Guilt-Free Side Projects

Hi Everyone,

I'm writing today because I think after years of trial and error building projects I finally have something to share that could be helpful for some fellow Indie Hackers out there.

I've had an unhealthy approach to side projects that made me feel worse overall as a person, despite side projects being a generally healthy endeavor.

Leading up to my current side project I had a perpetual feeling that I was never giving enough attention to my projects. I felt drained and defeated rather than curious, excited, and proud.

If you’ve ever felt this way, I’d encourage you to keep reading.

Hopefully what I’ve found below to help me feel better working on things in my spare time could help you feel a little more enriched in yours. Let’s get into it.

1. It’s okay to just start building

I struggled with this for a long time because I’ve heard so much advice about how to create something people want.

Whether it’s starting a community, an email list, blogging, talking to potential customers, etc. It always seemed like building the idea I had in my head was actually a bad first step. I had to do something else before to validate my idea or else I was an amateur.

I’ve decided though that creating is what I want to do.

This is my side project. My extra time. I should enjoy it as I see fit.

I definitely understand the goals of the market research tasks but for my personal fulfillment, I decided to stop feeling guilty for not doing them.

HOWEVER…

#1) I do think it’s a bad idea to just start building when you’re trying to solve other people’s problems. My projects are generally ideas that intrigue me or are solving problems in my world. When I start building, it’s around an idea I’ve been thinking about for weeks, months, or years.

#2) It’s okay to just start building with a clearly defined end. The goal is a true MVP. You might be building something no one ultimately wants and isn’t quite the project you even wanted to work on.

And that’s ok!

The only time that’s an issue is when you sink months or years into a broken concept. Building something small to validate your concept with yourself or others is logical.

I’ll dig into this a bit more below but for now, let’s move on.

2. Pick a project where you can’t “lose”

A great project is one where even if you don’t see the outcome you were seeking you still end up learning or experiencing something new that makes you feel good.

For example, maybe you want to learn to dance the tango. You sign up and go to your first class and bad news, you don’t become a tango pro on your first night. I know, you’re crushed.

But the class was located in a part of the city you never knew and now want to explore more. The people in the class were very fun and your dancing partner was pretty cute as well. The teacher was a pro and not only taught you some basic moves but integrated history and culture into your lesson that you never knew.

Sure, you’re not a tango pro yet, but that sounds like a pretty great night out to me.

One more example for this crowd, I decided to build my latest side project in Ruby on Rails.

My real goal for the side project is to build something people like to use, but even if it doesn’t meet that goal, I’ll feel damn good that I built out a pretty robust Ruby on Rails app.

In this situation, me “losing” is being able to confidently add “Ruby on Rails” to my resume with a likely bump in salary to match.

3. The Cold Email Test

If you’re proud of your service or product and feel confident in the value it provides, then you should be excited to shoot off an email or two to your ideal customers, even if you don’t know them.

My latest project is a tool I’ve always wanted on my teams. So once I had an MVP ready to go, I wasn’t shy about sending invites to friends to sort out any major bugs. And I’m legit excited to send the project out to people I’ve never met before.

Sending an email to someone that’s to the point, exhibits consideration to the reader, and offers value isn’t something to fear. It’s the quickest way for you to get feedback on how you market the product, find early users, and ultimately validate your idea and features.

4. Build small and do less

However long you think your next project will take in your head…is wrong.

It will take 2x-3x longer. Why? Because life is unpredictable and humans are terrible at estimating.

Whatever you’re creating, try to create the most functional version of your idea with no frills. I know this is very common advice but it’s worth repeating because it’s so hard to do.

It’s like losing weight. “It’s just diet and exercise!” Easier said than done.

Maybe you’ve heard the analogy for SaaS apps of baking a cupcake and not a cake. That resonated with me years ago. A similar analogy I’ve had in my head is instead of building a home, build a tiny home.

And recently, even less than that.

My latest side project could essentially be just the bathroom of my “tiny home”.

Objectively useful on its own, we definitely know what “done” is while working on it, and we know what to work on next. But just completing the bathroom is an accomplishment and something to feel good about.

5. Define Done

Building something small and doing less is nice to say but it culminates into defining done for your project. This has been the real secret sauce of feeling more accomplished while working on side projects.

Done for me historically ended with fantasies of finding tractions, quitting my job, or selling my business. (Oof, that’s embarrassing to write.)

With definitions of done like that no wonder I felt like I wasn’t accomplishing much.

I’d recommend trying your best to create the smallest version of your idea possible. List out how you would go about building it. Everything you’re saying yes to creating but also everything you’re saying no to as well.

Everything you create will have branches into other areas that could provide additional work. For every one thing are going to do, you have to be saying no to 3.

6. Set Limits - Embrace Downtime

Setting limits on how many hours I could work on my side project has helped me to enjoy the time I do set aside.

Currently, I’m only working on the project during the weekend for a maximum of 4 hours.

It’s such a small amount of time that when the weekend rolls around I’m just dying to work on the project.

That limitation has the secondary benefit of giving my mind, conscious and subconscious, time to think about what to work on next.

Generally, I have a good idea of what’s in the pipeline but in that 5-6 days in-between working sessions my mind starts crafting solutions and approaches for the next week.

It’s amazing how something that’s “really important” one Sunday, gets cut the next in favor of something else the following Sunday.

Building my MVP had the additional restriction of only 6 working sessions or 6 weekends.

I knew that if I couldn’t build an MVP (my tiny house bathroom) in 6 weeks, I would lose that spark of positive energy I needed to complete the project.

7. Expansion Mindset

Adopting an expansion mindset means that every time you want to work on your project you feel like you’re enhancing it instead of filling in the gaps.

I think about it like building a sandcastle. You could just build one tower and feel great. Any additional, wall, moat, or tower simply adds to the empire.

Scoping your project to provide value ASAP allows you to adopt this mindset easier.

I mentioned building my MVP in 6 weekends. Getting super small MVP to a solid “done” state has allowed me to feel really good every time I sit down to work on my project since it feels like I’m just making it better rather than having an internal monologue of “It’s not ready yet.”.

Hopefully this was helpful

This is just what I’ve been doing recently and it’s been working well.

I’m feeling creative and motivated. Proud of my accomplishments week to week without the guilt of feeling like I could do more.

Again, this is just what’s been working in my world. I hope this is useful to a few of you out there.

Cheers