I also listen to the same song on repeat. How do you think Despacito got all those views.
The thought of listening to Despacito for a week straight is making me sweat
Finish your projects
21–30 of 241 posts
Re: Finish your projects
#22I often say this to my teenagers: "You don't get any credit for the homework you thought about handing in. Even if it's not perfect, the only way to get a mark is if you hand it in." So true for work and side-projects as well. (I needed this reminder myself as I have a blog post I've been noodling on for 12+ months. I just need to publish the damned thing!)
This reminds me of two quotes that really helped me with perfection anxiety: "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing badly." "Within acceptable tolerances."
The corollary of which is "It's not just good, it's good enough" (which I think is a Simpsons reference).
I actually have a project on the shelf that's ][ far from being releasable.
It's waiting on two things.
One, is since it's a Java GUI, getting it built into a form for the MacOS/Window/Linux platforms, rather than just "here's a jar file". There's ways around this, but it's not quite drag and drop, and I haven't got a Windows box to test anything on, so its stalled. (I tried installing one of MS's VM images that they offered, but that's didn't work, so...back to the shelf).
Two, is documentation. I could probably just let it go, and explain it to the 3 people who might actually download it and use because simply launching it, "Neat!", and letting it bit rot forever more. But, I think it needs some documentation, so...it sits.
If I could satisfactorily drag and drop the installers, I'd probably press on with it, but it could still use some docs.
Meanwhile, I continue on my meta project which this project would inevitably be folded into, so it's not all lost.
Re: Finish your projects
#23My "hack" is to release work early (while you're still embarrassed by it), and iterate ruthlessly: https://onlineornot.com/unreasonable-effectiveness-shipping-....
Re: Finish your projects
#24I heard that Shannon was a mess hyper multitasker. He just went wherever his mind wanted to, and moved accordingly. Made me try to accept my scrapyard of project shelf and just keep iterating hard.
Re: Finish your projects
#25My "hack" is to release work early (while you're still embarrassed by it), and iterate ruthlessly: https://onlineornot.com/unreasonable-effectiveness-shipping-... .
I try to make at least one commit a day. Some days I fail, but often I have weeks-long streaks.
Re: Finish your projects
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
This reminds me of two quotes that really helped me with perfection anxiety: "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing badly." "Within acceptable tolerances."
The corollary of which is "It's not just good, it's good enough" (which I think is a Simpsons reference). I actually have a project on the shelf that's ][ far from being releasable. It's waiting on two things. One, is since it's a Java GUI, getting it built into a form for the MacOS/Window/Linux platforms, rather than just "here's a jar file". There's ways around this, but it's not quite drag and drop, and I haven't…
Personally, I have lost count of the times I've got a jar from some place, and had to look at the source to discover how to use, and still used the software.
It is really not a good experience, but totally beats not having the software.
Re: Finish your projects
#27My "hack" is to release work early (while you're still embarrassed by it), and iterate ruthlessly: https://onlineornot.com/unreasonable-effectiveness-shipping-... .
Love this framing! Good article. Followed you on Twitter!
Re: Finish your projects
#28Totally agree. And even after the big finish^Wlaunch, too many people give up on good projects because they don't know how to get traction yet. The truth is that sometimes that's your fault, not the project's fault. New founders especially quit good ideas way too often, way too early because they've been conditioned to want to drop things if they fail to reach hockey-stick growth within a certain time threshold. It takes time. All of it.
I briefly wrote about this awhile back as well: https://keygen.sh/blog/5-things-ive-learned-in-5-years/
Re: Finish your projects
#29In general, I like the empathetic tone of the article, and I appreciate that it addresses an emotional facet of software development. But nevertheless it triggers some little part of me w/regard to telling people what they should or should not do, or what they may be proud of. I worry for someone who reads "You also have a duty to your future self to release the project" and "...you tell yourself that you are the kin…
Nuanced and valuable feedback, that I receive. Thank you! I think your edit was basically going to be my reply, haha. It is hard to address every side of every potential topic in an article. I actually needed help softening the tone to end up with the final version you're reading today. I'm empathetic by nature so it's easy for me to write with empathy, but I'm still prone to generalizing my personal experiences!
> You have a duty to your past self to release the project. It’s a way to honor your work and sacrifice. All the time spent on the project is time you could have spent on something else. That time was not without cost.
Ouch!
I strongly encourage you to read up and understand the sunk cost fallacy. In general, do not let past efforts be the guide for future decisions.
I've quit a lot of projects in my life. And it was the right thing to do. Put another way, many of the valuable projects I've completed would not have been accomplished had I stuck to the projects I had sunk time into.
> You also have a duty to your future self to release the project. Every time you don't release a project, you're telling yourself that you’re the kind of person who doesn't ship.
If you tell yourself that every time you don't release a project, the fix is not to release the project, but to stop telling yourself these lies.
Despite the strong complaints, the article isn't that bad and does have some merits.
Re: Finish your projects
#30To take the contrary position: give up. Your project will take far longer than you think, and you will get much less from it than you hope (at least in terms of external validation and rewards).
You may feel a horrible pressure to finish it, but you are a free person and can simply choose not to. You can free yourself from this pain without lifting a finger. Go take a walk or bake some cookies instead.
If you have the intrinsic motivation to continue with your project, then your interest will return at some point and you'll get back to it with the wind at your back. If you don't have that intrinsic motivation any more then you will only make yourself miserable by trying to whip yourself forward.