups?
Take a leap and if you don't like it after sometime, just plan to leave or
reasses.

~~~
thesmallestcat
You shouldn't need to network to get a job programming or to advance your
career. It doesn't hurt, but it's unnecessary. That's at least half of the
allure of this line of work.

~~~
jnbiche
> You shouldn't need to network to get a job programming or to advance your
> career.

I think some of you forget that the rest of the world isn't New
York/Austin/Bay Area. For most of us, just because we're competent programmers
and have a pulse doesn't mean we'll get snatched up off the street.
Programming is a very competitive job situation in many mid-sized cities
across the USA and Europe, and networking is unfortunately quite necessary to
both get a job and to advance your career. By far, the most successful
programmers I know around here and those who network the best (I'm
unfortunately not very interested in networking, and have suffered
accordingly).

Also, once you hit around 40, lots of people who once would have loved to have
you don't seem to want you anymore.

Programming was a great career when I was 20 and self-taught. Twenty years
later, it's not looking so hot, even though I've very much kept up with the
latest stacks and languages. Still, I love writing code, so what am I going to
do, go into management?

~~~
thesmallestcat
Right, but OP is in the Bay Area. But to your point, if you are willing to
relocate (which, if you're trying to start a career at 26, you should be..)
then geography doesn't matter that much. An email address, a phone line and
recognizable skills will get you a ticket to SF/Seattle/Boston for an on-site
interview in a heartbeat.

~~~
jnbiche
I thought OP was in Mexico?

Anyway, many of us have family situations that don't allow us to easily uproot
and move across the country, as much as we might like to do so sometimes.

~~~
thesmallestcat
Yea, I don't know, the author's LinkedIn says Bay Area but education appears
to be in Mexico.

------
aasarava
For me the most eye-opening lesson about the business world was the
realization that you are not an entrepreneur just because you can build
something. You become an entrepreneur when you build something that people are
willing to pay for.

You may be good at writing software, but are you writing software that solves
a problem for anyone? If not, you're going to be hard-pressed to find external
validation.

You don't say what your family business is, but is there something there that
can be made better -- more efficient, more profitable -- with technology? Some
aspect of billing? Shipping? Inventory control?

I'm not suggesting that you acquiesce and go to work for your father if you
don't want to. The fast track to misery is following the path that some else
chose for you.

But at 26, you don't have a lot of years of hands-on experience in a
profitable business. So your father's company may be a quick way to get your
foot in the door and expand your skills for a while.

~~~
jmt_
I've come to realize the same thing. Like the author, I've been programming
since I was an early teen and that was pretty much all I did for years. I
would love to break into the software market but realized that I only think
like an engineer and not so much like a business man. I've been mainly
interested in the design, implementation, and theory of software rather than
thinking of what software that people would and have had a tough time thinking
in the business mindset. Do you, or other HN readers, have any resources that
they would recommend for engineering minded people to better understand what
goes into building a business? Just started reading Zero to One and am
enjoying it so far.

~~~
Denzel
"The E-myth" by Michael Gerber is the single most helpful book I've ever read
on transitioning your thinking from engineering-focused to business-minded.
Specifically, the difference between the Technician, the Manager, and the
Entrepreneur. I read it on the recommendation of an ex-Google engineer turned
failed-entrepreneur, here on HN. He said that a The E-myth described all the
failures he had encountered trying to start-up his own software company after
leaving Google. And that he wished he'd read it before he took the leap. Do
yourself a favor, and pick it up as soon as possible.

~~~
daveguy
There are about 20 e-myth books. Is there a specific title?

~~~
kalmi10
The author's name is right there in the comment.

~~~
radley
The author has written 20 books in the "E-Myth" series dating back to 1990.

------
armandososa
Dude, your english is not great. I am Mexican myself and believe it or not,
that's a big show stopper.

I applied to 37Signals back in 2008 or 2009 and my english was so bad that
they won't even bother to reply (And they wrote a blog post shortly that they
wouldn't even respond to poor communicators :P)

That wouldn't explain why the holagus guys wouldn't hire you, tho ;)

This is my advice:

1\. Forget about going to a job you hate. I'm 36 right now and I wasted almost
ten years of my life on boring jobs and now I wish I wouldn't. The tech sector
has an age bias and the older you are you're less likely to get hired. True
story.

2\. Get involved in Mexico's tech community. Build things and show them to
people. Go to conferences.

3\. Work in a startup with coders that are way, and I mean _way_ , better than
you. If you don't live in a tech hub move to CDMX or GDL. I know that in GDL
there are startups which are hiring pretty much everybody.

4\. Don't be an asshole. I'm not saying that you are. But if you give that
impression, people may not want to hire you. Please don't brag about how you
were programming at 10 (we all were)

Lastly, I know some people in mx's and latam tech community, maybe I can help
you get connected. Ping me at @soska.

\-- And yes I know my english sucks too. But it used to be worse.

~~~
chillacy
Side question: how did you improve your english? Was it deliberate practice or
just something you get better at

~~~
armandososa
Most of the media I consume (movies, series, articles, books, podcast) have
been in English for the past ~10 years and it did not help much my
communication abilities. I actually have a vast vocabulary (sometimes people
mock me for using fancy words) but I still struggle writing "natural" english
because, for the most part, I still have to translate from Spanish (or
Mexican, rather :P) to English in real time.

As for spoken communication, what I needed was a boost of confidence. In my
last job I always avoided talking to people because I was too self-conscious
of my accent and constant pauses for real-time-translating. Then, one day, a
friend noticed it and said to me: "Dude, don't worry about your accent. I live
in Manhattan, everybody has an accent here and it's no big deal." And I was
like, "yeah". And just like that I started speaking more and slowly became
better at it.

So, it was confidence for me.

------
metafunctor
On getting a job: it's not just about coding chops. You should also appear to
be not-an-asshole, a good communicator, a positive team player, exhibit a
certain kind of humility, yet appear enthusiastic about other people's ideas,
etc. My (shallow) first impression based on 4 minutes of reading your writings
is that one of the above might be why you're getting rejected.

With entrepreneurship, it's almost entirely not about coding skills. You
should find and solve problems people are willing to pay for. Customer
development, marketing, sales, and all sorts of other people skills are key.

You're still young. It may seem to you like everybody else is an idiot – I've
been there. However, it just might be that you're the one with a lot to learn.

~~~
erikb
"appear to be not-an-asshole" In some regards yes, but if you just appear like
that it can only work in the short term. You really need to learn not to be,
and sadly a huge part of not being one is something programmers need to learn
(I'm one myself). E.g. even if other people really are a-holes themselves it
makes you one if you tell them that.

In my experience though, you can get around the a-hole show stoppper also with
time. If people see you are an a-hole and for some reason still continue to
work with you and see you really provide value for them, then after some time
they will support you (and also tell you what you need to stop doing).

------
SallySwanSmith
Stop living in the past and suck it up cupcake. You've been though interviews
that went poorly. Reflect, learn, grow, try again. You're not that good. It's
more then just some raw amount of code or random projects that you spew out
while interested and then abandon when you're bored.

As for the complaining about lack of support. I'm sorry, but you're being
supported! You have a roof over your head and food in your belly. You have a
computer and freedom of choice.

It may not be the support you want or imagine, but it's support. Don't forget
that and don't take that for granted.

~~~
ziggystardust
It's not a matter of sucking it up. OP clearly has emotional difficulties. It
would be nice if OP could share a lil about his relation with his father.

~~~
totalZero
Talking about emotions is barking up a fruitless tree. Better to accept that
life is not perfect and find the way forward, despite imperfection.

------
welanes
This reads like a parody of all the other 'help, I'm stuck' HN posts.

> I’m a 26 years old “entrepreneur”

Apparently not....yet.

> I’ve written more than the equivalent of 32 Bibles (around 4M lines of code)

Sadly, nobody cares how late you stayed up or how many loc you wrote. They
just care about how awesome/useful/reliable/beautiful/addictive your product
is.

> My dad has always told me...I’m really pissed off with this one, I’d go back
> in time and fix it

Dude, you're 26. Fix it now. You've plenty of time.

> I should’ve... I should’ve

See above

> people are too closed-mind.....I don’t know what’s the deal with coding
> interviews, but I bet they don’t work good.

Stop blaming others. People didn't want your service, these places didn't want
to hire you. Maybe it's their fault. But you don't control them so assume it's
your fault and think about how you can improve.

It took me much too long to learn this lesson which now drives everything that
I do: You are only as good as the value you add.

Bringing this back to your dilemma - "I have no motivation on continuing
coding".

Do your products have users? Install Intercom or Crisp and find out. Talk to
them and listen to what they like and don't like. Make them happy and more
people like them will appear. You're not a coder in your parents house, you're
a builder of things that add value to people. Instead of adding code day by
day, add value.

You've written 4m lines of code. That's great but people have become wealthy
from 1000 lines. What did they do different from you?

Answer that and you're on the right path.

PS: throw some of those older projects on Github and make them open source.
That should help you find out if you're a good developer, plus it's access to
a community.

