As quick potential answer for how to deal with this sort of stress for those of you not able to make it out to the library in the immediate future, with the obvious caveat that I am not trained in this sort of thing (nor quoting from the book in question, as I've not yet read it either) and therefore you should take what I say with a shaker's worth of salt, comes from sex researcher Emily Nagoski's blog which I read about a decade ago. It was, unsurprisingly, in the context of trying to deal with people who, in long-term relationships, were having trouble actually engaging with sex. It might seem weird to think about performance anxiety in the context of two people who have had a long sexual history, but I think it's reasonable to call it that -- for a lot of couples, the expectation of sex going a certain way and requiring a certain amount of work can be daunting, even if it's still something they both enjoy.
The solution was, paradoxically, to tell them to not have sex with each other over a certain period of time. Usually, within that time frame, they would have had sex -- and that's because, now that they were in a context where sex was not an expectation or obligation, it was something that could develop naturally again as part of the relationship.
It's a similar idea to the now fairly viral "run the dishwasher" twice story, where a depressed person tells their therapist they simply do not have the mental energy to properly take care of their dishes, and the therapist advises them to, if they need to, just run the dishwasher a second time. The rules about not doing this are self-imposed, and there's no reason to follow them if the only result is inaction.
Slight aside: Well, they're also rules built off propaganda in a society that uses personal responsibility as a way to mentally tax people who care about issues to the point where learned helplessness sets in -- why would the programming on your TV, sponsored by cascade plus, be telling you it's your fault the dishes are dirty? Asking this question isn't quite directly related to the original post, though, or at least can't be a solution in and of itself, because the group of personal skills needed to keep one's immediate surroundings organized is very similar to the ones needed to organize in the "organized labor/political organization" sense. The nadir of this would be seen in someone like Elon Musk, whose management skills are so woefully inadequate that the people working at SpaceX are happy he spent 44 billion dollars on a website solely to steal conservative image macros, because it means they're no longer running interference to distract him with fake issues for him to micromanage. Not to say that people with ADHD, depression, or other executive function struggles can't or shouldn't try to lead, but that every movement starts small and you have to be able to address burnout. That is what the passage is about, if not in those terms, and if you're reading this and still thinking that you're a lazy asshole, well, at least take comfort in remembering that no matter what you do, you're also incapable of being a fuckup on the scale that he is, irrespective of how either of you spend your attention or money.
Saying to yourself "I don't have to do this right now" is not a trivial task for someone struggling with depression or executive dysfunction, I realize! Actually learning to do this is arguably the entire process of healing from its complications. If one of the reasons you are struggling to do a task is that the stress of needing to do it is leading to a sort of cognitive paralysis, let yourself not do it. If you're still here tomorrow and the day after that, you can vacuum the carpet once you feel a little better. If there's something jeopardizing you being here tomorrow or the day after that, it's a much bigger priority than the amount of dust behind your TV.
If you accept that you won't do it right now, you'll have more mental capacity when you can, and be more likely to do it.
And, again, saying this is the easy part -- I have laundry to fold, and dishes to wash too, while I can type like this all night if I cared too. But I'm definitely not going to do it right now. I just ate; I'm going to let dinner digest before I get up and do actual work. I might play some more computer soccer. Sure, people say that's an excuse borne out of laziness, but in my experience the people saying that sincerely are the most miserable people in the world (the sort of protestant-work-ethic/(pseudo-)rationalist/bigot ideology that is the birth canal the ugly head of overt fascism crowns from). I'm not inclined to believe them, given everything else they get wrong. Why should I let them tell me what to do?
