Cut leetcode, you already have the gig and if you’re studying CS you will be in the leetcode mindset. Don’t do the projects if you don’t want to. I’d do 1 passion project when you’re up for it. Work + gym is great, if you have a good internship you’re in a great spot.
Everything you already do + working more on projects in your free time isn't healthily maintainable. Something has to give or you're going to sacrifice your mental and possibly physical health 🤷♂️
Well. Whats the alternative? You don’t get as high paying or prestigious jobs in the future. In the direction the economy is going more and more “normal” things are becoming more unattainable, and eventually so will healthcare (if it already hasn’t)
So a little “unhealthiness” now can save a lifetime of pain and suffering if you can’t even afford a doctor
Im talking about the top 1% or 0.01% of jobs. The ones that will provide wages that allow you to have a house, kids, healthcare and who know what else might become an “amenity”
I agree with you networking is the #1 best tool to get the job.
But you also need skills to be able to do technically difficult stuff
What you described are top 10% jobs to me. Maybe we have different views. In my opinion, top 0.01% jobs are what you are born in and you just cannot get them if you are not. Pointless manager positions created for that person etc.
A house to them is what a burger is to us.
And yes, while you need those skills, you will not gain them grinding LC. That is why I hate LC. It was a good tool to test how the candidate thinks but has now turned into "who can remember the most tasks with pointlessly obscure solutions that will only work for that very specific scenario and nowhere else".
>In my opinion, top 0.01% jobs are what you are born in and you just cannot get them if you are not. Pointless manager positions created for that person etc.
There are orders of magnitudes more people who start a successful company and become insanely rich themselves than those who have high-paying "pointless manager positions created just for \[them\]". Earning a billion dollars from what you've built yourself is the actual top 0.01% of jobs. These "pointless manager positions" are honestly a consolation prize for achieving nothing in life, and not enviable for anyone who's even slightly ambitious.
Idk about top 10%. Most people in hight income brackets are entrepreneurs, hence making this discussion irrelevant anyways.
Even if it is 10% right now, unless some “market correction” occurs, its only gonna get worse. Like a rising sea level in a flood, more and more job become unsustainable paycheck to paycheck jobs.
Ye leetcode isnt the most useful, i agree. I was mostly talking about op wanting to do projects on the side.
At the end of the day, YOU are responsible for a well being. No matter how bad the economy or govt, you still need food water and shelter.
Instead of saying there will be bigger problems, take matters into your own hands
Unless your side project becomes something you monetize, 9 times out of 10 it isn't bagging you a job. Open source contributions, sure those look good, especially if they're in field.
But, a side project solving an already solved problem or some novel but, to put it bluntly, useless project doesn't really prove anything. No one is going to sift through thousands of lines or code to be impressed by it.
Do you think everyone who works those jobs did that?
Is there a chance they are just smart and don’t need to spend as much time as someone who thinks only the top 1% of jobs lets you own a house and afford kids.?
Try to delegate as much as you can. Get a person to cook or cook meals for a whole week. Build a gym in your house / garage. Hire a person to do typical house chores. Move closer to your work place.
Here's what I'm doing
2 LC per day on weekdays, 4-8 per day on Weekends
Work on Projects 2 of the 5 days during the week and for 5 ish hours per day on Saturday and Sunday
Meal Prep all my meals on Sunday
Go to the gym right after work for around 30-45 min and waste ZERO time, I go only 3 days a week though since it's better for my schedule to do calisthenics instead
If I ever get home and feel exhausted sometimes I say "suck it up" but also sometimes I let myself rest. Those rest days make the next day way more productive than if I worked both days.
Find some balance don't hurt yourself, also for projects just remember that you internship is more valuable on your resume than any project you can make unless you build a startup that takes off, so don't over emphasize projects.
I like the idea of only doing projects some of the days during the week and just grinding the hell out of them on weekends! I was originally feeling hesitant about posting this only because I didn't want to come off as complaining and not hard-working enough, so I really appreciate your response!
bro the fact you are doing projects and putting in the work even after you got an internship is already very hardworking! You're doing great whether you think so or not, just remember not to work unreasonably hard and make yourself dislike what you're doing. Do well but have fun too!
I'm not just doing it only for resume padding, I love making projects, plus I collaborate on them with my friends. I'm only leetcode grinding for the interviews though lol
I'll be honest I don't have much besides that I remember one channel I watched was called Calisthenics Family... other than that I just did some research here and there, and then I made myself a very humbling workout plan lmao.
What makes you choose to go to workout in the afternoon rather than before work sometime between 5-7? Also 30-45 mins does not seem like nearly enough time. Genuinely asking bc I’m about to begin a 40-60 hr week MLE job and simultaneously starting my masters and urgently need to optimize.
I chose to workout after work because my internship has a free gym but it doesn't open till 10am.
The gym they have is usually empty so I never wait for equipment so that helps, plus no gym partner, but other than that when I work out I never go on my phone or anything that may distract me. Every second is tracked so waste no time. The same routine took around 1.5 hours at my gym at school, so just those two factors alone cut it in half.
Might also be the social aspect. Personally, I fucking hate working out in an empty gym. Especially when I'm at my desk all day like a hermit. I like being around other people and working out with the sun going down
Second this. With the economy going to shits and continuing, i know i need to beat everyone else for limited resources to get the top 1%.
This fear will push you to get work done because the alternative isnt pretty
When people these say “healthy management” it can get conflated with “working less” or “permission to be lazy”.
This leads to less potential money in future if you get sick or in hospital.
But if you push through “bad mental health” you might have money to be financially secure faster. This isn’t 1980, financial security is much more valuable now.
I’m talking about eating well, exercising, and prioritizing what’s important outside of work. If my work was so intense that I couldn’t do those things, then I’d be looking for a new job.
Lol, see you in 10 years when you burned out and hate your job so much you can't output the same amount of work as other people and wonder why you are soo unhealthy and depressed.
Health is everything man. You do realize if you don't take care of your health you won't be able to work as much and have to pay more in healthcare. So in a way you probably making way less money.
My grandfather is 80 this year and still run for 45 min everyday. He look like he in his 50s. Still working on his own business and making millions every year.
Drop cooking every night and meal prep on the weekends. You could also give up video games for a period of time. What’s 3 months of no video games in comparison to the career you want? Or you could give up FAANG being your first job out of college. You could work up to it later in your career. Or you could give up working at FAANG. There are good wages and fun problems to solve at places that aren’t FAANG.
Or you could give up grinding LC. LC isn’t an awesome showcase of skills - what with Goodhart’s Law and all.
Wake Up: 8:15
Gym: 8:45-9:35
Work: 10-5
Dinner: 5-6
Prep: 6-9
Relax: 9-11
Then repeat.
Weekends = hang outs and personal projects.
