| 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. |