The candy jar beside my desk is making every afternoon a negotiation

A coworker brought in a glass jar of miniature candy bars after Halloween and placed it on the cabinet beside my desk. The jar belongs to the whole team. The cabinet is technically shared. My right hand can reach it without my chair moving.

At first I enjoyed having something sweet after lunch. Then I started taking one whenever a task became annoying. The wrapper appeared before I had fully decided. By 4 p.m., I often could not remember whether I had eaten two pieces or five because none of them registered as an event.

I am not trying to ban candy from the office or turn ordinary eating into a moral crisis. The same jar across the room would probably be fine. The issue is the combination of visibility, reach and repetition. Every time I look up, I receive a tiny invitation. Declining it forty times feels more tiring than making one decision.

I moved the jar to the break room once while cleaning. By noon, someone returned it and joked that I had hidden morale. I laughed because I did not want to announce that the cabinet's location was affecting me. I also considered asking to switch desks, which is an enormous solution to a six-inch glass container.

The obvious step is to say, “Could the candy live in the break room? It’s distracting right beside me.” That is honest and does not criticize anyone else for eating it. I could offer the cabinet for something less interactive, like tissues or printer supplies.

Part of me thinks an adult should be able to ignore a jar. Another part knows that offices arrange everything else for convenience, then act surprised when convenience changes behavior.

Would you move the shared food, move yourself, or create a personal rule and leave the environment alone? What is a reasonable request when a communal treat is sitting inside one person's work zone?