This is not linked to from any other page on site site, maybe it will leak into Googles index at some point, so be it.

Context

The more I look at myself the more i believe I am probably mad and the impact is bigger than I ever appreciated.

I’m very poorly read in terms of philosophy, psychology, mental health, self help. I can never finish a book. This is an analysis of what i see in myself.

I have been writing this document in my head for years on and off, thinking about it frequently. Only now that I am procrastinating have i started to finalise putting it all down in writing.

Myers Briggs

I know this gets laughed at by serious people but I fluctuate between strong INTP and ENTP when answering truthfully. I take a test every couple of years just to see how my personality has evolved.

 

I feel sorry for you because your life quality with ADHD must be so bad, you need support from somebody.

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Work

The relationship between stress and work

I need to be working with someone if i dont have motivation energy to do the task.

Imminent deadline or a disaster that will happen

Lately even a massive disaster I just bow down and let it happen.

Inertia and Paralysis

Can not start, cannot literally silence, nothing moves its like paralysis

I hate myself, boiling rage and self hatred builds up

even if its something i want to do and would enojy

Particularly around unknowns, if i don’t immediately know what i need to do to get started

How my gf helps, sit with me and open something and make me explain what i have to do to start, its like a pin prick in a baloon, suddenly releasing,

I cant think about something its like trying to raise your hand but the hand doesn’t move. Blank, thats the most frustrating. But 1000 thoughts about the other projects are spraying wildly around.

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Procrastination

This has cost me thousands of pounds over the years. From fines to flight tickets.

Doing menial tasks

• Ill just organise my SD cards
• I need to clear my inbox so I’m organised, and unsubscribe, oh I’ve got an important email, i need to deal with that now
• my chair is uncomfortable

working on the computer

Ironically all of my work requires me to sit at a computer, but this is the worst place to be to avoid distraction.

Distractions

Youtube, Military videos and plane disasters.

Catching up on the latest war on guardian, google images, Wikipedia, whatsapp, i even read the entire one star negative review of freelancer.com on trustpilot. Self destructive.

Many things at once

Typing up ideas – becvause they need to be saved

Points where i get distracted

End of the roadmap or path

Normally I have a roadmap of 1000 things that Ii’m going to do when starting something. Normally its been churned over for days in the background when I’m doing everything else and a whole detailed web is laid out of all the interconnecting ideas. Where i start to drail when working is where

i dont know what to do next and brain feels like it doesnt want to look it up.

I get to the end of the web having blased 2000 notes into a document or scaffolding.

Filling in the gaps becomes a mundane chore and i will do anything other than filing those in.

Changing tab

I have four or five ideas in mind, i need to paste the image on my clipboard i just found into Figma, but its not open, so i open a new tab, the tab is loading, and I’m off, forgotten that i was doing that and I’m now writing something in another program. I then catch what I’m doing but cant remember the other two ideas that needed to be captured and feel anxiety and I can’t find the tab i was opening Figma on.

Doing something really tedious to patch up someone else’s work

An example of this is i need to go through a video edited by someone, compare all the source footage, and the editing instructions and list out every problem. I have unreasonable contempt for the task because they should have got it right in the first place. I start thinking about something else and cant stop. I start the task but need to write up the ideas before they forget. The anxiety that I will forget this golden idea starts to increase. I have to type it. 2 hours pass.

Im doing exactly this right now.

Finding things, the permanent damage done by boat life.

Be it a tab in my 1000 tab browser or a pen, this one is getting worse, particularly after spending so much time on the boat. If i cant see something right in front of me or within 30 seconds after aggressively and systematically looking I find the situation so repulsive I can drift around the room listlessly moving things and then my mind goes off to something completely different and interesting. I’m actually not aware of it at first, then catch myself 5 minutes later standing looking in a drawer completely deep in my own mind thinking about some CSS Utility Class UI improvement for the Webflow interface because the current UI is lacking and that it’s of upmost importance that I change it and fix Webflow. I have gone so deep in these situations that it’s like my attention completely detaches from reality for that space of time and I don’t see the images from my eyes, even when the item is right in front of me, the shape recognition functions in my brain don’t fire. This has got significantly worse since my boating trip.

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Coping Strategies

Generating stress and arousal with fast paced music and stimulants, leaving everything to the absolute last desperate minute basically sums it up.

Caffeine

I have a horrible relationship with caffine. Near addiction to energy drinks, its the only way. At peak i was on three big cans of monster to get warmed up.

