Just a short one today on habits, losing habits, and ND living.
I've recently been talking to a counsellor who specialises in working with those with neurodivergences, like me. One thing she has drawn my attention to recently is the fact that many neurodivergent brains struggle to/cannot form habits. We can form repetitions which can appear to others on the outside AS habits, but they are different from neurotypical habits. If we get knocked out of our habits, then we have to consciously begin again at the start in forming them - apparently neurotypicals can just "pick up where they left off". That floored me, and has helped in readdressing how I feel about myself.
I'll put up something longer another day on routines vs habits, but the short which is relevant here is that when I lost a "habit" due to my routine altering, I felt bad. Not bad, stupid, idiotic, incompetent... and more importantly, I didn't have the available brain cycles to re-add the lost habit. Whatever external (or internal) thing happened which caused me to "lose" the habit, was also often impeding my ability to re-establish non-vital things into me new routine. And I feel useless about that. I can be so accommodating with others when "life gets in the way", but not with myself.
Writing on here got lost in that. I tried to force myself into a habit of writing at least once a month Or Else (internal pressure here!). What happened was that I felt trapped, and then when changes due to (I think) going on holiday got in the way, I just felt so incompetent that I made it into a self-fulfilling prophecy - "I'm too incompetent to do this thing regularly - see!". So, what has changed? Not a lot, if I'm honest. Do I think I'll manage to update regularly from now on? Maaaaaaaaybe, but probably not! What has changed is that if I write something here, it's a Good Thing. If I don't, then it's NOT a Bad Thing, it's just A Thing. Will I feel guilty? Gods yes, I don't think I can retrain my brain that much just yet!!
So where now? I'm going to draft up a couple of things that are in my brain, and then we shall see. Maybe more in the way of general life updates. Maybe more ASD/ND stuff that's been percolating around for a while. Maybe more costuming stuff as and when - possibly less of that because I really don't have any self-confidence around this area still so sharing stuff feels far more raw and exposing, plus the group I was associated with I currently feel as welcome as a fart in a lift (which might be just me overthinking, but I need(ed) space to process). Hmm, that might also be something I write - "On Processing". I am fairly sure I'm talking into the void on here, but if so, I might also put some more professional-related stuff on too. I have an idea gestating about alt-ac, and how to NOT approach libraries as an alt-ac profession...
In the event that the void wants to read any of those, or even something related I've not suggested, do say as I can think on that too...
Current in-draft-unwritten-thoughts:
- Faith and ASD - my perspective
- Current costuming project (a rant one will probably be a quickie upcoming), probably with some ND related content
- My habits and routines - where they are fixed, and where I currently have found workarounds
- Reflective writing and ASD - what I find hard about this
- Counselling - what I've learned
- How Not to Alt-Ac
- Differences (for me) between professional conferences and academic ones
- How having an ND boss has caused me to rethink things about professional-me
- General life babble - I may try to make that a monthly thing, with "proper" posts written more ad-hoc.
- Things I've Read Recently - more of a "here's a link" thing than book/article reviews
- Article reviews - to help with Reflective Writing issues, then summaries of articles every once in a while might be good for me.
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