A Better Work-Life Balance Will Get Your Life Back​

Do you feel like you're so busy that you don't have time for a life? Do you feel as if you're constantly running behind? There are ways you can learn to negotiate your work life so that you become more productive. Once you become more organized at work, you can more fully enjoy your time away from work as well.

If you're not stressing about your job, you can relax when you're at home and live a more balanced life.

How can you be more productive? What can you do to improve the quality of your life?

Nobody reaches their full potential alone; which is why having a career mentor is so incredibly important. Today, I'm going to talk about the other side and reveal how rewarding it can be to share your experience with future generations.

Organizations that leverage social media to amplify their voices may find that they missed a crucial step. Often, people will not speak up, if we don't let them. Let's discuss how we can be sure to include diverse points of view.

How to be a happy developer is a question we get asked a lot. We’re often asked, what do we feel, is the best way to become a better developer. I want to share my thoughts and experience of getting to where I am today with anyone who is willing to listen. Making the right choices can open up whole new worlds of opportunities and happiness for you and your family.

Being a happy developer means being able to worry less about the big things. It means not worrying about an immediate paycheck, but thinking about the long-term impact of your work on people in the future.

Relax. You've got this​

You are busy. Between work and home life, there is not enough time to do everything. Learning how to maximize your potential is not about choosing what to do, vs what to ignore. Learning how to structure your day can help ease the burden.

De-stress your mess​

Interviewing is one of the most stressful aspects of your career; some of that stress and anxiety can be mitigated with practice and preparation.

While many companies these days are still accepting remote work, it won't be much longer until the industry returns to what it pretends to be normal. These tips work great for virtual interviews but should help you out if you are in person as well

Causes of burnout​

1. Sedation Spending too much time in one place, staring at the same things day-in-day-out.
2. Stress Programming is high-stress, high-mental energy. This can lead to mental breakdowns, depression, anxiety, etc. Don't be afraid to talk to a professional. It is especially useful to find a professional with experience with programmers if possible.
3. Monotony kills. Try to do smaller tasks and order tasks to prioritize variety and change.
4. Isolation. Talk to your friends, family, etc. regularly--even if it can only be virtual.

Eight Dimensions of burnout​

Everyone experiences burnout at least once during their career. What many people don't realize is that it can be felt in many forms[^1], and manifest in different ways.

How to keep your WSL instance up to date​

If you are like me, you prefer to always keep your packages as up-to-date as possible. You also like to automate things when possible to avoid repetitive admin tasks.

This script will call your default WSL instance [^1], and update/upgrade all packages.

Eight tips for becoming more productive as a developer​

10 months ago I transitioned to full-time remote work. First to help my medically fragile son, and then again for Covid-19 lockdown. This is a list of things that have helped me cope, and still have a good work-life balance.

What to do when you no longer love your work​

Burnout is a common, yet serious, mental health issue that plagues the dev industry. Devs often feel stuck working long hard hours with little reward or reprieve.

It can manifest as mental or physical stress and can be debilitating if not dealt with.

What do you do when you finish a tutorial​

So you've finally got around to watching that YouTube video or Udemy course? If you are like me, you need to apply the knowledge that you've learned as soon as you can, or you'll lose everything. Here are few things you can do to keep things fresh.

Quick Career Assessment​

This is a quiz about career success. It is a short quiz that will help you understand where you are at in your career and some things that you can do to define your definition of success. If you would like to share your results with me: you can take the online version at SurveyMonkey.

What does career success look like to me​

• The ability to love the work that I do
• The ability to work on interesting problems that provide a challenge.
• The ability to surround myself with people I respect and admire
• The ability to respect my employer
• A fair trade between the hours I put in, and the compensation for those hours
• The ability to make that choice myself

A Fresh Start​

This site has taken many forms over the years, started in 1996 hosted as a simple Geocities site it has evolved many times and many ways. Most have been hosted at Dreamhost, my vendor of choice for the past 15 or so years.

Stay curious! And other things I learned too late​

Stay curious about everything and anything that you can. Curiosity is the key to learning and knowledge, and will help you grow in ways you never imagined.

Be kind to yourself. Self-love is the most important love of all, so treat yourself with kindness and respect every day!

Be kind to others. You never know what someone is going through, so be kind to everyone you meet. You never know when you might need someone to be kind to you.