1 thing I was proud of that turned out to be the easy part

I finished a piece of work last month and felt genuinely proud. It was clean, it was well structured, and it worked exactly as intended.

Then someone asked what I was going to do next, and I realized the work I had been proud of was the part I already knew how to do. The part that scared me, the unclear part, the part that required talking to people and possibly being wrong, I had not touched at all.

I had spent three days on the comfortable thing and called it progress because it produced output. The uncomfortable thing was still exactly where I left it.

This is the shape of most of my wasted time. The easy work looks identical to the hard work from the outside. Both produce things. Both take time. Both let me say I was busy.

Do you notice when you are doing the comfortable version of the work? And what helps you catch yourself in it?