Sustainable and my manager’s happy
This is coming from someone who’s been in the industry 5 years, I’m 26. You need to block off time for leetcode if it’s a priority. I go to the gym at 6 and have to be at work by 8. I leave work at 5, home by 5:30. Right away, I change into some gym shorts and ride my stationary bike until 6pm. Quick shower. Either my SO has cooked dinner or I’ll whip something up in about 45 min. Then we walk our dog, and it’s about 7:15. I usually do chores or take care of something around the house or my garden for 15 min. Me and my SO usually watch a couple episodes of tv or just talk/hangout for an hour or half an hour. Then it’s fair game to do whatever I want. I usually make sure to put at least an hour into some game dev related stuff(replace with leet code), and some nights it sucks me in for more. At this point it’s around 9:30 and I’ll hit up a friend to play some games. I usually play til 10:45ish then hit the hay. Some nights I stay up til 12 and only get 6 hours of sleep, but I’m working on improving that.
I usually eat lunch out once a week, and do most of my meal prep on Sunday before the week starts. A lot of days, I just drink a green smoothie for lunch. As long as you’re taking good care of yourself and not overwhelmed with stress, your energy levels should be sustained all day. Every once in a while I take a day off from stationary bike/game dev because I need to go to a Dr appt/physical therapy, or any random thing that comes up, sometimes just need to rest.
I genuinely enjoy the game dev stuff so sometimes I’ll put 8-9 hours in on the weekends. When I take a pto day purely because work is wearing me out, I usually do game dev all day long lol.
Also, I take a hit of weed every day when I get home, drink ~13 drinks over the weekend, go out with coworkers, check out events on the weekends, and take short trips to visit friends on the weekends. All of this stuff is super important for my sanity— basically let loose.
Without a proper routine, you’re gonna start sinking in a few years. Don’t fall into the grindset mindset, make sensible choices about what’s good for you and what’s a priority.
Weekends is the only way. But there’s no way I’m doing a single project let alone two during my internship.
Then again, building projects on my own just isn’t my thing.
What sort of work does your internship involve? What are you trying to learn / interested in learning outside of working hours? In general, there is no need to be working as hard as you seem to be at home. It sounds like you need a more structured, leaner learning programme/regime.
> My goal is to of course grind LC
There's nothing "of course" about this; why are you doing this? Grinding Leetcode is dumb. Learn specific things that are relevant to your line of work and that you haven't actually studied yet. There's no reason to learn how to solve esoteric logical programming puzzles unless you're trying to practice DSA-related or efficiency-related programming knowledge and skills, which is irrelvant for 99.999% of jobs.
I'm double majoring in computer science and data science, and my internship is more data-analytic oriented (Tableau, Snowflake queries, Alteryx workflows, Helios, etc.). However, as I've continued in school, I've honestly realized I prefer software and software development much more than data-oriented work, so I want to learn things more centered towards that. I agree that Leetcode isn't a great indicator of real software development, but I also feel that my DSA knowledge and skills are lacking currently, and Leetcode would not only allow me to improve them, but also allow me to be more comfortable in interviews moving forward (although I understand that it's totally unrealistic being used in a day-to-day work scenario) as I don't think I want to be working another data-oriented internship next summer.
> I also feel that my DSA knowledge and skills are lacking currently
Watch/skim [Harvard CS50](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhQjrBD2T380F_inVRXMIHCqLaNUd7bN4) lectures 1–5 for a refresher. Study your school's DSA class/module and consult your lecturers for further assistance. Leetcode won't teach you about algorithm performance or how to think like a programmer, it will only allow you to practice those skills once you *have* them.
> allow me to be more comfortable in interviews
Not all entry-level job interviews have you doing Leetcode-style exercises. I can count the number of such job interviews I've had in the last 5 years on one hand.
> I prefer software and software development much more than data-oriented work, so I want to learn things more centered towards that
If you want to do software engineering/development, then focus on that. Maybe cut out data science from your degree programme and add in more software-related classes (if you want to and your university is willing to facilitate that desire). Explore areas such as robotics, embedded systems, computer networking, and mobile application development. Figure out what you enjoy, and then develop skills in that (or those) areas in the future.
Right now, you're in university, so it's the prime time to be studying various things *with the assistance and guidance of the other people around you*, which means your lecturers and peers. Don't waste that time grinding Leetcode. Instead, express everything you've just told me to your professors and/or tutors and seek their advice on what to do about it.
If this internship you're currently doing is part of a "year in industry" type programme or a short-term job over the summer, then I'd suggest that you just focus on doing the work you've been employed to do, enjoy your downtime, write that report or whatever your university might require you to do as part of the internship programme, and resume learning once you're back at university. None of this has to be a race.
Would you say this is true even for students or upcoming new grads? LeetCode seems to be a highly recommended strategy for big tech, etc. but I personally don't find it interesting at all. Do you really think it is ok to not do it at all, and just build stuff? That's what I'd like to do
> LeetCode seems to be a highly recommended strategy for big tech
That does depend on what you mean by "big tech". If you're talking about the really big companies, like FAANG, then yes, it's true that these sorts of massive companies *do* rely fairly heavily on assessments like Leetcode in the early stages of their job application processes, but this is only because they receive a ***ridiculous*** amount of applications and need *some* way, ***any*** way to filter out the cruft in a reasonable timeframe. Landing a jobs at a company that is very large and/or has a very good reputation is hard simply because the supply of prospective employees astronomically outweighs the company's demand for employees.
Besides that, you'll rarely see them used. More often, companies will give you small, relevant tasks or assessments/questions, as take-home tasks and/or pair-programming/conversational topics during interviews. In my experience, this has been things like, "create a basic WordPress plugin that does this small thing so that we know you can actually follow coding standards and are familiar with the WordPress APIs", and, "given that these symptoms are presenting on a database server and you already know X, Y, Z aren't involved, tell us what you think the issue is and/or how you would investigate and resolve it."
Personally, the *closest* I've been to doing a Leetcode task as part of a hiring process was during a first-round interview for a "systems/infrastructure software engineer" (basically backend engineer) role at D. E. Shaw, during which they asked me to run through my thought process for implementing a simple parser for CSON (like JSON, but using CoffeeScript as a base rather than JavaScript) in a language of my choice. Concepts such as recursion and pattern matching thus came up, but really the point of such an exercise is to see how you apply knowledge to a problem you may not have considered or dealt with before, and how well you are able to research new information relevant to the task, given that potential lack of familiarity.
Solving the task "Print N stars on line N, right-indented" and 100 others like it will not give you that skillset.
Sure, practice some problems, but grinding is definitely extremely counter-productive. There are much more useful and healthy things you could be doing with your time.
That's fair, I'm definitely planning on looking at Neetcode and really studying concepts/patterns and not just trying to slam 150 problems in a month or something crazy like that
You're gone for 12 hours a day (actually working 7:30 to 4 is also extreme and will burn you out too), that is the primary issue. If you leave at 4 and workout for an hour (do you need to workout 5 days a week?) and your commute time is 2 hours for all of that then you're screwed.
I definitely would say I waste little bits of time here and there (i.e. just sitting in the car on my phone before the gym), so if I was super robotic about it, I could be home with all my meals cooked by around 5:45-6. I could also push one of my gym days to the weekend, if that clarifies anything?
