Re-re-recalibrating, again. and again.
^(vibe check)
Remember all those goals I made earlier this month? Yeah… I definitely bit off more than I can chew. Which is totally fine and somewhat expected honestly, and if anything I’m pretty glad I was able to recognize that. Earlier this week I had a pretty off day, just feeling generally overwhelmed, distracted, anxious, couldn’t get any substantial progress done on much of anything creative-wise. After dumping out my brain into several journal pages, by the end of that night I decided to bow out of this month’s game jam I had joined, and it felt like such a big relief. And the following day I absolutely crushed the final editing of my most recent game review video which I feel turned out pretty great!
Basically some lessons were learned:
It’s good to set your sights high, but also don’t be afraid to change your goals if you run into a block. In my case, game development is still one of my lowest skill/confidence areas, and the looming jam deadline started to cause enough stress to kick off some substantial procrastination in all sorts of other things I was working on. Technically, I still have the rest of the month to complete my original goal of finishing a small game this month if I can figure out a healthy way to fit it into the schedule, but I’m definitely reprioritizing my time going forward. Don’t want to spread myself too thin and get mediocre results all around, or worse - burnout entirely and get nothing done.
Follow the momentum. Finishing videos this month has felt really great, and sitting down to write, edit, etc has been mostly friction-less. When you can lose track of time working on something and not find yourself constantly drifting into other thoughts or tasks, you’re probably onto something good.
Always strive to improve. In my last video, I made efforts to increase the energy in my voiceover, get more creative with some of the editing, and create a more captivating video thumbnail. I feel like my channel’s reboot is still very much on the ground floor, but the feedback seems to already be confirming that I might be on the right track. I don’t want to get too caught up in “algorithm chasing” but the validation can still be a helpful motivator.
Analyze the situtation as objectively as possible. Always good to routinely take a step back and look at the bigger picture. Dig into WHY something is causing a problem. I was able to accept that I’m still very much a game dev novice, and for the time being I need to focus my energies differently. I’m certainly not giving up on it, but I’m reevaluating my approach to working on games and not impose any strict deadlines on myself (yet). I still have to think about paying the bills, and perhaps leaning into my strengths in video production is a better choice currently. Or perhaps I will readjust again in a few weeks! Basically I just need to review my current situation on a regular basis and refine my processes wherever I can.
Hope everyone out there has a wonderful and inspiring weekend! Anyone out there feeling some momentum in their projects/goals? Or maybe roadblocks? Any small improvements you’re planning to implement?