At one point I even built a live sales dashboard[1] to keep my dopamine in check, but a year later I realized it was a mistake. It started shaping my motivation instead of supporting it.

I guess the main lesson is that the ups and downs are normal, and you get better at riding them over the years.

[1]: https://x.com/kushsolitary/status/1777306909344715158

I love the freedom and doing nothing when I don't feel like it is the most inspiring and creativity boosting thing I've ever tried.

Even in the times where money wasn't remotely enough, live was good and motivation was even higher.

Monetization is always the tricky part, since most of the ideas I’m drawn to aren’t things a large audience would pay for. But working on projects I’m personally interested in is what keeps me motivated long enough to actually finish them. It’s easier now too, because AI lets me go from an idea to something usable in just a few hours.

I'm proud of all I've built and shared so far. But I still can't leave my day job. So at this point it's still 40/60.

At work, management asked if I'm willing to come back full-time and take over the team's leadership. No way. It's a costly game to play (huge opportunity cost), but the freedom is so valuable.

> It’s more chaotic and demanding than it looks, but also more rewarding in ways you don’t expect.

The first few lines immediately captured my attention because that's exactly how I've been feeling since going solo.

I left my big tech job about 5 months ago and started building my app - it's been a roller-coaster and I think this write-up summarizes how I've been feeling really well. I especially relate with the "constant decision making" - this can get exhausting; I definitely get decision fatigue frequently lol

The hardest part isn't the code. For me it's when I see VC-backed competitors with full teams. When I look back and remember working in a team of 20 devs with PMs and other support staff, it's hard to plough on alone. I'm glad of AI or this project would have been impossible. When my boy reads a story the app generated and asks if he can read another one, it makes it all feel worth it.

The loneliness is real. No one to bounce ideas off, no one to celebrate small wins with. Thinking about launching on HN soon just to find other builders in the EdTech space.

Still figuring it out. But my child is reading again, so that's a win for me.

Good luck to all those still trying.

The work can be insane and makes you question why anyone would be mad enough to forgo the easy path for this. The freedom is just way too good though. Often I'm not exactly sure what weekday it is. When I want to go on a vacation I usually decide that 1-3 days ahead and just go somewhere. Silksong was great too. There's absolutely nothing better. Thinking about a 9-5 office job now fills me with pure dread, I think it would break my soul.

Good luck, you should try to scale up the business and get 2-3 regular contractors (artists, designers, marketing folks) so you have somewhat of a team going. It helps when you have people on a project to throw the ball back and forth a bit.

You can find yourself in the same situation at a usual workplace.

What I would recommend to the "new indies":

- Build this on a side with a steady full-time job. If you can't get to a few thousand dollars per month by investing 2-3 hours per week day plus 10-20 hours on a weekend, going full time won't make a difference.

- If you have a family, be careful. You are making high risk decisions but people who depend on you didn't ask you to make a leap into unknown territory. Attempt to pull of indie business is stressful for everyone, may lead to years of strained relationship, and to a divorce.

- Do not share too much business information with your spouse. What is acceptable risk to you may cause dread to your significant other. They don't deserve all the emotional ups and downs that come with running a solo business. Absolutely do share important things because you are in this together - just don't frighten people whenever you are in a bad situation.

- Be mentally stable. If money is tight, if things are unknown, remember this was your choice.

- Don't be too proud - always be prepared to freelance or find a "real job" if needed. Remember that big success can take (many) years or it may never come. Do your best but do not self-destruct.

- Read "The E-Myth Revisited" to learn that your job changes. I was a spectacularly good developer when I started this. Today? Perhaps just a very good one because development turned out to be 10% of the job. You will wear many hats and some of those hats you will absolutely hate. You thought all you'll do is make state of the art software? Yeah, and you will also do sales, website, marketing, customer support, accounting, taxes. You will be exposed to all the shit you were blissfully unaware exists in business while at a steady job because it was someone else's job to handle all that. You will understand your past bosses much better.

All that said, I love the business I built. A beautiful lifestyle business for a quite a few years. It's a stable and growing business now, with a team of 20-ish people in 6 countries. We make great things, and have a great work-life balance.

You can do it, just don't sacrifice everything else. Nothing is certain but do your best. Always be kind to people. Remember to take care of the family first. Be there for them, spend time with them. Kids never grow up twice - what you missed, you missed for good.

(Edited for formatting)

edit:

But this part is wild to me: "I use AI for some things. It helped me fix a few bugs a couple of times"

I can't imagine being solo indie and not leaning hard into Codex, CC, or Composer at this point. To use it only sometimes for the rare bug or copy editing sounds tragic. It's been an incredible boon for me at least - extending, refactoring, prototyping etc. within a complex codebase I wrote myself and in new ones that I guide it on.

> It’s especially bad with new APIs.

It's great if you give it the context