Sad? Shovel sand
I have a good job. Still, from time to time, I feel the urge to build something of my own again.
I try to do it the reasonable way. I keep my job, work on small things on the side, and hope one of them slowly sticks. On paper, this sounds perfect.
In practice, it is hard.
A while ago I heard a story from Pieter Levels. When he was feeling low and did not know what to do next, his dad told him to go outside, grab a shovel, and move sand from one place to another. No goal. No meaning. Just movement.
“Sad? Shovel sand.”
That line stayed with me.
I have limited time. I have a three-year-old. When I finally find an hour, I want it to count. That makes it frustrating when new ideas excite me at first, then slowly lose their spark as I explore them deeper. Not because they are bad, but because the magic fades and what remains is work.
This is usually where I get stuck. Not because I lack ideas, but because starting over again and again takes more energy than I want to admit.
So when I feel stuck, I shovel.
Not literally. I shovel code. I fix a small bug. I refactor something boring. I open an old side project and clean up one tiny part of it. The goal is not progress. The goal is movement.
And strangely, that is often enough.
While doing something dull, I notice small things that could be better. Something that could be simplified or removed. Sometimes a new idea appears without trying.
I know I should probably finish things before moving on. But even if an idea never becomes more than a thought, it still serves a purpose. It pulls me out of stagnation and back into motion.
When nothing sparks interest, I shovel.