Can't Express How Stress Free Being Open Minded Is.

Can't express how stress free being open minded is.

Some lesbians use he/him? Oh cool.

Some people have people inside their head and sometimes it's fictional chars? Sick your brains like a pirate ship they're all working to run.

Some people like being treated like a pet dog? Bark bark bro.

Being fat isn't unhealthy but a perfectly normal type of body to have? Kinda beautiful how different we can all be.

Something doesn't make any fucking sense? Cool an opportunity to learn. And even if I can't figure it out it's cool we still have mysteries today.

You're just a mammal. Let yourself act like it. Your brain needs enrichment. Your body needs rest. You feel hunger and grow hair. You need to pack bond with other sentient things so you don't become unsocialized and neurotic. You are biologically inclined to seek dopamine and become sick when chronically stressed. "Hedonism" is made up to place moral value on taking pleasure in sensory experiences. I am telling you that if you don't let yourself be a fucking mammal, as you were made, you will suffer and go insane. No grindset no diets no trying to be above your drive for connection. Pursue what makes you feel good and practice radial rejection of the constructs meant to turn you into a machine. You're a mammal.

Cartoons messed people up on what rabies looks like. Ppl think of a rabid animal and assume it's always snarling and frothing at the mouth and ready to attack. Rabid animals can appear really friendly because they lose human fear and they might approach you supposedly looking for food. It might look like a deer stumbling in circles and limping and falling over as if it's injured and disoriented. Might looks like a fox repeatedly trying and failing to stumble to its feet and unable to pick its head up. Their brains are melting. They might seem angry but they might also seem confused or injured or in need. But if you try to help that injured crying fox you could end up getting bit by an animal that's basically already dead and then your brain will melt too

i know vitamin c basically neutralizes adhd meds but lemonade good

An Introvert's Unconventional Guide to Friendship 👯‍♀️☺️👬

i've been making a conscious effort to lately to develop my relationships with friends, new and old (you can read more about my progress here under the relationships section), so i wanted to share some things i've realized through that process in the hope that it helps you debunk some myths and reconsider some assumptions you may also have as an introvert navigating your social life ☺️

💌: please feel free to also share any tips or hacks in the tags/reblogs/etc.! i would love some help too 😅

Don't just wait for extroverts to adopt you 🥺🐶

this used to be my primary strategy for making friends, especially in school. but you know how cher in clueless “adopts” tai for her own selfish reasons and essentially turns her into someone she's not? yeah, you put yourself at risk for that when you rely on others to extend to you their “friendship,” whatever that means for them, instead of advocating for yourself and seeking out the friends you genuinely enjoy being around.

but what does this mean in practice?

🤧 don't be allergic to sitting / standing / doing pretty much anything by yourself — similar to how one of the most effective conversation tips is to be comfortable with silence. if you wouldn't rush to fill every gap in the conversation, don't rush to surround yourself with “friends” because the wrong ones can do you more harm than good.

👁️ case the joint — now that we've settled in by ourselves, take time to observe your peers. you might not always know what you're looking for in a friend, so keep an open mind. basically, if they seem to be respectful, kind, and have personal integrity — you know, the basics — don't hesitate to introduce yourself! and remember, if they treat you badly, remember that says everything about them and absolutely nothing about you! don't give them the satisfaction of ruining your day!

💞 share your interests — or whatever is most important to you. if you're looking for a true kindred spirit, then you need to put yourself out there! sometimes people just have different interests and that's okay, but often it's easier than you may think to find common ground. and you don't need to have everything in common with someone in order to be good friends! i have a friend with whom i share nothing in common with, but we stay curious about each other's interests and continue to share them with each other, and in doing so, we still maintain a strong bond 💓

to be clear, i'm not saying extroverts don't make good friends for introverts!! if they have good intentions, then i personally definitely willingly let myself be adopted 😂 but it's no longer my only or even my best option for making friends!

There is more than one way to be a good friend 😌🤗

i literally had an anxiety attack one night because i was worried a friend i had talked to earlier that day might think i was a bad friend because she always sends me recommendations for stuff i've expressed interest in and i felt like i couldn't reciprocate because the venn diagram of her interests and mine is like a small circle that's mostly inside of a big circle and i'm the small circle, so while she has a lot to recommend to me, if i tell her about something, she probably already knows about it 😭

but then i remembered something we talked about, how there are different love languages and even within a single love language like acts of service for example, there are different ways to show it! my friend's act of service is to be a good listener and remember small details about her friends, while i'm more of a literal acts of service person sometimes, so i will cook for you and help you clean up 😂

some unconventional ways to be a good friend:

😈 pranks / teasing (if you have that kind of relationship)

🤡 willing to embarrass yourself like you're in a slapstick comedy to make them laugh

🔒 confide in them about your struggles / concerns (you are not a burden and the right people will feel privileged to have your trust)

🦦 spam them with pictures and videos cute animals

so, i'm probably not a perfect friend (i literally admire my friend so much for remembering the little things and i want to practice so i can become that way too), but i don't think i'm a bad friend anymore 🥰

