I am reminded of the concept of "deep procrastination" by Cal Newport. He's written about it in a handful of articles from a decade ago, rather disappointing that the concept hasn't caught on and isn't talked around more. It sounds a lot like burnout- either a cause or a symptom of it.
> Deep procrastination is a distressing affliction. Students who suffer from it lose the ability to start school work. Deadlines pass and they hand nothing in. Professors provide special extensions, but the students still can’t bring themselves to do the work. And so on.
> One way to understand deep procrastination, therefore, is as a rejection of an ambiguous, abstract answer to the key question of why you’re going through the mental strain required by the college experience.
His solutions involve mindset refocusing (diving into the why's of the goal that is being procrastinated on), which I think I've seen in another anti-procrastination guide posted somewhere on HN before recently, and seem to be a bit cursory.
> Deep procrastination is a distressing affliction. Students who suffer from it lose the ability to start school work. Deadlines pass and they hand nothing in. Professors provide special extensions, but the students still can’t bring themselves to do the work. And so on.
> One way to understand deep procrastination, therefore, is as a rejection of an ambiguous, abstract answer to the key question of why you’re going through the mental strain required by the college experience.
https://www.calnewport.com/blog/2011/07/15/how-to-cure-deep-...
His solutions involve mindset refocusing (diving into the why's of the goal that is being procrastinated on), which I think I've seen in another anti-procrastination guide posted somewhere on HN before recently, and seem to be a bit cursory.
The other two blog entries about it:
https://www.calnewport.com/blog/2009/02/16/the-danger-of-dee...
https://www.calnewport.com/blog/2010/04/29/the-upside-of-dee...