59 lines
2.9 KiB
Markdown
59 lines
2.9 KiB
Markdown
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---
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title: The Itch
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date: 2020-10-11
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tags:
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- 100DaysToOffload
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---
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# The Itch
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I write a lot. I code a lot. This leads to people asking me questions like "how
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do you have the energy to do that?" or "why do you keep doing that day in and
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day out?". I was reading [this
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post](https://aarontag.dev/2020/06/14/the-urge.html) that I found linked in the
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Forbidden Orange Site's comments and it really resonated with me.
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At the core, I have this deep burning sensation to try things out to see what
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they are like. It's like this itch deep in me that I can only scratch with
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writing, coding or sometimes even just answering people's questions in
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chatrooms. This itch is a catalyst to my productivity. It powers my daily work
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and makes me able to do what I do in order to make things better for everyone.
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However, sometimes the itch isn't there. Sometimes it makes me want to focus on
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something else. Trying to do something else without the itch empowering me can
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feel like swimming upstream with heavy chains wrapped around me. My greatest
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boon is simultaneously my greatest vice.
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I don't really know how to handle the days where it's not working. I try to save
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up my sick and vacation days so that I can avoid burning myself out on the bad
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days. Things like this are why I am a huge fan of unlimited vacation policies.
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Unlimited vacation does mean that I get paid out less money when I leave a job;
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however it means that I have the freedom to have bad days and let the good days
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tank me through the bad days so that I come out above average.
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Trying to explain this to people can feel stressful. Especially to a manager.
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I've had some bad experiences with that in the past. Phrase this wrong, and some
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people will hear "I don't want to do this work ever" instead of "I can't do this
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work today". This especially sucks when deadlines roll in and that vital itch
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goes away, leaving me at half capacity at the worst possible time.
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This itch leads me to set increasing standards on myself too. It's had some
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negative sides in that it makes me feel like I need to make everything better
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than the last thing. Each post better than the previous ones. Each project
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implementation better than the last. Onwards and onwards into a spiral that sets
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the bar so high I stress myself out trying to approach it.
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I haven't kept to my informal goal to have at least one post per week on this
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blog because of that absurdly high standard I set for myself. I'm going to try
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and change this. I'm going to start participating in [100 days to
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offload](https://100daystooffload.com). Expect some shorter and more focused
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posts for the immediate future. I am going to be working on the Rust series,
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however each part of it will be in isolation from here on out instead of the
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longer multifaceted posts.
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This is day 1 of my 100 days to offload.
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Also be sure to check out my post on
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[Palisade](https://tech.lightspeedhq.com/palisade-version-bumping-at-scale-in-ci/),
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a version bumping tool for GitHub repositories.
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