It reminds me of the possession of Karras

After battling to work, when the caffeine kicks in is like the moment the demon transfers to Karras and the struggle carras has to endure not to go back the the old situation. The analogy with the jumping out the window bit doesn’t quite fit but i like it the sudden transition from fight to “the power is in me”.

https://youtu.be/O-GbIHCpkGk?feature=shared&t=186

Music to get in the zone

Fast paced drum and bass, always, the more industrial and harsh the better, sometimes i listen to the same mix on repeat so i can guage. The rise and fall of the intensity keeps variation over time, its like listening on a hour long timescale rather than paying attention to each drum beat.

These mixes often act as cues for me to start, and can shift my mood from resistance to “ok lets do this”

With headphones on, so loud that it hurts.

Interestingly Metalcore works despite vocals…

Some vocal drum and bass works too

Recent additions

Anything with vocals or classical, is a big no no.

Traditionally Distracting Environments work

Sitting in a cafe or beach bar on a stool, restaurant pool with chatter all around i can work perfectly. My worst nightmare is a silent library.

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Losing things and forgetting things

Forget wallet need to borrow lunch at work.

Interestingly I never lost my lanyard key after 10 years.

Losing phones when younger, a lot of this was to do with partying its not as bad now.

Cant remember which pocket or bag my stuff is in.

Put stuff down absent mindedly because I’m not present due to overthinking and cant remember where I put it, good example is holding a screwdriver and need a hammer. Girlfriend has to fill in for me and find the stuff, she knows where everything is.

Shopping impulse

Go to get washing powder, get loads of other stuff like drinks, walk out of the shop and remember why i went in.

Addicted to shopping on Taobao, resource gathering for every project I’ll never finish.

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Education Struggles

Primary

On Ritalin at primary school. I was frequently with a learning assistant in the library. I was always placed close to the teacher with the behavioural problem students who had learning difficulties or who in hindsight had neglectful parents.

Struggled with maths.

Very influential leader, with “bugs club” quite a significant group of students gathered around an insect zoo which eventually lead to battles in the playground against competing factions. Ultimately the headmaster stepped in and banned bugs club and had the groundkeeper destroy the site.

Secondary

Silly behaviour, attention seeking, detentions, isolation, on report, demerits, minus marks. Endless detentions for disruption, not doing homework.

Never got suspended.

I quote my mum on saying she used to go out and sit in the car and cry after parents evening because the reports were so bad. My dad doesnt seem to remember any of this.

Work was so boring, particularly maths. Was on and off on ritalin again.

I excelled at subjects that didn’t require rote learning facts, but understanding of the real world.

Results

• Geography A
• English: A, English Lit: A
• Double Science: BB,
• IT: B
• Technology: B
• Maths: C
• Religious Studies: E  (i remember one exam question asking me to draw a map of Nazareth and some rivers or something and I deliberately drew what resembled a testicle, pushing the detail to the point of not being called up for it)

Study leave removal, challenging authority

Although I was never suspended i did have my study leave cancelled after an incident that was close to the end of term. I had a good relationship with my head of year who liked me despite me being in his office so frequently. The incident in question was me challenging authority of a teacher.

An english class was being held in lunchtime detention in my form room. I went in to get my ball and the teacher said no and stood by the door. I told her that

“I know emotionally it feels like you cant allow anyone in or out because you are upset, but I’ve got nothing to do with this class detention, i just want to get my ball from my form room and leave, you are being irrational.”

She tried to close the door in my face and I put my foot in the door so I could continue arguing, just as the head of english walked past.

Jacob Sharp, come with meeeee.

In a thick brummey grandmaesque accent, one of my favorite teachers whisked me off to be disciplined. I was told that had it not been the end of term I would have been suspended for that.

The same head of English also coined one of my favorite phrases after marking my A grade work…

Jacob You are an enigma

For context I was in the third set, sat in front of her desk for not paying attention and “silly behaviour” and used to goad her in the lesson. I enjoy all of that.

A level, sixth-form

Product design set a bad precedent

I got 97% on the final project I did the night before. I spent every lesson messing around or driving around Chelmsford making home movies or spraying people with a water pistol from the car.

This lead to leaving everything to the last minute because if I can just skip class, muck about in lessons, never do the homework and then bang out the work last minute and get high scores, why bother?

Behaviour problems continue

I was kicked out of psychology and Sport Science for challenging the teachers methods of teaching. I criticised her in front of the whole class saying that copying out the text book and memorising studies isn’t how psychology should be taught. The same teacher who was also head of year tried to expel me from the sixth form which would have meant i wouldn’t go to university.

