How to build something on the side with a full-time job and a family

You can build something meaningful on the side, but not by squeezing in more hours. What works, I believe, is protecting small and regular blocks of time, spending your best energy on the hardest part, letting tools carry the boring work, and saying no much earlier than feels comfortable.

I have a full-time job in international sales, I’m a dad, and I build things with AI in whatever time is left. I don’t have this figured out. This is what I believe right now and what I’m trying, written down partly so I can hold myself to it.

Small blocks beat big plans

The biggest trap for side projects is the “big weekend.” You tell yourself you’ll do real work on Saturday, when you finally have a whole day. Then Saturday arrives with family plans, errands, or simple tiredness, and the project moves another week.

I’ve come to think a short block that actually happens is worth more than a long block that might. A small window, repeated often, keeps the project warm in your head. You remember where you left off. You don’t lose half the session just rebuilding context.

The trick is to treat that block like a meeting with someone you respect. It goes in the calendar. It has a start and an end. And it has one clear goal, written down before it starts, so you don’t spend it deciding what to do.

Energy matters more than hours

An hour at the end of an exhausting day is not the same as an hour when your head is clear. Most side-project advice counts hours. I think it should count energy.

So I try to match the task to the state I’m in. Thinking work, like designing a system, writing, or deciding what to build next, goes into the moments when I’m fresh. Low-energy moments are for the mechanical things: renaming files, small fixes, reading documentation, cleaning up notes.

Sleep is the part people cut first, and I think it’s a mistake. The CDC recommends that adults get 7 or more hours of sleep, and notes that enough sleep supports attention and memory. If staying up late to build costs me focus the next day, at work and at home, I haven’t gained time. I’ve borrowed it at a bad rate.

Let tools take the boring parts

This is where AI has changed things for me. A lot of side-project time used to disappear into tasks that needed doing but didn’t need me: first drafts, boilerplate code, formatting, summarising a long thread, turning rough notes into a checklist.

Now I try to hand those over. Not the decisions, and not the parts where my judgment is the whole point, but the repetitive work around them. The goal isn’t to do more things. It’s to spend my limited, good-energy time on the part only I can do.

One rule I keep: if a tool saves me time, I don’t automatically fill that time with more work. Sometimes the win is simply closing the laptop earlier.

Say no early, and say it to yourself first

Most of the “no” in a side project is not said to other people. It’s said to your own ideas. Every new feature, new project, or new platform sounds small on its own. Together they quietly take over every free evening.

A few questions help me decide:

• Does this move the one thing I’m building now forward? If not, it goes on a list for later, not into this week.
• Would I still want to do this if no one ever saw it? If the answer is no, I might be doing it for the wrong reason.
• What does this cost at home? Time on a side project is time from somewhere. I’d rather be honest about where.

Saying no to other people gets easier once you’ve practised on yourself. And a clear, early no is kinder than a yes you can’t really keep.

Keep the project small enough to survive a bad month

There will be weeks when work is heavy or family needs all of you. That’s not failure. That’s life, and family comes first.

I think a good side project is one that can pause without collapsing. Clear notes on where you stopped, a short list of next steps, and a scope small enough that you can pick it back up in one session. If a project only works when everything else in life goes smoothly, it’s probably too big for this season.

Building on the side is not about heroics. It’s about showing up in small ways, protecting your energy, and being honest about what matters most. That’s what I’m trying to do.

Sources

• CDC: About Sleep