This is actually a lesson that originates from the early days of Call of Duty at IW. From what I’m told, IW never named their engine, because any time you name something it becomes a bit more of a thing, and you start working for it. And they were a studio making games, the game is the thing. Nothing else.
This taps into a really interesting idea that I've been thinking about a lot. In high school, when I first started making games, this is exactly what I'd do. I would have Unity open on two monitors, and post to my snapchat story of how excited I was to be an indie developer.
I had a similar thought when I watched the making of documentary for The Last Jedi, everyone was so excited that they were making a Star Wars movie. But in 1977, I'm sure George Lucas was just thrilled to be able to make what he wanted to make.
I think this is what PG meant when he described playing house[1]. I think there's a lower local maximum for imitating what your heroes did or innovating for the sake of innovating than the global maximum of trying to make something really good. There's nothing wrong with getting excited about what you're created, but if you have any way to direct that excitement, direct it towards making something that people will love. (Not something that you'll love making).