~~~
erikb
I think it's quite important though, that he already starts calling himself an
entrepreneur. He has the right to ask for money for his programs, because he
is an entrepreneur. He has the right to incorporate his own business and
handle the taxes for it, because he is an entrepreneur. He has the right to
talk to CEOs of other companies to ask them for investment or product ideas or
buying his software, because he is an entrepreneur just like them.

At least for me getting that thing straight was quite important.

------
dkarapetyan
You seem to have externalized all the failures that have lead to your current
situation. At least that's how it comes across. You are in charge of the
situation. Just because you have been coding since 10 doesn't mean you are
entitled to anything. It doesn't mean you should be rich and it doesn't mean
you should have a well-paying job.

Most of the people that do well tend to have a different attitude. They assume
that success and failure is in their control (to a limited extent of course).
They also tend to do work that they find fulfilling regardless of how much
money they make and whether other people shower them with praise or not. In
short, the motivation is intrinsic. The success then seems to happen on its
own. Not to say that luck is also not a factor but it's out of your hands
anyway so focusing on that aspect is wasted mental effort.

------
fiveoak
I'm a 27 year old programmer that was in a similar situation as you when I was
25 (although with much less lines of code written). I still struggle a bit
with motivation for working on personal projects, but I did eventually get a
job as a software developer at a non-tech oriented company. I noticed you
applied to several highly selective companies like Google, Facebook, Uber but
have you tried looking at less selective companies that might be in other
industries? You'd be surprised how many companies hire software devs although
it might not be the most interesting technologies (for instance I spend a lot
of time on "out of favor" technologies like Java EE) or applications (like
banking or medical software). For me at least it helped to actually get a real
software job where I could focus my efforts a bit more and learn from working
with co-workers.. and being paid to code helps my motivation too :). I also
don't live in a city, just a random suburb in Connecticut.

edit: By the way I didn't realize you were in Mexico at first. I only have
experience with getting a job in the USA but hopefully what I wrote is at
least slightly helpful.

~~~
BlackjackCF
You'd also be surprised at the number of companies out there that aren't the
Big Five and are tackling a bunch of interesting problems using different
technologies.

~~~
zzguy
This. And what everyone else is pretty much saying. If you only read tech
blogs you'd probably think the only companies in existence are Google,
Facebook, Amazon, Apple, etc. The world is big and you can have an impact in
places that will probably never get press, because they aren't sexy enough.
Take healthcare, Google keeps trying to break into that industry, and kinda
failing miserably. Partially because the problems in that industry are more
related to regulations and people, stuff that machine learning isn't going to
solve anytime soon.

------
csallen
Making money on your own as a developer is not easy. It is much easier to get
a job and get paid for your time than to build something independently and get
paid for your product. And I say this as the guy who run
[https://IndieHackers.com](https://IndieHackers.com), a site all about
developers making money independently, so you know I'm not speaking lightly.

Anyway, it sounds like your environment is poisonous, but you can't leave
because you don't have money, you don't have money because you don't have a
job, and (as far as I can tell) you don't have a job because you're not
applying to enough places and you haven't studied properly for coding
interviews. Take 2-3 months to compile a large list of companies (50+) and to
study for interviews. I know, I know, the typical interview format sucks, but
study for it anyway. Then get a job and move somewhere less depressing!

If you want to eventually make money on your own, you'll need to change how
you look at business. First things first: don't overestimate the importance of
code. Almost all the interviews on Indie Hackers from people making <$1k/mo
say, "I haven't done much marketing yet, but I'll get to it one day." And
almost all of the interviews from people making >$10k/mo say, "I spend most of
my time marketing." There are a few lucky people who've found success without
marketing, but you really don't want to rely on luck if you don't have to.

Also, make more posts in Ask HN or on the Indie Hackers forum and let us know
how you're doing. Lots of people are happy to provide feedback, and maybe this
will help you feel less alone!

------
vlokshin
I did a quick search through the comments on here that the OP (@mrcabada) has
made. While this sort of snooping is rarely pleasant for the party being
snooped, I hope this is helpful.

Mr. Cabada,

I believe the most impactful thing you can do is to stop blaming others and to
start putting all of your energy into improving yourself.

Based on your writing, your site, and your LinkedIn, you are already doing a
lot of improving yourself -- but you're also putting a lot of energy into
blaming the rest of the world.

(1) An entire article that basically says "I'm awesome but the world isn't
favoring me. Halp!" (2) comment: "I'm mexican, it's hard..." (3) comment:
"fixed", a few times over, with no recognition of mistake and no thanks for
pointing out the issue <\-- granted, that could just be efficiency (4) one
single "my bad", buried in an early comment thread.

Life is hard. Privilege is a real thing that we should systematically correct
with each generation.

That said, you're wasting brain cycles (yours and ours) when you blame others.
It's just not a very efficient activity and it does very little to improve
you. If anything, it can shift your attitude the wrong way for the long haul.

Listen to feedback -- beg for feedback. Begging for feedback is not saying
"fixed" \-- it's rewarding the behavior of someone giving you feedback (i.e.
Thanks! this is helpful). Don't get defensive. Internalize it. Be smart enough
to filter out what feedback is good and what's just fluff. Learn your faults.
Fix your faults. Learn your strengths. Better your strengths.

Good luck! (jk, it's more in control than you think. luck will have very
little do with it. Attitude will have everything to do with it)

~~~
mrcabada
This is a feedback I'd filter as good, thanks. And sorry for the "blameness",
the straw broke the camel's back today.

------
kzisme
I'm not sure why people consistently get hung up on getting accepted at one of
the "Big Five"

"I tried to look for a job out of my city, but no luck, I don’t know what’s
the deal with coding interviews, but I bet they don’t work good. I’ve been
rejected from"

...

Google Facebook Magic Uber Holagus (Mexican startup)

I'm not sure what draws everyone to places like this when there are ~many~
other companies.

Also does the article end abruptly for anyone else at "There are two possible
reasons"...

Edit: After looking at your LinkedIn it seems like you've accomplished a lot
(well done!), but you haven't had much "real" workplace experience - I would
assume ~most~ companies would want some industry experience on a resume (I
could be wrong)

~~~
mrcabada
I'm mexican, is not that easy to get a working Visa. Is a bit easier to get
working Visas in big companies, that's the main reason why.

~~~
iktwo
Also mexican. Not sure what visa you are trying to get. But if you just want
to work in USA it is very easy to get a visa if you are Mexican and you have a
relevant degree. Look at TN Visa. You just need an offer letter. 3 close
friends have done that and the process was very simple.

[https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/employment/nafta.h...](https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/employment/nafta.html)

~~~
armandososa
Not that easy. There are a limited quantity each year and the process is
excruciatingly long. I was sponsored, had a company-sponsored lawyer helping
me and I was rejected still.

I get depressed for, like, two years after that.

~~~
victorhn
[https://www.uscis.gov/archive/archive-news/nafta-
professiona...](https://www.uscis.gov/archive/archive-news/nafta-professional-
workers-canada-or-mexico)

There is no limited quantity. The process is very simple, basically you show
the offer letter to the officer, answer some questions, prove you have a
degree and you are done, no need for lawyer.

------
ziggystardust
OP maybe suffering from manic depression (note:not depression).

The post, like the one linked here and apathy towards family/dad's business,
shows a case of depression but the kind of skill OP has demonstrated through
projects posted on OPs website shows that OP must have Bursts of mania. Mania
is also demonstrated through OPs wish to get placed at companies like
Facebook,etc due to heightened self worth.

Due to unstable mood, OP maybe having difficulty taking decisions and maybe
subject to environmental factors dictating life decisions.

I would advice OP to take a break , not cause he needs to get away from a
computer. I'm sure OP will do great things on a computer. But to evaluate
mental health n well being. To try out things to keep a stable mood.

All the best Mr.Cabada . Hope this helps you :)

~~~
thesmallestcat
Please don't do this.

~~~
ziggystardust
I'm curious to know what you mean by "please don't do this".. I'd really
appreciate if you could elaborate for me.

