Intro Statement

When I first started programming, I thought it was just about writing code. You learn a language, build a few projects, get better over time — simple. What I didn’t expect was the mental side of it: the constant confusion, the feeling of never knowing enough, the pressure to keep up with new technologies, and the imposter syndrome that pops up at the worst times.

Being a developer is rewarding, no question — but it’s also mentally draining in ways many people don’t see. In this article, I want to talk honestly about why development can feel like an endless marathon, how the tech world amplifies stress, and why so many of us battle self-doubt even years into our careers.

No End

One reason, why programming needs so much energy, is that it’s a learning process that never ends. If you think there’s an end, you’ll just become an outdated developer over time.

Many of us more seasoned developers started learning programming by reading documentation or simply coding (side projects, Udemy courses, etc.). Nowadays, people start more often via LLMs. Once you start learning your chosen language, you may get better at it over time, but honestly, you’re just less “confused” over time.

There are definitely some intelligent people who just learn concept after concept and get it immediately (that’s not me). Most people start in a well of confusion, and step by step, and slowly the chaos turns into something that actually makes sense. Additionally, you gradually let go of the feeling of “reaching an end,” because there is no end in the life of a developer.

To get an idea of how wide the field really is, start with the areas most developers first encounter: web and app development. Each of these opens up into even more branches — whether you’re building the front-end or back-end, you will undoubtedly come in touch with a lot of different frameworks, libraries and all kind of tools.

In web development alone, you might touch React, Vue, or Angular, and before you’ve even finished learning one of them, someone tells you about Next.js, SvelteKit, or whatever new framework just dropped this week.

And that’s just one corner of the map — behind it wait Java, Python, C++, Rust, databases, servers, hosting, AI, cloud, security, testing, and a hundred other rabbit holes.

You don’t master programming; you just get better at navigating the chaos.

Chasing Hypes and Money

Sounds like the title of a rap documentary, but honestly — the internet is full of new tech hypes.

If I got a penny for every thumbnail promising a “six-figure income after learning this new framework,” I could probably retire.

There’s always some next big thing. But those money promises almost never hold up, because every country has its own job market, salary structure, and demand for developers. Nobody in those videos ever mentions that these “six-figure incomes” usually apply to American salaries — in most other countries, that’s either rare or nearly impossible.

Chasing hypes doesn’t get you far. To actually reach the level where you could get hired using a new technology, you’d need at least six months of focused learning — and that’s if you’re already working full-time. By the time you’ve reached that stage, the next trend has already arrived with yet another “six-figure income” promise.

At that point, you’re not progressing — you’re just chasing without ever arriving.

That’s why it’s important to stop and ask yourself: do I really want to learn this because it interests me, or just because everyone says I should?

Make up your own mind about how useful or relevant a trend is — not based on clickbait thumbnails, but on your goals, your country, and your current stage of life.

Of course, not every hype is bad. Some stick around — like AI or, back in the day, the internet itself. But treating every new “AI feature” like the birth of general intelligence gets tiring fast. Most of the time, it’s just an OpenAI or other LLM integration, often not even trained on its own data.

The thing with AI — and I really enjoy using LLMs and MCPs for different use cases — is that all the new AI hype always brings statements like “developers are searching for new jobs” or “nobody will need devs anymore.” It’s just annoying, because guess what: all developers will do the same thing they’ve always done — they’ll adapt and learn the next new thing, much like they learn new things every day that they didn’t understand before.

Hypes have their place, and excitement is fine — just take it with a grain of salt. And never let flashy thumbnails mess with your reality too much.

Imposter Syndrome

Imposter syndrome — the classic developer companion.

It’s that feeling where, no matter how much you’ve learned or achieved, you still believe you just “got lucky,” and that one day everyone will realize you have no idea what you’re doing. Every developer knows that feeling — and maybe, deep down, we’re all just fooling each other a little bit.

On a more serious note, there are also the actual imposters — the ones who claim to “do it all.” The self-declared experts in five languages, ten frameworks, and DevOps as a weekend hobby. Those people probably don’t feel imposter syndrome at all — because they already know they’re faking it.

That doesn’t mean they’re not developers; everyone oversells themselves a bit on a CV. But when someone insists they’re a master of everything, you just know they’re bluffing. Nobody at 29 is a true expert in that many things, at least most of them. Being an expert in a single framework already means deeply understanding its core language, concepts, and edge cases — really knowing how to use it to its strengths.

For the rest of us, the feeling of being an imposter is almost inevitable. It comes back to what I mentioned earlier: there’s no real “end” to programming. Languages and frameworks evolve constantly. Every major update can introduce a completely new architecture or core concept to master.

