When a final goal is only a tool to give you intermediate goals

Mon, 06 Feb 2023 23:06:19 GMT

Despite intermediate goals often being a tool to reach a final goal, I was recently noticing a lot of different cases in life when the reverse was true.

Exercise

This is the one that got me thinking. I realised that I used to really often have a problem that if I was running or something, and try to "run fast for a bit", I'd almost immediately run out of motivation to continue, not from immediate discomfort, but from feeling like "I won't be able to keep this up long enough to matter, it's not worth it". When I started exercising regularly, I started with something like Couch to 5k, and really really relied on having a set target for the session, which I did everything I could to meet. I didn't think of that as a "thing", just that exercise was hard to maintain. (And I DID experience positive feelings in my body, unlike some people!)

Since I've been treated for adhd and a bit less stressed out by doing something that feels important that I used to be bad at, I feel like I am more able to say things like "lets see if I can maintain this pace for another 2 minutes" or "lets adjust the target" according to what feels like it will be useful and follow through on them, without falling into reinforcing "I MUST hit my original target, I MUST" or falling into "oh it feels hard, I'll reduce the target"

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ADHD emotional dysregulation

Wed, 21 Jul 2021 16:39:12 GMT

As often happens, a friend with experience with ADHD linked me to a quiz inspired by diagnostic questions. One question was "Do you often have difficulty completing tasks because of your own emotions" (or something like that) and I was like YES that's my entire personality. (Exaggerated for effect, that's not my only personality but it is defining a lot of my characteristic experiences.)

Another was "do you tend to give up on tasks that you find hard or confusing" and... yeah, that. Not intellectual things! But "no-one tells you what to do" things

To cut a long quiz short, I had medium levels of forgetfulness and inattention, low levels of impulsivity and forgetfulness, no developmental delays, but maxed out "Emotional Dysregulation" and "Inflexibility". So not classical ADHD but I DO fail to do things: https://www.idrlabs.com/adhd-spectrum/65-45-70-25-100-90-40/result.php

Aside

Obviously those are based on my quiz answers. Lots of the questions I yelled "COMPARED TO WHO?" and I wasn't being contrary -- genuinely the thing I want to know is, given my awareness of my own level of eg coping strategies for being late, is that typical, or high, or low?

I wasn't born knowing how much average people struggle with things! And even if you ask most people can't tell you! So went with best guesses. But assuming the "YES THAT'S ME" questions and the "I guess I do have coping strategies there" q I placed ok results prob mostly right

Continuation

My friend recommended the video "Why is it so hard to do something that should be so easy" by "How to ADHD" BY Jessica McCabe about adhd style emotional dysregulation and "climbing the wall of awful" and strategies that don't work. Short and v watchable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=Uo08uS904Rg

I don't want to be premature but that seemed to unlock answers to a lot of questions. I have a lot of friends with similar but different struggles and I seemed to fit in with them but some of my classic experiences didn't fit them and vice versa, so I didn't have a box for me

I like being in literal boxes, and I like being in metaphorical boxes when they're the right shape, but not when they're not. But this seemed right for me. Knowing seemed to help, even in a few days. And gives me an action plan. See how much knowing the things I need to watch fixes them. Possibly diagnosis helps. Possibly medicine helps.

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jack

When a final goal is only a tool to give you intermediate goals

ADHD emotional dysregulation