I have, yes. I've also framed homes, roofed homes, and water proofed basements. I spent some time landscaping. I've held a variety of manual labor jobs, from working fields to construction to warehouses and factory floors to the military. Today, I'm a team lead and senior software engineer.

I'd also rather be outside again all day, working with and alongside people, physically and towards goals we can visualize, doing tasks that we all understand well and can articulate in an accurate way, and cultivating a genuine sense of camaraderie. Not the sort of weird brogrammer nonsense that is frequently encountered in our industry and which is oftentimes confused with camaraderie.

I pull a lot of my previous lives experience in to my work today and I spend a lot of time working very closely with my colleagues, but it's not the same. I don't end a day with the same sense of purpose or belonging that I experienced with physically demanding jobs. I got close, once, but it was a shared experience between myself and one colleague, as opposed to a team, and it was because of circumstances that aren't exactly repeatable in a meaningful way.

edit/ Of course, the above is making some assumptions that probably don't hold. There is genuinely something that I miss from physically demanding work that can't be found or replicated with the work that I do today (or, perhaps it's just that I have failed to find or replicate it). But, I'm also dramatically better compensated and live a nearly fully autonomous life today, too. These are just the trade-offs that we make, I suppose.

Almost in the -exact- same boat, as if I could have written this comment myself. My favorite job, by far, was landscaping. Being outside all day, getting sun and exercise, and seeing your completed project were all very rewarding/valuable. I was in great shape, left work at work, and had no problem sleeping at night. It just doesn't pay well. I find working at computers all day rather depressing, at times pointless, and I can watch my health slipping. I really wish there was some kind of middle ground.

>> I really wish there was some kind of middle ground.

I think there is a market for a large, physically demanding computer keyboard. The keyboard 'keys' would require pressure from a full hand to activate, and the return and backspace keys could have a different type of lever action (pull to the side maybe). The operator would have to stand, which seems like a trend these days, and the PRO-version could come with a large inverted water bottle. Not joking about the keyboard, only half-joking about the bottle.

Repetative strain injury is already a common hazard of typing heavy proffesions. I'm not sure adding keyboard resistance is a good health move

I would often find it pretty satisfying to punch a punching bag to send emails.

The closest thing to a middle ground I can think of is FIRE-ing and going back to work as a landscaper, or a carpenter, or whatever. You can not "need" to work financially, but still have to/want to have a job. The key is it can be any low or even non-paying job that you want.

Some of the happiest people I've met are retires that work part time in jobs like you mentioned. They get to feel productive but not have the same level of pressure and hours that people that work full time and are living paycheck to paycheck have.

A stint of physical labor is certainly a valuable experience, I long for it too, but it DOES eventually break the body if it is done year after year for decades.

I suspect that years of meaningless work just shuffling money around for wealthy people and institutions has a similar effect on the psyche, even if it is obscenely compensated.

Physical work shouldn't break your body if you work within reasonable limits of exertion.

Also, sitting all day does breaks your body.

I've concluded when people say "break your body", they usually refer to the slowly accumulating string of little slip-ups. You turn the wrench too hard and bash your knuckle. You grab something that was still too hot. You drop something on your foot. You lift something the wrong way and pull something. No one slip-up is a real big deal, but you can't help but make a few, and they slowly add up.

Goddamn. Can we be coworkers? I've worked countless manual labor jobs and am now crammed in an office. If I have to be here, I'd at least like to have coworkers who have your notion of cohesion and vision.

I worked manual skilled labor for four years between college and graduate school. I enjoyed most aspects of it but there is a definite pay ceiling and a greater risk of injury.

I have tried a variety of hard manual jobs over the years - mainly during my college years:

- Longshoreman (manually unloading 45 - 120 lbs of frozen boxes, non-stop, for up to 20 hours a day)

- Worked on construction sites, carrying cement/concrete bags up and down - for hours and hours - often in sweltering heat during the summer.

- Dug ditches all day long .

- Manually emptied trailers for appliances (fridges, ovens, dryers, washing machines, etc.) all through the night.

and some more.

Either way, they all sucked. Some were absolutely terrible, and made fresh workers quit only an hour or two into it (longshoreman), while others were more bearable (emptying trailers).

But all these jobs share a couple of things:

- The majority of workers lack formal education, and take the jobs because they have to. - They are all in it because of the cash - Almost no one over 40. 90% of the guys are in their 20's. - Injuries are extremely common. In fact, that's why I took those jobs: There "regular" crews were always short of people because of injuries or recovery, and would let anyone (with a fitting physique/strength) try for the spots. And on larger jobs, they would call in extras.

A lot of office workers seem to romanticize these types of jobs - like some kind of honest "manly" work where you get to be outside and enjoy the nature, while staying in shape.

Yeah, no, most of these jobs just suck.

Doing it for 1 hour might be OK, but when you're 12 hours into the shift, sore from the previous days, and know it'll be the same tomorrow, next week, next year, etc. you really start to question your life choices.

The only thing you look forward to is to lie down and rest - but even then, you're getting anxious because you know it's only X hours 'til your alarm goes off, and another day of grueling work. It gets to the point where you have actual nightmares, and will wake up depressed.

Of course, YMMV, and not all of these hard labors jobs are the same - people are different. But the above is based on my own experience, and what the other guys would say.

I used to dig ditches on weekends as a way of relaxing. It's not bad when you get to do it on your own time. But yeah, I'd probably not appreciate doing it for eight hours a day five days a week.

I'd still do it for a million a year though.

I did it 10 hours a day, four days a week when I had just graduated from high school. Extremely good money for the time, but you would have to pay me a lot more than a million now.

Brutal and back breaking. I couldn't get enough to eat, my body was always sore and tired.

I would do it if I had to, I suppose, but even though my cushy desk job coding pays a lot less--a very much lot less--than a million a year, I would take it every time.

Having dug ditches for septic tanks for a few years I can definitely vouch for _not_ doing it. 5 years of digging ditches is awful work, and most people aren't cut out for that level of manual labor. After a week I think most programmers would happily return to their day jobs.

I'm not sure about nonstop digging of ditches, but I've done a fair deal of farm labor and construction. And absolutely love it.

I enjoy what I do, but I'd go back to it in a heart beat if there was even a chance for comparable earning potential. Hard work feels really really good at the end of the week. I think the one reason I enjoy software is because it gives you that similar high of being able to see something you've built with your own hands, that didn't exist before.

I worked on a farm in high school. Ditch digging was one of many manual tasks.

It was a much more creative & rewarding job in many respects.