I retired this year after 4 decades of writing code; now I write code to make art (in addition to other digital painting and effects). The code is actually much harder than anything I ever did before since I don't use other people's tools but make my own, but way more fun since its what I want to do, not what someone else wants. Programming without meetings or JIRA or stupid processes or politics or impossible deadlines/requirements or anything is so much better. Becoming successful as an artist is even harder than programming, that's still WIP.