~~~
thesmallestcat
Don't play armchair psychologist, it's disrespectful if not destructive.

------
jorgemf
I don't get how being reject from 5 companies has any effect in your
motivation. I was rejected from 5 companies a week for a couple of months and
don't care at all. I always take the first rejections as a warm up. Because
the interviews needs some practice until you can show all your potential.
Moreover, as long as you pursue what makes you happy who cares?

Think the interviews are like dates, you have to impress them with your
skills, but it is very hard you can do it in your first date in years. You
need to get the mind set, you probably need to learn the skills. You can be an
awesome developer that if you don't know how to explain it the other person it
is not going to know. Communication is important, empathy, charming. It is not
only about your CV, it is about you and the image that the other person
creates about you.

As a side note, you have a lot of projects, too many in my opinion. I think
you should get a project and keep working on it for more time, because you
learn a lot of things from small projects but keep learning more when the
project matures (maintain code, refactorization, keep adding features, etc).

------
dsiegel2275
40 million lines of code is a _lot_ of code to have written. Is this number
exaggerated a bit? Exaggerated a lot? Just doing the math: to code that much
in sixteen years (assuming a start of age 10) would require writing 6,800 LOC,
every single day.

~~~
mrcabada
Yes, remove a 0 to that 40. Did the maths wrong. Fixed.

~~~
dietrichepp
4M is still high. In order to maintain 680 lines per day on average, you have
to sacrifice a lot. Remember that code is not intrinsically valuable.

The highest I've hit is 3,500 over a three-day weekend, and the experience was
awful. I spent a week recovering.

~~~
eropple
Yup. My estimate of my own, over the last _twenty-one_ years, is somewhere in
the neighborhood of a million. And that's in delivering projects for a lot of
customers.

------
klodolph
I'd just like to comment on your relationship with your dad. Take this with a
grain of salt, and consider that what I'm about to say might be entirely
wrong.

I think you have emotional baggage here that's preventing you from using the
resources that are available to you. First of all, you don't sound like an
entrepreneur, you sound much more like a hacker (in the good sense). But you
use the word _entrepreneur_ which tells me that you want to make money, but
you're not developing a relationship with your dad (who can teach you about
running a business) and you're not selling anything (which is the essence of
being an entrepreneur). I have gone through some of the same things. I didn't
want to work at a big tech company because I was worried about loosing my
freedom... but that turned out to be an unfounded fear, once I got over it,
which took eight years. And I was older than you before I moved out of my
parents' house.

Are you scared that you'll "sell out" and see your dreams vanish? Are you
scared that you won't have enough time or money to do the things you want to
do? Are you jealous of the wunderkinds of Silicon Valley, the people who went
to Stanford and MIT that are making waves in tech?

Yeah, that's normal. It doesn't go away just because you get a job at one of
the Big Five tech companies--speaking from personal experience here. It
doesn't go away just because you create a startup company--in fact, it usually
gets worse. Again, speaking from personal experience.

Take an inventory of what your resources are, and how you make money, where
you can move, who you can meet. Take some time to figure out exactly what you
want. All your life you will be stretching your resources until you can get
what you want.

Maybe you can move and find a business cofounder somewhere who will take
advantage of you. Maybe you can work for your dad and reach out to him... if
you can convince him that the cool things you're doing are really going to
change _his_ life, and not just shuffle money around in Silicon Valley, then
you can convince other people too. And if he can convince you that the world
of business has something to offer too, well, that could be good lesson.

Again, take my perspective with a grain of salt. There are a lot of smart
people on HN but like all humans, we only give advice through the lens of our
personal experiences and biases.

------
fizzbitch
Your perspective and feelings are hugely influenced by the environment you are
in. Anyone who has ever worked a horrible job or went to grad school can tell
you that. In your case it seems that your parents are---consciously or not---
really holding you back. If they are questioning your life choices every day,
and if the topic of how you are going to make money is something that is
continually discussed, then it's no wonder you feel the way you do! My advice
is to get out of your house at any cost. Move to a different city, get a job
you're not too happy with, it doesn't really matter, but get to a place where
you're not being questioned and second-guessed every single day! Seriously, it
will make a world of difference to get out of the environment you are in.

------
lolikopter
OK, some hard facts and some advice. If you have the possibility to build on
the work of other people, like your farthers business, that is where you will
have the best chance of making money. That is just a fact. Somebody (your
farther) has already done some of the hard work for you.

Now if that does not appeal to you for some reason you can choose to do
something else, but the chance of making money will be less, not zero, but
less.

You can go down two roads if you want to do programming; work for somebody or
start your own. The first option has the highest chance of landing you a
decent paycheck. But don't go for the "Google's" of the world. They pay very
well and that is why you will be competing with the best programmers on the
planet. Hard fact: You are (probably) not that good. But hay none (with the
very few exceptions) of us are, and you don't need to be to be successful. If
you want little competition for a good position, find a company which employs
programmers but with no "brand". And if you really want to have no
competition; they have to make something dull! :) After your first job getting
the next one will be much easier.

Finally starting something yourself you have to have tremendous drive. Like
you would not believe. Something you hear from time to time about making a
start-up is "Starting a company is like eating glass and staring into the
abyss." Not fun! I have made my own company and it is something you learn a
lot from, mostly about yourself and you earn every penny the hard way and risk
loosing it all.

But in the end you have to choose what is best for you. It is your life! As
for support find people online or IRL who does the same thing as you. Start-up
communities, hacker spaces or any other place where there are people who can
inspire you.

Hope this helped and good luck. :)

------
cocktailpeanuts
You don't have to generate immediate revenue to be successful. In fact, unlike
what a lot of people are saying here, a lot of successful startups started out
without charging anyone anything. See Facebook, Google, Instagram, Youtube,
Snapchat, etc. (actually most internet related startups). So don't worry, your
"not being able to make money directly from you creation" is not the main
reason here. Of course this is not saying making money is bad. I'm making a
point that there are tons of people who are in the same position as you are
and end up becoming successful.

That said, I looked at your site and it's impressive. No doubt you can build
stuff.

The only problem I guess based on this is that you can't commit to a single
project. I mentioned above that a lot of Internet related startups started
without charging anyone any money, but you should remember that the founders
of ALL of the above companies focused 100% of their effort into their single
project to get to success.

Again, this is not to say quantity is bad. Actually printing out all kinds of
apps like you is 1000 times better than people who never ship because you
probably have learned much more than those guys. Plus if you keep going
without giving up, you will probably hit a jackpot someday.

But I think quality is also important. At least try to focus on a single
project for a while. I have a couple of friends who are like you, they are all
creative and competent developers. But they don't like to feel the failure so
they end up spreading out their energy on multiple projects simultaneously,
just so that they can say "ah that project? It was just for fun, I could have
succeeded if I put my full effort into it". Of course they don't say that and
probably won't acknowledge it if asked, but I know that's what's going on in
their mind, because I feel like doing the same thing all the time, I try to
push myself to really go all out on something, so that I can later say I at
least tried my best.

------
heretoo
Ignore the comments "you're not good". I'm pretty impressed by you're output.
If you haven't got code up on github, perhaps consider putting some there. It
will help you to finding a job.

As for getting work. You just need any work that you can put on your resume
that shows "commercial experience", rather than raw coding ability.

Have you considered Australia? We have a shortage of good coders, and it's not
getting better. A lot of the coders that get interviewed are not great at all.

I've worked for one company that hired remotely out of Russia, and another
that hired and sponsored foreigners, though you may need a degree to qualify
for that, but I'm not certain. You might need that first starter job on your
resume to attract attention before doing this, but it can't hurt to try.

Don't aim straight for Google/Facebook. If you're that good, you'll get there
anyway, but in the front door right now might be tough until you've had at
least one job, but you can always keep knocking until they open.

Also, that one coding job could be simply doing something specific for your
family's company.

You could try A/B testing the recruiters. Find some jobs on job sites you
might be interested in, but probably not. Contact them about remote work,
figure out how they respond. Test out your cover letter. Test out how github
code helps, how your portfolio helps. See how they respond to the idea of
remote work. A guy I worked with, desperate to find coding work, spammed the
local IT companies on linked-in, and found a sponsored job here in Australia.

~~~
sanswork
>I've worked for one company that hired remotely out of Russia, and another
that hired and sponsored foreigners, though you may need a degree to qualify
for that, but I'm not certain.

