Jeffrey Way ran a poll on X the other day asking developers if they still enjoy coding.
If you're in the web development field, given the workflow changes that AI introduced yada yada, how are you feeling about your day-to-day work?
— Jeffrey Way (@jeffrey_way) July 7, 2026
I read that thread and realized I've been on both sides of it. Some features I ship and feel nothing. No pride, no satisfaction, just a merged PR and on to the next thing. Other times I ship and feel genuinely proud of what I built.
That bugged me enough that I started thinking about what was actually different.
Everyone is optimizing for the wrong thing
While I was still thinking about that, I noticed every other day there was a new workflow going around X, all with the same goal: take the human out of the equation as much as possible and ship as fast as possible.
And while I agree there is value in that, for me there is a massive conflict in it.
See, I want to keep building things for the rest of my life. Not as a career strategy. It's just the thing I love most.
So I had to stop and ask myself: "How can I adapt and stay in the game for as long as possible?"
And I landed on 2 things that are key for me:
I need to have fun.
I need to preserve my ability to think through complex problems, and learn.
So while optimizing for moving as fast as possible might seem like a great idea in the short run, it directly undermines both of these things in the long run.
In other words, it sucks the fun out of coding and rots my brain.
Problem 1: no fun
When I let the agents run ahead of me, skim the diff, and merge, I can feel the joy being drained. The feature works, but I feel nothing.
The work happened near me instead of through me.
The developers I see quitting on X all say essentially the same thing: there's no joy left in coding. And I get it. For many of us, that joy is the reason we became coders in the first place. We're a passionate bunch and love this craft. Take the joy away and the whole thing starts to feel meaningless.
And I'm no different. So finding a way to still have fun in this new era is a must for me if I want to keep going. Even if it means I'm trading off some speed in the short term.
Problem 2: the brain rot
It seems AI is not only creating a massive amount of technical debt but also a cognitive debt.
Our brain is like a muscle. If we don't use it, it atrophies.
And when I offload all the thinking to the AI, that's exactly what happens. The capacity to think through complex problems just goes away, and my relevancy goes with it.
I don't know about you, but I can't let that happen.
So I started thinking…
How can I accomplish both of these things: have fun and not let my brain rot?
Slower, on purpose
Part of my solution: move slower. On purpose.
I review every line. When one agent reviews another agent's work, I review the reviewer too. I don't approve a change until I understand why it's there, not just what it does. And why this way and not the other way.
If it's not clear, I ask the agent to explain, so I can keep learning. And I review and simplify until the code looks elegant and maintainable, and I'm proud enough to put my stamp on it and ship.
And I noticed when I do this, shipping beautiful, maintainable code still gives me a lot of joy.
Sure, the way I build changed, but I still feel like I am the builder, I'm the one who is in control. At least when I do it this way.
Bigger problems, on purpose
The other part of my solution: take on bigger, more complex problems. That's what keeps the fun going.
I think part of what gave us the joy of coding when we were still writing code by hand was that we were often solving challenging problems, pushed to the edge of our abilities.
Now, AI made a lot of things easy.
I think the Goldilocks amount of challenge is the key to having fun with everything in life.
If the workouts are too easy, it gets boring fast. If they're too hard and it's pure suffering, we want to quit.
The key to having fun is challenging yourself right at the edge of your abilities.
So even if you can't pick your work projects, start a side project and learn a new framework or language. Find something big enough to excite you.
The project I'm working on right now, an ambitious Laravel + React + Reverb app, I wouldn't have dared to take on before 2025. Now I'm building it. I'm staying curious, using AI as a tutor to learn along the way.
