Eat. Sleep. Meh. Repeat.

Look, I get it — ▮▮▮▮▮▮▮ is a ▮▮▮ers conference, and the “eat, sleep, ▮▮▮, repeat” phrase is intended to be a clever way (albeit a completely unoriginal one) of saying “▮▮▮ing is awesome and we want to do it all the time!” I appreciate the enthusiasm, I do.

But there’s a damaging subtext, and that’s what bothers me. The phrase promotes an unhealthy perspective that ▮▮▮ing is an all or nothing endeavor — that to excel at it, you have to go all in. It must be all consuming and the focus of your life.

Such bullshit. In fact it’s the exact opposite.

At ▮▮▮▮▮▮▮ I work with some of the best ▮▮▮ers in the world. It’s no coincidence that they all have numerous interests and talents far outside of their ▮▮▮ing capabilities.

Whether it’s racing cars, loving art, reading, hiking, spending time in nature, playing with their dog, running, gardening, or just hanging out with their family, these top-notch ▮▮▮ers love life outside of ▮▮▮.

That’s because they know that a truly balanced lifestyle — one that gives your brain and your soul some space to breath non-▮▮▮ing air — actually makes you a better ▮▮▮er.

Life outside of ▮▮▮ helps nurture important qualities: inspiration, creative thinking, patience, flexibility, empathy, and many more. All of these skills make you a better ▮▮▮er, and you can’t fully realize them by just ▮▮▮ing.

— “Eat, sleep, code, repeat” is such bullshit (Signal v. Noise)

I guess if you extend the argument that less programming makes you a better programmer, then the best programmer is someone who has never programmed.

Not that I disagree that spending all of your spare time programming is a bad use of your time, but that, surely, the best programmer is the one who practices most. The key point is that since there are few interesting problems for programmers to solve, probably fewer than there are programmers who can/want to solve them, there is no point aiming to be the best.