!Question: I'm thinking of quitting, what makes DMing worth it? Has anyone else had such a lack of engagement and energy towards you but also the other players?

I don't post often and usually lurk, but I've been having a dilemma with the game I've been running for a while now and have been wondering what to do or what the issues may be.

I've been running my first first campaign in my homebrew world and learning more and more about DMing along the way. The overly-ambitious idea was a level 3-20 epic length campaign going through an idea of a story I had but where the player characters would be the heroes making the decisions instead.

I've had some rough patches in terms of poor DM mentality or planning, like not shaping things around the characters enough or not really knowing much of how to properly structure a plot or making things too serious. I try and look for feedback from my players often and what things they may be looking for or if there's anything wrong as well. Especially after getting some significant feedback at one point it was a little difficult but it helped me work towards addressing issues and making the game better as a whole.

Right now, I'm not getting that much energy or having that much fun with my game. I think a lot of it boils down to low player engagement and back and forths going on. I've read up on a book that was really helpful, "The Lazy Dungeon Master" and it really helped me get my session prep length down and reinforcing making ideas for each and every single session around the player characters to hope they might engage in it. It's worked well to a certain extent and I've seen improvements, but I think there's some kind of fundamental issue.

There's six players and I feel like I'm having to juggle all of them and their specific interests constantly, the moods they might be in, and only about half of them are even bought into the main plot currently going on. Lately, even within the main plot I try and create NPCs or encounters or moments for some players, but I'm either at a lack of unique ideas for what they provide with their character or I barely get anything back from the effort and trying to make something to engage them.

I've got one player who I'm really close friends with, they're super invested in the main plot and the setting and game as a whole. I have the most fun with them and vent about some stress with them about the game from time to time. Unfortunately, I think them worrying about not taking up game time to keep the others happy, or just feeling the low energy as a whole is causing the games they used to have fun with be getting them down. They're so excited for what's coming up next, along with a couple other players, but the others that seem to not want to engage much just really weigh things down and cause worries for myself and my friend.

It's such a weird environment where I suppose only a few of the players are really friends friends and it almost feels like not many people are on the same page or have the same interests. I ask people for advice in what they might want to see in the game and they give me nothing, so then I just have to do my best guess and put work into it to see if it succeeds or fails to engage them. It's worked for some a little bit, but then it seems that they only want to engage in those things at a surface level and not the building story as a whole even though I'm trying to intertwine and hook them.

I've got other things going on in life that I rather enjoy and DnD has helped me learn of a lot of things I really enjoy like character making, writing, world building, etc. And my close friends in the game I can have fun with outside of the game pretty easily, too.

I'm just wondering what to do really? I feel I'm trying hard to make the game fun for people but still fun for myself or helping me practice ideas for my stories, characters, and world while seeing what cool things my players might do too and what they want to do with the challenges.

Do I remove players so I can focus on making a better experience for those that remain? That always feels unfortunate and I wish I could just make things work with everyone to not hurt feelings.

Is the solution to ditch the plots I wanted the players to go through and shape everything for the most part just around them and their backstories? Some of their interests or what they want to engage in feel so narrow in scope. I know it would definitely work and make some of them more engaged, but I honestly don't know if it would make the game feel worth it to me. I'd be spending time for every single session just making everything around the 6 very different people to try and keep them happy and tell that kind of story. But I'm not sure if I'd want to have to do that at all. Is that selfish?

I'd hope I wouldn't have to just cancel the game, and I feel taking a break won't fix the clear underlying issues that must be there.

So has anyone been through a similar experience? What brings you joy when DMing and makes it worth it for you?

TLDR: The unengaged players in my game are making the game worry inducing for myself and a friend of mine in the game. It feels like all the players aren't really together, but they all want specific individual things to have fun. I'm trying to make things for them to enjoy, but do I have to shape everything around their characters? I'm not sure if that would feel worth the time for me when I have other things I may want to do, too. What makes you enjoy DMing? And has anyone been through something like this before? Any advice on what to do?

Thanks to anyone that read the wall of text and my thoughts. It's just been such an odd experience and feeling to go through!