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I am leading a team to make another product. There is plenty of work, a large business impact, and enough time for me to knock out a bunch of it. But I feel no motivation to write code. Instead I distract myself with searching for more knowledge. I keep hoping that inspiration will strike.
I love to rise to technical challenges, and doing so will usually trigger a flurry of coding. But once completed it seems I never want to do a similar thing again. Despite this I have managed to release multiple successful products. But after a long career, it seems hard to find challenges that motivate me in the work that my employer actually needs done.
I feel guilty for even coming to work, knowing that I will not bring that much value today. So I am nearly out of vacation days. But when I take off, I also feel guilty for not being there to help the team.
I am always up for helping the team, and I spend a chunk of most days doing that. I give them ideas and help them get past technical obstacles and keep the vision for what we are doing fresh in their minds. But that does not fill my day. I still have a lot of time to stare at the screen and try to convince myself to write code that I know needs to be written. That people are expecting me to write. But I do not want to, and I hate myself for that. "Just write something already!"
I go home with the frustration of not achieving "a job well done". When I wake up the next day, I know the same fate awaits me. It is difficult to get out of bed. On the way to work, I try to prep myself to just get in and start writing code. But things always come up right away. When I finally sit down to code, momentum is gone.
It is not always this way. I have productive seasons, and seasons like this.
Am I just burned out? Has anyone been in or seen this pattern before? Please share your experiences with this.