Curious how many folks working on projects here deal with burnout or a loss of interest in the project they’re working on. Do y’all abandon the project or do you find a way to push through?
For myself, I’ve gotten a little better each time I’ve started a new project at seeing it through further. I kinda want to try to stick with what I’m working on at the moment, but too many other things are pulling at me in life right now it feels like. I think trying to post here and other places might help keep me invested and thus this post haha.
Well sometimes burnout is because what you are working on isn’t working, if you catch my drift. Sometimes it’s for the best you change gears and move on to something else with some new ideas and a stronger foundation.
For long running projects I’ll take a break and work on a different story or nothing at all for a week to give myself a mental relaxation.
If I’m just experiencing production/art burnout I’ll stop and play a game, read a book, workout or something to get my mind in a different gear.
What I’m getting at is just getting away from the thing that’s wearing me down and doing something else usually helps. Why force yourself to work on something you’re not enjoying?
Really depends. Burnout’s a real issue for me, 'specially with adhd, but I’ve made a habit of giving myself a few edges regarding it.
Letting myself actually stop before it gets bad is the big one. If you’ve got adhd and didn’t get diagnosed or handled until later, or any other kind of nonsense you’ll often hear and then internalize lines like,
“Oh, if I quit now I guess I’m just being lazy again, huh”
And it’s never a useful idea, because what I’ll do is drive myself bonkers well past the point of when I wanted a break, or needed a break. And when I give out, instead of the one day, or two day, break, it’ll be a week, two weeks, a month. Letting myself off the ride when I want and need one’s critical lol.
Making it easier to get feedback. Getting on sites like this posting updates, etcetera is and can be really good for you. Because it’s easy to get discouraged when you’re going. “Oh, will this be any good, why do I even bother” blah blah. It makes staying with something good, because you’re getting feedback. You are - to your brain at least - making more progress.
Leaving myself with an actionable and reasonable plan/goal posts.
This is a tip mostly for adhd, but I’ve found other folks get good use out of it: Get out of your head and focus on a viable minimum product. Or put another away: Trim down your thoughts and expectations. If you come at a project but especially in video games like -
“I’monna make an epic always online, fully immersive 4D super mmo that hooks into your brain and summons dragons with a fully run player economy and npc/world system” and you’ve never coded before, or never designed a game before, you are setting yourself up to get burnt out. You’re one person. Or maybe even three or four people but still. There’s only so much you can do in the 24 hours you get. Keep your scope and ideas reasonable.
Focus on the most basic of basics. “Oh. I’monna make a blank world. I’monna make a box. I’monna figure out how to get that box to move! I’monna add jumping to the box.” Start with a very basic workshop on everything, give yourself time to get used to details, engine finnickiness and treat it like what it is:
A hobby no one’s paying you for up front. You go at it at your own pace, when you want to, and in a reasonable manner that works for you.
Blockquote
If you’ve got adhd and didn’t get diagnosed or handled until later
omg same bestie
But in all seriousness yeah I got diagnosed early last year, been on adderall for about half a year now. One of the thoughts that got me to finally accept maybe something was wrong was “Nearly everyday I’m trying so hard just to do something, anything. Even if I’m failing if it was really laziness I wouldn’t even be trying.” I’m still learning about how to best operate both under medication and not, and I think the thing for me right now is remaining invested in longer term projects and your second point I think is a good one in that regard.
I actually have scoped my current project back into essentially something different from what I originally wanted, which is probably why I’ve made it farther on it than my past projects.
I think for me, especially getting confirmation from another ADHD person, the things I need to focus on are self investment → planned concrete steps → feedback → (which feeds back to investment) and kinda get it self sustaining. I appreciate both of you replying because it’s kinda breaking the ice for me and helping me feel like I can start posting more, both in general and about my project when I have a small slice to show. Thank you.