So she turned herself into an automaton.
A receipt printer cured my procrastination
521–530 of 634 posts
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#522I was diagnosed with ADHD at 38, and never expected to hear that diagnosis. Main reason was my misunderstanding of what ADHD is. Like most people, I just naively associated ADHD with hyperactive kids, and thought I was just lazy and having procrastination issues. Now that I understand it so much better, I start to recognise it everywhere. After reading first paragraph of the article, I immediately though: Laurie must…
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
With mental illnesses there is no clear limit between normal and sick. However there is a point when it's really hurting the person afflicted.
For example procrastination: everyone procrastinate more or less, but in people with ADHD, procrastination happens even when they actively don't want to procrastinate, and even when it hurts them right now to procrastinate.
Another example : depression. It's not easy from an external point of view to see where is the limit between sadness and depression, however at one point the sadness has no objective reason, and is so overwhelming the brain that the person cannot function normally or is able to mentally fight it
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#523I was diagnosed with ADHD at 38, and never expected to hear that diagnosis. Main reason was my misunderstanding of what ADHD is. Like most people, I just naively associated ADHD with hyperactive kids, and thought I was just lazy and having procrastination issues. Now that I understand it so much better, I start to recognise it everywhere. After reading first paragraph of the article, I immediately though: Laurie must…
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
Most symptoms of ADHD are things almost everybody experiences from time to time, some even regularly. What makes ADHD is combination of many symptoms cranked to 11.
ADHD is the difference between having difficulties starting some tasks and being absolutely unable to start a mundane task until you curl yourself into a corner and cry.
That being said, things that help people coping with ADHD can totally help people not having ADHD but suffering similar issues (case in point: planning and handling tasks)
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#524I was diagnosed with ADHD at 38, and never expected to hear that diagnosis. Main reason was my misunderstanding of what ADHD is. Like most people, I just naively associated ADHD with hyperactive kids, and thought I was just lazy and having procrastination issues. Now that I understand it so much better, I start to recognise it everywhere. After reading first paragraph of the article, I immediately though: Laurie must…
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
Well people differ. Look around at your colleagues, some have dry eyes and lower back pain from working hours without interruption on a boring task.
Others, like myself, are easily distracted, quickly bored and only work hard with a specific goal in mind. Working on smaller tasks makes it easier to not be distracted. I feel this is more important for people with ADHD.
But you are right, in the end it is useful strategy for everyone :)
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#525Okay why not… One part that is not addressed is procrastination because of tasks that are scary. I think I have fairly low levels of anxiety in general, but there are things I know I need to do but I’d just rather ignore them because they somehow terrify me. Things like “call someone to negotiate a price”, or “find a holiday place to rent when I know it’s already too late”, or “reverse-engineer what this giant pile o…
Seriously. I'm so jealous of people who only need to do things that are so tractable that splitting them creates a series of microtasks that are all easy, rather than a series of distracting trivialities that mean nothing without actually accomplishing the one thing that I really don't want to do.
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#526I was diagnosed with ADHD at 38, and never expected to hear that diagnosis. Main reason was my misunderstanding of what ADHD is. Like most people, I just naively associated ADHD with hyperactive kids, and thought I was just lazy and having procrastination issues. Now that I understand it so much better, I start to recognise it everywhere. After reading first paragraph of the article, I immediately though: Laurie must…
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
Here's an analogy that might make it clearer:
Alice is in a wheelchair.
Bob has a broken leg.
Charlie is unfit, but otherwise a healthy adult.
Alice, Bob, and Charlie would all say "I find getting up the hills of San Francisco difficult". But "doesn't everyone find that hard" conflates the causes and severity of the difficulty for the three of them in a way that isn't useful for making their complaints feel heard, or addressing the complaints such that they don't have that issue.
For example:
Alice could get an electric wheelchair.
Bob could take public transit / Ubers up, or get rides from their friends.
Charlie could take up running with friends.
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
Here's an analogy that might make it clearer: Alice is in a wheelchair. Bob has a broken leg. Charlie is unfit, but otherwise a healthy adult. Alice, Bob, and Charlie would all say "I find getting up the hills of San Francisco difficult". But "doesn't everyone find that hard" conflates the causes and severity of the difficulty for the three of them in a way that isn't useful for making their complaints feel heard, or…
Right. But then when someone says "I see the symptom of broken legs everywhere now. When the blog author said they had trouble getting up the hills of San Francisco, I just knew they must have an undiagnosed broken leg", it's fair to be more than a little skeptical.
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#528I like the overall idea and glad it helped. OP, how do you feel about the waste produced by this? I would personally feel guilty to a good extent—curious to know how that goes for you.
Same here. Going through dozens of post-its feels super wasteful. Even more so the dozens of thermal printers that will be ordered as a result of this post, and might end up gathering dust on someone's attic in two weeks.
Ultimately there's going to be a lot of repetition. Many of these tasks are going to be the same. I'm wondering if there's a variant of this system that involves reusable kanban tickets.
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#529I was diagnosed with ADHD at 38, and never expected to hear that diagnosis. Main reason was my misunderstanding of what ADHD is. Like most people, I just naively associated ADHD with hyperactive kids, and thought I was just lazy and having procrastination issues. Now that I understand it so much better, I start to recognise it everywhere. After reading first paragraph of the article, I immediately though: Laurie must…
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
Advice for ADHD people helps everyone in the same way that any accessibility improvement commonly helps everyone.
Re: A receipt printer cured my procrastination
#530Earlier quoted context omitted.
Genuine question: isn't this everyone? Don't we all find large tasks hard to start and so we procrastinate? Isn't it common general advice for all people to break things down into smaller steps so you can get going
With mental illnesses there is no clear limit between normal and sick. However there is a point when it's really hurting the person afflicted. For example procrastination: everyone procrastinate more or less, but in people with ADHD, procrastination happens even when they actively don't want to procrastinate, and even when it hurts them right now to procrastinate. Another example : depression. It's not easy from an e…
I don’t think you understand depression. There’s a big difference between depression and sadness … like the difference between purple and green. They are just not comparable. This is not shades of a different color.
My personal experience is: “I’m sad” and that can mean… “I want to cry”
But If im depressed can be like “I’m happy.., and yet.. I don’t see the point of living.”