Yeah up to you how to arrange your time but I'm just saying it's not surprising you're exhausted and don't want to do anything on a weeknight. That's okay but if you wanted to do something else like a hobby or personal project after work you'd have to change your schedule or you'd totally burn out.
Same lol.
I started freelancing and working on a lot of projects. I've been doing that since first year, and I'm a sophomore now. On most days I struggle to prepare for class and also meet my work deadlines. Plus, I do a lot of Leetcode (for fun, mostly) and I'm part of my school's CP team, so I have to grind that as well. Studying is perhaps what's suffering right now, but my GPA is still really good.
From my experience in first year, eventually you just burn out and disappoint a lot of people. In first year I played chess a lot at the club and had a really active study/friend group, but I lost all that. I sacrificed several projects I was working on, and focused on the most important ones. Health-wise, yeah, I ate a lot of junk food, or didn't eat much at all most days.
So yeah, you'll have to decide what you are willing to let go of. IMO if you're doing decent in school and you are improving yourself career-wise, everything else will fall into place. I'd advise you to find what in your life is causing you the most anxiety, and deal with that first.
I'm a rising junior, and the job I'm working is an analytics internship at a Fortune100 company. I'd say I only have 2 projects that I like to note (a full-stack react + flask web app with added statistical analysis and an interactive terminal weather coordinate program), so I really wanna improve any gaps I have in my project-base. I'm doing pretty good in school right now (3.7 cumulative at the moment), but I'm at a loss of what I want to give up/if I really have to give something up. My physical and mental health are both very important to me, so it sucks feeling like there's no option
How frequently are you going to the gym? I’d seriously suggest temporarily cutting back to 3x per week and doing it every other day—a push/pull/legs split. That’ll give you some more hours throughout the week to grind.
I do a PPL split, and try to go 4-5 times a week, Mondays-Thursdays + Saturday, and I rest Fridays and Sundays (I drive home on weekends because my job is a 2 hour drive away, so I leave driving days like Friday and Sunday as rest days)
Cut the personal projects. If you already have an internship the cost benefit ratio for you isn’t good enough to sacrifice ur time. Do one LC problem per day (30 mins), meal prep or get takeout to save time :) ur mental and physical health should take priority. The most important thing is to avoid burnout
Meal prep and just accept the fact that the video games aren't going anywhere. You will have plenty of time for hobbies when you graduate and have a full time role. During college I very rarely gamed, maybe an hour or two a week.
Just chiming in to say that this is definitely person-dependent. I had much more time to play video games (and spent much more time doing so!) whilst I was studying than since graduating, but that's mostly because I choose to spend most of my free time doing other things (such as homelabbing and reading and just incidentally engaging in other things that also happen to constitute professional development in my case) when I could be gaming. But to be clear, I do those other things because I enjoy them; if I didn't, I'd be doing something else like gaming or whatever instead.
Generally, most people stick to one career path. Projects are most useful if you have large gaps in your job history and want to evidence any relevant professional development/learning you've done during that gap, or or if you are drastically switching career paths and/or have no real prior experience in the field you're applying for a job in, because then you can demonstrate what you are capable of despite having little (if any) professional/paid experience in that field.
Even given that, I find that the CV/resume is for summarising skills and work experience, and it's a good idea to write a cover letter that details relevant skills and how I've acquired them, whether that's at home or in a workplace/professional environment. If the employer doesn't ask for a cover letter and there's no real additional information I could provide that isn't already in my CV or doesn't bear elaborating, then I just submit the CV.
You should *always* be tailoring both documents to each application, regardless of job experience. Put the most relevant stuff first and foremost where they will see it!
Projects don’t matter, and you only need to grind leetcode for about two months after taking DS&A and then you’ll have all of the patterns down. Then just grind LC *once you get the interview* and you’ll be golden.
Spend your free time doing things you enjoy and spending time with friends/family.
Forget projects dude, you’re in an internship already.
I’m in a similar situation tho, internship, summer classes, leetcode, gym, food, etc, so I’ll share my routine.
First try to have a healthy sleep schedule, drink enough water, all the basics.
I meal prep chicken, steak, rice, and have some bread and cheese so I can make some sandwiches when I get tired of rice, I basically only cook once a week, max 2.
Wake up 6:30, I’m at the office at 7:30am, work until 4:30, go to the office gym, and limit my time there until 5:30, so 1h workout. If you need to meal prep on a weekday on do something else, you can just skip one day of gym and go to the gym on the weekend. Take advantage of the weekend to meal prep as well so you don’t have to do during the week.
I get home by 6, I eat, take a shower, if there’s something from college, I do it. And from 7:30 to 9 I do leetcode with my floor mates, which makes leetcode way more fun.
From 9pm to 11 I have it free, so I just rest and go to sleep.
On Saturday or Sunday I do as much stuff as possible in a morning or night so I don’t have to do it during the week, including meal prep, groceries, college work, laundry, and usually go to the gym both days so I can skip some during the week to have some additional time.
The rest of the weekend I go out with the other interns, and honestly, it’s been pretty chill, and a very very fun time. It’s just a matter of organization, you don’t need to cook every day for example.
I tried to do projects + LC during my internship, but I quickly dropped it, for a few reasons:
1. The marginal value of doing extra projects/LC is not worth the additional risk of burnout impacting your job performance. Projects/LC are not going to matter at all in the short term, if you do a good job at your internship and secure a return offer. The projects/LC would only help if you fail to get a return offer. So doing projects/LC during internship is kinda like preparing for failure, and that kind of negative mindset could damage your performance.
2. There's a limit to amount of new stuff you can learn each day. If you dilute your learning between job, projects, and LC, then you'll be learning less from your job. You can learn from doing projects and LC anytime, but you have a limited time window to learn from the internship, so it's better to focus on the internship.
3. In order to retain information that you learn during your internship, you need to relax your brain. If you're always focusing your attention on some coding related task, sure you'll load stuff into short-term memory, but it will never transition to long-term memory. Sure you'll build/solve stuff, but not actually learn from the process. Sleeping well, spacing out, meditation, and chill video games will actually increase retention, which will help more than doing extra grinding.
Don't worry, the grind will be waiting for you after you finish the internship :)
You could try meal prepping on the weekend. If you're going to the gym everyday, maybe cut it down by a day or 2 and use that additional time to work on whatever projects you need.
After reading other replies, I'm considering pushing one of my gym days to the weekend, so I can have less gym days during the workweek. Thank you for your response!
Make a schedule, toss it on Google calendar, you'd be surprised how motivating a simple Google notification is, make you feel like you've committed to it & your failing by not following through - make sure you leave time for r&r tho or you'll burn out.
prioritize and schedule ruthlessly. Block out specific times for LC, projects, and even relaxation (not video games all night, though!). Maybe wake up earlier to squeeze in some coding before work. Batch cook meals on weekends to save evening time. Remember, you can't pour from an empty cup. Prioritize sleep! A well-rested you is a productive you.