457(sponsored) doesn't require a degree. Skilled worker visa does though.

------
swiftisthebest
A modern business owner is closer to a programmer than you realize. I
automated almost all of my daily business tasks and now get to spend most of
my days just coding new features and accruing income passively.

You can pay an accountant. They're not that expensive.

------
maliker
You've clearly got good design and programming skills. If you need money, and
you keep applying to jobs, you will get one.

------
mattnewton
Honestly, as someone who is both going through the Big-Co. hiring process
myself, while also interviewing cadidates for replacing myself, I'd say it's
50% skill and 50% a crapshoot. They are heavily optimized for turning away bad
candidates and as a result have a high false negative rate. Don't beat
yourself up over that.

My advice: don't take your Dad's offer, yet. Move to the valley. Get a job at
a random startup, or big-co. Hell, get a job at a random ass company as the
role you want. Provide business value for money for a year then keep
interviewing.

Also, based on your portfolio, If you are willing to move to the bay area, I'd
phone screen you this week. We'd get you a visa.

------
FrancoDiaz
_My dad has always told me that doing taxes is a pain in the ass, that I
shouldn’t get into making money that fast. (I’m really pissed off with this
one, I’d go back in time and fix it)_

Huh, what?

But you're still young at 26 with lots of experience. I didn't even really
start my "real" career until about that age.

------
musesum
Funny, about the similarities. I moved from Iowa to California, in my mid
20's. Had worked for my Dad's business, for a while. Wrote a new DBMS from
scratch to use in the business.

Moved to California would sell it, but ran out of money. So, I got a gig
selling computers. Wrote code in my spare time. Then I got a gig selling
software. Designed a better version in my spare time. And then my Boss
invested in it. And then we failed at selling it. And then got a new gig
writing software. And then another and another.

Then, at one gig I stumbled upon how to make a tool cheaper and better. That
turned into a startup. Became a CTO. Had a little success. And then onto the
next thing. My old Boss became a friend. So, he invested in the next thing.

In the midst of all that, there were some dry periods. I remember not eating.
I remember flunking a job interview after spending my last $100 for a cab ride
to get there on time. It felt like: what's the point?

Making a product is not the same as solving a puzzle. I'm an entrepreneur.
That is very different from being a software engineer. An engineer is usually
forward chaining from tools and patterns. An entrepreneur is usually backward
chaining from goals.

I learned a lot from my Dad. I'm glad I worked for him. And I'm glad I moved
away.

------
projektir
Well, making businesses is stressful. I'm the same age and have no experience
of the sort, nor do I really have a portfolio. I may have money, but I'm not
convinced I'm better off. I think that kind of experience may be harder to get
than the money.

Could be beneficial to do some more things than just computer, though, just
for simple well-roundness and insights into how other facets of life work.
Your parents' business is probably a big deal for them and they want it to
continue, which doesn't mean you absolutely have to but it's going to be hard
for them to let it go, especially if it is a rather successful business.

Maybe just take a normal job for a while? It shouldn't be that hard to get one
with your portfolio, and it could even help you relocate. Working at a normal
job and doing well could give you some confidence. Or contracting could fit
you better, perhaps.

Either way, this is far from catastrophic, as the tone in your writing
suggests. 26 is very young and it's not like you haven't gained any knowledge
or skills during that time.

> Is it now the time to make money? I think I’m way off... I should’ve been
> making money since I was 14 years old, I had an online game that reached
> over 100,000 registered users

Such shoulds do not exist in this universe. That sounds like it may have been
a missed opportunity (hard to know for sure how that would have went, really),
but that's about it. Often such opportunities do not exist at all. That's not
the only thing you've missed, our brains can only work so well, we will miss
things.

------
ady_bangalore
PS-->English is not my first language, please do not roast me for my grammar
and sentence formation

1\. you should distinguish yourself as either a copy paste coder, or a
genuinely articulate engineering guy who loves to churn original stuff.

2\. if #1 is true, then you should continue to pursue coding as hobby and help
your old man in putting his affairs in order by using your skill set.

3\. if #2 is true then 1\. are you positioning your self correctly? 2\. are
you reaching out to right set of hiring managers? 3\. are you able to
effectively communicate in your own mother tongue about your skill set? forget
English, clairvoyance could be be exhibited in your language as well. 4\. did
you analyze why you flunked your interviews, was it communication or
technology? 5\. are you a guy who starts 20 different things or projects and
complete very few. 6\. do you have a github page to showcase your
technological prowess?

After you analyse your self, ask question, why your brain is so adamant and
thinking about taxes etc? could it be way to escape for not accepting that you
are not a good engineer?

Your father has given you food and education with his EMPIRE and he is still
running it successfully, i would say since he is still supporting you.

Very few of us are luck to have old man setup a running business, if you are
not doing any thing right now, sit with him, help him in optimizing his
business with your skills, trust me in bad days 1 in hand is better then 2 in
bush. Ask him to pay you salary for your time so that you feel independent and
lookout for good opportunities simultaneously.

------
z3t4
So you have applied to Google et.al, you are not the first brilliant kid they
have turned down, so don't worry about it. Your first priority should be to
get a job though. Take the first one you get. It will suck, you will have ten
years more experience then your boss, it will pay bad, and you will be the
only one that knows shit, but you will afford to move into your own place, and
that is the most important. You need to get a life of your own.

------
noobermin
A lot of people are telling you what you should do. Heck, you even asked what
you should do. The truth that I too struggle to grapple with is that a lot of
your push forward has to be internal and not based on what others say. There
are up days and down days and you can have a host of sources to blame for down
days, sure. We all do. But sometimes you have to just get up and start again.

I agree with aasarava's comment regarding entrepreneurship, but something that
hasn't been mentioned here is that even if you make something people are
"willing to pay for", who's to say someone else isn't making it better than
you? Or earlier than you? There is no deterministic formula, everything has a
degree of chance and doing what HN comments and their reading recommendations
say only sharpen that chance. You do need to take their input, but failure is
inevitable. Naysayers and their discouragement are inevitable. Bad shit is
inevitable.

So you will face bad days, but finally, _you_ have to make the decision to go
forward. Or, _you_ have to make the decision to change course. This is the
answer to your main question, _you_ have to keep yourself motivated, _even if_
nobody supports you. You should decide deep down whether something is worth
suffering for or not, but that decision has to be internal, as your
motivations have to be. I'm not saying you should be completely delusional and
deny feedback from reality, but even if you are doing the right things, you
will fail and you have to hold yourself up through that.

That's how "success" works. You keep trying through failure and eventually,
you'll monte-carlo onto the right spot.

------
bcheung
Hang in there. I started programming when I was 7 and by the time I was 18 I
had lots of programming experience but nobody would hire me because I didn't
have a degree or previous work experience. I had to do a lot of QA and support
before I finally found some development jobs. One things that helped was
moving down to LA and doing a lot of freelance work. I found it was a lot
easier to get work at places where I was the only programming. Once you get a
good reputation and have a portfolio of work it gets easier and easier.
Eventually I moved back to the SF bay area and didn't do well at interviews
either despite programming for 20+ years. Now I do a lot better just because I
have interviewed so many times. I found that interviewing others at different
startups has helped me interview at other places as well.

Also, I would definitely recommend reading Robert Greene's book called
"Mastery". It talks a lot about how to go about building a career and is a
great read.

------
danso
I don't have a lot to add to the general question, but it sounds like you need
to find a job. You clearly have enough experience to get a job at a decent
high-paying tech firm even if it's not Google.

If I could recommend a practical measure; consider revising your portfolio. No
one cares or has time to visit every one of the projects you've listed. And
yet your most important ones are given the same weight as your lesser ones.
Even worse, the design of the portfolio is not only unflattering visually, but
exposes poor implementation choices. I'm on a university network and it took
30 seconds to load the portfolio. Even if you're on a slow ISP, the effect is
exacerbated by how slowly the small thumbnails (which are hundreds of
kilobytes each) progressively load.

Those all lead to a bad first impression. Edit your portfolio down to your
best 5-6 projects. You don't need more than that to show the depth of your
experience.

------
michaelgrafl
I think at this point in your life your next step should be to grow up and
move out from your parent's. Get a job - any job - that provides you with
enough money to get your own place. Then work from there. Work hard at your
job and take part in your local community, building strong relationships.

If you are genuine and talented, things will progress fast and you'll get more
and increasingly interesting opportunities to grow as an engineer and a human
being. But you must not let yourself be scared from taking on responsibility
for your own life.

