Coding as a hobby? For me, non-work coding is a regimen, like going to the gym
Tags: career, coding, developer, discuss
Published: 2019-03-21 16:07:05

---
title: Coding as a hobby? For me, non-work coding is a regimen, like going to the gym
published: true
description: In this post, I explain my perspective on coding as a regimen. I contrast the regimen approach with a more prevalent view: coding as a hobby.
canonical_url: https://www.pskirko.com/2019/02/02/coding-as-a-hobby/
tags: #career, #coding, #developer, #discuss
---

![](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/j9zwwwuye7d57db3rr9i.jpg)

_The opinions stated here are my own, not those of my company._

This post is also available on my website ([link to post](https://www.pskirko.com/2019/02/02/coding-as-a-hobby/)). Read it there or here; up to you!

## Who is this post for?

You should read this post if you are trying to get better at coding. If you have questions or stories to share, please comment!

## tl;dr

Don’t feel pressured to treat coding as a hobby if you don’t actually find it fun and relaxing. If your goal is to get better at coding, just treat non-work coding as a regimen, like going to the gym.

## Coding as a hobby

Stack Overflow runs a developer survey every year. In the [results for the 2019 survey](https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019), a whopping [80% of respondents said they code as a hobby](https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#developer-profile-_-coding-as-a-hobby)!

![](https://thepracticaldev.s3.amazonaws.com/i/q925ba2kj0vbbd02vs9k.png)

Of course, don’t misinterpret this statistically. This survey is voluntary, so it suffers from [selection bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selection_bias), which means that the 80% only applies to the survey respondents; it doesn’t apply to all developers.

## Is coding my hobby?

Not really. Let me explain.

My hobbies are things I do to relax, learn outside of work, have fun with my family, etc. Riding bicycles, re-learning to play guitar (after many years of inactivity), playing Lego with the kids, etc.

I don’t find coding outside of work relaxing during the work week because **I spend all day at work either coding or dealing with code (filing bugs, discussing fixes, etc)**. By the end of the day, I really don’t want to see any more code.

Furthermore, the weekend is generally family time. By the end of the night, once the kids are asleep, I’m pretty tired. I want to veg out, not code.

## Do you want to become a better coder?

I do, for a few reasons.

First, even though I don’t code as a _hobby_ myself, I do consider it a core _mental activity_, like reading, writing, doing math, etc. It should be a standard part of the K-12 curriculum. Even if you don’t like coding, [software is eating the world](https://a16z.com/2011/08/20/why-software-is-eating-the-world/). Since coding is a core mental activity, getting better at it is innately rewarding.

Second, I feel a lot of professional pressure in my career as a software developer to keep getting better. For example, to get a job at a better company, to get a better job in your current company, to cultivate a specialization, to get promoted to a lead or manager role, etc. For these reasons alone I take coding as a non-work regimen fairly seriously.

## Does the code you write at work make you a better coder?

This is not a trick question. If you feel like the code you write at work is consistently making you a better coder, day after day, year after year, that’s great. I am curious how common that is.

In my experience, the code I write at work _only occasionally_ makes me a better coder overall. This has been true over my whole 16+ year career. Once in a while, I get a nice tricky problem, delve into a language feature I haven’t used before, or start something from scratch, and I learn something new. It’s great when it happens!

The rest of time, I am writing code that is similar to the code I’ve written before. I can still learn things here, such as getting faster, writing code that is easier to read and understand, etc. But in my experience, I have learned the most by tackling problems that are **unfamiliar, hard, and without obvious solutions**. My day-to-day work has never satisfied that for long stretches of time, which is why I have adopted a coding regimen outside of work.

## What is my coding regimen?

My coding regimen is super simple. I try to code outside of work for at least 1 hour a week. That’s it. Regimens don’t have to be obsessive or overbearing.

Of course, when I have applied for new jobs in the past, I have adopted a much more intense period of study and practice. But my day-to-day regimen is meant for slow, steady progress.

## Conclusion

That’s it! If you love coding as a hobby, good for you. If you don’t, but still want to get better, consider adopting a coding regimen outside of work.

This is Version 1.2 of this post. You can see other versions (older, and possibly newer) at my GitHub repo ([link to post](https://github.com/pskirko/pskirko-website-writing/blob/master/2019/02/02/coding-as-a-hobby.md)).