Stop Your Claude Code Sessions From Getting Dumber

The longer you run a Claude code session, the dumber it gets, and using Compact is not enough to fix it.

The longer you run a Claude code session, the dumber it gets, and using Compact is not enough to fix it. Compacting still drags the old conversation forward, meaning it brings the dead ends, the messy debugging and all the bad assumptions into the next conversation. I call this context right and it's killing your code. So what you want instead is a full handoff. So before you end a session, tell Claude to create a handoff MD file and have it include six things. The goal the current state active files it's working on, any changes it made, a list of failed attempts and specific next steps that it was focused on. Then run the forward slash clear command. Or open a new session and tell it to read the handoff doc and continue from where it left off. And you want to use this when you're stepping away for hours, or when Claude keeps making the same broken mistake on a loop. Now I made a short guide that tells you exactly how to do this and how to get started. Comment clear below and I'll send it right over.