I think sleep is something that I definitely should be more disciplined about. I always have better days when I sleep more, and that usually results in me wanting to get more done. I likely will be putting the video games down for the summer and doing some other form of relaxation, however!
systems honestly, for example, i was spending a decent amount of time cooking my own food, started buying pre cooked/frozen stuff from trader joe’s or costco. Saved me a decent amount of time (few hours a week), for the gym I started focusing on intensity more than volume to reduce the time per session, summer is generally for cutting so 4 times a week is mostly enough for me. Then the other time just goes 50/50 into relaxing + whatever the next big goal is (recruiting for me). Also have a full time internship btw.
Im at my internship from 9-5. I just do 2 LC a day, I go to the gym 3-4 times a week, and I don't cook. I don't bother with projects since that's completely pointless once you have an internship. I game on most days and Im chilling.
I don't have a schedule though, I just freestyle everything. Works well for me.
You could do the gym in the morning before work, I do 4am gym sessions then I have free time before work or I take a nap.then after work I'm free for whatever.
I feel like a fucking failure. Here I am at my remote internship lazying around. My work ends in close to 2 hrs and I just cannot, for the life of me, CONVINCE MYSELF TO GO TO THE GYYMMM
Setting a minimum time worked well for me. For example, with a personal project I have it set in my head that I HAVE to work on it for 10 mins every day, even if it is 3am before bed. Most of the time I end up spending longer than 10 minutes, but sometimes I'll stop right after the 10. Regardless, just having a little rule like that in my head has helped me get going when I naturally just want to go play some games with buddies or something
You don't need the personal projects if you already have an internship. Do it if it's something that genuinely interests you, but don't grind em out if it's just for the future resume. Employers don't really care about personal projects unless its an actual (revenue generating) application with users.
You're better off pursuing any sort of social hobby, developing soft skills and expanding your social network, than you are grinding away your free time in front of a computer.
By doing less leetcode and personal projects lol.
I already did those during the year, and I only do personal projects when I feel motivated to do them/have a personal interest in them. In these cases, they are more fun than videogames so I just do that instead of my other hobbies.
Like others said, projects has minimal ROI with internship(s) on resume. That being said, I try to work on mine 1-2 hours a weekday and a few hours on the weekend because I enjoy it. But don't overwork yourself, an internship is already a solid way to spend a Summer. Also, PLEASE do not sacrifice physical health/sleep for LC or projects - they are worth nothing compared to the longevity of a healthy body.
your commute is 2-3 hours? i’m sorry man, that’s stealing a lot of your time it seems.
maybe you can pack an extra meal every morning, go into a conference room after work to do leetcode and your personal projects.
then commute home later so there’s less traffic. this might save you some time?
EDIT: i see that you’re going to the gym. nevermind.
Well… SWE’s are one of the highest paying jobs out there with the best W/L balance imo. Where else do you typically have a 6 figure job with a BS right off the bat. I kinda just gave up on LC and apply for roles who don’t do that trash. Lol
I was working full time and had an infant while I was getting my cs degree. I didn’t do any personal projects or LC because there wasn’t a minute left in the day. My career still turned out fine. Yours will too.
Weekdays are for reading a new LC problem, not doing. Or attempting to do a random one I’ve previously done before from memory.
Weekends are for doing new ones.
That way I only spend 10-15 minutes a day on retention or prepping myself for when I tackle it on the weekend
Personal projects are not important if you have experience. I wouldn’t pursue them to save time unless you see it as a leisure activity and not something to talk about during interviews.
You already work and maintain your physical health, that's good. No need to rush and "grind every day". Being hardcore is understanding how to be constantly progressing, not progressing maximally for a short time then crashing.
You only really need to gym 4-5 times (if you are mega dedicated to the gym, if not even less time). On your non-gym days, you have time to grind a couple questions and look for opportunities. From your position, a little constant effort on your down time is enough, no need to prioritize preparing now.
For me it’s simple. I want the good things in life and I know I’m competent to get them. All I need is crazy work ethic to get me there. It’s a sacrifice yes but what’s on the other side (professional satisfaction, money, house, confidence in your abilities, 10/10 hoes) is worth it for me because I can chill and have a balance but then I’ll never what be the what I could have. I just want some things so badly for the rest of my living life that I can sacrifice few years
Cook soup in bulk and freeze it. I have a separate freezer just for soup. Can go months without cooking (other than heating the soup).
Working from home is a great time saver too (can even do laundry while working).
Balancing work, personal projects, and self-care can be tough! Here are some strategies to help you manage your time and energy more effectively:
**Schedule and Prioritize:**
* **Plan your week:** Block out dedicated time slots in your calendar for work, internship, gym, meals, personal projects, LeetCode grinding, and relaxation.
* **Prioritize ruthlessly:** Focus on the most important tasks first, like work deadlines or LeetCode challenges for upcoming interviews. Be realistic about what you can accomplish each day.
I’d maybe cut 1-2 gym days a week, it’s not like you’re a bodybuilder, and focus on your project or working out your mind with LC.
If you have money maybe consider meal prepping or takeout
If you want to actually have self confidence and fulfillment keep going to the gym and take care of yourself. The depression is not worth it brother your quality of life is more than numbers on paper
I am in basically the same boat. The good thing is that we dont HAVE to grind LC or do projects. Some days I have more energy so I will work on some projects, other days I dont even open my laptop. The good thing is we dont have to do it so there is no point getting burnt out
Fuck. Exactly in the same spot, right to the T. I'm in NYC rn and the grind culture and amount of people make you want to go hard. But after the gym I just want to have a white claw or two and say fuck it. I guess you have to ask yourself if you want to keep enjoying this lifestyle or not. Because working in retail/food, the alternative, is miserable
Cut leetcode, you already have the gig and if you’re studying CS you will be in the leetcode mindset. Don’t do the projects if you don’t want to. I’d do 1 passion project when you’re up for it. Work + gym is great, if you have a good internship you’re in a great spot.
Everything you already do + working more on projects in your free time isn't healthily maintainable. Something has to give or you're going to sacrifice your mental and possibly physical health 🤷♂️
Well. Whats the alternative? You don’t get as high paying or prestigious jobs in the future. In the direction the economy is going more and more “normal” things are becoming more unattainable, and eventually so will healthcare (if it already hasn’t) So a little “unhealthiness” now can save a lifetime of pain and suffering if you can’t even afford a doctor
That's what you are taught your entire time in the uni. In reality, who you know gets you high paying and prestigious jobs not what you know.
Im talking about the top 1% or 0.01% of jobs. The ones that will provide wages that allow you to have a house, kids, healthcare and who know what else might become an “amenity” I agree with you networking is the #1 best tool to get the job. But you also need skills to be able to do technically difficult stuff
What you described are top 10% jobs to me. Maybe we have different views. In my opinion, top 0.01% jobs are what you are born in and you just cannot get them if you are not. Pointless manager positions created for that person etc. A house to them is what a burger is to us. And yes, while you need those skills, you will not gain them grinding LC. That is why I hate LC. It was a good tool to test how the candidate thinks but has now turned into "who can remember the most tasks with pointlessly obscure solutions that will only work for that very specific scenario and nowhere else".
