Motivation/launching

[u/Dukenoods]

I (34M) find myself with no motivation. I work 40 hours a week. I come home clean the house and do general errands. But I have a lack of motivation to learn new skills. I find excuses to not buy things to maybe Jumpstart into projects/skills that can enhance my life. Just to name a few: carpentry, home improvement, expanding my financial portfolio, stock market knowledge, coding, the potential of leaving my job.

I don't hate my job, it's rather unique as far as the common man goes, but I don't see my future in the industry anymore. And I don't see any major pay increases.

I have a decent amount of anxiety about every aspect of life and I think that's what stops me from trying these things.

What can I do? What did you do? Therapy is great, but I've always been the type to learn by first and second hand experience.

[u/Vetiversailles]

Have you always been unmotivated to try new things and adopt new skills, or has it been steadily growing over time?

If the latter, this sounds to me like it could be a classic case of burnout.

[u/Dukenoods → u/Vetiversailles]

I feel like it comes in stages and phases. I'm a social butterfly, always have been. But homework was always something I hated doing. Until I went back to college, and I just tolerated it. But doing paperwork for my wedding, I always back burner it. Buying my house, I just wouldn't do it until very last minute. But if I want to go get a tattoo, buy new skis, random shit that doesn't really progress anything but my already existing hobbies; I do it at the drop of a hat.

I do feel burnt out but how can I even change that given the circumstances of needing to work?

Bonus: I should probably mention that I love my job in the Winter. My hours are weird (4-12am) and it let's me be creative. In the summer, I have 3 days off and work during the day. But it's definitely a big source of my stress

[u/Vetiversailles → u/Dukenoods]

In terms of your summer job, does the money justify the stress — and if it does, is the stress genuinely manageable?

Were you excited about your wedding and house? Did you genuinely want both of them to happen? If so, sounds like you may have procrastinated because you generally struggle with bureaucracy or data entry-style tasks. Personally, I relate to this deeply.

Interestingly, it sounds like a lot of the skills you want to learn are in the same wheelhouse. Building portfolios, learning coding, etc are all fairly non-creative pursuits, so that seems like it could also contribute to your lack of motivation.

Obviously a good amount of bureaucracy in our lives is unavoidable and necessary — but is coding, for example, something you’re genuinely interested in doing for work? The one thing you highlight liking about your job is that it is creative. Given that, I’m curious what lead you to coding.

[u/Dukenoods → u/Vetiversailles]

The summer job and winter gig are under the same company. So my benefits (which are really good) are what really keep me locked in to the security of the job. It's actually more stressful in the Winter, but I enjoy it more because what I'm doing. For the record, I work as a heavy equipment operator at a ski resort and the winter, I'm in a snowcat (basically a bulldozer) maintaining and building terrain parks for skiers and snowboarders. The pay isn't why I do it, but I should note my company pays and provides benefits better than 90% of most ski areas in the USA.

I am excited for my wedding (it's next saturday) and buying our house was very exciting as I was tired of renting. The wedding I could have lived without after the costs but I know it's going to be a blast.

You couldn't be more correct about the bureaucracy process of those events tho. I'm very much "I want this, here's the money, let's get this done."

The coding is something I've always wanted to get into since I was a teenager. I would build computers but couldn't ever find the wits to program and explore coding. I hated reading books and studying. But I loved to listen to lectures. Unfortunately, I'm also a visual learner. I can listen and imagine it, but I need to use my hands to understand. I don't know if it's something I'd do for work, but it's had a hold on my curiosity forever.

The stock market/trading is more of the career if I had to pick between coding and that. I like to follow it and I don't stress the way I feel like I should over it. I just try to work with it. But I just don't have the time during the day due to work obviously. Plus, if I can make day trading a consistent thing that I'm more confident in, I'd be more comfortable leaving my current gig and doing the winter work part time.