When do you know you are trying to do too much and how do you improve self discipline?
I feel like I am doing to many things at the same time. I am trying to build project from scratch, I want to document my journey on my website SoloMaker.life read advice, listen to the IH podcast, exercise because I have become very out of shape, live-stream my progress with Twitch (to keep myself accountable in some way that is not my wife asking how progress is going), tweet daily updates, post my status on Indie Hackers, maintain daily house work, AND still have time for my wife and children.
It feels overwhelming. Nothing is getting done, and many things are deteriorating. When I left my full time job 3 weeks ago, I thought I'd have so much extra time and would be energized to accomplish more. But the opposite has happened: I seem more lethargic and less focused.
Is it just me? Am I incapable of juggling the things I need to so I can focus on the task at hand? Am I trying to do too much? A lot of the tasks surrounding me working on Eurotripr.com are so I can keep myself 'motivated' and 'accountable' to move forward. It seems like I shouldn't need to trick myself into doing this, but I find I'm more likely to sit down at regular hours if i record myself coding, even if no one is watching - it's like going to the office for me. Documenting the journey seems like a (hopefully) great way to also stay accountable AND build a small audience that might be useful in helping me gain traction once my project is in working order.
I know all of this might be superfluous, and of course the real priorities are my family and health so these items are non-negotiable, but should I ruthlessly pare other things back to a bare minimum until I have completed an MVP, and only then add more tasks to my plate?
Intuitively, it seems like paring back these 'accountability' tasks would be the best choice. But in doing so, will I somehow make it harder for myself to gain an audience or traction later? Am I doing something wrong?
Why does it seem I'm the only person who can't juggle everything and keep moving forward. I know others on IH have had the same question/problem, but it seems like it is affecting me more (I know that's not the case - but when it's you it just feels that way).
It's very discouraging to see others succeed no matter how many competing priorities they have. Yet I can barely stay on track with my own?
What am I doing wrong that 'everyone else' seems to have gotten right? I don't want to go another week with no / very little forward progress to show.
I would say what you experiencing isn't uncommon. I certainly experience it too.
I remember when I started my "creator journey" on top of the full time job that I couldn't do all the things that some creators managed to pull off without a hiccup.
After about a year I realised that I had to go slow. Build one aspect at the time and then expand once I got comfortable with the first area of work.
For example. First get the newsletter going weekly, then tweet daily, now I try to pre schedule the tweets, etc. It took me several months to nail each part but now I can sustain them in parallel.
Thank @ziga. It's nice to hear that other people face this same issue. I logicaly knew others did - IH is filled with many people asking / talking about similar situations/feeling, but it's hard to listen to the logic sometimes when you are in the midst of your own emotions. Thanks for the advice!
Most people only share the good parts. ;)
Allow yourself some time to get things right. You don’t need to have everything figured out after 3 weeks. I certainly hadn’t.
Also check out @jimzarkadas’ most recent YouTube video. I think you’re going to resonate with it: https://youtu.be/UITotVkPhRY
Thanks @nikwen. You're right that i need more than three weeks to get things right. But that internal voice keeps shouting 'HURRY UP! You're going to miss your opportunity!' I need to shut take a step back and focus on one important thing and silence the internal voice.
I watched a couple episodes of @jimzrkadas' videos. Thanks for recommending - he did resonate with me, and I find his journey is similar to what I am trying to do. I appreciate you pointing me to him.
Yes, I can relate to how you're feeling. When I started out, I felt the same.
When I started actually getting things done, I realized that if you keep working, things fall into place at some point, and that it's much more important to keep a steady pace than to be as fast as possible now. It's a marathon, not a sprint. :)
Jim is awesome. Glad you liked his videos!