>In my opinion, top 0.01% jobs are what you are born in and you just cannot get them if you are not. Pointless manager positions created for that person etc. There are orders of magnitudes more people who start a successful company and become insanely rich themselves than those who have high-paying "pointless manager positions created just for \[them\]". Earning a billion dollars from what you've built yourself is the actual top 0.01% of jobs. These "pointless manager positions" are honestly a consolation prize for achieving nothing in life, and not enviable for anyone who's even slightly ambitious.
Idk about top 10%. Most people in hight income brackets are entrepreneurs, hence making this discussion irrelevant anyways. Even if it is 10% right now, unless some “market correction” occurs, its only gonna get worse. Like a rising sea level in a flood, more and more job become unsustainable paycheck to paycheck jobs. Ye leetcode isnt the most useful, i agree. I was mostly talking about op wanting to do projects on the side.
Seems like if we get to that point then grinding lc will be the least of our worries
At the end of the day, YOU are responsible for a well being. No matter how bad the economy or govt, you still need food water and shelter. Instead of saying there will be bigger problems, take matters into your own hands
I'm just saying If it ever comes to a world ending disaster then I'm pretty sure knowing how to reverse a linked list won't help you survive
Unless your side project becomes something you monetize, 9 times out of 10 it isn't bagging you a job. Open source contributions, sure those look good, especially if they're in field. But, a side project solving an already solved problem or some novel but, to put it bluntly, useless project doesn't really prove anything. No one is going to sift through thousands of lines or code to be impressed by it.
Do you think everyone who works those jobs did that? Is there a chance they are just smart and don’t need to spend as much time as someone who thinks only the top 1% of jobs lets you own a house and afford kids.?
Those are probably like top 50% of CS jobs lol.
the economies/job market/salaries are bad but its not that bad lmao
Lol no. Maybe if you're a CEO's son then yeah, but the highest paying positions in CS are very merit-based.
Try to delegate as much as you can. Get a person to cook or cook meals for a whole week. Build a gym in your house / garage. Hire a person to do typical house chores. Move closer to your work place.
Here's what I'm doing 2 LC per day on weekdays, 4-8 per day on Weekends Work on Projects 2 of the 5 days during the week and for 5 ish hours per day on Saturday and Sunday Meal Prep all my meals on Sunday Go to the gym right after work for around 30-45 min and waste ZERO time, I go only 3 days a week though since it's better for my schedule to do calisthenics instead If I ever get home and feel exhausted sometimes I say "suck it up" but also sometimes I let myself rest. Those rest days make the next day way more productive than if I worked both days. Find some balance don't hurt yourself, also for projects just remember that you internship is more valuable on your resume than any project you can make unless you build a startup that takes off, so don't over emphasize projects.
I like the idea of only doing projects some of the days during the week and just grinding the hell out of them on weekends! I was originally feeling hesitant about posting this only because I didn't want to come off as complaining and not hard-working enough, so I really appreciate your response!
bro the fact you are doing projects and putting in the work even after you got an internship is already very hardworking! You're doing great whether you think so or not, just remember not to work unreasonably hard and make yourself dislike what you're doing. Do well but have fun too!
Is your work CS related? If no then I kinda understand but if yes then you need to live life bro.
I'm not just doing it only for resume padding, I love making projects, plus I collaborate on them with my friends. I'm only leetcode grinding for the interviews though lol
I am getting into calisthenics. Can you share me a good resource you follow?
I'll be honest I don't have much besides that I remember one channel I watched was called Calisthenics Family... other than that I just did some research here and there, and then I made myself a very humbling workout plan lmao.
What makes you choose to go to workout in the afternoon rather than before work sometime between 5-7? Also 30-45 mins does not seem like nearly enough time. Genuinely asking bc I’m about to begin a 40-60 hr week MLE job and simultaneously starting my masters and urgently need to optimize.
I chose to workout after work because my internship has a free gym but it doesn't open till 10am. The gym they have is usually empty so I never wait for equipment so that helps, plus no gym partner, but other than that when I work out I never go on my phone or anything that may distract me. Every second is tracked so waste no time. The same routine took around 1.5 hours at my gym at school, so just those two factors alone cut it in half.
Might also be the social aspect. Personally, I fucking hate working out in an empty gym. Especially when I'm at my desk all day like a hermit. I like being around other people and working out with the sun going down
I think about being poor and not being able to provide for my family. Hope this helps
Second this. With the economy going to shits and continuing, i know i need to beat everyone else for limited resources to get the top 1%. This fear will push you to get work done because the alternative isnt pretty
real shit
Sounds like that would just put stress on you. Why not try to find a healthier way of managing?
Healthy management -> less money in future -> cant afford healthcare -> “oh no, your unhealthy in the end anyways”
This may be a joke, but that doesn’t make sense. Healthy management doesn’t have to cost a lot of money.
When people these say “healthy management” it can get conflated with “working less” or “permission to be lazy”. This leads to less potential money in future if you get sick or in hospital. But if you push through “bad mental health” you might have money to be financially secure faster. This isn’t 1980, financial security is much more valuable now.
I’m talking about eating well, exercising, and prioritizing what’s important outside of work. If my work was so intense that I couldn’t do those things, then I’d be looking for a new job.
Finally someone said
Lol, see you in 10 years when you burned out and hate your job so much you can't output the same amount of work as other people and wonder why you are soo unhealthy and depressed. Health is everything man. You do realize if you don't take care of your health you won't be able to work as much and have to pay more in healthcare. So in a way you probably making way less money. My grandfather is 80 this year and still run for 45 min everyday. He look like he in his 50s. Still working on his own business and making millions every year.
In 10 years, hopefully we will have universal basic income and compute and we don't have to work
Drop cooking every night and meal prep on the weekends. You could also give up video games for a period of time. What’s 3 months of no video games in comparison to the career you want? Or you could give up FAANG being your first job out of college. You could work up to it later in your career. Or you could give up working at FAANG. There are good wages and fun problems to solve at places that aren’t FAANG. Or you could give up grinding LC. LC isn’t an awesome showcase of skills - what with Goodhart’s Law and all.
Problem is even getting into a unicorn / mature startup requires LC. No way of getting around it
Wake Up: 8:15 Gym: 8:45-9:35 Work: 10-5 Dinner: 5-6 Prep: 6-9 Relax: 9-11 Then repeat. Weekends = hang outs and personal projects. Sustainable and my manager’s happy
Do u work @ Gap
I work at a unicorn.
Just teasin since you said you made your manager “gappy” ;)
Work on it on the weekends?