Who gives a shit what your dad thinks about stuff he doesn't know Jack about!
He may be disappointed that you don't follow in his footsteps, but he doesn't
own you. Don't let him gaslight you into thinking your are a failure. Once he
sees you succeed he'll change his mind anyway.

------
brianpgordon
> There are two possible reasons I didn’t get a job: Either coding interviews
> don’t work, or I really suck at coding. (Which I doubt, I encourage you to
> visit my portfolio [http://cabada.mx](http://cabada.mx))

Or employers are looking for things other than raw coding skill?

------
Zyst
Hey, fellow Mexican developer here, currently in Mexico City. So if you ever
wanna grab a beer and talk about programming feel free to hit me up
erick.romero.dev@gmail.com

------
erikb
The thing about coding since ten and having coding interviews is that the
factors they check at coding interviews you probably haven't learned. I have a
few friends just like you. Since you already felt you know how to code you
probably didn't spend as much time and energy on the coding classes,
homeworks, exams as other students. And you considered most of it boring
theory that is not really needed for real life coding.

If that's the case, then that's why you didn't pass the interviews. This
"theory" is not just important because a big part of it really works and
improves code quality, but it is also a common basis for team work. E.g. maybe
yourself you always wrote only functions in C++, never used classes. But for
recognizing the structure of another person's code it is quite important to
see classes. Few people can think in functions only because university teaches
using classes and objects so heavily.

There are also languages you learn in university that seem like coding classes
but actually aren't. E.g. learning UML is not about architectural fantasies of
people who have a hard time coding, but it is a graphical language to
communicate ideas with. In an interview it is quite helpful to know such
languages because it helps you express yourself faster to other people who
speak it. Also if you don't speak it, interviewers might not find you
"intelligent" enough. That is of course wrong, but think about how you feel
about people who don't speak your native human language well. It's just human
nature to be like that.

And if you just want to start making money out of your coding, check out:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/)
and [https://www.reddit.com/r/freelance/](https://www.reddit.com/r/freelance/)

As long as you don't make more than $2k a month you can probably pipe your
bills and taxes through your fathers company if he allows it.

------
minitech
Do you have any/have you contributed to any open-source projects? Those are
important to meet people and learn from them.

Also, if your life is continuing to be “wake up, computer, eat, computer,
computer, computer”, maybe start broadening your horizons. Take up another
hobby or a job in an unrelated field.

------
kohanz
> There are two possible reasons I didn’t get a job: Either coding interviews
> don’t work, or I really suck at coding.

How do you know that you were rejected based on technical merits? A software
developer's fit within a team comes down to more than just technical
proficiency. Do you work well with others?

~~~
SallySwanSmith
Indeed. I reject people _all the time_ that can code just fine, but due to the
technical details of the position, they don't seem to have the technical depth
in a certain area that may be entirely unrelated to just generic coding.

------
iamgopal
Personal similar story. I am doing programming since school, and sensing that
I am really good at it, my dad encouraged programming instead of family
business as carrier. Unfortunately my dad pass away before I become enough
successful. I had to return to our family business and take care of it. Many
years reading success story here and elsewhere about software companies
thriving, I reconsidered my decision many a times, ultimately decided that I
should not let internet brainwash me. Great successful things happen when you
do anything everyday just a little bit better than yesterday. That's what kept
me going still. I may not reach to the Fortune 500 level of success doing so,
but I may, because I think I'm going on right path. A better day everyday.

------
ChoHag
Your web site says "yet another entitled CS-grad hipster" and so I suspect you
do too. Entitled coders are impossible to work with, however good their code
is. Entitlement combined with the exhuberant inexperience of youth...

You _deserve_ nothing. Anything more is a bonus.

------
cabinguy
I've been bootstrapping my current business for 13 years...and started in
business several years before that.

I didn't necessarily want to bootstrap, but no one (outside of my business
partner, wife & kids) ever believed in me or supported my efforts in any
way...and for good reason, I was a classic underachiever until I was 25 or so.

I personally believe that success has to be your life's mission if you are
going to be successful. If you know that success, no matter what (as long as
it's legal, moral and ethical), is your mission - you should be able to stay
motivated through almost anything. It's worked for me.

Note: Success can mean different things to different people. For me it is
making a lot of money while doing what I love to do. That and great kids.

~~~
mrcabada
Can't agree better with your concept for success. Thanks for your feedback.

------
MicroBerto
Bro, if you need validation or affirmation from "normies" to motivate you,
then you're in the wrong business. Keep plowing ahead, networking, meeting
pleasant like-minded friends, and learning. You're still young.

------
antoniuschan99
Are your two startups making any money? If not, then you need to focus on one
first.

Also, why not work with your dad part of the time? Or at least help him out
with the technology in the business. From what I've seen you have the
programming and design skills. However, from your post it does seem like you
lack the business skill set. You can either learn from him, or by working at a
company. You're lucky you have a good resource.

How often are you applying to jobs? You have the skill set and the market is
good. It shouldn't be hard to find a job in your situation?

Also, family is the most important thing and your parents don't get any
younger :).

------
IvanK_net
Carlos, I don't understand, what are you trying to achieve.

"How can I believe in something?" \- what does it mean? What do you want to
believe in?

It seems that you really enjoy what you are doing and your parents have no
problems with you living with them (they have been doing it for 26 years).
What is the problem? You said that you have been living on your own for 7
years, were you making money by yourself?

If you are disappointed that your parents "don't believe in you", when you do
nothing useful for them, while "consuming resources", you should move away, or
get used to it. Sometimes you can not change people.

------
meira
You motivate yourself, step by step. Start to make money, do freelancing.

------
kowdermeister
Don't give up coding or discontinue this kind of product building. You clearly
love building stuff from the ground up, you'd be disappointed doing anything
else. Having no support is a pity, but I'm sure the majority of people here on
HN will support you.

You wrote that taxes and business is a pain. I have to agree, I feel a sharp
pain in my stomach if I think about those things. What people usually do in
these situations is to team up with somebody else with complementary skills,
so you need a sales / marketing / getting things done type of companion.
(however if you find some business that you really like and got some initial
cash out of it, the you should outsource all this pain to a $really_good
accountant)

If joining the family business sounds like boring for you, then don't do it.
Do you live with your family? You could demonstrate that you have something
else on your mind by moving out, going abroad or something else, you know,
something more visible other than writing code.

Finally, recognize how lucky you are that you live in the Bay Area. I probably
would have succeeded by now If I was born there. (yes, big IF). Don't feel bad
because those companies passed on you, there are tons of alternatives and you
are not really unsuccessful if you make $150k+ and with your resume that
should be minimum even if you are a terrible negotiator. So keep up the good
work and push it hard :)

------
smasuch
I think you need to take a break, like other people have said, and reconnect
with friends. If you can't visit them, at least email them and ask how they're
doing. It seems like a lot of your self-image is wrapped up in being a
software creator, and I think you need to decouple it more. I understand how
you're under pressure now, like you're looking at each project like it might
be the thing that gets you noticed, but you're just compounding the stress on
yourself.

Take a break. Think about what you really want to do, and how support from
others is necessary. The great founder myth obscures how everyone needs
support and encouragement from others to keep going.

You're not too old. Don't compare where you are with where you 'should' be,
because I think you have an unrealistic image of where you should be. Any
success you have now won't live up to that image, and you'll beat yourself up
again and again. You gotta break out of that cycle.

Your parents probably see how unhappy you are, and are trying to guide you to
a path where they think you can be happy. They're probably wrong, but I bet
they want the best for you and are trying to help in the ways they know how.
They're probably frustrated themselves and all that, but go give them some
thanks.

You're gonna do okay.

------
wusatiuk
No matter how many loc you have written, no matter who did or did not support
you. As an experienced developer you should not have a problem finding a
remote freelance position. go to upwork.com or some other platform and get
some jobs to make some money. Stop blaming your father, your friends, your
city, your country, your whater for the current state if your live. Just
change it!

If you want to run a business on your own, stop to jump on every train passing
by. Get a deep understand of one thing, no matter if it´s a specific
programming language, a problem you would like to solve or maybe indoor
navigation / AI. But focus on a single topic at a time, and get an expert
within this field.

e.g.: If you are an indoor navigation expert, just thing about problems you
could solve with indoor navigation. Do indoor navigation freelance jobs on
upwork. Build relationships, go to meetups, join the community, and simply
focus on that one topic for at least 2-3 years. if you always jump between
technologies, ideas, fun projects, gaming, ios Apps, Bots, whatever - you will
never be successful, no matter if you work for a company or if you work for
your own business.

