Update


Hi there. I’m blown away by the quality of responses I’ve received here. Throughout, there are some extremely useful perspectives on what might be going on and the underlying motivations that are leading to my behavior. My next logical step is to be mindful of the emotions that I’m feeling when I start to feel these reset behaviors, and to extend my awareness of them outside of just the example I shared below. The next logical step is to seek out a therapist or other sort of psychological support. I just want to thank those have commented and encourage users to keep conversations going between them. My interaction with this post will likely slow a lot as I contemplate and try to find a normal. For the curious, I resisted a strong urge to do a reset yesterday at work and instead of spending a couple hours doing that, I spent considerable time learning through some blind spots in a language I’m supposed to be an expert at. Thanks again to all of you.

While all comments were useful in one way or another, I was especially impacted by comments from IonAddis and Boozilla

Original Post


I’m struggling to find relevant information or shared experiences on this topic and I’m hoping that someone here can point me in the right direction. I seem to have always struggled with what I’m calling tech permanence. I define tech permanence as the ability to use some form of tech (either a phone, an operating system, a library, a package manager, etc.) for an extended period of time.

My issue is then that I struggle with maintaining long-term relationships with these technical aspects of my life and it’s starting to affect my work and mental health. An example is likely the best way to describe this.

At least once a week I reinstall the operating system on my desktop computer at work because I can’t seem to commit to Linux or Windows 11. I’m not distro hopping on the Linux side of things (always Debian 12).

I’ve identified a cycle where this behavior repeats:

  1. Get excited by something that is only available on Linux: this can be a specific software, but more often than not it is actually the file system itself. I love everything about it.
  2. Work on Linux for a couple of days: in this stage I’ll painstakingly craft an environment that is needed for my work.
  3. ** Mental cry**: in this stage my mind will tell me that I’m just using Linux to use Linux and everything I want to do I can do on my MacBook or on Windows. I’ve seen this coupled with a bit of anxiety about not being able to use Microsoft products if requested (though I know there are a million work arounds).
  4. Searching for greener pastures: a stage in which I want to just use products that are more reliable, and honestly, just more pretty. This is the stage that perplexes me the most and often where the reinstall of my desktop to Windows occurs.
  5. Work on Windows for a couple of days: in this stage I set up my environment, do work for a couple of days, and then wonder why I don’t just use Linux.
  6. Repeat: I repeat this cycle 1-2 times per week.

This can be mapped to phone operating systems too. An example is that I use an iOS device on a daily basis, but sometimes I’ll go get a cheap Pixel just to throw GrapheneOS on, then to revert to Android, and then back to iOS.

I’ve tried pretty hard to search for relevant examples of this online, but I can’t seem to find the right search terms for any of this. The closest I’ve seen is “object permanence” in the ADHD research, but I’m pretty cautious to start self-diagnosing as I’m not a professional.

Can anyone comment on this or point me to a more appropriate community?

  • IonAddis@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    I’ve tried pretty hard to search for relevant examples of this online, but I can’t seem to find the right search terms for any of this. The closest I’ve seen is “object permanence” in the ADHD research, but I’m pretty cautious to start self-diagnosing as I’m not a professional.

    So, there’s always going to be the “script kiddies” of the psychology world out there, who throw around words and jargon without actually understanding what they’re doing or playing with. Just like there’s know-nothings in tech who do the same with IT stuff.

    But if you’re a measured and logical person, you’re not immediately going to become one of them if you start looking deeper into psychology and mental health stuff. You’ll start out as a newbie, sure, but your brains aren’t going to suddenly leak out your ears just because you’re wondering if you have this or that, and in your case you literally told us in your post that the issues you are having are affecting your work and mental health, which, to me, suggests you wouldn’t be researching to be trendy or to look cool, but because you’re hurting and in distress and want to figure out what’s going on.

    That’s a very valid reason, IMO, to start researching this stuff. You’re hurt, you’re in distress–time to research, even if that might on a superficial level make you look like you’re chasing trends. (But I don’t think you would be, necessarily.)

    Anyway, your whole post makes me think researching the mental health stuff is actually a good direction to go. What you’re doing with tech (not committing, searching for greener pastures) reminds me a lot of some of my mal-adaptive habits.

    I grew up in a traumatic home, and I figured out (eventually, ha!) 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!).