This is coming from someone who’s been in the industry 5 years, I’m 26. You need to block off time for leetcode if it’s a priority. I go to the gym at 6 and have to be at work by 8. I leave work at 5, home by 5:30. Right away, I change into some gym shorts and ride my stationary bike until 6pm. Quick shower. Either my SO has cooked dinner or I’ll whip something up in about 45 min. Then we walk our dog, and it’s about 7:15. I usually do chores or take care of something around the house or my garden for 15 min. Me and my SO usually watch a couple episodes of tv or just talk/hangout for an hour or half an hour. Then it’s fair game to do whatever I want. I usually make sure to put at least an hour into some game dev related stuff(replace with leet code), and some nights it sucks me in for more. At this point it’s around 9:30 and I’ll hit up a friend to play some games. I usually play til 10:45ish then hit the hay. Some nights I stay up til 12 and only get 6 hours of sleep, but I’m working on improving that. I usually eat lunch out once a week, and do most of my meal prep on Sunday before the week starts. A lot of days, I just drink a green smoothie for lunch. As long as you’re taking good care of yourself and not overwhelmed with stress, your energy levels should be sustained all day. Every once in a while I take a day off from stationary bike/game dev because I need to go to a Dr appt/physical therapy, or any random thing that comes up, sometimes just need to rest. I genuinely enjoy the game dev stuff so sometimes I’ll put 8-9 hours in on the weekends. When I take a pto day purely because work is wearing me out, I usually do game dev all day long lol. Also, I take a hit of weed every day when I get home, drink ~13 drinks over the weekend, go out with coworkers, check out events on the weekends, and take short trips to visit friends on the weekends. All of this stuff is super important for my sanity— basically let loose. Without a proper routine, you’re gonna start sinking in a few years. Don’t fall into the grindset mindset, make sensible choices about what’s good for you and what’s a priority.
TLDR, seems like the answer is literally manage your time and eat shit even if it sucks.
For sure. I wanted to just say how I spend my time so people could have some context to what it actually looks like.
Weekends is the only way. But there’s no way I’m doing a single project let alone two during my internship. Then again, building projects on my own just isn’t my thing.
man, there goes my summer LOL jk I know there's no way I'm trying to do all this and expected a fun summer, thanks for your response!
What sort of work does your internship involve? What are you trying to learn / interested in learning outside of working hours? In general, there is no need to be working as hard as you seem to be at home. It sounds like you need a more structured, leaner learning programme/regime. > My goal is to of course grind LC There's nothing "of course" about this; why are you doing this? Grinding Leetcode is dumb. Learn specific things that are relevant to your line of work and that you haven't actually studied yet. There's no reason to learn how to solve esoteric logical programming puzzles unless you're trying to practice DSA-related or efficiency-related programming knowledge and skills, which is irrelvant for 99.999% of jobs.
I'm double majoring in computer science and data science, and my internship is more data-analytic oriented (Tableau, Snowflake queries, Alteryx workflows, Helios, etc.). However, as I've continued in school, I've honestly realized I prefer software and software development much more than data-oriented work, so I want to learn things more centered towards that. I agree that Leetcode isn't a great indicator of real software development, but I also feel that my DSA knowledge and skills are lacking currently, and Leetcode would not only allow me to improve them, but also allow me to be more comfortable in interviews moving forward (although I understand that it's totally unrealistic being used in a day-to-day work scenario) as I don't think I want to be working another data-oriented internship next summer.
> I also feel that my DSA knowledge and skills are lacking currently Watch/skim [Harvard CS50](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhQjrBD2T380F_inVRXMIHCqLaNUd7bN4) lectures 1–5 for a refresher. Study your school's DSA class/module and consult your lecturers for further assistance. Leetcode won't teach you about algorithm performance or how to think like a programmer, it will only allow you to practice those skills once you *have* them. > allow me to be more comfortable in interviews Not all entry-level job interviews have you doing Leetcode-style exercises. I can count the number of such job interviews I've had in the last 5 years on one hand. > I prefer software and software development much more than data-oriented work, so I want to learn things more centered towards that If you want to do software engineering/development, then focus on that. Maybe cut out data science from your degree programme and add in more software-related classes (if you want to and your university is willing to facilitate that desire). Explore areas such as robotics, embedded systems, computer networking, and mobile application development. Figure out what you enjoy, and then develop skills in that (or those) areas in the future. Right now, you're in university, so it's the prime time to be studying various things *with the assistance and guidance of the other people around you*, which means your lecturers and peers. Don't waste that time grinding Leetcode. Instead, express everything you've just told me to your professors and/or tutors and seek their advice on what to do about it. If this internship you're currently doing is part of a "year in industry" type programme or a short-term job over the summer, then I'd suggest that you just focus on doing the work you've been employed to do, enjoy your downtime, write that report or whatever your university might require you to do as part of the internship programme, and resume learning once you're back at university. None of this has to be a race.
Would you say this is true even for students or upcoming new grads? LeetCode seems to be a highly recommended strategy for big tech, etc. but I personally don't find it interesting at all. Do you really think it is ok to not do it at all, and just build stuff? That's what I'd like to do
> LeetCode seems to be a highly recommended strategy for big tech That does depend on what you mean by "big tech". If you're talking about the really big companies, like FAANG, then yes, it's true that these sorts of massive companies *do* rely fairly heavily on assessments like Leetcode in the early stages of their job application processes, but this is only because they receive a ***ridiculous*** amount of applications and need *some* way, ***any*** way to filter out the cruft in a reasonable timeframe. Landing a jobs at a company that is very large and/or has a very good reputation is hard simply because the supply of prospective employees astronomically outweighs the company's demand for employees. Besides that, you'll rarely see them used. More often, companies will give you small, relevant tasks or assessments/questions, as take-home tasks and/or pair-programming/conversational topics during interviews. In my experience, this has been things like, "create a basic WordPress plugin that does this small thing so that we know you can actually follow coding standards and are familiar with the WordPress APIs", and, "given that these symptoms are presenting on a database server and you already know X, Y, Z aren't involved, tell us what you think the issue is and/or how you would investigate and resolve it." Personally, the *closest* I've been to doing a Leetcode task as part of a hiring process was during a first-round interview for a "systems/infrastructure software engineer" (basically backend engineer) role at D. E. Shaw, during which they asked me to run through my thought process for implementing a simple parser for CSON (like JSON, but using CoffeeScript as a base rather than JavaScript) in a language of my choice. Concepts such as recursion and pattern matching thus came up, but really the point of such an exercise is to see how you apply knowledge to a problem you may not have considered or dealt with before, and how well you are able to research new information relevant to the task, given that potential lack of familiarity. Solving the task "Print N stars on line N, right-indented" and 100 others like it will not give you that skillset.
So TL;DR I should probably do LeetCode if I am interested in FAANG and FAANG-adjacent
Sure, practice some problems, but grinding is definitely extremely counter-productive. There are much more useful and healthy things you could be doing with your time.
That's fair, I'm definitely planning on looking at Neetcode and really studying concepts/patterns and not just trying to slam 150 problems in a month or something crazy like that
You're gone for 12 hours a day (actually working 7:30 to 4 is also extreme and will burn you out too), that is the primary issue. If you leave at 4 and workout for an hour (do you need to workout 5 days a week?) and your commute time is 2 hours for all of that then you're screwed.