Right class, turn to page 35 in your textbooks and copy out Baddeley and Hitch for the next half an hour

I can still hear it in here thick Scottish accent and it brings back visceral hatred of her. She was a PE teacher before moving to psychology, part of the reason why I was removed from sport science as well.

I was on-report “special measures” document which tracked what I did, like a child. Which is embarrassing.

Fortunately a few other teachers really must have seen potential in me and I don’t know what went on but  I wasn’t expelled.

Results

• Product Design: A
• Economics: A
• IT C

University Multimedia Design

This is where caffine habits really got formed. Squirming on the floor procrastinating, self flagellating, until 3am them starting an essay, doing 3000 words by 11am, an hour after the deadline time and then getting 70%.

I worked out that if i had done all of my work on time and not had any 10% penalties i would have got a 2:1, instead i got a 2:2.

I saw an ADHD councillor here too, he gave me an anxiety CD with him narrating some story about being a rag-doll. I only did that because i heard about a free laptop. I think i failed to show up for a few meetings and let that go.

No matter what i did i just couldn’t get work done before the night before, id go to the cluster and sit looking blank minded at the computer then go and party after trying for 10 mins.

The work wasn’t hard or interesting, i couldnt be consistent or motivated to actually do it. Lectures were extremely boring.

First Job

Helpdesk developer during the tail end of the financial crisis.

Saw people who had served the company well for 20 years getting fired and shouting red in the face what a c**t the director was as they were lead out the door.

Shaped my opinion that if you work for someone else you are a grub, their property to be discarded as and when it suits them. Especially seeing the Bentley the director drove in and his aristocratic dress sense.

I hated it, HATED it. Got fired after 3 months. I would go out partying and not show up for work, or go in smelling of alcohol after a night of no sleep. I had to answer the phone and code all day long for a team of 40. I sat in the pub and felt relief after the clear your desk incident. I went back on jobseekers allowance and had more disposable income and time to learn PHP.

Postgraduate Computer Science

The work wasn’t hard, it was just really really boring. Around this time I think i had serious clinical depression brought about by procrastination and serious self destructive behaviour around work.

I didn’t get out of bed for around 5 weeks at one point.

Also the scale of work started to grow beyond pulling off all nighters.

For my final dissertation I lived at my grandmas house. I worked non stop for almost 3 weeks sitting in the same chair on 2-3 hours sleep a night, sometimes in the chair with hot coffee on tap from my grandma and meals placed next to me to pick at.

I got it in on time but it was rubbish, thats after having months to work on it. For some reason I chose to write a huge car auction CMS system with C# and ASP.NET 4 and MSSQL which I had no idea how to write. How the fuck I managed to make that whole system work and write 30,000 words in 3 weeks is beyond me.

I still wake up now in the middle of the night in cold sweats in panic that I’m throwing away my life because I’m giving up on submitting this dissertation. Long term damage.

I scraped through that masters with a “we’ll just past you with 51% don’t come back”

I was an hour late to my final advanced programming exam which almost torpedoed me completely. I thought i left enough time to get there but usign google maps i could see the venue across a motorway, but newcastle is a 3D city with walkways and tunnels. I couldn’t find my way there.

Fortunately i was able to dig out an old email i had send to their learning support team and explain the issues i was having after missing the exam.

I had a full “specific learning difficulties assessment” and yes, I am diagnosably disabled.

Newcastle gave me another opportunity at that exam this time in a room on my own with a laptop to write answers and i scored around 80% which is high, but it was too late after repeatedly eroding scores with my other late work.

A pattern emerges

Theres a constant theme here,

• I cant pay any attention and when i was younger that meant messing around
• I desperately want to do the thing and be better
• I cant do the work leading up to the deadline until theres massive pressure or fear
• Somehow i pull it out of the bag last minute but probably way lower standard than I’m capable of
• I get a good score despite everything
• Its not “not trying”, i try, but the trying is fighting my own internal resistance to doing something constructive
• When i do do things well the scores are dragged down by lateness and other penalties
• Mediocre to good results achieved.

 

If i could just sit down and consistently churn out work in a linear fashion from day to day leading up to the deadline like a lot of my colleagues would I be better performing? or am I  always tied to working in this way?

I know i would sit there and think, no. nothing. juices aren’t flowing. I’d type out some garbled rubbish and then delete it all next session.

 

Starting my first company

This was a major fight from day one, I went to hong kong with no money in my pocket and had to fend for myself with freelance projects from the start. I couldnt even buy shoes at one point.

