"Discover effective strategies to stay motivated as a software engineer, especially in demanding FAANG jobs. Learn how to engineer your motivation and find purpose through side-quests and deeper 'why' moments."

Substack is a platform for independent writers and journalists to publish and monetize their content. Through newsletters, articles, and podcasts, Substack offers insights into a wide range of topics such as politics, technology, culture, and personal development. Readers can subscribe to their favorite writers and receive regular updates, analysis, and commentary on the issues that matter to them. Additionally, Substack provides tools and resources for writers to grow their audience, engage with their readers, and monetize their content effectively.

Substack

Learn how to create your own motivation in a software engineering job by finding side-quests that align with your interests and goals.

My strategy for motivation in a software engineering job

This was amazing. I love that you went against the classic “Find Your Why”.
Everything you said is correct, but does not answer the question “how to get motivated”, because while your target is to use alternate additional sources to fuel the motivation they won’t necessarily make you want to start doing something.
Personally, what works for me and my neurodivergent brain is to make a list of things that need doing.
Task: Implement Feature XYZ
Task, becomes Project, for me.
Project: Implement Feature XYZ
<ul>
<li>Task 1: Determine what is needed to make it happen and make list of tasks</li>
</ul>
When the first Task is completed it will look like
Project: Implement Feature XYZ
<ul>
<li><s>Task 1: Determine what is needed to make it happen and make list of tasks</s></li>
<li>Task 2: Lorem Ipsum</li>
<li>Task 3: Lorem Ipsum</li>
<li>Task 4: Lorem Ipsum</li>
</ul>
The goal for me is to make any Task easy to start and work on. I make them dead stupidly easy and I usually check 3-4 at a time from the list, but I make them dead-stupid simple (i.e. create Git branch) so that I can get started.
Trick is that once I did the 1st thing I can easily move on. This will work wonders in terms of motivation and it’s sadly one of the least promoted.
The only caveat, which I need to mention, is that it won’t work for those suffering from strong anxiety issues. For anyone else, this would most likely work wonders.

This was really good to read, thanks for the inspiration!