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This Reddit comment of mine [1] is very relevant: I have thoughts about this. I'm in my 40s and for most of my life I had an unending series of unfinished pro

This Reddit comment of mine [1] is very relevant: I have thoughts about this. I'm in my 40s and for most of my life I had an unending series of unfinished projects that I felt guilty about. Today, I am able to finish some stuff, including some pretty large, hard projects. Better, I don't feel guilty about the stuff I don't finish. The trick for me is to be deliberate and mindful about why I'm embarking on a particular project. If it's because I want to feel good by: * Sharing something with others. * Accomplishing a difficult, challenging task. * Proving to myself that I can do something. * Getting the social cachet of being a creative, productive person. (Maybe this is shallow, but who doesn't like to feel impressive in the eyes of their peers?) Then the goal of the project is the product it and I focus my attention and discipline on it. I try to have as few of these as possible—like only one at a time—so that my willpower is not diluted. If it's because I want to feel good by: * Improving a skill. * Exploring an unfamiliar domain or learning something new. * Relaxing by tinkering on something I like. Then the goal of the project is the process and I don't feel bad about not finishing. The real treasure is all the stuff I learned and did along the way and there is no real destination. I can have as many of these as I want because there's no real failure mode here. They're all recreation. Once I got more honest and clear with myself about my goals for each project, I started to be able to finish the ones where that mattered and stopped feeling bad about the ones where it doesn't. [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/p71j9x/what_do_you_have_too_much_of/h9h8d3f/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/p71j9x/what_do_y... Ironically, I've been meaning to polish this comment up to be a full article for a while but haven't gotten around to it yet.

ashton314 2y ago
> Relaxing by tinkering on something I like. This describes a large number of projects that I start. Getting comfortable that this is the real reason behind a lot of what I want to do and being OK with something being unfinished goes a really long way to not stressing about unfinished projects. > Ironically, I've been meaning to polish this comment up to be a full article for a while but haven't gotten around to it yet. Lol. Just slap it in your blog. Right now, just like it is. Then maybe go and polish it up. Or set a pomodoro timer and polish it right now and publish once 25 minutes have elapsed or something. I once sent a professor in my department my favorite Emacs packages—he's an Emacs user too but was wondering what some of the hot new packages were. When I sent him a long-ish Slack message, he just said to publish the list as-is on my blog. I was initially unsure—I do like to do several drafts—but I decided it couldn't hurt. I edited a little to make the grammar more correct, but it landed on my blog and is currently the most-visited post. Go figure. So, for those stuck on publishing posts on their blog: just post. Post post post post. Don't over-think it. Don't try to have the flashiest blog post. Just write. ;) (The Emacs post, for those curious: https://lambdaland.org/posts/2024-05-30_top_emacs_packages/ https://lambdaland.org/posts/2024-05-30_top_emacs_packages/ )

ashton314 2y ago

> Relaxing by tinkering on something I like. This describes a large number of projects that I start. Getting comfortable that this is the real reason behind a lot of what I want to do and being OK with something being unfinished goes a really long way to not stressing about unfinished projects. > Ironically, I've been meaning to polish this comment up to be a full article for a while but haven't gotten around to it yet. Lol. Just slap it in your blog. Right now, just like it is. Then maybe go and polish it up. Or set a pomodoro timer and polish it right now and publish once 25 minutes have elapsed or something. I once sent a professor in my department my favorite Emacs packages—he's an Emacs user too but was wondering what some of the hot new packages were. When I sent him a long-ish Slack message, he just said to publish the list as-is on my blog. I was initially unsure—I do like to do several drafts—but I decided it couldn't hurt. I edited a little to make the grammar more correct, but it landed on my blog and is currently the most-visited post. Go figure. So, for those stuck on publishing posts on their blog: just post. Post post post post. Don't over-think it. Don't try to have the flashiest blog post. Just write. ;) (The Emacs post, for those curious: https://lambdaland.org/posts/2024-05-30_top_emacs_packages/ https://lambdaland.org/posts/2024-05-30_top_emacs_packages/ )