Slightly controversial reasons for Burnout.

You have probably read about all the common reasons for feeling burnout: overload, lack of control, lack of recognition, mismatched values, handling too many things at once, lack of rest, etc. However, I will share some of my slightly controversial personal reasons for experiencing burnout.

I did not care about the people involved in the project.

This might sound arrogant and selfish, but I simply could not stand some of the team members. I felt sick knowing I had to deal with them on a daily basis. This is something that you cannot control, and you can't do anything about it. It would be terrible and a jerk move to ask managers to remove this person simply because of an ego conflict.

I did not care about the project.

This is very simple. I did not care about the outcome of the project. I thought it was a meaningless project. For some time it was fun working on it because I learned new things, but after a while, I simply stopped caring.

I did not get a pay raise in a while.

Yes, we developers are spoiled with all the money, candy, ping pong, and other bling they throw at us, but it is in our nervous system that we seek more. Progress means a lot to us, and even when we have enough, we want some kind of feedback that we made progress. In this case, feedback is money.

I had too much personal stuff I had to handle.

Software development is mental work. You spend your energy finding a solution to a given problem. Life, by definition, is complex, and dealing with life is energy-consuming work. Having to solve multiple things at once drains your energy, leading to burnout. I felt this on multiple occasions: figuring out where to live, buying my first home, dealing with car issues, supporting my wife with her education and work issues. The list goes on, and I bet you have your own examples of things that simply drain you.

Conclusion.

There is no wrong reason to feel burned out. We are only human, and if somebody pissed you off, that is okay. Software development is not easy, and when you have so many things that make your work harder, of course, you will break at some point.

Disclaimer.

This is my first blog post ever. I wanted to write a raw and honest article pointing out some things I have rarely seen people mention in blog posts and videos.

In the spirit of this blog post I will appreciate raw and honest feedback.

Thank you very much for reading and I hope this was helpful.