I expect nothing less from someone whose profile picture is an anime child smelling feet.

It’s definitely a crutch for me. I’ve used exercise several times recently to give myself an attitude adjustment.

I can’t believe just how called out by this post I feel. There are lots of good tips and recommendations throughout this thread, but this one in particular seems to sum up not only my behaviors that I described above, but with a lot of oddities in how I do things. In particular, these are some notable items you mentioned that I do on a regular basis:

• “…the reason I (for example) restart video games instead of playing to the end is because my stress response is messed up, and my solution to a fun game going sour is to “reboot” and seek a redo (just like how I left home, or quit some jobs to get away from stressful people!).”
• “Set up entire websites and message forums just to get away from IRL stuff that sucked.”
• “You sound like you’re in tech, maybe a programmer…”
• “Things turn black and white–either everything is absolutely 100% perfect, or you’ve failed and you’re going to burn in hell with all the other failures!”

I really appreciate this comment. It’s one of the few that are really emphasizing that these are habits that seem more design, subconsciously, to pull me away from true feelings. Some feelings I tend to experience in connection with these episodes lack of purpose, imposter syndrome, hurt, etc. I’ve been responding to commenters throughout that I think therapy and mindfulness of these behaviors is my most logical next steps, but I’m really appreciative of the recommendations and personal experiences you’ve shared with us. It definitely makes me feel like I’m not alone in this world.

A few of my coworkers swear by it but I’ve never given it much attention. I’m going to download it this morning and play around with it - see what all the hype is about.

Thanks! I really appreciate seeing that. I try to be as kind to myself as I can, and to others. Cheers.

I think this is a really good point… I have been struggling a lot lately with purpose. I bet that’s a component to all this. I’ll be taking some extra time to evaluate how I’m doing.

Thank you, I plan to do just that.

I’m a little curious about what you do

I don’t mind! I am a data scientist at an academic research institute. We have almost complete freedom with our technical devices due to the policies in place by our university’s IT arm. We don’t even have to domain our machines if we choose not to.

I was having a chat with another commenter and this sort of behavior tends to arise when I have a slowdown at work. Luckily it hasn’t tangibly affected my output, but it has a dramatic effect through opportunity cost - where I could be learning something that would improve my output and skillsets.

OS across team members (about 15 people) vary widely by project, but most people have permanence with MacOS and Windows, with the former being the bulk. We also have several team members who only use Linux operating systems (they’re also good friends which likely increases my FOMO). So our surface is relatively mixed.

My current strategy is to just get focused. Today my plan is to work on my Windows machine and not think about the operating system at all. Staying plugged into this vibrant comment chain on this post has been immensely helpful in grounding me.

Thanks for chiming in on this. Your perspective actually feels the most accurate to what could be going on. A lot of this switching behavior comes out of times where work is slower than usual. When I’m actively engaged throughout the day this sort of thing doesn’t cross my mind. I’ll be taking your request seriously about researching ADHD.

Thanks! Yea, I’ll go ahead and look around for something like that.

Thanks for that perspective. I definitely feel like operating systems are a fixation for me. I love understanding their nuances and making them do things that aren’t typical. This is the crux because an operating system in a work environment is where I need the most stability.

How does one even go about exploring an official ADHD diagnoses? Is that something done through a therapist? Another commenter suggested seeing one and I’m taking that thought seriously.

which is where I spend most of my time

I think that this is a major component of it for me as well. I’m a data scientist at an academic research institute, so my day consists of 7-9 hours of screen time. I take a lot of pride in my physical environment so it only makes sense that this transfers over to my computing environment as well.

The euphoria that one feels from quitting an addiction is how I feel in stages 4-5 where I reinstall Windows, but it only lasts until the FOMO kicks in. I’m still trying to figure it all out, but I appreciate you sharing your perspective.

These are all good recommendations and I appreciate them! I’ll keep this in mind but I’m trying to be less impulsive, so I’ll consider this over the course of a few days.

Thanks for taking the time to chime in.

I appreciate the constructive response. The OCD aspect concerns me, but it seems in line with my behavior so I will investigate that further. In particular, I have access to a therapist through my work so that might be the next most logical step.

I agree that no technical environment is the end all, and I’m going to try and tap into that perspective next time this comes up.

Thanks for the response. I suppose that I don’t, but ever since Windows 11, I’ve been reluctant to consider dual boots. Maybe things have changed, but at the introduction of Windows 11, I had lots of issues with dual booting.

So in short, I just haven’t tried it in a while. My main concern is that I would just continue to switch back and forth and the workflow interruption would still exist in that form.

I think you may be on to something

Love it so much this straight up sounds like an advertisement

Oof.

Heck, I just played the demo for Octopath Traveler 2, but this was a self-published demo by the studio. It was enough for me to know this game wasn’t for me but I’m thankful I didn’t have to buy it and refund it as a result.

Exactly. I hate when people lead off with that. It assumes their personal involvement in the war does anything other than make themselves feel less hopeless.