Running from a bedroom operation to about 15 staff in 6 years

there was so mcuh to learn

It was only when things became a bit more stable that i think i started to procrastinate around tasks that

the stress sort of gave me a reason to live

Too much stress

coupled with a deteriorating relationship with my partner and insane workload i had to quit.

I think this company actually gave me an addition to high stress high pressure.

Working as CTO

extremely high pressure job, on the brink of bankruptcy most of the time

doing 3 peoples jobs,

scaled from one staff to 6 and rebuilt the company from scratch again

Real existential crisis started.

i would sigh at the window.

had structure hours to work

towards the end i would just walk out at 3pm and sit in the park for a few hours because i was really troubled with how time was passing and life.

I have anxiety now that i should be somewhere, ill be in a meeting with a client at the beach, and inside i feel like, “what are you doing messing around you should be at work!” remember you are owned! you arent in control of your own life hours if you want this money, money you can spend on rent and food so yo can sleep in a small concrete box and return to work the next day.  oh i am at work, i am making money right now.

Freelancing as a nomad

manage my time alone is a nightmare and crippling inertia.

tried a PA didnt work.

really enjoy what i do

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Hyperfocus Activities

DJing,

I can play techno, psytrance, Drum and bass for 6-8 hours non stop and it feels like 2.

I never actually record anything good, but used to play at big jungle events similar to this…

High Stress Sports

The more the risk of serious injury involved the batter. High speed, requiring precision and focus, moving my body in a particular way to balance.

Design flow

I went into hyperfocus beastmode recently and did some low priority work to avoid the pressing but boring stuff.

I produced a whole 11 page high fidelity design to about 90% quality from imagination in 6 hours. Thats faster than a professional designer, and I’m not even a designer! I felt restricted by the speed that I  could move my hand at at point to realise the multiple threads of ideas and chain of concepts.

I went into 711 afterwards and it was like every hair on my body was a hyper tuned sensory antennae and I could hear and feel every detailed sound and storyline behind even the scuff of someone’s shoe at the back of the shop. I saw what crisps look like inside the packet and how much light comes through the bag, the colour of it, the shape of shadows as someone walks past and how the shadows play across the creases on the inside of the bag. Completely mad. I think my symptoms are getting more extreme.

Binge working

Hygene, eating, drinking all go out the window when I’m in the zone as mere mortal distractions. I can work 9am to 4am every day for a week without moving apart to sleep fully clothed if i really get into something. Showering is a waste of time, except when i have more ideas but often have to cut it short to run for a notepad or extend for hours to think more.

Forgetting to eat for days when working in the zone. Hunger just goes away.

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High Stress clarity

One recent example was solo sailing in the adriatic, a seacock burst about 6 miles offshore, so water was pouring into the boat, in a storm, im sailing a 36ft yacht on my own in massive waves and 26kt winds.

Bullet Time Accidents

Particularly when crashing or falling reality almost slows down to Neo’s famous bullet dodging scene. An example is falling off a bike, or tripping, I analyse the ground I’m about to hit and calculate the steps involved almost.

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Time and Date Blindness, and Dyslexic Traits

This ones hard to describe.

It’s like looking at a picture with a hole in it, but instead of seeing a clear hole and knowing somethings missing, that bit of the picture is just absent, you know its absent you can’t sense it but you also cant see clearly that its absent, its just a void of nothing.

I can’t generate thoughts or understanding or retain what i have understood for more than a few seconds.

Time perception

Time perception doesn’t move in a linear fashion its more like a slinky, stretching out then suddenly snapping shut.

I have been able to sit on long haul flights to Hong Kong for 11 hours look out the window having felt only 2 hours or less.

Cant remember a date or time period

“Mike will be free from the second week of January until the end and then again from mid feb onwards” – this can only stay in my memory for a few seconds.

I cant tell the difference between months and times in my head

If I’m trying to recall a string of information that contains a month, the month is fluid and may change to any month I cant remember.

Numbers

I cant hold a string of numbers in my head, it fades, I feel a lot of anxiety as it fades that I cant hold onto it. Or i can hold some of the numbers

Interestingly playing with my own memory i can join the numbers together and store that,

3,6,7,9,2 impossible

36,79,2 doable.

Typing out something like a OTP password, I can say the numbers to myself in the right order but my fingers on the keypad press all the wrong keys. The number I think doesn’t correspond to what I press on the keyboard. Despite looking at the key and seeing it as correct (when its not in reality).

I cant read long strings of numbers say > 6 because i cant see the numbers, its like a blur. I can’t go one by one and just look to the next number in line because they become unrecognisable.

