I closed my laptop at 11 PM on a Sunday after six hours of finding nothing. My head hurt. I was refreshing my inbox every ten minutes like it owed me money.I wasn't hunting bugs anymore. I was hunting dopamine.So I stopped. For a whole month. Cold turkey.
What Burnout Looked Like for Me
- Refreshing platforms constantly, even during dinner
- Getting genuinely angry about duplicate reports
- Comparing myself to every "Just got a $5k bounty!" tweet
- Feeling guilty when I wasn't hunting
- Finding nothing, over and over, because I wasn't actually paying attention
The Month Off
Week 1: Did nothing. Watched TV. Slept. Felt weird about it.
Week 2: Read old bug bounty write-ups just for fun. No targets, no pressure.
Week 3: Built a crooked shelf. Finished something for once.
Week 4: Wrote down three rules for when I came back:
- No hunting after 8 PM
- One target at a time
- Phone in the other room
Coming Back
First hunt back: 90 minutes. Found an IDOR. $300. Nothing crazy.But I was excited again. Submitted the report, closed the laptop, went to sleep. Didn't refresh once.
What Actually Changed
BeforeAfterHunted every night3–4 nights a weekChecked inbox constantlyTwice a dayFelt guilty restingSee rest as part of the work
Weirdest part? I got better. More patient. More creative. Better reports.
If You're Feeling It Too
You're not bad at hunting. You're just tired.Take the break. A week. A month. Whatever.The bugs will wait.