We make endless “to-do lists.” But the truth is this: most things remain unfinished. At night, when your head hits the pillow, the mind rarely dwells on what got done. Instead, it circles around the incomplete: that nagging voice saying, “Damn, if only I had wrapped that up…”
The Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis captured this feeling in Zorba the Greek:
“Do you know what has brought the world to this state? Half-done jobs, half-spoken words, half-sins, half-virtues. Go all the way, man—throw yourself in and don’t be afraid! God despises the half-devil far more than the full one.”
So why do we leave so many things half-done? Why start projects we know deep down we’ll never finish? Motivation fading, procrastination, self-deception—excuses abound, but most of them are lies we tell ourselves. If you’ve already messed something up, trying to justify it only digs the hole deeper.
But let’s circle back. Why do we begin tasks we won’t complete? Half-finished work sits at the center of our daily lives, our personal growth, even our economic ventures. For people like us, starting is easy. Sustaining—let alone finishing—is the hard part. Why?
Tabs in the Brain
Starting a new project is like opening a new browser tab. Each tab consumes processing power. The more tabs open, the hotter the machine runs. The brain is no different: there’s a limit. Someone highly trained can juggle more simultaneous tasks than the average person, but overload eventually slows any system down.
Here’s the catch: unfinished tasks keep running in the background. This is the Zeigarnik effect—incomplete work sticks in memory far more than completed work. When you close a “tab” (finish a task), tension dissipates. But when it stays open, the brain keeps signaling: “Still pending.”
Case in Point
Imagine a student enrolled in multiple universities at once, while also managing student clubs, launching startups, dabbling in politics. He’s sprinting in four lanes simultaneously. If only he could clone himself and assign one copy to each project. But the brain has only one processor. With dozens of tabs open—unfinished assignments, draft projects, unanswered emails, designs waiting to be finished—the system bogs down.
That’s what psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik discovered in the 1920s: waiters remembered unpaid orders perfectly, but once the bill was settled, the memory vanished. Our brains cling to incomplete work like open files. Each one creates tension until resolved.
Her colleague Maria Ovsiankina later found something else: when we abandon a task, we’re more likely to return and finish it than if we had never started. This is called the Ovsiankina effect. In other words, starting matters. That old saying—“Starting is half the battle”—has scientific backing.
Cognitive Overload
But what happens when too many tasks remain incomplete? Research shows unfinished goals consume mental bandwidth, leaving fewer resources for new ones. Psychologists E.J. Masicampo and Roy Baumeister demonstrated that incomplete tasks remain “active” in the mind, disrupting focus and draining attention. They’re like background apps chewing up RAM.
And it’s not just productivity at stake—it’s emotional well-being. Unfinished work fuels guilt and self-doubt. Karen Horney once called this the “tyranny of the shoulds”: that constant self-attack of “I should have done this, I should have done that.” Left unchecked, this erodes self-esteem and breeds anxiety.
Think about vacations. If you leave tasks unfinished, your mind keeps revisiting them on the beach. Finish them—or convince yourself they’re truly done—and the brain relaxes, stress drops, and rest is possible.
Why We Leave Things Unfinished
Researchers list common culprits:
- Dopamine depletion: motivation drops quickly after the initial rush.
- Planning fallacy: overestimating how much we can handle.
- Perfectionism and fear of failure.
- Procrastination.
- Distraction and “shiny object syndrome.”
Put together, these forces explain why so many of us leave trails of half-done projects.
Reframing the Incomplete
But maybe the point isn’t always to finish. Sometimes leaving work unfinished plants a seed for someone else to grow. Science, art, philosophy—all are collective endeavors, never owned by one person alone. Perhaps what matters is opening doors, laying first stones, leaving paths others can walk.
Finishing is valuable—it brings peace of mind. Yet the greater human good often lies in continuation, not closure. Every unfinished effort carries hope, a chance for others to pick up the thread. Life itself is not a finished product but an ongoing collaboration.
So maybe we should stop obsessing over completion. What matters is participation—starting, contributing, passing the baton. That is how collective progress moves forward.
Sources
psychologytoday.com/us/blog/natural-order/202209/how-the-little-known-zeigarnik-effect-impacts-everyone-daily
nesslabs.com/unfinished-tasks
