I find myself striving for ideal and perfect solutions in parts of my work that might not matter much. Sometimes it's probably worth the time and detail, but admittedly, a lot of the time it isn't. It's just more fun and interesting to be "thorough." This happens when working on something new and unfamiliar, often side projects. In the quest for a "perfect" solution, entire branches of mathematics or programming start to beckon me, and away I go... down a rabbit hole of Wikipedia articles, Stackoverflow questions, and Github projects. Even if I do find an adequate solution, it's not good enough until I can understand the class of problem and derive it for myself. This also happens based on principle. When I encounter a problem that is actually solvable -- though it may not matter much, then I must conquer it entirely. As an example, for me it is unacceptable that something rated 5.0 with 1 review is ranked higher than a 4.9 with 10 reviews -- and I need to find the solution to this problem, even though it might only be a minor feature and won't matter if there are no reviews to begin with. I call this "conditional" Rabbit Hole Syndrome. It also sounds an awful lot like the classic interview answer: "My biggest flaw is that I work too hard." Well it's true, damn it. These types of trivial things can easily become my "top idea" for days at time. I am now able to admit it: I spend time working on things that probably won't matter that much, and I enjoy it. But how do I fix this? How do I learn to leave well enough alone? How do I learn the distinction between frivolous research and actually getting shit done? A couple of edits: After more thought, this is really only an issue with work on my side projects. I also think it's due to lack of accountability -- I report to myself. As such, I tend to work on "most interesting first" and avoid schlep. So I'm wondering: how do you motivate yourself to schlep? |
Rabbit Hole Syndrome is a symptom of having a curious, persistent, independent mind. If there were a drug that cured Rabbit Hole Syndrome, and everyone just worked on Shipping Their Products and Not Asking Questions, there'd be no one left to make the interesting discoveries that make the world better in the long run.
There are very famous quotes from Richard Hamming (see "You and Your Research") and Richard Feynman (see "Surely You're Joking!") about the importance of working on problems that seem trivial at first. Not only do they help you enjoy problem-solving for its own sake, but if you work on enough silly problems, then eventually the odds are good that you'll stumble upon something that other people will later think is really important. Incidentally if you read Thomas Kuhn you'll find that this tends to be how scientific revolutions happen: someone is bothered by some tiny little thing that doesn't quite make sense according to the prevailing theory, starts digging at the little cracks, and finally the whole system comes crashing down.
The major benefit of going down rabbit holes is that is opens yourself to serendipity: sometimes you'll turn out to be right about something for the wrong reason, or discover something that you later realize contains a solution to a seemingly unrelated problem. The more rabbit holes you've gone down, the more they start to connect.
In addition, frivolous research helps you develop a very "bottom-up" view of the world. If you know the details cold, then you are better able to see through high-level BS ("conventional wisdom") and evaluate things on their own terms. You'll find that regardless of what's optimal, most things are done a certain way only because they've always been done that way, and that regardless of what's true, most people believe things only because other people believe them.
Of course there are costs to all this -- in particular, "schleppers" will resent you for being irresponsible, and most people will think you're crazy if you ever explain what stupid little you've been working on lately. Which is why Rabbit Holers should try to should avoid actual responsibilities to the greatest possible extent and absolutely not care about what most people think about their work.
Anyway, to sum up, if you're lucky enough to be in a position to descend rabbit holes without impoverishing your family or bankrupting your company, I say go for it. It strengthens your most valuable asset (your mind), and who knows, maybe one day you'll discover something you can teach the rest of us.