You found a meal. It works. You eat it every single day. Sometimes twice. Your partner is concerned. Your coworker at lunch is confused.

Then one day, without warning, you never eat it again. The thought of it mildly disgusts you. You've moved on completely.

I'll tell you about my two:

Huel. I started with the powder at $2.65 per serving. Complete nutrition, zero decision fatigue. I drank it constantly. Then I optimized further: Black Edition, ready-to-drink, $5 per serving. More expensive, but even fewer decisions. No measuring. No blender. Just open and consume. Worth every penny in cognitive savings.

Freebirds (Burritos). I ate there so often I reached Elite tier in their loyalty program. The staff knew my order. I walked in and they started making it. I had solved lunch permanently.

Then they franchised. Changed the menu. Swapped ingredients for lower-cost alternatives. The burrito was different. The cached routine broke. I haven't been back since.

Here's what's happening: Finding a meal that works requires significant cognitive overhead. You have to decide what to eat, check what ingredients you have, gauge whether you have the energy to prepare it, assess whether it even sounds good. For a brain with limited working memory, this daily negotiation is exhausting.

When you find something that works, you've solved a problem. Your brain locks it in as a cached routine, one less decision consuming precious cognitive bandwidth every day.

You don't eat the same thing because you lack variety. You eat it because every meal decision costs cognitive resources you can't spare, and this one's already solved.

It ends abruptly because the cached routine eventually conflicts with something: a novelty-seeking system flagging it as "stale," or an external change that breaks the pattern. Your brain dumps it completely. Now you need a new solution.

You're not boring. You're efficient. Until you're not.