    And I have other habits that were once useful for managing anxiety in fear in very high-stress environments, but which work poorly once one is in a more normal environment. It’s very easy to pick up an adaption to stress or to something else in your past that is useful initially, but then starts misfiring when you unconsciously apply it to a totally different part of your life.

    Therefore, as others have suggested, I think it might be good to take a look at the rest of your life. Are things stressful with your parents? Any boyfriend/girlfriend issues? Is work or school being a dick to you? If you are getting stress from those areas, you might be immersing yourself in tech stuff (and vacillating back and forth) as an unconscious reaction to that outside stress.

    I’m a writer and I often submerge myself in writing when I have other stressors going on. So I look super-productive and happy to people who like to read my stuff, but it’s usually masking everything else going to shit. When I was younger, I did something similar when making webpages and learning tech. Stuff was stressing me, and I found relief by throwing myself into learning something new. Set up entire websites and message forums just to get away from IRL stuff that sucked. The more going on at home, the more I was trying new things with my website.

    One skill I found to be VERY useful to develop when trying to figure out my own psychology is learning how to kind of…stop and identify and name what I was feeling when I got out of sorts (anxious, fearful, upset, irritated, angry, hyper, manic, etc.). Try to name it and follow it back to its roots. WHAT am I feeling? Can I actually name it? And WHY might I be feeling it? What happened just before I suddenly felt this thing and switched tracks?

    It’s not going to be easy at first, it’s a skill you have to develop like any other. But I found once I started being able to stop myself in moments when I was doing something impulsive/avoidant, I got a better handle on what I was feeling, and why, and that sort of gave me the opening I needed to control it, instead of letting it control me. Once you can touch and name something, it’s easier to make it work for you instead of being hauled along by it.

    For you, I think it might be worthwhile to do a bit more reading on ADHD, but also look up OCD (it’s not about being a “neat freak” in practice, it’s more about people having fears and anxieties and coming up with rituals in an attempt to control the fears and anxieties), and also look up maladaptive perfectionism. Even if none of this actually applies to you, becoming more informed doesn’t hurt, and sometimes by following links from one topic to another you can stumble upon something that actually does help or apply to you.

    You sound like you’re in tech, maybe a programmer, and I’ve noticed several of my friends in this realm struggle with maladpative perfectionism, btw. (I do sometimes too, but to a lesser extent).

    Basically, due to having parents that expected much of them, or their own internal sense of competition, folks can end up kind of breaking their “learning mechanism” or their ability to complete projects because tiny humdrum “mistakes” trigger the same sense of failure as true disaster. 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!

    Like, for someone with maladaptive perfectionism, sometimes ANY mistake is a world-ending nightmare emotionally, and stress-wise. So one ends up being hugely stressed when small errors happen, stressed and anxious out of proportion to what’s going on. And when you have that shit going on inside, that can snowball into other behaviors. Some people stop learning and stop trying new things (if you don’t try, you can’t fail, basically). Some people avoid things (if I don’t engage maybe it’ll go away). Lots of different ways people can respond, but it’s often in order to get away from the pain or stress that happens when a “failure” happens.

    It seems possible to me, from reading your post, that you might be switching back and forth because you’re scared of settling on something imperfect. But–I could be VERY off-base. Which is why you should dig a bit more on psychology topics yourself. See what YOU think, given that you know your brain and history much better than any of us do.

    Anyway. I don’t know if this will help at all, but I hope it does.

    If you take anything away from this, I’d say you have this random internet person’s “permission” to go look up articles on psychology and things like ADHD or anxiety or the like. You won’t magically turn into an idiot because you looked up a topic once or twice.

    • whereisk@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Try to name it and follow it back to its roots. WHAT am I feeling?

      A great tip and a start to a meditative practice.

      As an addendum: Many times, curiously observing your feelings is watching those feelings ebb away and disappear.

      If you can stay in that space, or keep on going back to it you’ll be distinctly less likely to be overwhelmed by those emotions, as you’ll be creating some distance between the feeling and consciousness.

      You come across as a good and thoughtful person - trying to help someone you identified as in need. I do hope the OP reads your response, identifies with something in your writing and follows your advice.

    • Supercritical@lemmy.worldOP
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      10 months ago

      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.