I like to have multiple projects going at a time, but they’re not all the same type of project, and they all require different sorts of investment and serve different functions.

Routine projects are those that I’m already comfortable with, know the ins and outs of, and for which I have a bunch of systems and rituals that allow me to get a consistently high-end output with comparably low input.

I’ve figured out efficiencies for these projects, in other words, and those efficiencies (which are usually developed over the course of years) allow me to make stuff I’m proud of, while investing less and less time and energy on the inessential, annoying, or draining aspects of making that stuff.

Often (but not always) these are also the projects that pay the bills, and those cumulative efficiencies free up more time and energy for other sorts of projects that (at least at first) don’t.

Next-step projects are those that I suspect (or hope) might someday become routine projects, because I enjoy working on them, and/or because I think they’re valuable, worthwhile efforts.

I’d love to figure out how to make these sorts of projects a more integral part of my next-step life, and while I know a fair bit about them (enough to know I’d like to more deeply integrate them into my routine), I’m not yet at the point that I’m comfortable with or capable of doing so.

Maybe someday! Maybe not. As I learn more, I’ll be better able to determine if I’m just not cut out for whatever it is I’m attempting, if taking the next steps toward mastery would require too great an investment (out of proportion to the value gained), or if the project is interesting, but wouldn’t be as fulfilling long-term (and is therefore better to set aside in favor of another project).

The last project type I like to have going is the stretch project, which is something that’s just truly beyond me when I start, but which (in some cases, at least) is eventually brought down to earth, where I can better assess and understand it.

This is the sort of project that has me feeling like an absolute dunce essentially all the time, and which only gives me positive results in drips and drabs.

Working on this sort of project is not fun, usually, but it can be immensely gratifying, as any little sign of progress, any new ah-ha moment or milestone, feels like setting foot on another planet; it’s perspective changing, maybe even edifying.

I love all my projects for different reasons, but stretch projects are probably the most valuable, long-term, as they provide regular doses of epistemic humility, paired with sudden, startling, stupefying glimpses at larger contexts that I otherwise never would have known to look for.

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