Since we're talking about mental health this month, I decided to take a deeper look into ADHD. Here's how my own ADHD presents itself (one of the many ways):
Blank, blurry fog. Especially when I sit down to do a task. I'll have a great idea, it all makes sense, I can see how it works and how it works out, and then I sit down to do it... Eyes glass over. blank. fog.
It's literally like a cloud rolls across my brain and blows away all of the clarity and direction and I'm left feeling like, huh? What? Where do I start? What am I trying to do? It's like I forgot everything. I remember this feeling all through school when it came to homework. Nothing made sense anymore and I didn't know where to start.
What comes next is inertia. And a strong desire to take a nap. Or do absolutely anything else besides the task at hand.
There's an analogy that I think of a lot when it comes to my ADHD brain. Imagine an empty egg carton. Floating above the egg carton are a bunch of egg size balls, all swirling around, bumping into each other and causing chaos. This is happening inside my head.
Now, say I go for a run or a drive. After a little while the balls start dropping into the egg carton. One by one, each in their proper place. Peace, order, clarity.
Now I get home from my run, take a shower, get dressed, putter around, eat, and then I sit down to do the work. By this time, most of the balls have lost their gravity again and they're swirling around above the egg carton again.
This why I create formulas. When all the balls are swirling, I can usually follow very simple steps. My formulas are mindless. A step in the formula can sound like "open calendar app" and each time I complete a step, I get to check a box.
This is one of many tools I use to get past my ADHD and keep moving forward.
When I talk to other people who have ADHD, I'm struck by the different descriptions of what it feels like.
It makes me so curious. Can you relate? What's your experience?
Ps. I've in the fog the whole time I've been writing this. Yesterday and today. Sometimes writing comes super easy, everything just flows. This is not one of those times. So this is when it takes discipline. Just push forward and do it anyway. "Don't let the perfect get in the way of the good" is an expression I often remember in times like these.