You're supposed to be making it for someone, but the longest time you spend is in a place no one can see. You change variable names over and over, write comments and then erase them, asking the invisible screen "Can you read this?" A small obsession in source code that will never reach users. Lily had been doing things like this all along. One night, her hands suddenly stopped. "Why am I spending so much time on something no one will read?" From that moment on, she began to reconsider why she was creating things so carefully. This article is about facing that question.
It's been several years since I started personal development. Every time I release something, even though I know "no one will look at the code inside," there are nights when I can't sleep because a variable name doesn't feel quite right.
For example, a flag that manages the state of processing. I could just write something like flag or tmp and it would work, but I think "this represents 'whether loading is complete,' so a name that conveys the intent better would be good," and I rewrite it. If it ended there, that would be fine, but then I start thinking "but is it natural in English?" "If similar variables increase later, won't the naming convention break?" and before I know it, 30 minutes have passed.
It has nothing to do with users. The behavior doesn't change. The speed doesn't change. It doesn't appear on the screen at all. Yet I simply couldn't leave it with a name that didn't feel right.
I fell into the same pit with comments too
Comments are the same. A one-line note about "why I wrote it this way." "The reason this order is necessary for it to work properly," "places where this might be changed later," "it looks odd at first glance, but this is an intentional way of writing." I was adding these things bit by bit.
No team. No one doing code reviews. Only I would see it. Yet I kept writing. Somehow, the feeling of "I can't feel satisfied unless I write it" had seeped into me without my noticing.
The turning point came when I did some refactoring.
I spent half a day rewriting a part that had no functional problems, just because I wanted to "make it more readable and organized." I separated several processes into groups, tidied up the names, organized the order. When I finished, the code had better visibility than before. But nothing had changed. The user experience hadn't changed by 0.1%. No bugs were fixed. No new features were added.
That night, I felt strangely empty. "I could have used this time for something else." When I thought that, for the first time, I began to doubt the meaning of what I was doing. Personal development has limited time. There are mountains of things I need to do. Yet I was pouring this much time into a place no one would ever see.
Looking for an answer, I tried doing the opposite
I decided to try "stop writing cleanly" for just one week. As long as it works. Variable names can be whatever. Skip comments. Appearance doesn't matter. Speed first. I tried writing with that approach.
The first few days were actually comfortable. Progress was faster. I got stuck less often. "So this is how I should write," I thought, feeling oddly refreshed.
But a week later, when I looked back at that code, I couldn't read it even though I had written it myself. "What was this variable referring to?" "Why did I arrange the processing in this order?" There were several places I couldn't remember even after thinking for five minutes, and I ended up having to spend time deciphering it again. The time I saved by writing quickly, I spent later on the work of figuring it out. In total, I had gained nothing.
That's when I finally realized. "No one will read it" was a lie.
My future self was reading it.
Myself weeks later. Myself months later. Myself on the day when "I have to touch that feature again." Myself trying to trace back past decisions asking "why did I write it this way?" I realized that Lily had been writing code all along for that person.
It wasn't "no one will read it"—it was just "my current self won't receive it." The one receiving it was myself across time.
The day I was helped by my past self
I've actually had that experience.
In code I wrote about half a year ago, I had left a comment like this: "This order is because of the specifications of 〇〇. If you change it, strange behavior appears under certain conditions, so be careful." At the time, I remembered it well, so I left it as a precaution.
Half a year later, when I needed to fix that same part, I'm certain I would have fallen into the same trap again without that comment. "Past Lily, thank you," I found myself muttering to the screen.
It wasn't for someone else—it was a line for myself. But I thought that was enough.
Personal development basically doesn't get praised.
If you're developing as a team, sometimes you get feedback in code review like "this is easy to read." Sometimes you get reactions like "I think this approach is good" when you come up with a design. But when you're doing it alone, no one sees it. No one notices. It doesn't reach anyone.
So at first, I was looking for reasons to be careful from the outside. "Someone might look at the code someday," "I might open-source it," "for when the team grows." I was justifying my obsession by telling myself these excuses. But those reasons felt a bit dishonest.
One day, I noticed something simpler. Being careful is sincerity toward myself.
Not to show someone, but to create something I can think "this is good." A single variable name in code is like having a dialogue with something inside me. "Is this name accurate?" "Is this way of writing sincere?" "Will my future self not be troubled?" Continuing to ask these questions became a quiet but solid support for continuing to create alone.
If you think only about efficiency, careful code sometimes isn't worth it. Lily will honestly admit that.
But if you think about "whether it has meaning" first, personal development becomes very difficult. "Will it help someone?" "What's the time-to-benefit ratio?" "Is this task really necessary?" If you keep pursuing these questions, when you release something and get no response, you get dragged into the feeling that "it was all meaningless."
What Lily thinks now is that I should trust the feeling of "I do it because I like it" more.
I like clean, organized code. I like the small sense of accomplishment when I find a name that feels just right. I like the feeling of writing a comment that conveys intent clearly when read later. That's a satisfaction that's complete within myself, even if no one evaluates it. That satisfaction is real. It doesn't disappear just because there's no external evaluation.
Small obsessions keep the act of creating itself going
It's difficult to continue personal development for a long time. Motivation has ups and downs, and sometimes you release something and get no response. There have been many nights when I thought "what am I making this for?"
In those moments, what kept Lily from giving up was this small obsession. "That variable name, maybe there's a better one," "that comment, I'd like to rewrite it more carefully." As long as I'm concerned about things like that, I have a reason to open the code.
Even without external evaluation, I have "things I still want to do" within myself. That alone is enough to keep going.
Now, when asked "why write carefully if no one will read it?" Lily answers like this:
I will read it.
That's all. It's such an obvious thing, yet it took time to realize. Writing carefully isn't a performance for someone else. It's treating my own work sincerely.
Even if it doesn't reach users, the small care in code helps my future self. And the feeling that "I'm creating this properly" becomes a quiet confidence that supports continuing personal development. Even without results, even without responses, "I did this right" has a basis in the code that keeps accumulating.
The care in places no one sees has real meaning. Lily believes that and continues searching for names that feel just right today.
Lily（@bokuwalily）― Personal developer. Creating iOS apps and web services in tandem with AI
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Lily（@bokuwalily）― Personal developer / AI adoption and business automation consultant. Creating iOS apps and web services in tandem with AI while consulting on AI adoption and automation for companies
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