New Ideas, New Projects.

I come up with ideas all the time, anywhere and everywhere. I’ve always wanted to make things. An idea gets stuck in my head. I spend time thinking about how I could make it work, I lay it out at a high level, and decide to dive in. It’s exciting to start something and throw a bunch of time into it. However, I find that over time the excitement wanes, at least relative to the next new fun idea that’s stuck in my head. Rinse and repeat.

In that way, growing up curiously, I was always enamored with the things that I confidently believed I could make. Which felt like most things. Ambitious or not, I know how to break things down and how I can make them happen. There’s a wealth of knowledge online, there are like-minded friends and individuals to work with, and we’re all decently capable human beings. But we could never finish anything! It can happen for a number of reasons. You’re just plain not interested anymore, which is entirely fair. People fall off the project. We get a prototype but don’t manage to push beyond it. Life comes up, and before you know it it’s been months.

How frustrating.

It’s a problem I think many people can relate to. Fed up with myself, I made it a goal in the past year to finish something. And thankfully, I’ve been able to meet my own standards on that, releasing a mobile app on the Google Play store, Blind Chess Trainer. I have over 500 installed devices by this point, hooray! 🎉

Changing it up.

The major thing I learned about myself is that it was possible for me to manage my motivation. There are a few thoughts that helped me get to the finish line:

  • Don’t share about your goal. (At least not for a while)
  • Don’t binge; manage your enthusiasm.
  • Archive new ideas as they come.

Don’t share if you really care.

I, for one, tend to get very excited when I start a new project. I want to tell my wife, my friends, and anyone else who’s listening that I’m working on something cool in my free time. It feels great to get it out there. It’s like you’re finally getting to vent after bottling it up inside.

My issue with this is that I feel great but I didn’t do anything. I imagine that I have a tank of enthusiasm, and I just spent a decent chunk of it. There’s less energy left for me to actually get this project off the ground.

Right now, I’ll only let myself share by showing, and I’ll only really show my wife until I get to some sizeable prototype to show my friends (/ask them to test for me). Once I make a decent amount of headway into what I’m working on, I’ll take a short video of what’s new and send it to my wife and/or keep it in my log as a personal marker for progress. It feels rewarding to see the progression in design or quality when I look back through them myself.

To binge is to burn.

Like I mentioned many times before, I get very excited. I spend a lot of time in my head when I’m stuck on an idea, and all I want to do is burn 4+ hours at a time exploring or working on an idea.

Plainly put, it’s unsustainable. I’d spend anywhere from a week to a month binging work on my personal project until I fizzle out. The enthusiasm has waned and the tank is nearing empty.

Being able to identify the pattern, I’ve tried managing my enthusiasm. Minimize the 4+ hour sessions. Make 1-2 hour sessions the norm. Give time for the tank to refill.

Stopping myself from binging involves doing a little more planning. I’ve always brainstormed, explored, and designed my ideas in my personal wiki before hopping into implementing or executing in long hackathon-style sessions. Insert another step in between. Do what you do at work, make tasks, make a to-do list, prioritize. Sure, it’s a little paperwork-y and could feel like a bit of overhead, but ultimately you’re creating more context for putting down your work and picking it back up again. These are check points you can reload your brain from.

Archive to acknowledge.

New ideas are addicting. You can easily get stuck on them and start spreading your energy thin. The ideas almost clutter your brain space.

To get them out of my brain, I need to address them. What I ended up sticking to was giving new ideas a few minutes of my time. I’ll immediately whip out my phone and write it down in my Google Keep. I’ll explore the idea little more, flesh it out, ask myself interesting questions. I’ll finish up, save it, and it’s been dealt with.

This upcoming comparison started off as a joke, but I feel like it has a lot of personal truth to it. I started thinking about the Japanese lady famous for the art of tidying, Marie Kondo. Something I remembered loosely was focus on what you want to keep and let go of the rest with gratitude. That means giving them a proper send off. Thank them for what they’ve done for you so that you can put them down and let go. In terms of actually tidying my home, I haven’t even tried doing this. But the little ritual I do to address new ideas feels similar in spirit. Address them, give them space, and then let them go so you can continue to focus on what is important to you.

Keeping it going.

These were learnings from my first success. I’m sure there’s more to learn about myself. I have more things I want to work on, and what I’ve mentioned so far are a few things I’m going to keep in mind moving forward. Managing my motivation is one part of learning to keep my momentum.