It's 10:06 a.m. on a Tuesday. Planning is humming along. The team’s finally got some momentum, the roadmap’s blessedly bug-free, and the last deploy didn’t require a postmortem or whiskey.
Then someone says it.
“What if we rewrote the service in Rust?”
You blink. Surely it was a joke.
“It’s just... with WASM and edge functions, we could simplify the whole architecture.”
There it is. That soft, reverent tone. Like they’re reading scripture. Or pitching to YC.
And just like that, we’re off. Goodbye, roadmap. Hello, crowbrain.
But you’re not a crow.
And that glimmer isn’t food.
It’s an ill-timed rewrite that makes no sense even in context - like deciding to renovate your kitchen because the toaster’s acting up on Christmas Day.
The Instinct to Rebuild
Let’s call it what it is: boredom.
Or maybe not boredom exactly - impatience disguised as thought leadership.
You’ve been in the codebase a while. Things are working. Which is unsettling. There’s nothing to fix, but you need to feel useful. So you look around, crack your knuckles, and whisper the sacred spell:
“We should really consider modernizing.”
Translation: Let’s light a fire under this perfectly functional system because I need to feel like I’m doing something ambitious.
You tell yourself it’s about scale, or performance, or “technical debt” (which conveniently never includes your own architectural decisions from last quarter).
But let’s be honest.
You’re not chasing improvements. You’re running from stasis.
Because rewrites feel clean.
Because new tech means no legacy, no baggage, no awkward decisions to explain.
Because saying “React Server Components” in a meeting feels safer than saying “I don’t know if our architecture actually matches our product goals.”
You’re not optimizing for clarity.
You’re optimizing for control.
And deep down, you know it.
That it’s not a pragmatic suggestion - it’s a rewrite poltergeist that lives in the CI/CD pipeline and feeds on certainty.
The Shiny Spiral
Here’s how it happens.
You “just want to explore.” Innocent enough. So you spin up a proof of concept.
Then you realize it could replace the current system.
And now you’re three weeks in, maintaining two architectures, and using phrases like “interim dual-path strategy” or “legacy fallback” to avoid saying “I couldn’t let go of my POC and now we’re stuck supporting two realities.”
You start pitching the new stack like it’s a rescue mission:
- “It’s so much more elegant.”
- “It’ll reduce long-term complexity.”
- “I mean, the old one was duct tape anyway…”
Sure. But it worked. And duct tape has held more systems together than most engineers care to admit.
This isn’t simplification.
It’s sophistication theater. - a show where everything looks impressive, but nobody knows what the plot is.
A whole production designed to make you feel clever, while quietly setting the team back two quarters.
And for what?
A 2% latency improvement?
A new ORM that supports emoji-based migrations?
Or maybe - just maybe - you’re using shiny tech to avoid the actually hard problems:
- Legacy decisions that no one wants to revisit.
- Teams that don’t align on priorities.
- Process debt so entrenched you’ve stopped seeing it.
But hey, tell yourself it’s about clean APIs if that helps you sleep.
Real Growth Isn’t Always a Rewrite
Here’s a hard truth: being a senior engineer often looks a lot like doing the boring thing, well.
- Writing one more test instead of chasing one more tool.
- Refactoring the tangled function instead of replacing the whole module.
- Teaching someone how the system works instead of quietly plotting to replace it.
Growth isn’t “rebuild it in the hot new stack.”
It’s asking, “What’s actually needed here?” and being brave enough to sit with the boring answer.
Sometimes the most senior move in the room is leaving it alone.
Not because you’re lazy.
Because you’re clear on the cost.
Pause, Then Pick It Up
Before you pitch your Next Big Tech Pivot, hit pause. Ask yourself:
1. What’s actually broken?
Is there a real bottleneck? Or are you just allergic to the phrase “works fine”?
2. If this tool weren’t new, would I still care?
Would you be evangelizing it if it came out in 2012 and had a logo that looked like a dentist’s office?
3. What happens if we don’t change anything?
Do we collapse? Or do we just keep delivering features in a boring, predictable way?
Spoiler: that last one is called stability. And it’s underrated.
Sometimes the bravest thing you can do as an engineer is refuse the rewrite.
Or better yet—submit a PR that renames the 10-year-old variable called doStuff() to something someone can actually read.
No fanfare. No talk. Just better code.
Your Stack Won’t Save You
Here’s the gut punch:
Your tech stack is not your legacy. Your behavior is.
Nobody remembers the stack you fought to implement.
They remember whether it helped them—or made things harder after you left.
So if you’re tempted to rip things up and start fresh, ask yourself:
- Am I solving a problem, or avoiding one?
- Am I improving the system, or distracting myself from harder work?
- Am I chasing clarity, or just chasing dopamine?
Because the best engineers don’t need to chase shiny things.
They know how to make the dull ones sharper.
So maybe this sprint, don’t fly off with the glimmering tool you saw on HN.
Maybe just help your team ship clean code that doesn’t hurt to look at.
You’re not a crow.
And your roadmap’s not a perch.