Last week, I saw a lot of conversation like this article by Matt Shumer about the urgency of reckoning with AI's transformation of work. Base models continue to grow more powerful, agentic harnesses grow more capable, and high-profile stories highlight how teams are changing the way they build software.
And everyone is struggling to keep up.
I don't know why this week became the tipping point, but nearly every software engineer I've talked to is experiencing some degree of mental health crisis.
Tom Dale
Many people assuming I meant job loss anxiety but that's just one presentation. I'm seeing near-manic episodes triggered by watching software shift from scarce to abundant. Compulsive behaviors around agent usage. Dissociative awe at the temporal compression of change. It's not fear necessarily just the cognitive overload from living in an inflection point.
Tom Dale
I've felt some of this myself, even though I tend to be more optimistic about how AI will develop (maybe more on this in a future post). But I'm also working to stay grounded.
Here are a few guiding principles I'm holding on to in these tumultuous times.
Be Useful
I'm surrounded by people in my life: my family; my church; my coworkers; my customers. People, in this fallen world we live in, have problems. And I can solve problems.
Not all of these problems have a technical solution that requires software. Not all of these problems have great economic value. But the two most important priorities for my life are to love God and to love my neighbor, so these problems do have value.
My job, then, is to find and tackle the problems around me that:
- Align with my God-given talents and resources (so I will be effective)
- Are important (so I will do the most good I can)
- Are difficult (or, that no one else wants to do)
Even as AI grows more capable, there will never be a shortage of these problems, and some of them will always be worth paying for.
(In fact, if we accept the premise that "people have problems," then the more human-like AI becomes, the more problems we will have to solve!)
Be Prepared
Economic turmoil is not coming; it's already here. Layoffs and hiring freezes are already affecting developers. Many people, especially junior developers, are struggling to find work. God has blessed me with a stable position, but even that is not guaranteed.
Prepare for economic uncertainty.
- Reduce personal debt and other expenses.
- Build a stable buffer of savings.
- Consider secondary income streams.
Expanding on the last point, I want to be prepared for opportunity as well.
- Launch side businesses, even if they fail, to get practical experience
- Hang out (in person or online) with people who are doing interesting things and look for ways to help them (see Be Useful, above)
- Experiment with all the cool new tech coming out! Look for ways to apply it to the problems around me.
Be Confident
All my individual preparations can only go so far. But as a Christian, I have confidence in the future because of who I work for.
I am an agent of the kingdom of heaven. I am about God's work while I'm here on earth. God is therefore the source of my paycheck - he provides my daily bread. I've just got to be faithful with the opportunities He provides.
Admittedly, this is easier said than done. I have the benefit of past experience, of seeing God's provision in lean times. But His promises are true, and He is faithful:
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?
Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?
And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:
And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?
Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Matthew 6:25-34
What guiding principles are you holding on to?