Think Fast.... Think FASTER...

The book lay before me, wide open and receptive to my eyes. I was eager to learn (for once) because the subject was something I was interested in. But as I began to delve into the typefont---and I do mean typefont, as I never actually read the words and sentences--- I lost interest.

I was fully aware of all this happening as it occurred, and the more I thought about it, the more afraid I became. "Am I AADD?" (That's "Adult Attention Deficit Disorder" in case you didn't know) I guess I do show some tendencies of that, but... hm...

You see, on one hand my attention span appears to be shorter than in the past... Okay, put it like this: my attention span is short when I'm doing something that I feel is a waste of time. If a person needs me to listen to their problems and assist them in deriving a solution, then I can listen forever, and I'll still be totally focused on their well-being after they're long gone. That doesn't strike me as characteristic of AADD. But I admit, recently even my attention to others has dissipated a bit; whereas I used to feel sorry for everybody I'm now very quick to determine if a person is defeating himself or herself, and if it's habitual then I lose interest. Still... wouldn't that be considered a good thing? It's wisdom when one can recognize when it's time to let someone go, right?

Anyway, as I sat in the bookstore andjuggled the idea of me being an AADD case, I asked myself what I mostly find myself doing on a regular basis. Hmmm... "Writing long, cohesive blogs; playing complicated video games and making it look easy; writing, producing, performing, mixing, mastering my own music; studying martial arts trying to understand the metaphysics of the human body; walking through an empty house giving speeches about my take on things." But what's wrong with doing all that? (and yes, I talk to myself sometimes; and no, I'm not crazy. I voice my opinions sometimes to see if they sound right to meB-J)

When I was younger, I was SOOO much calmer. I used to meditate and center myself with ease. I've been trying to meditate for a few weeks now, and I've fallen asleep every time except once, and that's when I had some music playing. My mind is a constantly moving piece of biotechnology starving for activity. But what's the line between that and AADD?

Okay, okay; I have a million songs, a million beats, a million ideas that I've conjured, few of which I've actually completed. I know, that sounds AADDish, but here's the thing: I never forget about a single one of them. I chip away at each project day-by-day fully intent on finishing each of them in the fullness of time. Is it AADD if these things never actually leave my attention?

But then I started thinking agai... okay, let's face it: I NEVER stop thinking. Anyway, my mind wandered and I thought to myself, "I'm trying so hard to slow myself down and focus; but my mind only wants to absorb things as quickly as possible in order to put it to purposeful use. Something's funny about that..." Yes, being tranquil and meditative and focused has its place. However, it seems to me that I'm actually more "focused" than I'm allowing myself to believe.

Let's try something: let's throw the term AADD out completely and analyze...

My mind seems to want to go faster and faster, but I struggle against it because I'm not used to not being able to quiet my mind. But... I mean, look at what I just said that I do on a regular basis; it's a heap of things a lot of people WISH they could do. So, why should I slow down?

And most of the things I do, I do them with purpose. Just because I'm not moving slow doesn't necessarily mean I'm not focused; perhaps it just means my focus is extensive enough that it doesn't need to be slowly attained. Isn't that a gift?

I think back to my grade school experience. One of my gifts was that I saw all my subjects as relative to one another; it was all continuous and gaining knowledge in one subject automatically strengthened my understanding of another. So now that I'm an adult, why should I expect to be able to sit down and ingest large helpings of one subject at a time? I need a spectrum of subjects to allow me to think at full capacity.

Simply look at what I'm trying to accomplish musically and you can see it: I write, produce, perform, mix, and master my own music! Do you know how many processes that encompasses?! I have to engage my writing skills for lyrics, listening skills for production and mastering, mathematics for mixing, and speaking skills for performance. How would slowing down and singling out my thinking processes help me maintain that?

Then I did even more thinking. Perhaps I'm going about all this in the wrong way; perhaps the answer is not to slow down, but to accept full speed. Perhaps the reason I'm so tired and frustrated is because I keep fighting to slow myself down when my mind is capable of so much more. It's like doing the speed limit on an autobahn in Germany; kinda defeats the purpose.

And perhaps that's why it's so difficult to achieve my purpose; because I'm not allowing my mind to fully blossom. The solution: think faster. After all, nobody's gonna pull me over, right? Nobody but myself.(<----I think I wanna get that tattooed: "Nobody But Myself". Matter of fact...)

Nobody But Myself B-J