------
j45
Learning to lead yourself and doing what you know is right and understanding
how you add value and what your value is the most important skills I have
worked to learn.

Motivation is the wrong thing to go after. Discipline is the key. Building
discipline to do the things that are needed will beat motivation every time.

It's always nice to have external support, but the best support you can build
and keep is from the relationship you have with yourself.

~~~
projektir
> Motivation is the wrong thing to go after. Discipline is the key.

Please provide either some sources or argumentation for such a significant
claim.

~~~
j45
There's lots of positive data eschewing the benefits of pursuing discipline as
the master skill, because once you learn that you can learn to be disciplined
at any skill you need, you can more effectively learn and do anything that
needs to be done and get to the task of being successful towards your goals.

Discipline to do what needs to be done will always beat constantly seeking
motivation, because motivation implies a lack of it to begin with and staying
that way.

Discipline for me is like making sure one takes a regular bath. Motivation is
a temporary mental bath that constantly needs renewing. Discipline ingrains
habits that bypass a lot of that.

Discipline makes sure to keep you in a position to perform and remain
productive. In any hard task, great, aspirational, much of the things that
need to be done are heavy lifting, mundane, critical and a lot of drudgery,
not tasks anyone would be motivated to complete, and often the winner are
those who can be disciplined to do what needs to be done.

They say time and learning from experience is the best teacher, I'm slowly
beginning to realize this is true. In our case, talking about swimming,
reading swimming, and watching swimming doesn't make up for jumping in the
pool and realizing you don't need motivation to stay afloat in the water, only
discipline to do what needs to be done to survive before picking a direction
in which to thrive.

Some interesting reads that shouldn't be examined internally by an open mind
and not one seeking social or external validation for a belief in something:

\- A few weeks ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12557335](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12557335)

\- [https://www.hotjar.com/blog/the-passion-
fallacy](https://www.hotjar.com/blog/the-passion-fallacy)

\- [http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/opinion/sunday/learning-
se...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/opinion/sunday/learning-self-
control.html)

\- IQ isn't as valuable as self-discipline: [http://time.com/12086/how-to-
make-your-kids-smarter-10-steps...](http://time.com/12086/how-to-make-your-
kids-smarter-10-steps-backed-by-science/)

\- [http://time.com/4175356/habits-routines/](http://time.com/4175356/habits-
routines/)

~~~
projektir
Not a single one of your links supports your claim. Most (all?) are not even
talking about motivation or discipline at all. One talks about self-control,
which is a whole other topic and closely related to motivation.

Here's a link that would be relevant to what we're talking about:
[http://growthzer.com/substitute-for-
motivation/](http://growthzer.com/substitute-for-motivation/)

It could be argued with. But, at the end of the day, it's just a blog post.

Here's another blog post, with which I agree more:
[http://zenhabits.net/discipline/](http://zenhabits.net/discipline/)

Your statements cannot be read properly because you are using a term far
outside its normal definition yet you have not defined it. Discipline is
traditionally the execution of codes, norms, and orders, often involving an
institution or a person who will inflict punishment or other, well,
motivational tools to make you comply with those codes, norms, and orders. The
blog I linked goes over this.

You are vastly oversimplifying what motivation is and constructing strawmen,
it's a fairly complex subject:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivation)

> Motivation is a temporary mental bath that constantly needs renewing.

> Intrinsic motivation can be long-lasting and self-sustaining.

Interestingly enough, this sort of motivation is perceived as superior to the
motivation you're suggesting (if you are using the word discipline), which is
punishment based.

I can't help but think that this is simply a case of drastic misuse of terms.
If there was something of substance to be said here, I'd expect to see a
discussion about extrinsic/intrinsic motivation, how it plays into self-
control, and related pathways.

Pop-culture uses of discipline, grit, and other nebulous terms should not be
used as truth.

------
jsprogrammer
I think this solves most of your problems: only accept bitcoin. You can
convert them to dollars when you want and the taxes on that are extremely
simple.

~~~
andirk
Kind of pigeon holed yourself, dont you think? Maybe add a tariff to purchases
w/ other currencies or the like, but outright only accept bitcoin? That is
badass tho.

------
llvllatrix
We have a similar lineage. The process is simple; pick a reasonable objective,
work hard, modify your plan when necessary and be stubborn about it.

------
strictfp
As you can clearly see from this thread, showing weakness when you are male
only gets you ostracised. But I applaud you for doing so. Horrible as it may
sound,there might be noone there to listen. But try to find someone who
understands you and talk it through. Get an outside perspective. Analyze the
situation and make a plan. Best of luck!

------
plandis
Keep trying. Apply to more than 5 companies. What about internships? Perhaps
some of those companies where you might have a connection can help out?

Don't take this the wrong way, but the attitude you give off in your writing
comes off as kind of entitled. I'm honestly not sure that I would want to work
with you. Even after you get a job you will still fail from time to time. I
think what matters more is what you take away from failure and the only thing
your writing says is: "Woe is me! The world is cruel".

Perhaps taking a critical look at why you were not hired will help you to
learn how to correct any perceived deficits those companies say in you? Also
network! Even if you live in the middle of nowhere IRC/Google Groups are a
great way to talk to like minded people.

~~~
mrcabada
I agree with you. I don't tend to write like this.

------
jondubois
It's generally not good idea to run two startups at the same time. Especially
as a solo founder and especially if the two startups aren't related to each
other.

I think maybe the author is a bit too optimistic about everything. Building a
successful startup isn't easy. It's extremely hard.

When his game had 100K users, he didn't recognize it at the same, but that was
actually a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for most people. I haven't had such
an opportunity yet and I've been programming since I was 14. I've also done it
all; online games, web design, ATMEL microcontrollers, content management
systems, software developer tools...

You just have to focus on an area and work on it for as many years as it
takes.

~~~
totalZero
It's possible that the game was successful partially because it wasn't laden
with attempts at monetization.

------
cynicaldevil
I'm probably not as old as you; I turned 20 a couple of days ago, and I most
certainly do not want to become an entrepreneur, but here's something about
how I keep myself motivated:

Each day; at least once, I try to read/think about something which makes me
feel totally worthless. It could be anything, about how there are people out
there building really awesome stuff, conducting research in various STEM
fields, or producing fantastic works of art, just anything good, really. Elon
Musk's Mars mission would be a great example.

Realising this fact makes feel really, really guilty inside, and I know that I
am not contributing enough to this world. That's all the motivation I need to
get on with my work.

This stuff may sound a little cheesy, but it works for me :)

------
davesque
I'll offer a bit of critical advice and say that, even though you think you've
done a lot of great stuff, having an overly high opinion of oneself can be a
barrier to progress. Try having a little more humility. For example, it's not
likely you've actually written 4 million lines of code in 16 years of
programming. For that to be true, you'd have to have written roughly 685 lines
of code a day. That's a tall order for even the most productive software
developers. So consider whether or not you inflated that number and ask
yourself why you felt the need to do so. Also, comparing your code to the
Bible is self-aggrandizing. Egoism can be a pretty big turn off to some
people.

I'd also suggest placing less importance on your individual background. No one
in my family understands a thing about software programming. I found it on my
own and had no one to "support" my interest in the subject in the sense that
you're talking about. If you love technology and software, then that's the
most important thing. Be thankful that you've found enough of the right
situation to develop some skill in something you enjoy. Also be thankful you
live in a world that values those skills. Even if your immediate world doesn't
seem to place much value on programming, I can assure you that the world at
large does.

Don't think that the point of being a developer is to score a job at a big,
famous company. There are so many random factors that go into the interview
process at a large corporation that you can't feel too bad when they don't pan
out in your favor. Also, it's even true that the lives of corporate employees
are not always that enviable. There's often a lot of dumb organizational crap
that you have to deal with and it can be hard to stand out and develop your
career when you're just an ant in the army.

Bottom line, if you're a smart, creative, productive person, you can find a
way to make a contribution to the world that people will value. Just keep
trying. As a young man, you've still got some time and you shouldn't feel
overly pressured to attain immediate success.

------
pedrodelfino
Don't feel bad man. I really wish I had your technical experience. You know
the hardest part. You will make money soon. Keep trying (and make something
people want). Maybe you should leave your parents house. Some financial
pressure might accelerate the process.

------
Vadoff
Sounds like you enjoy building software, I wouldn't take up your dad's
business. It also seems like your hometown doesn't have many great companies
to join, I would move to a location brimming with opportunity like San
Francisco.

