Published on 12, July, 2020
Like most ASDs I am incredibly focussed on the things I am interested in.
But the mundane (and important) day to day things like paying bills, time sheets, household admin, insuring the car, writing reports, shopping etc, I have less than no interest in and I live a life of procrastination, waiting until it is critical before giving it any attention. This literally ensures panic and anxiety rule much of my interaction with the world.
This is where the "Super focussed autistic" label is misleading, because we are super disinterested in anything we are not interested in. Which is the majority of life.
In an attempt to get on top of these critical chores I write to-do list after to-do list - I enjoy writing out clear, prioritised lists - but it’s impossible to prioritise boring task 1 from boring task 2, or 300, so I still don’t actually do any of these mind numbing chores, and I just end up with lots of really long lists that frustrate me because they are:
a) endless and
b) no one crap task is any more important than any other crap task!
Does anyone have any success in organising or motivating yourself to do the crap you don’t want to do and staying on top of the endless train of uninteresting $h!t that is critical to conducting the everyday business of life?
Any advice is welcome…just don’t reply in the form of a to-do list…unless it’s well prioritised.
I am just the same as you Seanado. I would love to hear advice on doing the things I don't want to more. Looking after myself and my own house is what I neglect. I will spend hours every night reading about quantum physics and not clean or look at bills for weeks or months.
In terms of bills automating things was the best thing I could do, so I very carefully have everything set up to be paid on certain days automatically and it all manages itself - when it was up to me to do it the ball got dropped repeatedly.
Sadly there is no way for my house to just clean itself, so I have been trying to make a particular time on a particular day when something has to get done and make it a habit. For example, I will always clean the shower on Saturday after lunch, and so far I have managed to keep it not covered in mould or bacteria for a few months. But there is still a lot more that I am neglecting.