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| date | mp-syndicate-to | tags | title | type | url | ||||
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| 2023-02-07T19:41:54.928212 |
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How did I do it? Where did my energy go? | post | /posts/2023/02/07/how-did-i-do-it-where-did-my-energy-go1675798914 |
I recently finished and submitted my PhD thesis to Warwick University, ending a 7-year phase of my life in which I worked the CTO at an AI company by day and moonlighted by reading and writing scientific papers and writing experiments at night and during the weekends. I'm now just CTOing but I'm finding that when the evening comes around I am tired and lack any motivation to pursue side-projects or hobbies other than sedentary/low effort things like watching TV, playing video games and reading.
I recently picked up my saxophone and guitar again and started trying to build a habit of practicing every day for 15 minutes until I had a run in with a sharp kitchen implement and chopped up my thumb (not badly, just enough to need to wrap it in a plaster/band-aid and not use it to pluck metal wires for a few days). I'm also trying to do a couple of 25-30 minute walks a day to get some fresh air and exercise. The question then is this: given how I feel now, how the heck did I do a PhD? Where did I find the extra energy and motivation and how do I get it back?
I've never really been big on passive hobbies. For as long as I can remember I've always wanted to build, tweak, tinker and fiddle when I get some down-time. That hasn't changed. I can play video games or watch TV for a couple of hours maximum before I start to get twitchy and want to create or build. It isn't necessarily a need to be productive or hustle, its a need to create for myself. It's just that I often find I don't have the mental or physical energy to execute on things. I have a seemingly endless supply of ideas for side projects and scientific papers that I never got around to writing that I'd like to follow up on but when I'm done with work my brain just turns to mush.
I'm not entirely sure what to do to try and regain some of this motivation and mojo. Maybe I just need to try to take some downtime and be comfortable with some less creative hobbies. Sometimes I can short-circuit the need to create by playing video games that have a creative element (e.g. Factorio or Dyson Sphere Project). Anyway its all a bit discombobulating.