At work we’ve recently started our fourth large refactor since I joined the company. So far I’ve noticed that each refactor comes sooner than the previous one, and usually happens before the layers of refactors have been finished.
I’ve realized that refactoring usually looks like a fractal - as you zoom in and out on the work, think zooming in from initiatives to epics, down to stories and then tasks and then even just one line changes at each level there’s a bit of refactoring happening.
In many ways this feels a bit like Zeno’s Paradox, you get closer and closer to the finish line and feel like there are still many more things to do before the work is “done”.
I think I’ve come to accept this general state of things, in many ways it feels reasonable to work within an environment that is constantly changing and tackling new and different problems.