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I'm quite sure that they were not: anxiety-driven avoidance is far more stressful and exhausting for me than any fruitful work. And having a constant feeling that you ought to be making up for lost time is a serious bar to genuine relaxation.

I did need a break after my last job, and it's very possible that contributed to the problems I had, but this was definitely a bug, not a feature.

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Exactly. It's not a way to relax, it's more like spinning your wheels in place and having the engine overheat from all the wheel spinning. You just feel worse and worse the longer you stay in that state.

Would you believe me if I told you I’d explained this with that exact metaphor to someone relatively recently? I literally mean with those same words in that exact order. This feels matrix-y :)

God, even your description of that makes my skin crawl in recognition.

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