The Day Everything Broke

Actually no, that's dramatic. Nothing "broke." It just... stopped working.

Picture this: Tuesday afternoon, I'm in my fourth Zoom of the day. My boss is explaining something about OKRs or KPIs or some other three-letter thing that determines whether I'm a good employee. I'm nodding. Making eye contact with my camera. Taking notes that say things like "align on strategy" and "cascade goals."

But my brain? My brain is writing a grocery list. And wondering if my plant needs water. And calculating how many hours until I can reasonably log off without looking like a slacker.

Then someone asks me a direct question and I have to do that thing where you say "Sorry, you cut out for a second, can you repeat that?" even though my internet is fine and we both know it.

This is my life now. Pretending to work while actually just... what? Surviving? I don't even know anymore.

Okay But Here's the Really Messed Up Part

I can still focus. Just not on anything that matters. Last week I spent FIVE HOURS researching the best note-taking app. Five hours! You know what I wrote in it? Nothing. Because by the time I picked one, I was too mentally exhausted to actually use it.

But give me a personal project? Something nobody's paying me for? I'm a machine. Stayed up til 3am last weekend building a spreadsheet to track my fantasy football stats. It's color-coded. It has macros. It's beautiful and completely useless.

Why can I do that but not the presentation that's been haunting me for two weeks?

(I know why. Because one has stakes and expectations and the other is just... mine.)

The Thing That Kind of Helped

My sister sent me this link. One of those "life skills" things. I almost ignored it because the last thing I need is another productivity hack. I've tried them all. Pomodoro. Time blocking. That weird thing where you work for 90 minutes and then stare at a wall. None of it sticks.

But I was desperate and it was only 30 minutes and what else was I going to do, actually work?

Except.

Except when I tried it, I literally couldn't do two minutes. My brain started screaming about all the things I should be checking. Email. Slack. That presentation. Whether my Amazon package shipped. Two minutes felt like an hour.

But then I did it again the next day. Still sucked but sucked slightly less. By day three I made it the full two minutes without wanting to throw my laptop out the window.

Progress?

Where I'm At Now (Spoiler: Still a Mess)

It's been a few weeks. I'm not magically fixed. I still check Slack every twelve seconds. I still have that presentation hanging over me (though I did open the file yesterday, so... victory?).

But something's different. I can't explain it well. It's like... you know when you've been clenching your jaw all day and then suddenly notice and relax it? It's like that but for my whole brain.

Weird thing: the better I get at focusing, the more I realize how truly fucked our work culture is. We've built entire companies around preventing focus. Open offices. Instant messaging. The expectation that you'll respond to things immediately. No wonder we're all burned out and can't think straight.

But I can't fix corporate culture. I can barely fix myself. So I'm just doing this one small thing, teaching my brain it's okay to do one thing at a time.

I Don't Know How to End This

Usually I'd try to wrap this up with some inspiring message about how you too can reclaim your focus and become a productivity ninja or whatever. But honestly? I'm tired and my neck hurts from looking at my screen and I still haven't done that presentation.

All I know is that 30-minute thing helped more than all the productivity books I've guilt-purchased on Amazon. Maybe it's worth trying. Maybe not. I'm not your boss.

(God, remember when we used to just... work? Without all the optimization and life hacks and morning routines? I miss that.)

Anyway. It's almost 3am now. I should probably try to sleep. Tomorrow's definitely going to suck.

But maybe it'll suck a little less.