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Comment by junto | Hacker News Reader

I don't know if this is just me, but I used to be full of ideas, half finished projects and several projects that I talked myself out of.

Since having children, I no longer have ideas, and rarely work on anything than paid contract work.

Has anyone else experienced this? I feel void of ideas.

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Not exactly congruent experience here, but something similar has manifested itself for me in "number of f*cks given, zero".

Though I attribute this less to having a kid and more to just not being able to drum up the exuberance for the endless stream of wheel-reinvention that seems to be commonplace in tech right now. I can still get interested in novel or sufficiently esoteric things, but the endless parade of random javascript UI frameworks, dashboards as a service, fitbits for dogs, and all-new-way-to-send-dick-pics chat platform just isn't very compelling.

It often seems like today's marketplace is one of "me too" ideas. "Me too" ideas are boring. Like hearing a really fascinating story at a dinner party, and then the person next to them tells a worse version of something similar, and then the person next to them tells a still worse version of similar, but slightly different thing, and so on until the conversation reaches you and you realize that the last person talking to you was actually a plain baked-potato, but you didn't notice because the level of intrigue had dropped so low that a butterless, chiveless, baconless potato had stolen the spotlight.

When I was younger the "computer" part of computer science was enough to keep my attention, as I get older I'm finding that the "science" part is what sustains my engagement with the field.

A lot of the excitement in a project comes from learning: "can I do it," "what will happen," etc.

After a certain point in your life, you grow convinced that you've seen it all before, and that has a way of draining you of excitement. Children are a common tipping point because they also make you less selfish. Nobody is asking you to make those projects, so it has to come from within, and if you act only for others, you never get around to it, because there's always another household crisis looming in the distance.

The only way to pull through is to turn it into a habit, instead of relying on your whims alone.

That's an interesting take on it. I'd never perceived that, but you're right (in my case anyway). I have two children under 6 so there is very little 'pause time' until they are in bed asleep, and by that point I'm shattered.

I have experienced exactly this, but it was in combination with also switching from freelance to full-time employment. I used to have a new idea every day back when I was freelancing and didn't have kids. Now I'm lucky if I think of one every couple of months.

I actually think this is due to having less time to just explore the internet, read about interesting things, try out other products, etc. I spent a large amount of time doing that when I was freelancing and although it might seem like a waste of time on the surface, I believe it was what allowed me to connect certain dots about niche opportunities that weren't being exploited that I might not otherwise have noticed.

This jibes with my experience. You need a wide variety of inputs in order to connect the dots and come up with something unique. Time spent taking care of kids (for example) decreased my inputs, resulting in fewer outputs. Until I discovered audio books at least.

Absolutely. I still get cool ideas. It's a constant. But I don't often devote time to them, and fill most of my time in front of a computer on contract work. It's a frustrating thing for me, somewhat, when I hear and read of this obsession and expectation among developers (at least here on HN) to be working outside of work on side projects, as if that really shows you're something great as a developer.

My teenage sons are my primary project. Work is the side project.

I find that having ideas and inspiration requires time where you are not actively doing anything, time that I used to call "being bored" when I was a kid, but now have come to realise that it is much more than that.

Having kids takes that time away by default, so you have to take it back yourself and of course it's always a trade-off.

For me the trade-off is: be active with the kids and house and life and push through all the time. In this case I'm pretty much wasted by the time they go to bed and can only sustain imgur or netflix for a bit before I go to sleep. The other option is to realise that it's better for everyone if I get some time for myself as well, so I take it. Some evenings I don't spend time with the kids for example and don't do anything much else either. In this case the next day I'm full of ideas and excited to try new stuff and I see that everyone around me is also better off due to this.

So, for me the lesson has been - learn to take time for yourself. Simply because in the long run it's better for everyone, both you and the people around you.

Somewhat but not exactly. I have 3 children at home. I still get plenty of ideas, sometimes I even do research or hack up a quick rails scaffold to see how it might start. I just no longer spend nights & weekends banging it out until I get to the half-finished stage.

I have never had as many ideas as after I had kids (and got married)

Children alone brings in a lot of first hand experience and perspectives which have manifested in lots of ideas around products, services etc. both for kids and their parents.

But also bigger areas.

But I think it boils down to priorities.

i don't have kids, and so have no first hand knowledge here. most of my second-hand anecdotal experience is that people have kids, and they often still have ideas, but no time to really implement them.

i did have one coworker at my old job who said that the limited free time he got once he had kids motivated him to be more productive, and actually made him better at getting side projects done. probably the exception, and he was a pretty motivated and focused guy anyway, as far as i could tell.

I don't think it is a void of ideas, but more of a way of your brain saying this isn't worth it so lets forget about it.

Since my kid was born, every idea I have goes through a process of 'will it make money'->'how much'->'how long will it take'->'what is the actual $ amount per hour it requires' and if it falls lower than a very big number, I just ignore (and usually racionalize it as not worth it) and go play with my kid.

My 20/20 hindsight only remembers the great ideas that I never got around to chasing. (In 1991 - going long tech in Tel Aviv, in 1996 voice recognition for mobile...) As I've gotten older, the ideas come less frequently, perhaps because I've learned so many ways to dismiss them.

I think kids change our ambitions too. We care more about them than more broadly changing the world.

But when THAT idea strikes, I know I'll chase it.

Could testosterone be a factor?

http://healthland.time.com/2011/09/13/why-do-dads-have-lower...

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