Meet people on your own terms 📱💻🍜☕

during the pandemic, i got in touch with my (slightly) extroverted side for the first time in my life because i was finally able to stop overthinking about posture, body language, whether my outfit is still set the way i want it to be, etc.

and instead of needing to approach people in a physical space that may be crowded, noisy, or where they may have someone (or multiple people 🙈) already talking to them, i could take the time to craft a message to send 😌

i also learned that i really enjoy meeting people one on one vs. in a group setting, at least at first. and i learned from watching myself in zoom meetings how to emote better through my facial expression and body language when words fail me or to enhance what i say!

essentially, i learned to meet people on my own terms and that translates to meeting people offline as well! i like meeting up with people to eat or drink because if all else fails, we can talk about the food, the ambience, other meals we've had or restaurants we like. food is just such a good gateway to so many topics, from childhood to travel!

also, whether you're the kind of introvert who talks to your friends once a week or once a month (or once a year 💀) and then takes the rest of the time to recharge your energy, remember that it's quality rather than quantity and that it actually gets easier to slowly build your way up to more frequent interactions as you get more comfortable with each other!

🍋: i've always been known as shy and quiet. growing up in my culture, those were actually celebrated traits for a young girl, so i clung those parts of my personality for a long time. today, i'm still an introvert, but i'm not always quiet, and while i might sometimes feel shy, it is no longer something i am. hope these thoughts help you too, not necessarily to change your introversion, but to be a more balanced version of yourself with lots of friends who appreciate you for who you are 🤗

The biggest thing I've learned to help manage my ADHD in regards to getting things done is to Follow Those Impulses

(I'm not saying this will work for or is even a good strategy for everyone, but in my own situation it's helped me.)

I'm like allergic to consistency in schedule and cannot enforce one on myself so all it leads to is self-loathing and failure. Trust me, I've been attempting to will-power, shame-fuel my way through it since I was a preteen (I'm currently almost 30.) It does not work for me.

Obviously medication can give me a huge leg up on stuff. But beyond a certain point my brain is simply not wired for long-term sustained consistency.

As in many of my issues, I've found that working with myself gets better results than fighting myself.

When I follow those sudden impulses of interest and motivation, I get things done.

To the outside, I look absolutely haphazard. I'll pause a show I'm watching mid-sentence, stand up, and go empty the dishwasher because my mood/brain/chemicals *ping*ed that it was suddenly do-able and not a huge overwhelming task. Or I'll be putting away laundry and that *ping* will go off and I'll spend three hours re-organizing my closet.

To a neurotypical, this looks like distracted and disorganized behavior.

To me, it's following the way my brain naturally works in order to accomplish tasks.

My ADHD manifests in that I experience very small and unsustainable windows of motivation and interest. So when I feel that window crack open, doing the Thing right then (when the situation enables me to) can mean the Thing actually happens. Even if it's not the thing I'm "supposed" to be doing.

With a neurotypical in that situation, they might be putting away clothes and think: "Oh, I should organize my closet. I have time this weekend, I'll do it then," finish putting away their clothes, and then organize the closet when they had free time that weekend.

I used to try to do things that way too. Because it was how I was taught that "responsible, real people" did it, and had "finish one thing before you start another" drilled into my head. But I'm literally not wired to work that way. And I've been working on undoing that internalized ableism of believing one way of doing things is better and I need to change to adhere to it. I don't and shouldn't be expected to to my own detriment.

For me with the closet example, the weekend would come and I would spend 5 hours screaming at myself to stop working on whatever did have my interest in order to go organize the closet. Sometimes I might ended up doing it. More often, I would not be able get myself to do it even after all that. I would just sit there, yelling at myself, hating myself despite my brain literally not having the chemicals to initiate the activity (let alone follow through) and nothing would get done. Not even the thing I wanted to focus on instead.

The only thing I did accomplish was hating myself for not being able to do "simple" things like other people (read: neurotypicals.)

This is basically how I spent the majority of my schooling; doing simple tasks felt like running in sand. And I internalized all the messages that told me it was my own fault I couldn't run as fast and in as straight a line as those running on pavement.

The past few years, I've been trying to follow impulses more. And its honestly been really helpful.

I get more done even if it isn't a "consistent" amount or I can't always count on having a specific thing done by a certain date.

But the big thing is that I spend less time hating myself for not doing what I "should" be and more time actually doing things when I have the motivation for them. More shit happens, I'm undoing some of that self-loathing.

tl;dr: My advice for fellow adult ADHD-ers is:

Try to learn what your natural rhythms are and, where possible, try leaning into them. Without judgement, try working with your natural tendencies rather than battling them at every moment. See how it feels, see what you accomplish (and not just in the capitalistic "productivity" way--spending 3 hours hyperfocusing on researching the history of wheat germ counts!) See how your brain and body feel.

Your brain is wired different, let yourself operate different.