[kokotko]

Big fan of the Dilbert book...I struggled for years to find a way to make things work for me. I always had 'performance anxiety' when it came to doing work on my 'real' projects that were nevertheless relegated to a hobby-level alongside something else that paid the bills. I had limited time and as a result I became incredibly stressed out when I couldn't muster peak-level attention and productivity during those few hours. For some reason I felt I could only do the project justice when I gave it all, interestingly this has resulted in bailing out too often and not progressing with anything for weeks. Conversely I was much less productive than now when I put all my effort into just simply doing something (anything) every day, let's say for 30 minutes. All the anxiety is now channeled into the thought of missing a day or not maintaining the routine :)

I think your aim should still be to, at minimum, cultivate a system that is aligned with both your short and long-term goals. Then, when circumstances allow, you are free to exceed that minimum by racing to meet ambitious goals. But you should never let anything break the 'background process' or the 'system' (aka. routine). Write 50 words a day, anything. It really does add up big time.