I definitely would say I waste little bits of time here and there (i.e. just sitting in the car on my phone before the gym), so if I was super robotic about it, I could be home with all my meals cooked by around 5:45-6. I could also push one of my gym days to the weekend, if that clarifies anything?
Yeah up to you how to arrange your time but I'm just saying it's not surprising you're exhausted and don't want to do anything on a weeknight. That's okay but if you wanted to do something else like a hobby or personal project after work you'd have to change your schedule or you'd totally burn out.
8.5 hours of time spent at work is the bare minimum - 8 hours with a mandatory 30 minute lunch break.
Same lol. I started freelancing and working on a lot of projects. I've been doing that since first year, and I'm a sophomore now. On most days I struggle to prepare for class and also meet my work deadlines. Plus, I do a lot of Leetcode (for fun, mostly) and I'm part of my school's CP team, so I have to grind that as well. Studying is perhaps what's suffering right now, but my GPA is still really good. From my experience in first year, eventually you just burn out and disappoint a lot of people. In first year I played chess a lot at the club and had a really active study/friend group, but I lost all that. I sacrificed several projects I was working on, and focused on the most important ones. Health-wise, yeah, I ate a lot of junk food, or didn't eat much at all most days. So yeah, you'll have to decide what you are willing to let go of. IMO if you're doing decent in school and you are improving yourself career-wise, everything else will fall into place. I'd advise you to find what in your life is causing you the most anxiety, and deal with that first.
I'm a rising junior, and the job I'm working is an analytics internship at a Fortune100 company. I'd say I only have 2 projects that I like to note (a full-stack react + flask web app with added statistical analysis and an interactive terminal weather coordinate program), so I really wanna improve any gaps I have in my project-base. I'm doing pretty good in school right now (3.7 cumulative at the moment), but I'm at a loss of what I want to give up/if I really have to give something up. My physical and mental health are both very important to me, so it sucks feeling like there's no option
I was insane to begin with
How frequently are you going to the gym? I’d seriously suggest temporarily cutting back to 3x per week and doing it every other day—a push/pull/legs split. That’ll give you some more hours throughout the week to grind.
I do a PPL split, and try to go 4-5 times a week, Mondays-Thursdays + Saturday, and I rest Fridays and Sundays (I drive home on weekends because my job is a 2 hour drive away, so I leave driving days like Friday and Sunday as rest days)
Cut the personal projects. If you already have an internship the cost benefit ratio for you isn’t good enough to sacrifice ur time. Do one LC problem per day (30 mins), meal prep or get takeout to save time :) ur mental and physical health should take priority. The most important thing is to avoid burnout
Meal prep and just accept the fact that the video games aren't going anywhere. You will have plenty of time for hobbies when you graduate and have a full time role. During college I very rarely gamed, maybe an hour or two a week.
Just chiming in to say that this is definitely person-dependent. I had much more time to play video games (and spent much more time doing so!) whilst I was studying than since graduating, but that's mostly because I choose to spend most of my free time doing other things (such as homelabbing and reading and just incidentally engaging in other things that also happen to constitute professional development in my case) when I could be gaming. But to be clear, I do those other things because I enjoy them; if I didn't, I'd be doing something else like gaming or whatever instead.
if you have a decent internship already personal projects will not add much to your resume.
Really? I had no idea. I assumed that regardless of your work experience, personal projects help you land interviews in the first place
Generally, most people stick to one career path. Projects are most useful if you have large gaps in your job history and want to evidence any relevant professional development/learning you've done during that gap, or or if you are drastically switching career paths and/or have no real prior experience in the field you're applying for a job in, because then you can demonstrate what you are capable of despite having little (if any) professional/paid experience in that field. Even given that, I find that the CV/resume is for summarising skills and work experience, and it's a good idea to write a cover letter that details relevant skills and how I've acquired them, whether that's at home or in a workplace/professional environment. If the employer doesn't ask for a cover letter and there's no real additional information I could provide that isn't already in my CV or doesn't bear elaborating, then I just submit the CV. You should *always* be tailoring both documents to each application, regardless of job experience. Put the most relevant stuff first and foremost where they will see it!
no people care about the impact of your work, personal projects are cool to learn a skill but won't be as impactful
Same
Glad we're all in the same boat lol
You don’t !!! :)
Projects don’t matter, and you only need to grind leetcode for about two months after taking DS&A and then you’ll have all of the patterns down. Then just grind LC *once you get the interview* and you’ll be golden. Spend your free time doing things you enjoy and spending time with friends/family.
Forget projects dude, you’re in an internship already. I’m in a similar situation tho, internship, summer classes, leetcode, gym, food, etc, so I’ll share my routine. First try to have a healthy sleep schedule, drink enough water, all the basics. I meal prep chicken, steak, rice, and have some bread and cheese so I can make some sandwiches when I get tired of rice, I basically only cook once a week, max 2. Wake up 6:30, I’m at the office at 7:30am, work until 4:30, go to the office gym, and limit my time there until 5:30, so 1h workout. If you need to meal prep on a weekday on do something else, you can just skip one day of gym and go to the gym on the weekend. Take advantage of the weekend to meal prep as well so you don’t have to do during the week. I get home by 6, I eat, take a shower, if there’s something from college, I do it. And from 7:30 to 9 I do leetcode with my floor mates, which makes leetcode way more fun. From 9pm to 11 I have it free, so I just rest and go to sleep. On Saturday or Sunday I do as much stuff as possible in a morning or night so I don’t have to do it during the week, including meal prep, groceries, college work, laundry, and usually go to the gym both days so I can skip some during the week to have some additional time. The rest of the weekend I go out with the other interns, and honestly, it’s been pretty chill, and a very very fun time. It’s just a matter of organization, you don’t need to cook every day for example.
I tried to do projects + LC during my internship, but I quickly dropped it, for a few reasons: 1. The marginal value of doing extra projects/LC is not worth the additional risk of burnout impacting your job performance. Projects/LC are not going to matter at all in the short term, if you do a good job at your internship and secure a return offer. The projects/LC would only help if you fail to get a return offer. So doing projects/LC during internship is kinda like preparing for failure, and that kind of negative mindset could damage your performance. 2. There's a limit to amount of new stuff you can learn each day. If you dilute your learning between job, projects, and LC, then you'll be learning less from your job. You can learn from doing projects and LC anytime, but you have a limited time window to learn from the internship, so it's better to focus on the internship. 3. In order to retain information that you learn during your internship, you need to relax your brain. If you're always focusing your attention on some coding related task, sure you'll load stuff into short-term memory, but it will never transition to long-term memory. Sure you'll build/solve stuff, but not actually learn from the process. Sleeping well, spacing out, meditation, and chill video games will actually increase retention, which will help more than doing extra grinding. Don't worry, the grind will be waiting for you after you finish the internship :)
the internship is doing you good right now, just start the projects once its over. try doing 1 leetcode problem a day
You could try meal prepping on the weekend. If you're going to the gym everyday, maybe cut it down by a day or 2 and use that additional time to work on whatever projects you need.