Dates

Most of the time I cant remember my age or the current year.

I definitely cant remember most dates of birth for anyone important to me, much to their annoyance.

Picking dates in a date-picker to buy a flight, or book a hotel I cant really read the date I put in afterwards or remember if its the right date.

Reading

Apparently I have a slightly slower reading age

B and D, P Q, 9 they are the same thing you have to memorise the context and rotate accordingly

Feel the shape of words and know what the words mean

Read the same steence multiple times by accident.

read the words and say them to myself but attention is off on something completely different like the dynamics of a conversation I had about shareholder agreement, and the intentions of the person behind the words they say words are a fascade, thats how things get lost on whstapp…. and im not absorbing any of the story or message.

writing

Handwriting

My handwriting is atrocious. I prefer writing with a fountain pen. sometimes i cant form letters properly, cross out frequently or the wrong letter comes out of my hand.

Touch typing

I can type relatively fast and accurately without looking at the keyboard.

Presenting and Public speaking

Several months ago I wrote a 300 page report analysing a business from its systems to its social media account branding standards.

All of this information is permanently stored meticulously in my head and instantly retrievable, down to the minute details about the particular pixel value of the border-radius to use on the Accredited partner logo. This is while working on about 5 projects concurrently.

With pointers from a slide, I talked continuously at a fast pace for two hours while still limiting the information I was giving conscious of the time.

If I had to write a wedding speech and memorise it, absolutely not. Impossible. I would start to speak and complete silence in my head.

Spelling

I cant remember any of the rules, let alone apply them, I before e except after C, but then there are all these exceptions you need to memorise.

I struggle to spell the classic words like receipt, patience,

Spelling and grammar isn’t the important part of written text, so long as the message is effectively communicated and the message is sound.

Vocabulary plateaued

I got thicker as i got older in relation to my peers. Probably drink and laziness or maybe i was ahead when i was younger.

Organisation

Absolute chaos, imagine trello, google drive, google keep, desktop notes everywhere detailing the next big idea or to do list of critically important things that are late.

 

Mathemtics Vs Computing

Iv wondered how I can read and intuitively understand code like looking into the matrix yet always been bad at maths. I think of the torturous days doing algebra and quadratic equations in the lowest set of maths, feeling useless and unable to memorise all the formulas. Yet programmning and being syntactically correct, memorising tools, functions and libraries comes easily to me.

I can build a calculator with code, but would be completely unable to do the most basic calculations the calculator could do in my head.

Maybe if i tried to learn “maths better” now, away from the structure of the school system which fails neurodivergent beings. It might actually be fun.

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Memory

Name recall

Watching videos of myself talking, it’s like a speech impediment, whenever i hit a noun i “err” or pause.

Thinking of an app i want to open, open spotlight but cant “feel” the name of the app in my memory. It’s straining and stressful to recall the name, i can see the app, the logo, but the name doesn’t bubble to the surface for a few seconds.

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Social Impact

I wonder if this overlaps with Autistic spectrum behaviours

Double booking and showing up on time

time literally speeds up to 4X just before im supposed to go anywhere.

I cant make it on time, frequently double book, don’t allow the right time to move from one thing to another.

Talking to my colleagues helps with this alot, they are meticulous planners.

Decisions about a date

Decision fatigue, “do you want to go, whats your schedule like, can you make a decision?” I just dont know, its really stressful. Triggers avoidance, to avoid scheduling, time and plan.

Big groups of people I don’t know

Sometimes completely break down and get overwhelmed and need to step out of the situation but mostly don’t. Feelings of “being weird” panic behaviour turns into standing alone and staring hoping someone will start a conversation.

Forgetting details about people

Especially new people, I forget names, any topics of conversation or details like kids.

Conversation doesn’t flow

Again with strangers mainly that I’ve met for the first time. Polite chit chat is the worst form of conversation. I often run into a painful mental jam

Say something, say anything, think of a question

Loading….

Oh god, it’s awkward now. Say something, stop being weird.

Almost like trying to vomit, forcing, forcing but nothing comes up.

Alcohol

I become my best self, the center of attention, witty, confident charismatic. Makes it possible to forge new friendships and say hello to people.

Tendency to be dependent on it in social situations. Often drink too much.

Drinking alone

Its a way to “make it all stop”

I don’t actually enjoy the feeling anymore of being drunk, and groggy, unproductive. But it is calming and mind slowing. I can stare at a documentary and chat to friends on whstapp relaxed.