Finally, your technical interview algorithm/problem solving probably needs
work, I would either study for a month+ and improve this area (a good resource
would be Cracking the Code Interview), or join a startup instead.

I personally think you'd get a lot out of a startup, you'll learn about what
it takes to run a business and have a lot of ownership in what you build.

------
PhasmaFelis
Try googling for meetups and usergroups for your favorite language/technology,
and for hacker spaces. [https://www.meetup.com/](https://www.meetup.com/) is
good for the former,
[https://wiki.hackerspaces.org/Mexico](https://wiki.hackerspaces.org/Mexico)
may help with the latter. If you can't find one in your city, maybe start one
yourself? Based on your portfolio, you're definitely savvy enough to manage a
regular meetup, and I think it would do you a world of good.

------
jasonwen
I noticed myself that i stay motivated by focusing. I have multiple projects
running and i can be very motivated and passionate but only one at a time.
It's very easy for me to neglect other businesses whenever i'm focusing.

If i focus, i plan in my head what i want to do and imagine the results. I
stay more motivated when i make visual progress. This has always worked for me
and i created a lot of big projects on my own this way. Downside for me is
that its too easy to focus too much on product and less on market research,
marketing, and sales.

Working on that.

------
mrcabada
I couldn't add more than 2000 characters, so I hosted the writing on my site:
[http://cabada.mx/mylife.html](http://cabada.mx/mylife.html)

------
kafkaesq
_Either coding interviews don’t work, or I really suck at coding. (Which I
doubt, I encourage you to visit my portfolio)_

But how can we tell if your portfolio doesn't (easily) show off your... code?

------
pipio21
I was not financially independent until I was 36 years old. And by independent
I mean independent of my parents, independent of any company but my own, and
take all the decisions and be happy(successful). I tried since I was 18.

I had 250Ks of lines of code on my own when I started my own business. That
was enough for me as the code I had created worked for me. 40 Millions? A
ridiculous thing, impossible to maintain for any human being. I would get rid
of most it.

If I were you I will start learning metaprogramming and learn to make your
software work for you instead of the other way around.

With metaprogramming you could decimate your lines of code and be happy.

Learn to enjoy life, go fishing, go swimming, go surfing and meet new people.
There are no excuses , you are an adult and can do it, there are very
inexpensive activities. Don't worry about being broke, so are birds and dogs
or most people in Kenya, and they are pretty happy all day.

I had to learn sales, basic marketing,taxes,basic sex-understanding women(very
important), extremely easy compared with programming but you have to do it.
You could delegate it later when you make millions so your fear makes no sense
to me, you are just fearing the unknown.

Very few people out there are financially independent but most people can get
by working for companies. Most of the people here at HN dream on universal
income so they could stop working "for the man".

It is clear to me that you value freedom over everything else. Me too. It is
amazing being your own boss when you learn how to do it well.

If I were you I will do this: 1-Start making money out of your software.
Anything counts. USD 200 fo a month? Great. Easy if your software is worth
something.

2-Work for my father using my knowledge on software to improve his business,
but make it clear to him that you will get out on your own when you can.

3-Learn a lot from your father. It is going to be extremely useful for your
own business and your relationship could improve.

4- Double the income of your small business each month, or at least put this
as an objective.200->400->800\. Ask your father for advice on business.

5- When you make enough, jump ship to your own business.

------
joepater
I think I know how you feel but you have to remember this one fact. Most
people are living life for themselves, nobody else. So, you can't rely on
someone else's support to make something happen.

It sounds like you have grinded long enough and are due for something positive
to happen.

YC apps are due tomorrow. If I get selected I'll interview you for a role at
our startup. We are working in the energy efficiency space. www.rebatebus.com

------
shove
I have 20 years of _professional_ coding experience. The last time I was job
hunting, I applied to nearly 3 dozen companies and got only 1 (very good)
offer.

------
rublev
I'm motivated by ideologies and idols that serve as role models to me, they
keep me company even after death. My support comes from philosophy largely.

~~~
projektir
What ideology and idols are your role models right now?

~~~
rublev
Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev, Mussorgsky, Bach, Nikolai Lugansky, Sviatoslav
Richter, Evgeny Kissin, Orson Welles, Ilya Repin, Andrei Tarkovsky, Ennio
Morricone, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Pushkin, Hunter Thompson, David Foster
Wallace, Albert Camus, Kafka, and most of all Heinrich Neuhaus amongst many
others. Those are my lifes main influences. Mainly music, some authors, couple
of pianists, few painters.

Glenn Gould especially. Check my previous comments for his mentions.

I feel closer to them and their art (especially music) than any friends or
family. I hope one day I'll break into that 'sphere' of people but it's going
to take a couple of lonely decades and that's ok, and they've made me feel
okay with it. I respect the amount of time that goes into works of divinity.
With respect to philosophy, I mean in the loosest sense, peoples personal
systems of thought, especially those of idols have helped me. PG's essays,
Stoicism, and Eudaemonia come to mind.

------
teen
youre only 26 why are you flipping out about money you could have made. has
your life been that miserable? no? then why does the money matter?

------
laurentdc
> Wish I haven’t touched a computer when I was 10.

This hit way too close to home. I'm sure computing skills have made me a
better person in the long run (logical reasoning, resource planning et al).
But I also wish I spent more time working on equally important aspects of my
life - starting from those soft skills that make the difference in interviews.

------
mrcabada
Thank you all for your replies and feedback. There's a lot to learn/meditate
from these messages and your own stories. I'm totally having a talk with my
dad and I'm moving out of my comfort zone to find what's next with me. To
those who sent me an e-mail, I'll get back to you soon.

------
snoonan
Some of what you say here reminds me of how a friend described his ADHD
hyperfocus and extreme avoidance behaviors. Two sides of executive function
issues. It may be worth doing an online ADHD assessment to see if there is a
big easy solution you may be able to follow up on.

------
acidbaseextract
An great article on exactly this issue:
[https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2010/12/14/persist-
without-...](https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2010/12/14/persist-without-
praise/)

~~~
mrcabada
Gonna read that, thank you!

------
ddmma
This Software developer survival course might help
[https://www.pluralsight.com/courses/career-survival-
strategi...](https://www.pluralsight.com/courses/career-survival-
strategies-4devs)

------
emodendroket
It seems to me like every company you've listed as applying to and having been
rejected from is kind of top-tier elite companies, but there are lots of
programming jobs outside of those. Maybe not your ideal, but may you should
broaden your horizons.

------
johnnydoebk
Wow, this is my story. Every line, except I'm a few years younger, I haven't
heard about Holagus as I'm not from Mexico, I'm into other fields not IoT, and
my dad doesn't have a business.

------
WalterBright
Take your dad's offer for a year. You'll learn a heluva lot that will be very
valuable to you for the future. You'll also have the privilege of working with
your dad. I wouldn't pass it up.

------
crocal
Go out. Find out about a problem to solve nearby (not YOUR problem, someone
else's who you care about). Propose and use your skills to help solve it.
Share success. Find next problem...

------
oolongCat
There are 40 things listed in OP's site. And he claims to have written 40M
loc. So approximately 1 mil loc per program, (or 2.5M loc per year)? Honestly
can someone write that many lines of code?

