59: Hyperfixating

Hyperfixating is a term that has grown out of a deeper understanding of how some neurodivergent (modern, all-inclusive word for things like ADHD and autism) people's brains work that means just about what it sounds like. I hyperfixate sometimes, wherein I get started on some task, and I set aside or ignore other major tasks and focus solely on the thing I've hyperfixated on. Today, that was creating a joy-con grip for my switch 2 (Nintendo console). I have a custom case on my switch 2 that makes it much more comfortable to use handheld, but means when I detach the controllers I can no longer use the grip that came with the console, so I spent much of today (probably something like 5 or 6 hours of actual work, and almost that much printer time as well) building my solution for that problem. I don't hyperfixate to the point that I neglect critical tasks; my hyperfixations are almost always in the pursuit of prototyping or building something, and always take place in nebulously unscheduled time.

My type of hyperfixation is also usually not particularly debilitating, because it has built-in break time that I can use to complete other tasks or goals. As I type this I'm printing my 7th prototype of the grip, and each printing took ~20 mins for the first few, as I got the fitment down, and then the last couple and this one are taking roughly an hour. I used the breaks in that time to back up all of the documents on my laptop to the cloud, in preparation for wiping it tomorrow, as well as play some Beat Saber and work on one of my Magic: The Gathering decks (there were some cards that really didn't belong in it, so for ~$20 I'm going to make it a lot more consistent).