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Discussion on: How do you make time for your dev/tech projects?

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Anna Simoroshka

I recently wrote a post about this :)
dev.to/simoroshka/full-time-side-p...

  • How many hours do you work a day?
    7-8, with no commute

  • How many do you sleep?
    7-8, waking up without alarm

  • Do you have other unavoidable obligations?
    Spending time with my partner, and soon we are going to get a dog! :)

  • How much free time do you have, daily? (on average)
    What is considered free time? There are always chores, cooking, eating, etc. If we exclude this, maybe 5 hours. Of which I try to have, spread throughout the day, 2 hours of some sort of physical activity, like a walk at least.
    Then there are weekends and they vary, depending on the plans.

  • How do you stay motivated when you have too little time and too much to do?
    I do something that motivates me. I do it every day for at least 30 minutes (usually more). I keep my todo lists super short and only filled with essential things. I allow myself to rest and have fun when I need it: read books, watch youtube, play games, meet with friends.

If you have things piling up, I'd suggest to go through your priorities and decide which things you absolutely must do, which things you want to do now, and which things would be nice to do but they can be done later. Get rid of the first ones as fast as you can, and then focus on the second. The third go to a backlog which you can review periodically.
Statistically, half of todo list items are never done. I argue that they are not done because they are not that important or desired. Therefore, they can be easily scratched. Dropping things from todo lists is one of my favourite things! :D