My mental struggles 😬

Take a peek inside my brain for two of my mental battles… 🧠

Hey, friend! 👋

Ever since we launched Polar Habits on January 1st, people have been asking for the ability to rearrange their habits. I procrastinated to start this for so long because I’d never built something like it. It was outside my comfort zone! 😬

But last week, I finally shipped it.

It only took me 3 months! 🙃

OK, that’s not entirely true. We felt there were more critical features to ship (like daily reminders), and we had a workaround for rearranging habits, so we decided to put it on the back burner. But, if I’m completely honest, I was also using “higher priority” items as an excuse to avoid what I was afraid of.

Building the feature took me 10 days, with half of that time spent silently struggling to implement the drag-and-drop user interactions! 😖

Struggle #1

I’m not the type of person who frequently asks for help. I’m more of a “struggle and figure it out on your own” kind of person. After wrestling with the code for 5 days, I finally shared my struggle in the MegaMaker community, and even then, I wasn’t explicitly asking for help—just venting!

But, MegaMakers being MegaMakers—some of the most amazing people—they started sharing their experiences and suggestions to help solve my problem. Bhanu Teja P recommended an open-source library (dnd kit) that hadn’t come up in my searches. It made my eyes light up, but more importantly, it made my biggest struggle disappear!

5 days later, I finally shipped it! 🚢

I could have saved 5 days and so much headache if I’d come to the community sooner, but as I mentioned, I tend to go solo before asking for help. While that makes me self-sufficient, it also hurts my productivity and, sometimes, my sanity! 😅

That trait may have a lot to do with my upbringing, and it happens to be a topic of conversation with my therapist too! 😁

Maybe I could try a self-imposed rule:

“If I struggle with something for more than a day, I’ll ask for help.”

I’m writing out loud here, and I’m already sceptical! 😅

Sometimes, I can’t even articulate my problem or ask a helpful question.

Is that something you get better at with practice? What do you think? I could use your help! 😜

Struggle #2

This one is… comparison or impostor syndrome.

We launched Polar Habits over 3 months ago, and even though I’ve shipped some new features that have been outside my comfort zone and a bunch of improvements to the app, I can’t help but feel… slow. 🐢

Slow compared to some fellow makers who build and ship entire apps in the time it takes me to create a drag-and-drop interface!

I’m not going to name these fantastical makers, and it’s not like I hold them top-of-mind all the time, but there are a few, and if I’m fully honest with myself, they make me feel envious. Dangerous territory, I know! 😬

I feel happy for them, too, so it’s a constant battle between envy and happiness. Happiness wins every time, but the fight is never over! 😅

We don’t control our thoughts, so there’s no point trying to stop my brain from making comparisons. Instead, I choose to focus on my own progress while celebrating my fellow makers’ successes.

I also try to remind myself that we’re all on unique paths at different points in our journey, and that I’ll become faster and more productive with practice!

Again, I’d love to hear about your experience. How do you avoid the comparison trap? 🤔

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I wrapped up my last post by saying that next time (this time), I’ll write about why we don’t have skipped days in Polar Habits. That obviously isn’t what happened here… Maybe next time! 😜

Expect to hear from me again by May 4th.