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Marta Rose's avatar

Wonderful essay Devon, and thanks so much for the shoutout. As an autistic ADHDer (AuDHD as the kids have so cleverly named it), who is also extremely introverted to the point of nearly (and mostly happily) being a hermit, I *still* need social support and external motivation—I have found for me that virtual body doubling, with a check-in and check-out at the beginning and end, is a perfect balance. We call this “Studio Time” in DDS and have multiple sessions every week.

I also recently did a set of workshops in DDS about so-called “executive functioning” skills, noting, as you have, that they are really only compulsory for people with less power in a relationship — I’m expected to be on time, but my doctor, for whom I wait sometimes hours in a nightmare of a waiting room, is not. Also, anyone who can hire someone to do their executive functioning for them, or better yet get it done free by a spouse or family member (usually a wife or mother), isn’t required to have these “skills” and can be freed up to go make art or design things in non-linear, iterative ways. In the second in that series of workshops, which I called “Enchantment Functioning Skills,” I proposed that when many of those tasks of daily living are shared and valued and can be done without rush, there can be real ritual and community and enchantment in many of them—if you look at monastic life, for example, there is a slow, steady, unrushed rhythm of daily chores and daily prayer, all performed to a set schedule and done in community. It’s actually possible to find folding the laundry a meditative practice when you aren’t already late to a job you hate but can’t survive without.

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bindweed's avatar

Thank you for finally explaining this social motivation thing clearly! I'm an AuDHDer with chronic catatonia/autistic inertia, and the most useful insights I've gained about how to make my life actually *work* have been related to harnessing that social motivation and just... largely giving up on trying to be self-motivated in isolation. It doesn't work.

It took a long time for me to figure out though since I'm a habitual loner due to childhood emotional neglect + sensory and social overload have often caused me to shut down in "social" settings that are too loud or have too many (especially unfamiliar) people. So it's still a really difficult path to seek out the right level of companionship and stimulation to keep me capable of moving and initiating action, but at least it's a path that *will work* vs ineffective solutions like meds, individualistic self-help strategies for executive function, or self-blame and shame.

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