For a while, I was completely hooked on Cursor’s Tab feature.
I loved the feeling of being in control—seeing the big picture, deciding exactly what I wanted to build, and then using Tab to turn those ideas into reality at incredible speed. Coding felt genuinely enjoyable.
But now, I honestly can’t remember the last time I used Tab.
Programming has gradually turned into a boring workflow: tell an agent what needs to be built, wait for it to finish, then test and review the result. The fun has disappeared.
The world is changing incredibly fast, and it feels like one of the few things I truly enjoyed is slowly fading away. Sometimes I wonder whether I even like programming anymore.
Hey, thanks for sharing this. It’s a really relatable feeling. The shift from “I keep the plan in my head and Tab helps me build it fast” to “I give a task to an agent and wait” really does feel different.
Good news: Tab isn’t going anywhere and it’s still a full part of Cursor. Nobody has to switch to an agent-first workflow. If you enjoy driving the code yourself and speeding up with Tab, you can absolutely keep working that way. Agent is an option, not a replacement.
A lot of users go hybrid. They write the core architecture and logic by hand with Tab, and hand the routine stuff to the agent like boilerplate, refactors, and tests. That way you keep control and the sense of authorship, and the boring parts go to the machine.
If you’ve noticed coding stopped being fun, it can help to intentionally go back to the mode that used to motivate you. Try a couple days in your old Tab style and see if the feeling comes back. Let me know how it goes.
As I get older, I appreciate never coding directly anymore, I feel like an Architect/PM with nearly instant feedback and little need to rouse buy-in. Seeing products go from concept to completion in hours/days is extremely rewarding, and finishing a 40hr work week in 2 hrs opens a lot of time to do things I really want to.