Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#51

Post by sergiotapia » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:52 PM UTC

lukeholder wrote: post #44

sergiotapia wrote: post #12

Married, two children. I find myself wishing the days lasted 36 hours instead of 24. :P I have a full time job as well and do not have the time for pet projects. After work I get home and have some family time until it's bed time. Then my wife watches some TV while I work for about 1 hour tops. As you know, 1 hour is NOTHING when developing. I take at least 45 minutes to get into a groove and ultimately I do nothing…

Im in exactly the same situation. 29, 2 kids, wife. Full time job. No time to work on my ideas. I feel like I am just working to pay the bills and keep afloat. I try and pull a late night coding after all are in bed but i get super tired and know I will be wasted for work the next day. I dont know how much longer I can go on without creating something of my own to put out into the world.

Man, I know exactly where you're coming from. By the time I can get some work done it's 11:35pm and my brain is starting to mix up the keys on the keyboard and I get sloppy.

What can be done? I wish there was some sort of hypertime chamber like in Dragonball Z where I could in and work for three weeks but only have left for 1 hour. That would be sweet!

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#52

Post by agentultra » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:54 PM UTC

A wife. A full time job. And the first kid is on the way.

I have all the time I need.

I'm not a fastidious planner with a Type-A personality and an obsession with maintaining lists. I'm actually terribly lazy and my wife might have to remind me a couple times to get something done before I actually find time to do it. I think I've just structured my life around what I love to do that it all falls into place with the least amount of effort on my part.

Things that contribute to me having enough free time to work on my side projects:

- I don't spend much time watching TV, playing video games, or engaging in passive activities (I save them for when I need a rest) - I live close to where I work so that I don't waste hours commuting - I keep my circle of friends small and plan my social engagements ahead of time (I usually plan them around the time I want for working on my projects) - I do chores, run errands, and keep up with all the little things using a todo list. If I need to pick up groceries I'll do it on the commute home. If I need to run a bunch of errands I'll schedule that time in advance. - I get up early and get my exercise in before I start my work day - I never work at my full time job for more than 8 hours (very few extraneous circumstances will change that. I break this rule on occassion) - Wife and I are rather independent people and we like our personal time which helps too ;)

Time is the one resource that we cannot acquire more of. We're all spending at the same rate as one another. I believe it's how you choose to spend it that is the most important. I tend to be very self-centered and introverted and structure my life around spending as much time on the things that will make me happy as I possibly can. I don't like planning and living on a schedule so I just make sure I'm in the right place at the right time to do the things that I want... kind of like 'wu-wei' I guess.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#53

Post by up_and_up » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:54 PM UTC

I literally have no time, yet find time for major side projects and freelancing

I work as a fulltime developer, have a wife, two kids and one on the way. My wife also works part time

The biggest roadblock is sleep. Here is my daily schedule:

5:30 Wake and Meditation

7:30 Make Breakfast for everyone

8:30 Start work

5:30 End Work

6:30 Make Dinner

7:00 Eat Dinner

8:00 Play time with Kids

9:30 Get kids in Bed

10:00 Do dishes

10:30 Side Project time!

12:30 Go to bed.

Repeat!

During the last 3 years I have built:

http://wellhub.heroku.com/

https://www.targetmobi.com/

From my perspective, anyone without a wife/husband and kids in tow really has little excuses. Generally the issue is either being overcommitted or just laziness/procrastination.

You will only understand that if you someday have your back against the wall wishing you could back back to your pre-married pre-kid lifestyle.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#54

Post by throwit1979 » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:56 PM UTC

CodeCube wrote: post #40

throwit1979 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question, not trolling. Why did you make the choice to have a family, then?

I too have a wife and two children and often feel the same as parent. The choice to get married (at 18) and have kids (first one at 20) was actually quite deliberate. We talked about whether we wanted to live it up now and do all the serious stuff like having kids later in life ... or get the kids out of the way then while we have energy and save our "golden years" for traveling the world, or generally doing whatever…

I guess what I'm getting at it is not really "why did you choose to have kids at time X in your life" as much as it is "why did you choose to have kids at all?"

