Have you ever just worked on a project for so long that you just can’t stay motivated in it? Like you enjoy the project itself but the process of not knowing when it’ll be finished kills the motivation? Is this a normal feeling?

Yes, just broke 12 months and a delivery date that has kept moving for most of it due to 3rd party vendors and requirements changes throughout the whole ordeal. You get over it and just want it done with.

@C0D4 yes. And I hate complaining about this kind of feeling because it makes me feel like I’m giving off that vibe that I’m not feeling programming when that’s just not the case I just am not really enjoying the project right now since I’m not making a whole lot of progress on it at the moment

@Bubbles that's normal for long term projects, just keep pushing, and hopefully that end day will be locked in stone..... at least that's what I keep telling myself 😂

@C0D4 very reassuring thank you 😄 good luck with yours too

@M1sf3t honestly I didn’t realize how complex I’d have to make it, but honestly love how much networking and computer science stuff I’m learning to make it so that portion gets me excited

Welcome to the world of creativity. I'm more familiar with what you're describing from the perspective of fiction writing, but I think it's fairly universal across any large-scale creative endeavor. Somewhere (the authors usually have it in the last third of the project or so, not sure where it is for software) everyone gets a feeling of malaise. The project isn't going anywhere, what's being done is terrible, nothing you try is worth it, that kind of feeling sets in. *This. Is. Normal.* It happens to everyone, and is something that you have to push through to earn that final completion of whatever you're working on.

As a personal note, I seem to be wired to avoid effort as much as I can, so I usually abandon projects before I get to this point, but I'm learning to make myself keep going forward, and I hope to finish more and larger things soon.

@M1sf3t underestimating a project is definitely a bitch 😅

@powerfulparadox yes you nailed the feeling, thanks for the reassurance as well

@Bubbles You're welcome. It's very freeing to learn that we can actually expect something like this in our projects, and it's just another part of the process. When I read that every author experiences something like this with every book (at least those who write books for a living), it taught me that I could use it as motivation. It's almost like your psyche is making you prove you are tough enough to deserve the reward that is finishing your project.

Good luck with what you're working on. It sounds like you are close to something amazing.

@powerfulparadox thank you it means a lot!

@M1sf3t The human impulse to optimism is difficult to ignore and often takes a lot of experience to recognize. We all get our share of interesting learning experiences with things like that.

It’s normal feeling.

I work on single project for 4 years and I got used to fact there are waiting periods for integration with new version.

In distributed teams and multiple big projects dependent from each other it’s a trade off that at first annoyed me but now I appreciate having more time.

Yeah, that's normal :) it's 3 years since I've started mine. I had to take a few one month long pauses to remain sane, to step back and reevaluate my decisions. After some pauses I realised I was approaching some problems from a wrong angle which used to get me stuck.

I have set a hard limit for such pauses - one month sharp. If I'm not feeling better after that - I force myself back to the code. Takes a few days but I eventually get back on a track. With all the enthusiasm and excitement!

@Nanos that’s a long time