Only work 4 days. I put more value on my free time and learning than on money I don’t spend anyway.
Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
31–40 of 49 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#32My strategy is just to push myself to get _something_ done, even when I don't want to. So, the other night I wrote an SQL query. It was probably 20 mins of work, but it brought me closer to finishing the project. Other days, I'll end up "feeling it" and putting in several hours on a project. So, small increments plus the occasional big push.
true. my whole side project output yesterday was a shell script that monitors if another process is running and lights an led on the raspi if yes :P
40 min work. But one step closer to the goal
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#33The key to keeping up motivation is some sort of success or reason to think you'll be successful. In the beginning, us entrepreneurs are filled with confidence (or dillusions depending on how you look at it). It's this confidence that keeps you going. But, as reality sets in and no one uses your app, you begin to realize it's not going to work.
I guess thats why they always recommend release soemthing early , so you can get some small measure of success: at least get some positive feedback to validate your idea.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#34An omnipresent underlying sense of anxiety and rage caused by something or other in my past that is useful for work but not useful for building relationships!
Michael Jordan was great at doing this. His hall of fame speech is filled w/ anecdotes about him turning slights into motivation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLzBMGXfK4c
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#35I take the opposite approach. It's NOT good to work on side projects after work. That's reserved for the weekends.
Spend your after noons doing other stuff. Excercise, other hobbies, talking with ppl at a bar, etc.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#36Buy a PS4 and put it next to your PC. At least to me, playing video games give me some energy and some escape after work. After that, I tackle small 30 minute tasks. Don't take side-projects too seriously!
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#37I just do stuff because I believe in the idea and the stuff needs to get done for the idea to materialize.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#38An omnipresent underlying sense of anxiety and rage caused by something or other in my past that is useful for work but not useful for building relationships!
This is my life.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#39The way I see it, when I have some free time I have some choice in which ways to spend it. If I spend it doing some things, I end up with something to show for it, something I can look at later or point to and say "I did that." Other ways leave me with almost nothing. And I just get bothered by that. Now, it's important to note that I am very broad in my sense of 'something to show for it.' Being well-read, having a wide experience with cinema, etc are things that I credit as artifacts worth accumulating. So most of my time gets split between learning and building things (software, mostly, as that's where my talents lie).
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#40I tried doing it nights and weekends for 3.5 years and with a young family, I made advances in my skills but never produced anything meaningful. I'm working with someone else now to create a product and so I took a week of annual leave to try out what it was like doing my own thing full-time and vlogged about it.
It was so good the next day back at work I handed in my notice which is what the following video is about!