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#55

Post by kindohm » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:56 PM UTC

There is a difference between finding and making time. I'm married, have one child, play hockey 1.5 times a week, write and record music, and try to cook. When I have a pet project in mind, all of that gets put on hold. I have to _make_ time and shove some things aside.

There are boundaries though. I don't hide in a hole away from my wife and daughter for a weekend. It goes in chunks of time. Family is a priority for me, and I can't justify shutting them out so I can code for a weekend. As a result, I need to work in 1-4 hour chunks. Four hours is pushing it (either because of sleep or a daughter craving time with me on a saturday). Hockey, music, cooking... those things can always wait when I choose.

I also constrain myself to small pet projects. Many times the projects cannot be completed, and I'm ok with that. I usually work on projects to prove out ideas or learn something... not finish them. Sometimes I share stuff on my blog or github. However, my work is usually rough around the edges. My pet projects are not meant to be polished and beautiful. They are for me to learn or just do something crazy and cool.

Having a child will cut off your free time like a tourniquet. However, I've found that having a child has also helped me focus. My seven years as a father have arguably (and ironically) been my most productive for my career. I have a hard time explaining that, other than I've had to focus and really come to terms with what is important - both at the macro level of choosing an activity and at the micro level of how pretty I want my side-work to be.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#56

Post by lallouz » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 3:58 PM UTC

This is such a common question and the answer is always the same. Compromise. No matter what your situation (wife, kids, intern, job, etc) you need to compromise time on some things to make time for others. And depending on your situation it will involve compromise from other people in your life as well like friends,social life,wife,kids.

While most commenters here are right about schedules, That can be hard for some people. What I find is most important is communication with your stakeholders (i.e. wife/gf/kids) and maybe not setting an entire schedule for your whole day , but maybe a set time block a few days a week for "pet project work". What is really important here is do the same for your other responsibilities. Like Tuesday nights is "watch TV with the wife and kids" night and wednesday night is "I work on my project" night.

Most important to remember is Keep Trying!

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#57

Post by matthuggins » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 4:02 PM UTC

xoail wrote: post #25

matthuggins wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am planning to as soon as our lease expires, but unfortunately that's not for another 10 months. :)

Break the lease. Gotta take some risks.

Can't afford it at the moment, don't have the cash. Hence renewing the lease for another year until we can stash some savings.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#58

Post by gm » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 4:05 PM UTC

No TV at all.

Use time trackers like Toggl to watch what you do with your time. Cut the fat out.

Also get enough sleep. All these answers with sleeping 5 hours a night are bullshit. You cannot do stuff that requires concentration quickly if you are not well-rested.

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#59

Post by up_and_up » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 4:05 PM UTC

agentultra wrote: post #52

A wife. A full time job. And the first kid is on the way. I have all the time I need. I'm not a fastidious planner with a Type-A personality and an obsession with maintaining lists. I'm actually terribly lazy and my wife might have to remind me a couple times to get something done before I actually find time to do it. I think I've just structured my life around what I love to do that it all falls into place with the…

"And the first kid is on the way." "I have all the time I need."

Would love to hear your story 9 months from now to see how all your advice holds up ;).

Re: Ask HN: How do you find time for pet projects?

#60

Post by fmavituna » Mon, Oct 22, 2012, 4:18 PM UTC

> I need some time for sports/relaxing/whatever

Make you pet project your relaxing time, unless you truly enjoy what you are doing (especially initially) it might be a good idea to try another pet project. This is the key.

I've done many pet projects because I was truly enjoying myself doing them, even waking up earlier so I can work on my project before going to the office. BTW Weekends and holidays are great times as well. Recently celebrated our 10th anniversary I know how hard can this be with a family.

Nonetheless, I'm running my own startup for the last 3 years now (11 people at the moment) because one of those pet projects. But also I pretty much stopped doing pet-projects other than Google style 20% free time within the company.