Doing Better and Getting Back To Work (Patreon)

Hey Patrons!

As most of you are aware, I burned out pretty hard on work late last year - there's a video about it here, but I assume most of you have seen it: https://youtu.be/KYxOVKba0w0

The TLDR is that although I hadn't been posting much of it online, I was pushing way too hard on rocket work behind the scenes. It was a small problem for a long time, and then, like any small problem you ignore, it started becoming a big problem. After a few weeks off from my normal schedule, getting regular exercise and therapy back in, I feel like I'm ready to get back to rocket work, albeit very slowly at first. Gotta make sure that doesn't happen again.

I don't have a lot to share here, but I wanted to keep the folks who support this whole thing in the loop. Part of deciding to get back to work was about making some changes to how BPS operates - I've been doing everything myself for a long time and as it turns out, that gets a little old :)

Change #1 is accepting help, and hiring people. Not right away, but I've started delegating a few small roles to people who've repeatedly offered to help. It's tough to hand over the keys, which is why I've avoided doing this in the past, but working with other people makes such a big difference in the ability to smooth out the highs and lows of the job. I'll put out a video about this in a few weeks, but I've run the numbers, and if we do some more sponsored videos, I can afford to properly compensate someone for work. Nothing set in stone, but that's one of the major changes. I'll probably do another spring/summer internship, then look toward bringing someone on full-time late this year.

I've talked about this in videos before, but I believe that a solid chunk of why burnout happens is about losing momentum and going for long periods without good "wins" - for me that comes with pushing my limits on projects. I've pushed some limits in the last year, but not as much as years prior. I've also started hitting limits that don't make a ton of sense to try solving. I'm excited by the prospect of getting Scout E to land upright, but it's still a 30m flight, which is... you know... not that high and not that fast.

So with that in mind, change #2 is that we need somewhere to go after/while Scout is doing this landing stuff. I need some goals beyond propulsive landing so that projects end up with more long term focus; each project should be about pursuing some long term goal off in the distance, something like that helps a lot with motivation. So... how about space? Scout E is still happening, but I think a proper 100km+ space shot is within reach in two years if I'm careful about how it happens. Maybe a little less than two years, we'll see... The first step of that is a Level 3 certification flight. I've got about 90% of the parts I need in house now, and the flight is scheduled for early April. Going to 10km with a loooooot of electronics. More on that soon!

Change #3 is more internal, but someone suggested that I create activities that help me monitor my mental health, and whether I'm working too hard.  Regular exercise and journaling have been hugely stabilizing for me, like a well-tuned PID :) Essentially, I've got a rule now where if I can't fit one or both of those activities in every few days, something is off and I need to dial it back. This one takes longer to prove out, but it has worked well so far.

I wanted to thank you all for the patience you have as patrons of this project. I know posts are few and far between, and I've got about a million messages piled up that I need to respond to, but I feel ready to get back into things now and am genuinely excited about the next few months and years.

Blue skies,

Joe