This isn't really helpful. I have ADHD and it's been a major limiting factor in my life. I have things I want or need to do and I'll easily spend 3-4x as long as the tasks actually end up taking just trying to do them.
Unless my brain happens to be "in the mood for work", the only way I can get things done is by being in a structured "you must do X now" kind of environment. Doubly so since shifting gears from something you are focused on to something new is essentially impossible.
It is shitty and stressful being forced to run 100% towards artificially imposed deadlines that I'm always just barely late for but unless I do that, I will never make progress regardless of how much I actually want to do the work. And this really hurts me for burnout as I constantly feel like a failure for not meeting deadlines that I knowingly set to be nearly impossible. So I'm stuck in a balance between not being able to do work because I'm not running against an impossible clock or feeling like a failure for not beating said impossible clock.
Even worse is the reality that if I start to recognise that the constraints I've placed are artificial or have consequences I control, any help they provide falls apart. So it's a constant struggle to find new, increasingly ratcheted constraints for myself so I can continue to do the things I enjoy or even basic day to day personal or work related tasks.
Because of this, I 100% get the author. I couldn't see myself doing what they did but the thought process makes complete sense to me. I'm practically doing the same thing but using friends, coworkers, or technology to do it, even if they aren't necessarily in the same room as me.
I think in a lot of cases manual labor is extremely ironed out because the workflow is defined before the work is done.
- Pick up shovel
- Move dirt from pile A to pile B
There's not much else to think about, you do it and you know you're doing the right thing so there's no opportunities to second guess yourself into not doing it.
Compare that to a vague action of "build xyz app". There's a million things to think about and you can easily talk yourself out of it because maybe you're doing what you think is the wrong thing (note: the "what you think" is a really important phrase here).
But if you break that down to "open up code editor" and "design user registration page" that at least starts to get less vague. Eventually you get into precise actionable tasks like "create user model with an email, password and username" which you can start progressing on without much distraction.
Just do the work, or don't.
This is some bullshit.