IN 1890 WILLIAM JAMES WROTE THE SENTENCE THAT EXPLAINS WHY YOU FEEL EXHAUSTED WITHOUT DOING ANYTHING

William James discovered that unfinished tasks create significant cognitive fatigue because the brain continuously allocates mental resources to monitor and remember these open loops, even when no physical work is being done; this explains why people can feel more exhausted after a day of inactivity than after productive work, as the cognitive load of thinking about doing something often exceeds the actual effort of completing it.