And it’s not just the tech world that feeds that pressure — it’s the people around you.

Your friends hear you’re a developer and immediately ask if you can hack the Pentagon, rebuild YouTube, or “just make an app like Instagram.” Family members assume you can fix every laptop, printer, or Wi-Fi issue in a five-kilometer radius. You laugh it off, but somewhere inside, it adds to the weight — because you can’t do all those things. No one can. But saying “I don’t know how” always feels wrong, like you’re admitting you’re not good enough.

Here’s the thing though: programming is too wide for anyone to master. It’s not one profession; it’s a whole ecosystem. Expecting a single developer to know it all is like assuming someone who can order a coffee in Spanish should be able to defend a client in a Spanish courtroom. It just doesn’t work like that.

If more people understood what goes into building and maintaining a real, production-ready app, the architecture, testing, infrastructure, scaling and security, they’d stop assuming you could learn it all in a year.

So yes, progress often feels invisible. You move forward, but because there’s always more to learn, it never really feels like progress. When you lift weights, you can measure improvement: 100 kg last month, 110 kg now. In coding, your progress is hidden, maybe your code got cleaner, maybe your app runs faster — and yes, technically there are metrics for that. You can run static code analysis, measure render times, or analyze complexity if you really want to.

But that’s not something anyone tracks daily, and it’s not the kind of progress you can explain to a non-technical person. It never feels as straightforward or visible as adding 10 kg to a barbell.

That’s what makes imposter syndrome such a constant companion for developers. The field keeps expanding, the world keeps expecting, and your brain keeps wondering whether you’re good enough.

How It All Comes Together — The Mental Load

To sum it up: we’ve got the never-ending marathon, the constant hypes and money promises, and the imposter syndrome that tags along for the ride.

Together, they pile up into something heavy — the mental load of being a developer.

How you deal with that load depends on how you handle comparison, hype, and self-expectation. From my own experience (and probably many others), comparison is one of the worst traps. It’s human nature — we all do it — but in programming, it’s almost always counterproductive. You look at another developer with ten years of experience and start judging yourself with only four.

But when you say that out loud, it already sounds ridiculous: of course someone with six more years of real-world problems, bugs, and deadlines will be ahead. You can’t compress those six years into your four, no matter how much time you invest.

Some people are incredibly talented or have unusual opportunities — and that’s fine. But for most of us, progress happens in the same rhythm: bursts of growth, plateaus, and the occasional sprint.

Now, because everything about development sounds so depressing, we should all just quit and do something else.

Just kidding, I know I will be debugging whatever I built anyway.

It’s a marathon that never ends — and the moment you start treating it like a race, you burn out.

Reflection, Solution, and Why We Still Do It

So in all seriousness — I’ve just spent the whole article talking about how mentally taxing programming is.

So why in gods name do we do this to our selfes?

Because of that feeling. The dopamine hit. The freaking rollercoaster of emotions after a two-day debugging session when you finally find the root cause and fix it. That rush when everything suddenly works again — when the app builds, the tests pass, and the screen lights up exactly the way you wanted. The joy, the relief, the pride, the “I did it” moment. Every dev knows that high. You go through depression, doubt, frustration, anger and then boom.

You find the answer. And it’s pure dopamine of the highest grade. You could scream, cry, or punch the monitor out of happiness — the last one might just be me. But that feeling is why we do it. It’s worth every minute of frustration. Now, about imposter syndrome. The solution is simple, but not easy: get over it.

Not in a “just stop feeling that way” kind of sense — but by realizing how much of it is ego.

Ego has two roles here.

The first is the kind you should drop: pretending you know everything. It feels embarrassing to admit you don’t know something in your own field, even though nobody expects you to know everything. You wouldn’t feel ashamed for not knowing how to build a rocket — but somehow, when it’s a topic close to your own job, your brain treats it like a failure.

The second is the kind you need to strengthen: trusting what you already know.

Write down what you’ve learned so far — big or small. Remind yourself that you’re not at zero anymore. You’ve built things, fixed things, broken things, and learned from it all.

Even then, it might never feel like “enough.” That’s okay. Programming isn’t exponential progress — it’s cycles of growth, plateaus, and breakthroughs. Ride those plateaus. They’re part of the process. Consistency is what really counts.

And seriously — don’t let ego stop you from asking for help.

If time allows, figure it out yourself, sure. But asking for help doesn’t make you less of a developer. Programming is a team sport.

We all level up by learning from each other, setting new goals, and being inspired by people who are miles ahead.

That’s how you stay sane in this endless game — by remembering that every developer is just another player figuring it out, one bug at a time.