If you’re anything like me, then you’ve probably put off certain projects in your homelab because they feel too difficult up front. Recently, I found that the homelab projects I was putting off weren’t actually as difficult as I thought when I did them, and that completely changed how I viewed projects in my homelab and in other areas of my life.

I’ve found most homelab projects aren’t as difficult as I make them out to be

I finish almost all of my homelab projects faster than I originally plan for…almost all of them

Credit: Patrick Campanale / How-To Geek

I’m a procrastinator—always have been, though hopefully I won’t always be. But, I am notorious for procrastinating projects, especially in my homelab.

I recently moved all of my homelab services around. I deployed three mini PCs in the homelab to handle my Proxmox virtual machines and Docker containers, and I started by moving a handful of containers from my old Docker server to the new one, and that’s how the servers sat for a few weeks—half finished.

I kept putting off the move because I thought it would be difficult, incur a lot of downtime, and just be fairly annoying, to be honest. So I simply lived with services scattered across servers, virtual machines, and IPs because I didn’t properly consolidate them.

Then, one morning before work, I decided to just finish the migration. I had several containers that I still had to move, and some of them I was not looking forward to moving because there were a lot of files or setup associated with the move—it took me less then an hour.

Another example is with Tailscale—I had heard about it for years, but put off actually deploying it in my setup because I imagined it was going to take a lot of configuration and testing to get working properly, as that was my experience with other VPN systems. I was completely wrong. I had Tailscale up and running within a few minutes, and sat there wondering why I waited for so long to do it.

I had put these projects off for weeks, and they took less than an hour to finish. This is the story of my life, though—I put off projects because I make them bigger than they are in my head, and then they don’t live up to the hype I built them up to. Most people seem to be that way too, at least, those who I’ve asked to about it.

Some homelab projects become more difficult the longer they’re put off

So save yourself a future headache and just do it now

Some projects, like needing to move Docker containers, don’t really get more difficult if put off. However, there are definitely some projects that become much harder if procrastinated.

Take backups, for instance. If you have backups set up from the start, then they’re simple, easy, and fairly quick to run. If you come across a problem, then you can simply restore from a backup or snapshot and you’re back up and running.

On the other hand, if you are like me and put off setting up backups, then it can be devastating when something stops working and you have no way to restore it. I’ve been in that position more times than I can county, but have I set up proper backups of everything in my homelab yet? Nope, I haven’t, and I know it’ll come to bite me.

I really need to stop putting off setting up backups and just do it—and I’m sure you need to do the same. Backups are just one example of a homelab project that become more difficult if put off. Don’t be like me, stop putting off setting up backups (I’ll set mine up next weekend).

I’ve gotten better about smaller projects, but bigger ones still get me

Progress on procrastination isn’t all-or-nothing

Here’s the thing—I’m still definitely a procrastinator. I’m working on putting off less, but I still put things off. The best way I’ve found to fight procrastination is to start with the small things. I tell myself that it’ll be better to do the small project now, and then I actually do it. That gives me the motivation to start working on the bigger projects.

The great part is, I’m using my homelab as a way to genuinely improve my life, not just my homelab. By using the homelab to work on stopping procrastination in its tracks, it’s benefiting other areas of my life, and that’s something I didn’t realize I would get out of running a homelab.

I’m not perfect at it—as demonstrated by the fact that I still don’t have my homelab properly backing up both internally and externally—but it’s all a work in progress. Once I realized that procrastination could be worked on in stages, instead of all-or-nothing, it completely changed the game for me, and I don’t think I would have come to that realization without my homelab.

Brand

ACEMAGIC

CPU

i7-14650HX

The ACEMAGIC M5 mini PC is perfect for setups that need a high-performance desktop with a small footprint. It boasts the Intel i7-14650HX 16-core 24-thread processor and 32GB DDR4 RAM (which is upgradable to 64GB). The pre-installed 1TB NVMe drive can be swapped out for a larger one though, and there’s a second NVMe slot for extra storage if needed.

The urge to procrastinate is still very real though

Some projects that are larger—like backups—I’m still working on figuring out how to get myself to stop procrastinating and actually do them. Smaller projects though, like moving Docker containers around, trying out new hardware, setting up high availability, and doing other stuff, I’ve just about stopped putting off in the homelab.

It’s slow progress, but slow progress is better then no progress, and I’m just fine with that.