Curious about what other people do to maintain the energy (and money) to work on side projects after work. What's your side project working schedule like?
Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
1–10 of 49 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#2Regarding energy, I do what I can when I can, and I don't stress about things taking a long time.
Regarding money, I don't spend any. Between free services, free/promotional tiers of paid services, and open source tools, there's rarely a need to spend anything until your project is generating cold hard cash.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#3I don't, I would also like to know. I get home, feel like satan drained my soul all day and sedate myself to continue the vicious cycle the next day.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#4I'm lucky since I am by nature an early bird. I work on my side project for an hour or so before work. Also a few hours in the morning on the weekend.
IIRC this was how Scott Adams found time to draw Dilbert when he had a full-time job.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#5I'm also a morning person, sometimes I devote my morning time to side projects first. And I leave my actual work to the later part of the day.
But if I need to work on my sides during the evening, one trick I found is making my room extremely bright, making me think that it was still daytime. I also force myself to be away from my bed. As soon as I lay down, there is no way I can get up and be productive.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#6I've always found huge success in the mornings and huge flops in the evenings.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#7I've always found huge success in the mornings and huge flops in the evenings.
An interesting aside: https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-4-a-m-is-the-most-productiv...
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#8I have an hour commute to my real job, so I use that to hack on my side project before and after work.
Setting small goals has always helped me keep up the energy to move it forward. When you're working in really small time chunks, it's important to make sure you have something achievable to accomplish. You're not going to be able to do things like "finish the sign up flow" in one night, but you can do things like "finish the authByPassword() method" and still be moving forward.
As for the money aspect of it, that's simple, just don't spend any. Bootstrapping is all about doing more with less, so don't spend anything until you absolutely have to. When you do finally start writing checks, make sure you're spending on things that will have the highest impact.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#9I have an hour commute to my real job, so I use that to hack on my side project before and after work. Setting small goals has always helped me keep up the energy to move it forward. When you're working in really small time chunks, it's important to make sure you have something achievable to accomplish. You're not going to be able to do things like "finish the sign up flow" in one night, but you can do things like "f…
I tried that last year when I had a 2 hour commute.
It doesn't work well if you have to get off every half an hour to switch trains. Or if you can't get a seat.
Re: Ask HN: How do you keep up the energy to work on side-projects after work?
#10Sometimes I do mornings, but then I don't have enough focus capacity left for work.
Best so far is 4 day work week - Friday is exclusive for me, weekends for family. Pay-cut is 20% but I gain 50% more time off, time is money too.