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Start small. Put online what you learn. If you learned something today, you might teach someone else tomorrow.
The commitment is a big deal too. I don't want to start a blog, write two posts, and then abandon it, and I know that's more likely than not. I even struggle a bit with what the voice would be of the blog: would I write about work-related things? Just whatever comes to mind?
I don't have a great answer for you, but accountability and not breaking the chain are the two biggest things I hear: creating something every day, and having a couple of friends checking in on you, for instance.
Oh, and in my case, having just had a newborn doesn't help the situation. My brain is just too tired with the down time I have, frequently, so here I am, writing in an HN comment instead of the course I should be writing, or the other ideas I have kicking around. :-/
99% of the human species blows their time on Facebook so don't feel too bad about it
Some epiphanies I have encountered on my path:
- Terminal value - do things you want to do for the sake of themselves. Not to achieve some purpose, or benefit the society, or whatever, understand what YOU value and want to make.
- You don't "find your passion", you choose it. Make a decision on what you want to do with the following years of your life, and then figure out a way to make it work.
- Enjoying the process of creating things is a combination of skillset and value. When it works - programming or writing is supposed to feel like playing minecraft(or whatever is the most engaging computer game you can imagine). You do not force yourself to do it, you do it for the sake of the game. You are driven to make fun stuff, and then you do it because you can.
- Read the book about Flow, and about gamification - understand how your mind works and what drives it. It's all about the reward loop, your brain craves dopamine, and you satisfy this craving by setting clear, small goals and accomplishing them.
- If you feel "fear" I would guess that it's either because of the lack of skill(you dont want to waste time and hard work when you're not sure that you can successfully create something valuable), or because of the "ego" - you care too much about your self image, about what others will think of you or about what you think of youself, you tie your sense of self-worth to the quality of work you produce. To fix the first one you develop more skill, to fix the second you realize that this shit doesn't matter. The only thing within your control is how much understanding/practice you put into your craft, so you learn to only care about that and none of the irrelevant stuff.
To summarize:
1. Find the terminal value your brain craves. What do you want to do with your life, what do you want to make?
2. Follow the path to mastery, give all of your attention to getting good at what you do. That's the only thing within your control, and everything else doesn't matter.
3. Focus on practicing your craft, for the sake of the process. Design a rewarding process by understanding the idea of flow state, and your brain's core drives, and turn it into a habit. Set clear, valuable, attainable goals, break them down into simple steps, and accomplish them. Make this your lifestyle.
And creating cool stuff will simply be a side-effect of this process.
Also don't feel too guilty for "consuming" stuff, it's okay to relax and have fun and watch comedy and be inspired by the creativity of others. Focus your energy on creating more, not on consuming less.
Also, don't worry about following the schedule - it's an unnecessary arbitrary constraint you've made up that will just make things more difficult and add pressure. Moving further matters, following a plan does not. Use it as a tool if it helps, throw it out if it stands in your way.
Man, this is me all over. I've spoken to friends about how I feel like on the "consumer vs. creator continuum," I'm far too far on the consumer side. It's just easier to watch Netflix after coming home from work, instead of creating something new. The commitment is a big deal too. I don't want to start a blog, write two posts, and then abandon it, and I know that's more likely than not. I even struggle a bit with wha…
If you want to run a marathon, the most important thing is to run 1k per day. Once you're out in the road, the distance will take care of itself.
I block these websites because habit takes you there when you're bored. The dns failure is simply a reminder that you were about to waste time, and you can put it to better use.
There is nothing wrong with consuming information, what you put into your mind eventually comes out in creative expression. In my case I can't force myself to be creative when I don't feel like it, but when the creative impulse is felt, my raw materials (the contents of my mind) are better ingredients.
I ask because you need to:
A. build an environment conducive to producing.
B. practice discipline.
Like you, I had some half-baked blogs and projects that were doomed for failure. After way too much wasted time it was obvious that I wasn't living a lifestyle congruent with my goals. No successful person ever prioritized Facebook over their project. I was lying to myself and had to snap out of it.
So I began applying a version of the Broken windows theory* - which argues that if you prevent small crimes it discourages large crimes - to my life. (In this case the smaller crimes were procrastination and the larger crime was not getting my shit together like I know I ought to).
The rules were simple:
1. Everything I did had to align with my goal to produce. I got a faster laptop, dual screens (this makes a difference, trust me), began sleeping well and eating well, rationed consuming to 2 hours a day, stopped drinking (hangovers are dumb...for now at least).
2. Apply discipline everywhere. I made my bed first thing each morning, the apartment was always spotless, I worked out every day. Even began doing stuff like not using auto-correct on Chrome - fight your lazy brain and spell the word correctly dammit. The idea was to practice discipline as much as possible so as to train it like a muscle.
End result: I learned how to code, built a product, quit my job and am now at 500 customers.
So you can do it. It's just going to cost you - dates, meetups with friends, a slight drop in Facebook-notification-induced-dopamine. But, I assure you, the joy from creating something that people enjoy eclipses all of that.
This approach is geared more for an all in lifestyle change. If you just want to be a better blogger, even a fraction of the above will do.
Worse than the fear of commitment is the tinge of regret. Took almost a decade to figure that one out.
The War of Art [1] and Do the Work [2] both are excellent books about making things and why it's hard. I found them motivating not only because of the solutions in the books but also just because someone describing the problems I have with creating, so clearly, is helpful to read. It's nice knowing you're not a crazy person and that these are problems a lot of people go through. They're also very short and easy to read. So give them a shot.