I don’t have as many ideas, but maybe one big one that develops. when i read it the next day its terrible.

How I’m Perceived

Strangers say:

• Mysterious
• Depressed
• Rude

Friends say:

• Wacky
• Creative
• Busy and Disorganised
• Unreliable
• Life and soul of the party.

Do you care?

My mum is terminally ill, she’s also far away. I think about her regularly but that doesn’t translate into contacting her by WhatsApp. I have an aversion to using WhatsApp and crafting conversations in my head, particularly when the topic is difficult or requires some social conventions and small talk.

She may perceive that as me not caring.

I do however plot ways to preserve her memory, or meet her more often while balancing my busy schedule and overcrowded mind.

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Unsettled in routine while needing it.

Fear of the almost suicidal level of existential dread and boredom that stability, a mortgage a house, kids would bring. I am constantly chasing around the world, seeking new experience.

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Speed of thought and Overthinking

It’s almost exhausting on a daily basis but about three concurrent threads of thought about maybe 5-6 different projects.

The stress comes from remembering “good ideas”. For example walking to the shop I co

Distracting sound

Doing something a sound from afar pops into my attention in perfect 3D spacial awareness of where each sound comes from. If i was in a back garden in a row of terraces I almost feel the fences and can see over them to the sound of a baby crying and which direction its head is facing.

Connecting Dots

I see everything as interconnected systems and get carried away following them. For example turning on the tap. The tap is connected to a pipe in the wall, that pipe leads to a tank, that tank is up high to get gravity to provide the pressure, presumably there is a pump that pumps the water up which is wired into some power system (how is that powered), and before that a reservoir and water treatment system. So there are tubes connecting through the ground all the way back to the reservoir all with connectors which could leak at the connection points, how do you seal two pipes or trace leaks? If you opened every gateway from the tap mechanism (exploded view of the interconnected screw thread in the tap handle and the door that it closes in the pipe and the tactile feeling in my fingers and hand of closing that door) presumably you could travel along that pipe right back to the reservoir.

It almost drives me mad with stress to think about all of that infrastructure. All of this happens in around a second.

In reverse I often find solutions to problems that others don’t see by pulling in multiple different unrelated things that can be tied together. These thoughts spring into mind without any input from myself and often quite fast.

Systems and Mechanical Items

A good example here is a folding chair. My ex housemate who is also ADHD couldn’t unfold a chair, she gave it to me, I looked at the mechanism which was unusual and I hadn’t come across before, in a split second I calculated how the specific parts would all move and interact to unlock the chair and clicked it open.

Another example is the gas hob, the spark wasn’t strong enough to light the gas rising. I looked at if for a second and took a frying pan turned it upside down and placed it over the nossel so that the gas would collect underneath in a pocket and reach the spark which worked.

One final example, i wanted to take a selfie in baggage collection in Phuket airport. I needed the camera to be eye height if i sat on my suitcases. I looked around, saw a trolley, and thought how can I attach my phone.

Instantly the concept came to mind,

If get one of those small items trays on the conveyor, they have a reinforcing rim (sub thread: how curved metal sheeting gives it strength like those car barriers at the side of the motorway, how effective are those really, remember that one you saw in greece, humanity is blissfully unaware of its own mortality and risk…) around the outside to lift it by, turn it upside down the width should be similar to that of the handle on the cart, if its too small the material is flexibile enough to be pushed down over the handles, this should actually give a better grip so I wont need to balance the box, i can then sit the phone in the upturned rim and if the angle is incorrect use the reciept in my back pocket to hold the phone forwards. If the receipt is too densely squashed into a ball, unfold it and compress it less then press the phone back against it until the position is correct, but be careful that the phone isn’t leaning too far forward because it might fall, the ball might expand slowly once its been lightly compressed causing unbalance, but the cases is strong enough to withstand hitting the floor from that distance so its ok….

I remember actually giving up converting that into words

Speed is a problem

I often physically cant, type, write or move fast enough to keep up with the rate at which my thoughts spark into existence, and this triggers anxiety that something will be missed.

I need to upload an image to this post, as my cursor is moving to the upload button I run through the process, where to find the file, click this click that, but my mouse is still going up to the icon and then the window has to load, so my attention goes back to another concept for a new part of this page. I start to look for an image for that, NO! stop wait for the window, it’s tedious, click this, click that, anxiety starts, but your forgetting that idea…

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The firing order of thought

Using computing as an analogy…

I don’t think in words first of all, ideas flash into existence like sparks flying from an angle grinder in the dark, short lived and they fade out the further they move from the grinder.

