What Happened When I Stopped Showing Up : Deepti Krishna

Learning Loop – What Happened When I Stopped Showing Up

By Deepti Krishna | March 2026

In mid-February, I stopped writing.

Not because I ran out of ideas, and not because I lost interest. If anything, my mind was doing the opposite jumping between thoughts, overanalyzing everything, struggling to stay with one thing long enough to finish it. I have ADHD, which means focus is not always linear for me. Some days, I can sit for hours and go deep into a problem. Other days, even starting feels like resistance.

For weeks before that, I had been consistent with my “Learning Loop” series. I was learning new concepts, writing about them, and sharing my progress. It felt structured. It felt disciplined. It felt like I was moving forward.

And in many ways, I was.

But that version of consistency had a condition it worked only when I had control over my time.

Exams took that control away.

The Illusion of Consistency

Before this break, I believed I understood consistency.

To me, it meant:

• Showing up regularly
• Producing output
• Keeping a visible track of progress

And while that isn’t wrong, it’s incomplete.

Consistency under pressure looks very different from consistency under comfort.

When exams started, my priorities shifted completely. My time wasn’t flexible anymore. My focus had to narrow down. And suddenly, maintaining a blog series was no longer the most important thing.

That realization was uncomfortable.

Because stopping felt like failure.

But continuing without doing justice to either would have been worse.

From Output to Understanding

Earlier, my learning process looked like this:

• Learn a concept
• Simplify it
• Write a post
• Move on

It was efficient, but it was also surface-level.

During exams, I didn’t have the option to move quickly. I had to stay with topics longer. Revisit them multiple times. Solve problems until I actually understood why something worked, not just how.

That shift changed everything.

Learning stopped feeling like a checklist. It started feeling like a process of building clarity.

And clarity takes time.

What This Break Taught Me

• Depth over speed: Covering more topics doesn’t mean understanding more
• Silence is part of learning: Not everything needs to be documented immediately
• Pressure reveals priorities: What you choose under constraints defines your discipline

Progress is not always visible. And not everything meaningful needs to be shared in real time.

Rethinking the Learning Loop

This break made me question what I want this series to be.

Earlier, it was about documenting what I learn.

Now, that feels insufficient.

Because learning without reflection is just accumulation. And accumulation without direction doesn’t lead anywhere meaningful.

So the Learning Loop is changing.

Not in consistency, but in intent.

What Comes Next

The next phase of this series will be different.

Instead of just explaining concepts, I want to focus on:

• Why these concepts matter beyond exams
• How computer science connects to real human problems
• What I think about the things I learn, not just what I learn

I’m especially interested in exploring areas like Human-Centered Computing, where technology is not just about systems, but about people.

Because at some point, learning stops being about information. It becomes about perspective.

Closing Thought

Stopping for a while made me uncomfortable.

But it also made me more aware.

And maybe that’s the point.

Consistency is not just about showing up when it’s easy. It’s about knowing when to pause, and coming back with more clarity.

Also, Learning Loop – Volume One is not over yet. There are still two episodes left, and I will make sure they are worth reading.