At times I find myself fighting a tough battle. I am talking about the battle between the will for creating a new game / mechanic / idea against the need to work on the 'behind the scenes' of the ones you already started. Making something new is, for me, the 'sexier' option. Working and grinding the Excel or Google sheets is not as fun, but it is the majority of the work when you make a game that includes cards or tiles.
When I'm talking with gamer friends they never think of the giant 20X200 sheets with numbers, text and comments. Oh, never forget the comments. They will ask about that game I pitched to them in order to see how exciting it is. I will not have an answer since, of course, the sheet that will enable me to create the array of tiles needs 8 hours of work, the board is not yet ready, the cards are a mess and did I tell you about these 2 new ideas I have? Did you read my new blog entry? :)
So, you have to manage your time. Especially when you have a job and designing board games is the other thing you do. I try to make sure that the only things open on the computer are the ones I need + something entertaining. I keep the pads I scribbled on nearby and showing the right pages. A container with a beverage that suits the temperature and time of day is never a bad idea.
My best tip: find your work environment. Try different things for when you are being creative and when you grind those colorful little rectangles to death. I find that my brain reacts well to these changes, maybe yours will as well :)
Pini
Depicted - Horrible colorful little rectangles.