I know and understand the concept intuitively, but converting to words is part of the process of having a thought, and i have control over this process most of the time to either do it or stop.

But if anything words inhibit the speed at which I can store or play with the thoughts because then I experience multi threaded attempts to record and organise the firehose of thoughts and it’s hard to listen to it all at once, I then cant remember most of what was thought. The process of converting the words is like building a linear line of the words, it normally makes sense as it comes into being and is like an accurate internal monologue.

A concept i understand will flash into existence, i then start to decode it into words, but i cant hold it there for long it starts to fade.

As I type there are almost three processes running constantly though generation, decoding that to words, reading what I’m typing, and another trying to keep synch between the typing and whats shooting out of the firehose, so that when the typing is done the next bit of sentence or concept can be thought up as a written sentence. Where it gets out of control is when there are thoughts that trigger related thoughts or some related video or song creeps in and starts playing and its like an orchestra where each instrument is playing a different piece with no conductor.

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Understanding Interconnected Concepts

Finding opportunities and solutions where neurotypical think liniar.

Economics

 

Extremely fast “it just clicks”

Understanding new concepts or

I don’t want to blow my own trumpet but I generally get new concepts quite fast at understanding ahead of Neurotypical in group sessions and have to play silent leader at times. Or just observe others slowly getting there, analysing how other people don’t understand.

This depends on the concept, mathamatical concepts are hardest. but that may be the way it’s explained, thoeretical concepts based on no practical or aplicable situation apart from “this other concept you need to remember” I can’t get.

Memorising things

Example is learning Cardinal marker, i still cant remember what the symbols at the top mean, but I remember the method for working it out

 

Learning Practical things with hands – knots bowline, used it day in day out for 7 months, still struggle to remember the squence

 

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Relentless Drive

I can’t spend a weekend relaxing or sunbaith, I need to be packing a bag to go off and make a video i’ll never edit.

The power to do do do to my detriment

The boat being a prime example, I’m so determined I can think away or dissolve any feelings of just give up its not worth it”.

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Chronic-Unfinishing

thousands of notes and projects all “really good ideas”

Side effect unfulfillment

“Life begins when i just get one of these launched. ”

perpetually stuck

possibly linked to existential crisis.

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Never feeling “flow”

I once went to an ADHD counsellor. After a few sessions he eventually said he couldn’t help me.

he talked a lot about flow and just being in the moment

I have tried to once went to a sound bath meditation session with my girlfriend at the time at Wonderfruit festival, I looked around and everyone including my girlfriend was in a catatonic state.

I saw the person guiding the session sitting with their mic and eyes closed rocking back and forth in a trance while running a stick around inside the bowl.

I could feel the texture of the wood running around the inside of the bowl in my imagination almost on a microscopic level, and thought about if you slowed down time could you see the vibration of the bowl, then started to character assess the person who was instructing the class, what social conditions create a person that would do this for a living and wear those elephant baggy cotton “Im in southeast Asia as a white tourist” trousers. I’m not in the moment but analysing it from the outside, stop thinking. I wonder where they store these sunshades after the event and how much carbon….. URGHH!!!

Afterwards my girlfriend explained that it was hypnotic, the sound came into her consciousness on a deep level and put her to sleep.

I have a similar experience with massages, only more cynical. It’s just a person pushing my skin, and this is all some pretend act that I’m supposed to go along with. This isn’t relaxing or sensual at all, they just want to get paid, its profitable getting paid for massaging, like making money out of thin air.

Never feeling flow isn’t entirely true

As mentioned I obsessively listen to drum and bass and love raving. Being about 12 pints in at 2am on a dancefloor with 1000s of other people squeezed into a sweaty room with an intense sound system and a DJ throwing out double-drop after filthy double-drop, intense jump-up and classics I do eventually let go and feel out of body relaxation, able to move in ways that feel completely fluid and natural and i guess happy.

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Concurrent Projects and daily thoughts

At this snapshot point in time i am working on the following each of these have their own rabbit warren of sub tasks and complexities.

