It’s interesting (haha I usually say to replace the word “difficult” with “interesting” in a whiteboard interview….) to think that my last post was more than a year ago. Things have been pretty hectic over the last several months and I’ve spent most of my time trying to “stay afloat”. I have good news, bad news, and…news?

Bad News

• I don’t think I would be exaggerating if I said that the last 7-8 months have been the toughest of my life.
• I stopped working on every….single…one…of…my… projects. I have nothing to report on the “big list of project ideas” I mentioned a year ago. I still have the ideas. I just haven’t worked on them.
• Sadly, I think I finally achieved the mythical burnout state. The root of the situation is, of course, the fact that I’ve been working too much during a very difficult time, but there were smaller reasons too. I lost contact with:
  • martial arts and exercise.
  • family and friends.
  • most of the entertainment I love: novels, anime, and videogames
  • self-improvement/self-study

Good News

The good news is that things will start to improve, at least a little, soon. Over the next several weeks I’ll spend a lot of time focusing on resting and recovery. Part of that recovery is going to be to finally start to work on the projects I’ve neglected for far too long. (Is it weird that I’m planning on working to be able to…rest?)

I’m going to use Twitter to document the process and to keep myself accountable to living a healthier lifestyle. Follow me if you would like to check that out: https://twitter.com/vladimirsan

I’ll probably write a post here to summarize the process in a few months.

News…?

Neither good nor bad, but one of the most interesting outcomes of this whole process how it may force me to re-think most of my plans. I’m trying to avoid making any big decisions until I take care of my burnout though.

Over the last several years I’ve noticed that there is one particular type of post I always dread to write: a post where I explain a massive change in my plans. It is with a heavy heart that I’m about to cancel my newest project: irpgs.com.

But why?

Time

Even in the earlier development days; it was very clear that iRPGs was going to require a healthy amount of time. Especially after I realized the amount of free time I had while working a full-time job.

In hindsight, that was a red flag for any “side” project. I didn’t want to cancel yet another project, so I persevered.

However; at some point, I had to ask myself “Do I really want to spend this amount of time working in iRPGs and not working on my main projects (the same projects I left stranded because of iRPGs)?” Sadly, the answer is NO. Even if iRPGs were to become super successful, the answer is still NO u_u

Python

I’ll admit this is a weak justification, but I did not have a great time with python. I love python for small scripts, but I didn’t like using python for iRPGs.

It can be said that most of my problems with python stem from the fact that I might not have learned enough python, but I didn’t have a great time with the environment and I don’t think I’ll start another project in python anytime soon.

It’s not you Python…it’s me.

So, what’s next?

Hopefully, I’ll think thrice before starting any other project…

I have a  big list of project ideas in my queue, but I’ll limit my active projects as much as possible. I should be able to write about my next steps in the next few weeks.