I haven't been using Obsidian as much as I used to. I've been using Obsidian for the past four years as a foundation for my personal growth, whether it be for learning new things, productivity, or life design. But over the past few months, I haven't found myself as reliant on the program as I used to be. This makes me wonder which came first, the chicken or the egg—did my lack of Obsidian usage cause me to stop caring about self-actualization as much? Or did my lack of effort towards self-actualization naturally cause me to use Obsidian? By lack of self-actualization, it's not like I've been rotting in bed all day doing nothing — it's just that it's taken a different shape. - I've been learning and growing a lot as I continue to work as a developer at Morgen, but I haven't had as much time and energy to stay on top of my personal curiosity. I haven't finished a book in months, and I procrastinate my weekly lecture series watching of [[After Socrates]] the day before my discussion calls with Aidan. Most of my note-making and meaning-making happens when adding annotations via highlights instead of creating new notes and links in Obsidian. - I'm doing non-productive hobbies that I can improve in, like bouldering and playing competitive FPS games. Still, I haven't intentionally defined tasks and outcomes in something like a project note nor created weekly objectives to work towards. - I still journal daily to capture my thoughts and experiences in Goldfish, but I haven't felt compelled to start reflecting more profoundly on these experiences by further elaborating on them in Obsidian or weekly reviews. After four years, this April has been the first time I haven't done a monthly review or quarterly review, nor do I feel I need to. Instead of trying to keep up, I rationalized it — "You've been doing the same thing for years; maybe it's a good thing to switch things up?". Or, "The things you've been doing daily haven't been changing too much; I don't think there's much to reflect or improve upon." It's a silent regression in my character, one that isn't detrimental to my happiness but still manifests in the various forms above. But what has been causing it? Could I be experiencing burnout? I was going to propose more reasons, but after revisiting my notes on [[Burnout]] I made when reading [[Feel-Good Productivity]], it seems to sound like it 😅 In this quarter, I tried doing a lot of things at once: - Full-time Morgen as a software developer - Part-time product manager for Linking Your Thinking - Working out consistently - Building Goldfish, a mobile quick capture app - Working on a new update for my digital product, the Ultimate Starter Vault - Recording new videos for my channel (you can see how this is going 😁) - Self-learning through reading and lecture series like After Socrates I can't realistically engage in all of the above activities and projects with my current time and energy levels, which is a form of overexertion burnout. When I fill my entire day with focused time to work on these things, and my breaks aren't actually energizing, then I'm not actually getting rest. This is known as depletion burnout. There was a third type of burnout, misalignment burnout, which happens when you work on things that don't bring you meaning. I feel like this isn't the case since I do have a mix of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation for the things I work on. Now, how did this burnout manifest? Exhaustion. When you think of exhaustion, you may think of being too physically tired to do anything. But there's a disguised form of mental exhaustion, that when I reflect on the past few months, has been quite prominent. As Byung-Chul Han puts it in [[The Burnout Society]], ![[The Burnout Society#^8nhydg]] Considering [[ADHD brains prioritize stimulation over importance]], this exhaustion from burnout only amplifies this trait. There was a [video from oliSUNiva (I can't remember if it was this one)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJZ5YNrXMpE&t=4s) that highlighted how algorithms have fragmented our mental states due to the polarizing stimulation it gives us. This has been my experience with Reddit as I scroll through my recommended page… In my first scroll, I'm seeing a thoughtful discussion on the recent episode of a show I'm watching that makes me appreciate and feel for the characters. Scroll again, a frightening announcement on my country being jeopardized as the "51st state", or experiencing tariffs that threaten our economy, making me feel anxious about my future. One more scroll, a major breakthrough in artificial intelligence that amazes me and opens up new potential opportunities for usage. These swings in novelty and emotions take advantage of my vulnerability to stimulation and impulses from my exhaustion, causing me to hedonistically seek more and more. Why would I engage in a multi-hour book that takes effort to process and understand when I'm experiencing Stockholm syndrome while riding this emotional rollercoaster? As a result, [[Overstimulation causes us to act animalistic]]. We revert to being in survival mode rather than growth mode, suppressing my innate desire for self-actualization. Fortunately, there's an antidote. [[Contemplation]]. I know this answer. It's why I haven't felt much stress or burnout the past few years. But putting it into practice during this time of need has been effortful. The thing that would help me the most is the thing I'm avoiding by not doing my periodic reviews or doing much note-making. Great. Instead, I've been taking baby steps. The first step was to free myself from my current environment and start re-exploring my [[Digital Galaxy]]. I decided to revisit some of my core notes like [[Digital Self-Actualization]] and [[Digital life solar systems]]. It felt grounding. I felt more connected with the version of me who wrote this, connecting me with my deeper values and mindset. With this identity shift, I was ready to start cultivating a life of self-actualization.