The 3 AM Commit and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves

It's 3 AM. You're in the zone. The code is flowing. You feel like you're one function away from finishing the feature that's been haunting you all week. Your eyes sting but your brain is electric. This is it. This is peak productivity.

Except it isn't. Not even close.

I know because I've been that person more times than I'd like to admit. And every single time, I woke up the next morning, looked at what I wrote, and realized I'd spent four hours going in circles on something that would have taken forty minutes with fresh eyes.