[fairpx]

What helped for me is build a team around you. The moment there are others that join your mission, everything changes. I started out my service based UI design business (http://fairpixels.pro) as a solopreneur. At some point, I started getting the same feelings as you're describing and realised (from past projects) that having a team for support had always worked for me. If you don’t have the budget, no worries. You don’t have to hire full time people. These can be VA’s, freelancers that occasionally help you out or even a mentor that actively pings you to keep updated on the progress you’re making. Knowing you’re not by yourself has been a huge motivator for me and might be the solution you’re looking for. Good luck & feel free to ping me if you have additional questions.

[davismwfl]

fairpx has the right advice. I can echo it nearly word for word. Get some help even if you are specifically carving out say work that takes you 10 hours a week to do and you hire a VA or freelancer to do it each week.

A few additional things I'll add, make sure you are eating well, getting some exercise/activity everyday and make a plan to take say a week off 1-2 months from now. Part of your job during that 2 months is to make it so you can take the time off and not panic. Just remember this, if you can't take time off you don't have a business you have a job.

One other suggestion which I have personally done. I was having trouble with doing the above personally, but I knew I was going to implode if I didn't do something. So in my case I took my laptop got a hotel room on an island and worked from the pool, hotel room, etc during a week. I found I could work a few hours a day and accomplish everything and had enough time to go explore and relax. That helped energize me, I think just getting out of my pattern was the most important part.

Good luck!

[vineet]

In particular - it helps to do your work in a coworking space. Even if the team is not people working for you or your company, it is really nice to have others that you see every day who have a similar goals as you.

Alternatively, maybe find meetups and/or online communities for other solopreneurs.

[wyldfire]

This response was my first instinct -- a team will help motivate you.

[vayeate]

If you're looking for a cheap American developer OP, check my comment history.

[phil21]

Yep, I was going to suggest this as well. $10k/mo is borderline on being able to hire someone else, but if you can scale the business it should help a lot.

As someone who works solo probably far too much, and in the past did the self-bootstrapped startup thing the stuff I can think of is:

1) As soon as possible get someone to join your team as an employee. If it's not working out fire fast and find someone you mesh well with. While it was certainly a huge challenge hiring and finding the right people, after the initial pains there is absolutely nothing as motivating to wake up in the morning after hacking on something the previous night, only to see the project being progressed in your absence. You go from "ugh" to "holy shit, now I have to do my part!".

2) If you work from home 100% of the time - stop. Shared office space, even getting out once a day to work in a different environment is key for me. I can do 1-2 weeks head down hacking on a project, but beyond that I start to go a little loopy and if I continue I have motivation issues like you describe. Everyone is different, but I'm far happiest when I have an office I can go into but don't have to go into.

3) Network more in the evenings. Sounds silly, but just find some groups for hobbies/industry/whatever you can casually attend. Most you likely won't find that awesome, but when you do find a good fit you'll make some great friends/contacts/mentors.

4) Know when to get out. Sometimes it's time to sell your baby and move on to the next thing when you start feeling stagnant. Again, different types of people on this one. Plugging away at the same thing for half a decade (or more!) where you are completely unmotivated is a great way to kill your soul as well as your career.

5) When all else fails - make a major life change. This kind of motivation issue will kill a career eventually, so it must be addressed. This can be as drastic as moving across the country, or as simple as working from a foreign country remotely (if you can swing such a thing) for a few months. For me it's changing the scenery like that, for others it may be something entirely different.

6) Make sure you are taking quality restorative time off. Since it seems you are socially isolated, it may be best to force yourself to do more social things on the weekends if you haven't been. I know I struggle with this a ton (getting motivated to meet up with friends/whatever on the weekends) - but whenever I do it I feel much better than if I stayed home and binged on video games or whatever.

7) Get out of the house every day!!! I can't stress this enough. Working from home makes it easy for me to stay on a single floor of my house for days on end, much less getting out and getting a little exercise. Just a 30 minute walk a day is a huge benefit - for me I try to find errands I can do, since I hate "idle" active time.