~~~
jsprogrammer
They may not have listed every piece of code they wrote since they were 10
years old.

~~~
mrcabada
I've only listed there what I think is important for my coding career and the
ones that have resources to show.

------
asimuvPR
Having a strong work ethic helps me. Just doing the work because that's what I
have to do is enough to push me over low motivation bumps. Nothing else
worked.

------
slavik81
Interviewing is a skill like any other. You can improve with practice. There
are thousands of great companies out there, so keep applying.

------
throwmenow_0139
Ok, I know how you feel. You are 26yo and you are definitely a good
programmer. The problem: You're not 10yo anymore, so no one will congratulate
you for building your bots and games.

You realized that. You are intelligent like many others in this industry.
You've understood that you had potential and now you've got the feeling that
you wasted it. Otherwise I can't explain that all your writing is directed
towards your past.

I get that you feel sorry for yourself, but this won't help you, it'll lead to
a miserable life.

The solution is simple: Start to live your own life. Pack your stuff and go.
And when I say it, I mean it.

Stop building these bots if you don't earn money with them. You can start
later again if you have companies that want to pay your for this. Start asking
for advice for your landing pages, your own website, Hivee and talkbot look
like they have interesting content, but it's very inaccessible (e.g. Talkbot:
would be a great chance to show the features instead of opening the mail
client).

If you have experience doing web development, native app development, AR, NLP,
ML and even Hardware/IoT, you are absolutely able to get a job that is paying
you a rent and a lot more. Maybe your home city is not right to get a job
there, maybe not even your home country. But you really don't want to waste
your life feeling sorry for yourself.

So go out and seek opportunities. Use Github and show your projects. Talk to
business owners, ask them if you can work for them and search for
opportunities to implement software that help them and charge them for your
support. Learn to do invoices, seek a mentor who can help you with your tax
filing. -- you're not going to build your own life if you're not even able to
learn how to get money.

Stop calling yourself a founder: say that you have some projects, but don't
sound like a douche bag - having a business means getting revenue. Show people
your projects and they will understand that your work can help them. Whining
about missing support from people who don't know code is only the absence of
creative ideas and valuable projects that even laymen can understand. Work a
week for your father and you'll see how inefficient his processes are: improve
them, you have the skills. -- When I was 12yo, I was crying once because
nobody in my family understood my coding hobby. After I wrote some helpful
tools and earned some money, they've realized that this computer stuff is good
for me and supported me.

Regarding job interviews: The best way to get hired is to build trust and
relationships. You don't have to do whiteboard interviews if you know the
right people. I'm not suggesting that this works for Facebook or Google, but
there are more than those 5 companies you've listed.

And if nothing works, make a nice CV, write some blog posts and case studies
of your projects, create accounts at upwork, craigslist and similar pages and
connect with other people through the internet.

So, back to your question: "How do you keep motivated if nobody supports you?"
You start to give a f#?k about other opinions and simply hustle, we're not
entitled to anything. Stop blaming other circumstances and gain control of
your life. You may want to be the highly gifted man who talks about his
businesses while living at home or you start to do the real thing - your
choice.

~~~
timbutlerau
I'd like to second most of the advice here. The three critical bits that stand
out for me:

1\. Lots of projects don't really mean much. More can be worse, as it
(potentially) shows an inability to focus on a task. Instead, reduce it to a
few core projects. List what technologies they use, what problems they solve
and how you solved them. Ideally, upload them to github so that people can see
the source code.

2\. Move. You're going to have to take the plunge and believe in yourself.
Especially if visas are involved, it's far easier to hire someone locally if
you have the choice. To be considered for a visa for a common job like
programming, you would need to be absolutely amazing.

3\. Aptitude. As someone who's hired over a dozen people in various tech and
supporting roles, aptitude and team fit are just as if not more critical than
actual technical skill. There's no point hiring the greatest programmer in the
world if they aren't going to be a good fit or if they can't adapt to
different processes. Good programmers are adaptable because they're able to
change languages and environments yet carry over their skills in the process.

Good luck finding your path, don't forget to have fun along the way!

------
macygray
Strange. So many years of coding and no github link on page...

------
crawfordcomeaux
First, if you're feeling discouraged by people telling you to "suck it up,"
just realize that some people don't know or remember what it's like to be in
your position. Everyone's doing the best they can in the moment, even if that
means telling someone with a broken leg to "walk it off." It also means some
people confuse financial support with emotional support & encouragement.
Money's merely a strategy for meeting our needs, but emotional support is
literally something social creatures need. Nobody comes out of the womb with
an actual physical need for money. I hope you can forgive anyone who fails to
recognize that when giving you advice.

I'm a 33 year old programmer & my story's like yours, except I became addicted
to researching before coding. Instead of motivation to monetize what I
produce, I'm trying to learn how to actually produce. The "support" I got
growing up embedded a deep fear of failure in me to the point that merely
thinking about working alone on something paralyzes me. I've been unemployed
for 2-3 years now & so I also have anxiety around simply applying for jobs.

I don't know if any of this applies to you, but I'm hoping it'll help.

Here's what I've learned through just the past year of struggling to recover
from my addiction:

\- I tend to take other people's advice more easily when I hear it in the form
of stories about other people's experiences, though I used to think that if I
talked about myself, I'd just be viewed as selfish/narcissistic. I'm still
working on that bit of self-consciousness, so this first point's kind of a
disclaimer for the rest, which will mostly be things about myself I consider
relevant or citing things you've said about yourself.

\- Nobody asks for support who doesn't need it in some way. You've said you
grew up without it from your parents/community, don't have any peers, and
you're asking for help here. I hope you'll keep working to develop a support
system for yourself.

\- I lived most of my life in a small town in Louisiana where the local values
are very different from my own. It's really hard living in a place where the
message "you don't belong here" is heard time & again, even if it's followed
by something like "you belong in Silicon Valley or some place like that." I
had to get out to separate myself from those messages (including any coming
from my parents) so I could learn to think differently. I have to catch myself
thinking in old ways & immediately follow it with telling myself something
different.

\- My parents have no idea what I need or have any business telling me how to
live. It doesn't matter who's supporting me. I've thought for a long time that
financial independence doesn't have to come before interacting with my parents
like an independent adult. The problem was I quickly reverted back to acting
like a dependent child when they tried to play the role of parent (and vice-
versa) instead of any of us behaving like independent adults. Being assertive
with them has been key to me regaining some sense of autonomy in my life, but
it's been really hard. It means I have to set boundaries with them and not
negotiate on them. An example: I told my mom I would no longer respond to her
text messages as she gets upset when they're too long for her taste. The
reason they're too long is her phone's font size is huge because she's
choosing to not use her glasses. Instead of getting into a fight with her over
what constitutes a reasonable text length, I just said "Ok. If this is how
you'll be responding when I'm trying to communicate over text, then I'll stop
communicating with you via text until you're able to take emotional
responsibility for the decisions that make texting with me hard for you." (The
book "Nonviolent Communication" has been AMAZING for me learning this!)

\- I desperately need collaboration right now. It's not that I can't get into
a productive mindset where my old ways of thinking don't plague me at every
turn, but it's way more difficult to stay in that headspace when I'm not
connecting with people. I don't know how to get it & wish I could give you a
suggestion for this, but I'm in the same boat as you right now. (As I type
this, it's occurring to me that maybe I don't need to connect with people over
what I'm working on, as long as I'm connecting with them, but I'm not sure
that's actually the case & don't feel like I'm in a position in my life where
I can risk being wrong about that.)

\- 20+ years of interacting with text on screens more than faces has led to a
huge emotional disconnect in myself. I've only just started learning how to
recognize more emotions than the basics of glad/sad/mad/afraid. Teenage years
are when we're supposed to learn how to emotionally self-regulate, but I
missed out on a good bit of that. Taking time away from information
(computers, the internet, looking things up in books, puzzles, strategy games,
brainstorming, asking people questions, and more) was required for me to get
to a point that I was able to admit that I was traumatized as a kid & part of
that trauma stemmed from how I interacted with my parents (neglect,
emotional/verbal abuse). When I literally said to myself out loud "Ok. Let's
assume the opposite. I was traumatized." I was immediately overcome with fear,
anxiety, and sadness within seconds. That was the first step for me to start
learning how to emotionally connect with myself & only then did I start
learning how to emotionally connect with others. Maybe you've experienced some
kind of trauma or maybe not. The point is that before I could truly
emotionally connect with others, that block had to be removed. Maybe you don't
have that problem, but if you do, I'd suggest finding the block & working to
remove it because things become much easier then.

\- Another side effect of not interacting with people: I didn't learn the
value of human connection. It's difficult to describe, but there's a physical
feeling that comes with solid connection. My chest feels light and warm when
I'm able to connect. Connecting starts with me accepting and empathizing with
people, which, again..."Nonviolent Communication" is my guide for that.

~~~
crawfordcomeaux
One more thing I forgot:

\- Gratitude! Taking time every morning to make a list of 10 things I'm
grateful for was REALLY helpful for me, as was learning how to express my
gratitude to others in the moment beyond simply saying "thank you"
("Nonviolent Communication" taught me how to do that, too). If there's
something I'm learning how to improve in myself that I missed an opportunity
to practice, I'd add gratitude for that opportunity to practice to my next
list. It helped me view the world as more welcoming & every "negative"
interaction became a learning opportunity given to me by someone, whether they
intended to or not.

~~~
crawfordcomeaux
Ok...yet another thing popped into my head just now:

\- Trying to work with my parents on a project was a HUGE mistake. They didn't
know how to respect me or my decisions, even when I was in charge of
something. Ultimately, I recognize that trying to get into business with them
simply served to strengthen my codependent relationship with them.

