It's nice to hear that everyone here (and yourself) are talking about job and being productive or not.
Maybe it's hard to hear this right away after your major, but a job is just one part if your life. As someone already wrote, also concentrate on your private life, your body and social connections.
And, forget that you will be something super special or will feel super special. You don't have to be Steve Jobs, probably won't be and nobody says that Steve Jobs was a happy person.
Do what you feel is right for you at the moment, have a couple of good friends, work out, and maybe look for a job which helps you for your "birds eye view".
Have a look at Freuds "Über-Ich" [0] and maybe start to listen more at your emotions than on money and job. Nobody says that both couldn't go hand in hand, but after leaving a well paid job, starting at a very poor paid one but with good friends, it's totally worth it.
I don't think Europeans care or have to care. If it looks different, there will be other StartUps/innovations for the missing pieces.
Here are many sub-search sites which doesn't deliver like Google, but are famous because they are more ethical. The question is: Is it real innovation or just an addiction for everything new and shiny.
Well, they don't solve your money problems, nobody can do this :) They offer you a really good service, which of course they want money for. But I think its around 2,50 Dollar a month? I already saved up to 15k in the last few months, so they can have their 2,50 ;)
It takes time to get used to, but after 6 years on and off, I am using it for the last 8 months regularly, and I already saved enough money for the next 4 months in advance.
But, of course, what these two have in common, is simply:
1. Spend much less than you earn
2. Try to just spend 30-40% of your income, but an emergency fund which stores 6 month worth of money, and then invest the saved money.
What I recommend, is a little game:
1. Don't eat out for a whole month
2. Don't do any big purchases for a whole month
You will see how much many you usually spend, and how your mind is triggering you to buy things. It will be really hard, so instead of thinking about "oh no, I shouldn't buy this", just write a note on a piece of paper everytime you want to buy something.
At the end of the month, you will see how "stupid" you were to want a certain things. If a certain things come up on this list over and over, then maybe it could be useful.
If you be honest, almost every suggestion won't work. When you feel the need to really finish a project, you just cannot hold back and start to code in the night or during your normal work day.
What I can suggest (for your sanity and social life):
- Pick the weekends (one or two days) where you code for 5-6 hours.
- Do it during your work day. If you want something out of your side project, just don't work hard enough at work so you have ressources left for yourself
- Ask your boss for a 25 hours working week or try to get one day off without salary reductation to see if you be as productive as before. If not, ask for 10% less.
Divide your side project in learning and developing.
Get a book which you can read during your commune, or even an ebook which you can read during work.And then, at home, take a weekend/one day off/two nights off to develop and code.
I also suggest the Lean StartUp method, which is not only helpful for StartUps, but also for side projects. The key is to develop in small iteration to always have a finish product you can test.
So, don't do everything, pick one little feature, develop it and see where it goes from there.
Experience (5+ with StartUps and contract projects) in JavaScript (Angular 1+2, React, NodeJS), HTML5, CSS/SASS
I can create and deploy a Microservice architecture using Docker (with DockerCloud or others).
Also: Go and a bit of Python (develop small pieces and read/debug code).
GitHub: https://github.com/gruberb E-Mail: gruberbastian /at/ me.com Website: gruberbastian.com