I am currently undertaking a software project on my own time. When I first got the project I put in many hours working out how to do the "tricky" parts of the solution. I spent many hours googling and reading up on classes available on MSDN that I could use for the project. I was madly excited and passionate about doing this work.

However once, I got a working samples of how I could get around the "tricky" parts and got to the part where all that I needed to do was "grunt" work to finish the project, I lost all interest and desire to work on he project. Suddenly instead of looking forward to sitting down and working on this project it became a chore and a major hassle to motivate myself.

I am now fast approaching the deadline and I am getting the work done now, but it is under very high pressure as I have left it almost too close to the deadline! I will manage to get it done but it will involve several all-nighters. (BTW I completely despise doing these all-nighters and would love to eliminate these by maintaining my motivation and working at the project continuously.)

So my questions are is this normal? Does everyone else notice such spikes and troughs in their enthusiasm for projects?

Anyone more experienced have any advice on how to keep the motivation going?

Or am I just not designed to work on a full project lifecycle, should i and people like me being doing an R&D type role where I can do the fun figuring out part of the projects and leave it for someone else to finish the "les interesting/mundane" coding?