you should be joymaxxing your projects

When I'm working on a passion project (or anything, really), I tend to be obsessively serious in ways that stress me out. Something I initially wanted to do becomes a thing I have to do. I've subconsciously cultivated this behavior, as I only ever notice it late: tired, tense, wondering why something I chose to do feels like something I owe, in a sense. I'm not always caught up on social media jargon, but I'm interested in the —maxxing suffix I've seen circulating online. I liked the shamelessness of it, the idea you can just decide to maximize something (good), as aggressively and deliberately as you want. Joymaxxing, specifically: making happiness non-negotiable, not a reward for finishing a task but a condition maintained throughout the process. It's why my current goal, when working on something, is prioritizing fun. The older I get, the more I feel permission to play. In practice, this looks different for everyone: working from a cafe instead of my desk, reading something…