Managing mental health
Important: If you are experiencing a mental health crisis, please reach out to a mental health professional or a helpline immediately. All the advices shared here are based on personal experiences of community members and may not be suitable for everyone. The information provided here is not a substitute for professional advice.
Perspective & advice from the community
The following advice was shared on post titled, How do deal with burnout as a developer?.
The main enemy is stress - it comes in all forms and you might not even be able to recognise if you’re stressed.
8 hours of sleep: Don’t listen when people say 6h is enough, it is not. Not when you use your mind at full-throttle everyday
Stop chasing the next big goal - I learnt that if I “chase” much I find everything depressing. Like as if the best is the future and the present, which is also something I worked very hard for, is not being valued. I instead put in my best everyday, think only of my efforts “today” and breakdown all short/long term goals over a period of months. I gives me a breathing space and time to accommodate unexpected changes. Whatever you do, don’t stress.
I am not very aged so my experience might be limited but I realised if I did not manage my time, everything was going to be worthless. It also adds to the stress to be unorganised.
I found a really nice book on time management for a person in the corporate/IT industry. It has greatly helped me. Ofc there can be better books and techniques and I have read scores of books on time management, but this is the only one which worked for me. I realised the power of effective time management recently and now I’m able to fit my music learning , language learning (not coding languages), reading and yoga into my schedule without even feeling a bit of stress. Yeah, it requires you to throw out the gadgets for sometime but it is definitely worth it.
Edit: I was typing fast and I thought I had put the name of the book here lol. The book is “Make Time” by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky.
The following perspective was shared on a post titled, How do deal with burnout as a developer?.
I am currently working in a startup and there is work 24/7. Most of the time there is some deadline that we need to worry about. I'll tell you one great advice that my senior gave me- "Other people's emergency is not your emergency."
And most of the developers are not saving lives or working on something that is so time critical that would endanger lives. There is always time to do things the proper way.
Lastly, the worst they could do is fire you. That's it. And you'll find a better high paying job within weeks.
u/Stackway shared the following advice on a post titled, Is it burnout or lack of interest? Genuine question.
You’re experiencing burnout due to poor management in your organisation.
Every new language or framework has a learning curve. If your organisation is not giving you time to up-skill, it’s a project management problem. Additionally, it’s the individual developer who should be estimating the task rather than someone pushing a deadline.
Software development is a mentally exhausting activity. As your body needs rest after a run, your mind also needs a break every few hours. Crunching for 8-10 hours never produces optimum results. That’s why when you take a break, your mind resets & eureka moment happens.
When I run teams, I don’t expect any engineer to work more than 6 hours in a 8 hour schedule.
Software development is engineering not manufacturing. Unfortunately most companies in India do not understand this. It’s just about completing tasks with highest velocity. Treating software engineers as lemon & squeezing them to the point of burnout.
u/jp_majesty shared the following perspective on a post titled, How do you guys destress after a tiring day at work.
Something important that I have learnt the bad way is, Prioritise your health no matter what! Simply NOTHING matters more than your health. So:
- Do some form of exercise to keep your body fit.
- Eat right and at right times. One tends to really get into bad eating habits when they are stressed, I know I did and still do sometimes, so being aware helps.
- Good amount of sleep, period.
On the work front:
- Planning is important. If you plan well, estimate efforts well, schedule your tasks well and effectively communicate ( knowing how to say NO to more work without it coming off as blunt) , there is hope for timeboxing work . I know it's not easy, I know how people are unreasonable as fuck at work, it's still something I am working on BUT it does help. One of the primary reasons for slogging 11-12 hrs everyday is because we never manage expectations clearly.
Happiness Hour : Everyday, try to find sometime for something that you always wanted to do in life, something you enjoy doing, something which is effortless . For me, it was playing music on my electric guitar. Even if it's 15 mins, I sleep better at night knowing I tried . Hope this helps buddy. Wishing you tons of stress free weeks ahead!
u/kidakaka shared the following advice on a now deleted post, After work I just sleep and don't do anything else anymore.
OP, here's what I do. Divide the day into 3 slots. Before work, work and after work. Make sure there are enough hours in before and after.
Use the before slot for fitness and improving your body. This will give you more energy levels at work. Use the after slot for entertainment, study and relaxing your mind. This will help keep you sane during work.
I ain't telling you how to work :)
Use weekends to unwind and work on plans which have been long pending. If you do not have plans,.then start thinking about the things that worry you the most and what needs to be done to solve them. Work on those solutions during the weekends.
I hope this helps. Have been in tech for over 2.decades and I still code but that's mostly for fun.
u/the_kautilya shared the following perspective on a post titled, How do you handle stress?.
The main stress in IT comes not with the work but outside of the work, thinking about the work outside of work.
In my experience, 2 types of people do this:
- Those who don't work during working hours & then get stressed out with delivery timelines committed to others
- Those who are workaholics
Don't be either of these. Do you work during working hours, commit to realistic delivery schedules, don't over commit - you're not wearing red briefs over a blue bodysuit nor are you wearing a red bodysuit. You're only a human.
Doing the "thinking about work outside of work hours" occasionally is not a bad thing or a cause for concern. It just sometimes happens. Like if I'm working on a complex problem, sometimes mind wanders towards it while watching a movie or playing a game & some possible solution comes to mind - when that happens I just note down the line of thought I was going on (so that I can follow that lead next day when I start work again) & then I go back to whatever I was doing.
Some people would say meditation is good. If you can do it (not forcibly) then yes, its good & relaxes your mind.
Also, get a hobby or two to divert your attention. I play video games or watch a movie/show or play with my kid or meditate for a short time. This helps keep the mind relaxed. If your mind is relaxed, you will be able to better focus on work.
u/Mindless_Let_7583 shared the following advice on a post titled, What do you do to decompress? What's your outlook on life?
10 years of experience and counting. 6 years of that was as a tech lead for a small startup. So stress was super high.
The short answer is that it really depends on your character, tastes and interest. I will only be sharing what helps me and would like to make it clear that I am an introverted person as well, which biases my choice here.
- Parties and extremely "fun" activities are fun at a young age and as you grow, you will most likely slow down and enjoy more relaxing hobbies or interactions.
- Reading non tech related books helps me.
- I am a fairly good badminton player and I currently just train every day and that means a lot of my life is a compromise between my job and badminton. Maybe you like gaming, or open mics, or standup comedy. These things are also good socialising avenues where you are not really expected to do terrible damage to your body unlike parties.
- If you are driven by knowledge, even something as simple as learning a different tech stack than your work can help. It sometimes helps for me.
- Travel, meet new people, visit new places. The experience you gain by seeing more places cannot be replaced by reading about them or watching YouTube videos. It will help you grow as person too. I am a long time motorcyclist too and spend a large number of my weeks on hill stations around the western ghats.
- Keep good and fulfilling company, sometimes just sitting with someone you gel well with and doing the most silly of chores can relax you.
- Detox from tech as many times in a week as you can.
Related Discussions
- Suggestions on handling burnout as you age as Developer.
- Devs of India, how do you handle burn out?.
- I can’t do coding anymore, i am mentally and physically tortured.
- How do you handle stress?.
- Anxiety, stress and poor work life balance.