Dealing with Stress as a Developer
I’m in charge of an app, and it’s stressing me out. How do I stop panicking?
More responsibility means more stress.
I worked as an iOS tech lead for over a decade, and I've experienced my fair share of this. I kept checking my email, Twitter, app reviews, customer service reports, and crash statistics, thinking everything was about to come crashing down.
I can come up with a very long list of small things you could do to mitigate the problem. Still, the main thing - the most important thing you have to learn when you are in this position, is a seemingly simple idea, and you might not like what I'm about to say because it requires a mind shift. It is a mental effort; if you don't learn to do this, you're on the path to a total meltdown.
You have to accept that shit will happen. AWS will go down. Apple drops an update that makes your app crash. Facebook logins will stop working, or OpenAI will go down. It might be beyond your control, and your users will think it is your fault. Maybe even your boss at first. Hell, it might even be your fault, too. It doesn't matter.
It’s not like I’m making pacemakers
Take the stoic approach and let go of it all. You can't control these things. What matters is how you react. The most important thing that helped me was to tell myself that it's only an app. This whole incident is an inconvenience at worst. It's not like I'm making pacemakers. I'll fix it, or whatever was down will come back up, and everyone will forget it soon after.
These things are unpleasant, but do not allow them to impact you before they happen.
Protect your mental health. It is more important than anything else.
I had planned to end this post on this quote:
Worrying does not take away tomorrow's troubles, it takes away today's peace.
But then as I was finishing writing this, I opened Twitter and the perfect one rolled right into my feed:
Have a great day!