It sounds like you feel a sense of ownership around the work you do. That is great but I hope you understand that you do not own the code. You are a contractor and have no stake in the future success of the project.

All of the extra free hours you are spending could be used to build your own product that you would have a stake in.

I've built my own product, now building someone else's product at a scale that was inaccessible to me in my previous adventures. I've had lots of back and forth with myself on that as it's the first time I hold a corporate position in 10 years and I found the idea of working for someone else very unlike myself.

Eventually I understood I just like building stuff, the monetary compensation is just a bonus. If you let me build big enough stuff and pay me enough so that money is inconsequential, I'll be happy, at least temporarily; the end game is taking a startup "all the way", but what I'm doing now is an indispensable lesson in large scale stuff.

The scale thing is one way of seeing you've found a place where you can be much more than you could be by yourself. I've put my exact same work ethic into other jobs and projects and gotten nowhere; in the current case where what I can provide is actually just what they need, I want to work as many hours as I can while the opportunity lasts. It's just wasteful not to.

> I'd advise anyone to prioritize having a work they thoroughly enjoy well ahead of a work that requires less hours.

Thanks, that's really insightful. I've been trying to minimize my work hours lately, but am starting to realize it might be that I'm not enjoying the job as much as I should be.

Seems like the ideal job would be one that you _could_ get done in minimal hours but _don't want to_. If you find yourself in that situation, you have a lot of control of your work/life balance.

At that point whether you are doing it for yourself or an employer doesn't matter as much, though it's pretty hard to find companies that measure employees on output rather than input. Or rather, ones that understand that more input _from a given developer_ won't necessarily deliver more, or at least higher quality, output.

I work around 50hours a week on salary, and always productively. I do it because I enjoy programming, I like making our products better, and want to be recognized for being a key employee. I also work out 5 Times a week, and spend every evening and weekend with my family.