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What you’re describing is a transition failure, and it’s one of the most underappreciated executive function challenges. When you were about to sweep, your brain had already built up complete mental and physical momentum for that specific task sequence. The moment you realized you needed the Swiffer upstairs, everything changed. You had to stop the current task flow, navigate to a different location, retrieve an object, and then return and re-initiate the original task. That’s four separate executive function transitions, and each one is a potential derailment point. What looked like “sweep floor” suddenly became “manage a complex multi-step retrieval mission,” and your brain’s motivation system responded accordingly.
For future situations like this, one approach that can help is staging the task equipment, for instance keeping the tools you need in the spaces where you’ll actually use them, even if that means keeping duplicates. It’s all about reducing the number of transitions your brain has to manage. Another strategy is to try to catch yourself in that moment when you realize something is missing and make a conscious choice: either commit to the full retrieval mission as its own separate task, or give yourself permission to pivot to something else entirely without the guilt. Sometimes the kindest thing you can do is acknowledge that the activation energy needed to follow through just got too high and let yourself off the hook so you dont feel so guilty.
I love you
Seconded.
Surely there is a way to train myself to handle more switches on average?
No easy way but what I’d recommend is to see if you could recognize the need for the transitions, pause and reconcile yourself to needing to pass through them, expending the energy required to do that. See if you can come to an internal consensus about it, and if you can move in that direction then push forward.
keeping duplicates
I’ve started doing this with some things without even realizing why.
oh man I have so many duplicates of tools around home
I’ve got a up to four sets of each item depending on if I am likely to need it in the garage, work space, office, or kitchen. and it’s fucking great to have them when and where you need them
Is this the same for largely mental problem solving tasks like computer programming? Nothing upsets me and destroys my productivity like my boss making me switch tasks when I already had my day planned! I typically have a sense of the sequence of coding tasks in my head, it sounds very similar!
Yes, same thing. Its the switching costs that define the energy difficulty, not the task.
My entire life, home, digital footprint, are about stations where shit happens
It is genuinely embarrassing how much more I am motivated to vacuum my apartment after finding a Dyson V11 battery powered vacuum on a smokin’ deal about 6 months ago. “Plugging the vacuum in” should not be such a hurdle to keeping my house clean… and yet here we are.
My life has become about either adding or removing friction in my life to circumvent my self sabotage, so yeah, I get it
That is an honestly great way to put it, and it’s 100% true for me as well
A way to remove friction here is robovacs. I have mine to run on a timer so I don’t even have to start it myself.
Major improvement over the stock Dyson: replacing the dying battery with a power drill battery adapter. The big ones easily have 2-3x the capacity of a new stock battery, which let me vacuum my whole flat at least 3 times before
swapping in a fresh batteryexecutive dysfunction kicks in.Oooo, for me it’s also winding the cord back up when done.
Cordless vacuums are amazing for me.
Same. Dealing with a cord was enough hassle to very rarely ever use it.
my hurdle is moving it up and down stairs, especially in my narrow basement stairs
so I have a shitty little old vacuum that lives plugged in downstairs, and the good vacuum lives on the main floor
problem is it’s a bag vacuum, not canister… I hate the subscription & garbage aspect of it, so I tend to use it only when necessary
“Motivation to clean.” What is this? I’ve never heard of this before.
It’s what happens when you’re supposed to work, or go out and meet friends.
it’s when the pile gets too big to walk through
My second to oldest daughter used to be “the nuisance”, an antihero, to play with the younger set of kids. If they opened a door she would close it, she’d step in front of them or turn them around, grab them and gently lay them down on the ground, just generally jam whatever they were trying to do. It was really funny and the first thing I thought of when I saw “inconvenience imp”.
I have spider webs all over my garage and porch but the duster thing is in the basement.
There’s also spider webs in the basement but I only go down there to do laundry, and if I’m doing laundry that’s all I’m doing for the day.
Also I missed garbage day again
Ungh I hate missing garbage day.
Granted, I compost everything I can so it’s mostly just plastic that can’t be recycled, and then my recycling that goes every other week (for which I have two bins because I often forgot to take them out on the correct week, and a month of recycling definitely doesn’t fit in a single bin)
But by the time I actually go to take out my trash, it really needs to go out. And it’ll still take 2-3 weeks to actually get it out there on time…
Oh shit I was cleaning. I’ve been watching TV for an hour. 😅
I’m cleaning.
I’m turning on the tv to have some background noise while I clean.
Ah, it’s late, let’s go to bed after watching TV.
Why the fuck is there a bucket filled with water and cleaner on the way?