• Digitally transforming a clients entire business operation and digital presence
  • This ones particularly deep because although it’s one bullet point i can think of an idea for a sentence to add to a strategy document that is superfulous to the main project. The document is something i will propose the client sends to their customers in order to explain why this digital transformation is happening, the sentence I want to add is a key point, written it in a way that will feel reassuring from the customers perspective to head off potential adoption issues. The  document decomes – (that was a genuine organic B-D switch left in there!) an additional nested task in my mind.
• A 30+ page Webflow website for that client
• A series of 50 videos with a fiverr editor
• All of the content in my sailing blog
• relaunching my sailing social media accounts and how to present that to my small audience
• my own company website
• setting up a company in sri lanka with my friend including  researching coworking spaces and planning operation flows
• preparations for a trip to Hong kong and wonderfruit festival
• brokering an exit deal with my old business partner
• Working on UI fixes on an shooting app which has stalled including testing
• working on finding people to develop a sailing app and business development for that
• Planning and defining an open source version of my companies SaaS platform.
• Multiple Reel concepts for my instagram account
• Writing scripts and thinking of a visual style for my sailing youtube channel based on a wealth of videos.
• Designing in Figma a new app i want to make with plasmic to do with fonts using Ant UI
• working on the UX for an AI startup including branding
• Company audit which is late
• Plotting the chess game of running my own business, getting talent in, setting up stepping stones.
• Crisis fighting, managing bills and not having cashflow to cover it.

Day to day stuff like

• Visa to live in Thailand, sort term and 10 year
• banking issues, lost card etc
• seeing a dentist
• Health Insurance
• Getting a Motorbike
• Insurance claim for my crashed boat
• rent and where I’ll live
• Creating invoices for clients which are late
• Around 20 emails in draft including ongoing conversations with partnership opportunities, support tickets and resarch for the other projects
• managing the boat hardstanding maintenance guys
• business development while on my trip to hong kong.
• planning what to do with my boat
• buying food

 

A poor mans Davinci

I like to think of myself as a renaissance man with many skills

In reality as i have got older people who focus on a field have naturally got better at those things to an industry leading standard

Wide interests and often lead others into my ill thought out or new ventures

• Airsoft
• Taekwondo
• Diving
• web stuff
• video editing
• photography
• running
• pokemon go
• sailing

I cant sit still at the weekend .

Existential crisis and need for meaning

Constant toying with big questions, especially at night when I need to sleep

I know there is no answer to some of these questions, but i cant stop thinking about it.

• “Why do i exist?”
• “Why does anything i perceive exist? theres no reason for it”
• “Do other people exist in the same way or are they parts of my perception, like furniture in a room. Of course they exist in my perception by the definition of “exist” but what about outside that?”
• “If I cease to exist, or perciece, will they continue to exist?”
• “When will my life start”
• “Do i really enjoy anything?”
• “I have seen 50% of my lifespan now, I have a tangible sense of how much there is left, and the rest is only downhill”
• “I don’t know exactly what death is, so am I afraid of the death part? Not really, the being trapped in a car accident  dying slowly in flaming wreckage, in severe pain, looking at my mutilated body failing, the tool I use to move around, aware that I am dying, yes.”
• “…But ultimately I’m going to go to that place anyway so I might as well carry on with this, because that might be worse, I just don’t know”
• “What will future technology and society be like, I’m not going to see it all, why bother to continue ?”
• “Why as humans are we so collectively useless but brilliant”
• “…We can put satellites in space but humanity as a whole is a disappointment, the average person must be primitive, believing in gods and caring about land boundaries”
• “I have no hope that we will figure out conflict, when it makes money”
• “Evil and primitive human impulses, animal like traits control the world”
• “We are destroying the planet and I am part of it”

So, what am i doing to manage this?

Well nothing really, I just get more and more pent up self hate. Gradually the stress as a motivator is starting to wear off as I age. Finding a doctor to medicate seems too difficult with my nomadic lifestyle, do i really want to “medicate” to exist?

Pumping myself full of energy drinks and staying up in the dark detached from the cycle of the sun to get something I’m facing a wall of paralysis on to get the work done is going to ruin my health and lead to diabetes.

I tried that app where you co-work with someone remotely, but I never remembered to turn up to the shared session on time and got banned.

My detrimental neurodivergence manifestations are diametrically opposed to how i want to lead my life, remote working and “indi-hacking” which requires long periods of solo work on the computer, doing things I at times really enjoy but cant get started on or can’t see through to fruition.

So I have no solution and am in a downward trajectory, while also somehow being productive and successful at what I do, earning good money I then fritter away on large scale passion projects and alternative lifestyle pursuits in search of meaning.

If i don’t find a solution, I’ll be trapped in a perpetual state of “when i do x” but the reality is nothing will see the light of day. All of this work, struggle, for nothing because I’m not present and enjoying the journey and there is no reward at the end.

I think explaining to those around me and finding support from colleagues and friends is the only way forward. Someone to collaborate with who can tell me my ideas are shit and what to focus on.