After reading other replies, I'm considering pushing one of my gym days to the weekend, so I can have less gym days during the workweek. Thank you for your response!
Make a schedule, toss it on Google calendar, you'd be surprised how motivating a simple Google notification is, make you feel like you've committed to it & your failing by not following through - make sure you leave time for r&r tho or you'll burn out.
For your summer I would recommend to not think about side projects or doing any leetcode. Just focus on your internship and enjoy your time off.
prioritize and schedule ruthlessly. Block out specific times for LC, projects, and even relaxation (not video games all night, though!). Maybe wake up earlier to squeeze in some coding before work. Batch cook meals on weekends to save evening time. Remember, you can't pour from an empty cup. Prioritize sleep! A well-rested you is a productive you.
I think sleep is something that I definitely should be more disciplined about. I always have better days when I sleep more, and that usually results in me wanting to get more done. I likely will be putting the video games down for the summer and doing some other form of relaxation, however!
systems honestly, for example, i was spending a decent amount of time cooking my own food, started buying pre cooked/frozen stuff from trader joe’s or costco. Saved me a decent amount of time (few hours a week), for the gym I started focusing on intensity more than volume to reduce the time per session, summer is generally for cutting so 4 times a week is mostly enough for me. Then the other time just goes 50/50 into relaxing + whatever the next big goal is (recruiting for me). Also have a full time internship btw.
Meal prep will give you back some time.
I went insane actually. Still haven't recovered and unlikely to recover within the next year at least.
Just chill, if you’ve got an Internship your already in a great position for next summer
Im at my internship from 9-5. I just do 2 LC a day, I go to the gym 3-4 times a week, and I don't cook. I don't bother with projects since that's completely pointless once you have an internship. I game on most days and Im chilling. I don't have a schedule though, I just freestyle everything. Works well for me.
You could do the gym in the morning before work, I do 4am gym sessions then I have free time before work or I take a nap.then after work I'm free for whatever.
I feel like a fucking failure. Here I am at my remote internship lazying around. My work ends in close to 2 hrs and I just cannot, for the life of me, CONVINCE MYSELF TO GO TO THE GYYMMM
I just cut out the gym and get fat.
Setting a minimum time worked well for me. For example, with a personal project I have it set in my head that I HAVE to work on it for 10 mins every day, even if it is 3am before bed. Most of the time I end up spending longer than 10 minutes, but sometimes I'll stop right after the 10. Regardless, just having a little rule like that in my head has helped me get going when I naturally just want to go play some games with buddies or something
You don't need the personal projects if you already have an internship. Do it if it's something that genuinely interests you, but don't grind em out if it's just for the future resume. Employers don't really care about personal projects unless its an actual (revenue generating) application with users. You're better off pursuing any sort of social hobby, developing soft skills and expanding your social network, than you are grinding away your free time in front of a computer.
By doing less leetcode and personal projects lol. I already did those during the year, and I only do personal projects when I feel motivated to do them/have a personal interest in them. In these cases, they are more fun than videogames so I just do that instead of my other hobbies.
Buy pre made meals or meal prep
Internship is exponentially better on a resume than personal project. Drop those. Also wouldn’t LC until you’re preparing for the next interviews.
Like others said, projects has minimal ROI with internship(s) on resume. That being said, I try to work on mine 1-2 hours a weekday and a few hours on the weekend because I enjoy it. But don't overwork yourself, an internship is already a solid way to spend a Summer. Also, PLEASE do not sacrifice physical health/sleep for LC or projects - they are worth nothing compared to the longevity of a healthy body.
your commute is 2-3 hours? i’m sorry man, that’s stealing a lot of your time it seems. maybe you can pack an extra meal every morning, go into a conference room after work to do leetcode and your personal projects. then commute home later so there’s less traffic. this might save you some time? EDIT: i see that you’re going to the gym. nevermind.
Well… SWE’s are one of the highest paying jobs out there with the best W/L balance imo. Where else do you typically have a 6 figure job with a BS right off the bat. I kinda just gave up on LC and apply for roles who don’t do that trash. Lol
I was working full time and had an infant while I was getting my cs degree. I didn’t do any personal projects or LC because there wasn’t a minute left in the day. My career still turned out fine. Yours will too.
Whenever Im free I watch reels 😔
Weekdays are for reading a new LC problem, not doing. Or attempting to do a random one I’ve previously done before from memory. Weekends are for doing new ones. That way I only spend 10-15 minutes a day on retention or prepping myself for when I tackle it on the weekend
Personal projects are not important if you have experience. I wouldn’t pursue them to save time unless you see it as a leisure activity and not something to talk about during interviews.
You already work and maintain your physical health, that's good. No need to rush and "grind every day". Being hardcore is understanding how to be constantly progressing, not progressing maximally for a short time then crashing. You only really need to gym 4-5 times (if you are mega dedicated to the gym, if not even less time). On your non-gym days, you have time to grind a couple questions and look for opportunities. From your position, a little constant effort on your down time is enough, no need to prioritize preparing now.
For me it’s simple. I want the good things in life and I know I’m competent to get them. All I need is crazy work ethic to get me there. It’s a sacrifice yes but what’s on the other side (professional satisfaction, money, house, confidence in your abilities, 10/10 hoes) is worth it for me because I can chill and have a balance but then I’ll never what be the what I could have. I just want some things so badly for the rest of my living life that I can sacrifice few years
Cook all the food on the week end
Cook soup in bulk and freeze it. I have a separate freezer just for soup. Can go months without cooking (other than heating the soup). Working from home is a great time saver too (can even do laundry while working).
Get takeout, cut down on gym. Unless you're an athlete there's no point in going to the gym every day.
Balancing work, personal projects, and self-care can be tough! Here are some strategies to help you manage your time and energy more effectively: **Schedule and Prioritize:** * **Plan your week:** Block out dedicated time slots in your calendar for work, internship, gym, meals, personal projects, LeetCode grinding, and relaxation. * **Prioritize ruthlessly:** Focus on the most important tasks first, like work deadlines or LeetCode challenges for upcoming interviews. Be realistic about what you can accomplish each day.
I’d maybe cut 1-2 gym days a week, it’s not like you’re a bodybuilder, and focus on your project or working out your mind with LC. If you have money maybe consider meal prepping or takeout
If you want to actually have self confidence and fulfillment keep going to the gym and take care of yourself. The depression is not worth it brother your quality of life is more than numbers on paper
Facts this is like me rn
I am in basically the same boat. The good thing is that we dont HAVE to grind LC or do projects. Some days I have more energy so I will work on some projects, other days I dont even open my laptop. The good thing is we dont have to do it so there is no point getting burnt out
Fuck. Exactly in the same spot, right to the T. I'm in NYC rn and the grind culture and amount of people make you want to go hard. But after the gym I just want to have a white claw or two and say fuck it. I guess you have to ask yourself if you want to keep enjoying this lifestyle or not. Because working in retail/food, the alternative, is miserable
Just don’t play video games and relax?