

Working Hard With No Regrets - gregbayer
http://gbayer.com/observations/working-hard-with-no-regrets/

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gst
It all depends on the type of your work.

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.

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jamesbkel
I think this boils to down to definition of working hard. For a lot of my
friends, that would mean "working more at the same thing".

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.

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sixtofour
I wonder how long you can get away with abusing your health? I wonder how much
longer older people would feel young if they hadn't abused their health?

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bjelkeman-again
Working hard can be very rewarding. But for the long haul you need balance or
you will burn out. Find out what your balance is before you hit the wall.

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dreamdu5t
Please let us end the myth of staying up all night as some noble right of
passage, or that if you don't find this enjoyable you're not really a hacker
or you don't enjoy your work.

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.

~~~
rewind
Everybody does some of the time, but not everybody does all of the time. I can
relate: there is nothing like being tired, going to bed, have a
hard/frustrating problem roll around in your head, come up with a solution you
were agonizing over, then be wide awake, get up, hit the computer, then crank
out code until your body puts you back to sleep.

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.

~~~
dreamdu5t
_there is nothing like being tired, going to bed, have a hard/frustrating
problem roll around in your head, come up with a solution you were agonizing
over, then be wide awake, get up, hit the computer, then crank out code until
your body puts you back to sleep._

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.

~~~
rowaway1
it's not about working at night, but going balls out from waking to sleep. how
long u stay awake doesn't matter, but the passion that engages your every
waking moment, and makes you want to stay awake longer, so great is your
desire to hack.

~~~
yesimahuman
Perhaps, but some realize that the mind can control the body in unhelpful
ways. For me, my mind races at night. Sometimes I indulge, but I always feel
like complete shit the next day.

I've learned my mind doesn't actually want to stay up all night. I had to
optimize my own process.

~~~
rowaway1
i said: "it's not about working at night, but going balls out from waking to
sleep."

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.

~~~
yesimahuman
I wasn't arguing with you. My point is that even if I have the passion, the
passion might not optimize for productivity. A super late night might ruin the
next day, for example. I have to harness the passion to make it more
productive.

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flarg
Some people don't understand how much hacking is fun for some of us; money,
fame, fortune, the monthly check from a shady employer - they are are just
useful side-effects.

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pgbovine
Ha, way to self-post, greg ;) but it seems like people are feelin' your
article, so keep up the good work.

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).

~~~
swombat
There's nothing wrong with self-posting on HN.

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coenhyde
Work hard, just don't push yourself harder than you find enjoyable. For a lot
of us that threshold is extremely high for hacking. This has always been my
philosophy and it work really well for a long time. I broke it recently and
paid the price.

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jakeludington
Is it truly work if you are enjoying what you are doing? One of the keys to
avoiding regret is to figure out how the things you need to do and the things
you love to do can be one and the same.

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Mz
_However, sometimes I do get caught up in chasing my dreams and forget to make
time for friends and family. Just like realizing dreams, successful
relationships are built on quality time spent together. I always appreciate
being reminded to dedicate more time to this essential part of life, as I was
today. I’d love to hear your thoughts or personal experiences on achieving the
right balance._

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.

