Comments on: How Long Can You Stay Motivated?

By: Jake Birkett

Jake Birkett — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:28:02 +0000

Same with me and books, all mine are read except for the small pile of To Read books.

By: Juuso

Juuso — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:33:12 +0000

Jake: % games thing. I actually have finished very few played games. Mainly… because I play online multiplayer :) No “finishing there”. As for books… I’ve got tons of them here and get from library. There are less than 5 unfinished book in my big shelf of collection (maybe like 2 or 3). So… it depends your style too… ;)

But I do get the point.

JC: “do what you enjoy”. Very good piece of advice. :)

By: Jake Birkett

Jake Birkett — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 17:25:36 +0000

@psycho: Great article thanks. I believe that you can learn grit from things like martial arts, I can certainly persevere more now than before I did Aikido for 12 years, but maybe also just growing up (and having kids) gives you more perseverance too…

Maybe a good test to see if you are the kind of person who sticks with something is too look at your game collection and see what % of games you have actually finished. I’ve finished most of mine, but it helps that I only buy good ones in the first place, as there is no point sticking with a crappy game, book, movie OR indeed job or project…

By: Ovogame

Ovogame — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:03:54 +0000

I have been working full time on my current game for the last 14 months. It is a pretty big project for just 1 man. It wasn’t too hard to stay motivated that long (even if I had some lows at some time). Oviously it was pretty stressfull (loads of work and loads of money to invest into that project) but I never felt un-motivated.

Before that, I cancel the game I was working on after 2,3 months. I just didn’t enjoy working on it. So, I guess the best factor for me (too stay motivated) is to work on stuff you really want to do and enjoy.

By: Frantic-Sheep

Frantic-Sheep — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 21:10:25 +0000

To be honest, for myself its very hard to maintain besides my normal full time day job :(..

Sadly to say that our current project once again just didn’t really make it.. or maybe again needs a kick in the back. Partially because of the motivation, its just really hard to keep it up.

By: Juuso

Juuso — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 04:52:57 +0000

@Ruben & @Archatas: interestingly… both of you are telling about the 2 sides of the same coin…

@psycho: good article. skimmed it through. bookmarked for reading.

@Brian: yes… can’t argue with that.

By: Brian 'Psychochild' Green

Brian 'Psychochild' Green — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:58:55 +0000

I think the mark of a professional is the ability to stick with a project. If you drop half-finished projects all the time you’ll never get anything launched.

The way I get motivated is to imagine the end product. I think the real thing that causes people to lose interest is when you’re in the middle of something and there’s so much work left to do and it seems hopeless. Thinking about the end product and thinking about people who will enjoy the game helps keep me going when things are at their most mired.

By: psycho

psycho — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:57:08 +0000

You may like this. I do, it gets to the point.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/08/02/the_truth_about_grit/?page=full

By: Darnell Gooch

Darnell Gooch — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:01:01 +0000

Well with me when i get off track with work i think about my carrier goal and how i got to stay focus(I am still in college) and how much fun it will be to be doing what i wont to. This is what keeps me motivated.

By: Archatas

Archatas — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 22:31:01 +0000

I am ashamed to accept, but I can’t really keep motivation for longer than two weeks. Then I find some other things to do and forget my main project for another several weeks. Maybe it would be different if I was doing my main project as main activity, but currently I do it only during my free time, so I am usually too tired to do programming after 8 hours of programming at work.