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So. I've got just enough ADD to have all the problems, symptoms, and opposite drug reactions (man, you shoulda seen me after that dental surgery....), and we'd seen signs waaay back when. I'd jump around in a conversation, leaping from one topic (like ketchup) to a completely, seemingly unrelated topic (like Transformers. Or vice-versa. )
In my own head, it's like 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon. There'll be a series of associations, logical leaps, whatever - that get me from A to Z by means of D, M and Q. But nobody else can follow, because they're missing some piece.
Anyway, Mum says to me; "Nick, you need to remember how you get from one topic to another, so you can tell people and take them along."
So I started watching my own mind, which, I'm damn certain, is critical.
Flash forward to a college summer. I'm teaching programming at idTech Camps. I'd take the students through the basics of code and Hello World, then give them a task. Wait a bit; for the inevitable confusions and questions to arise. I'd lean over, see a bit of code that didn't make sense, or an unusual way of doing something, and so I'd ask:
"Why did you write that?"
All to often, they'd just shrug. They did a thing, and they had no idea why.
The entire concept of not knowing why you did a thing that you just did boggles my mind. You might have a terrible reason, a silly reason, a dumb one - but you still had one. There was still a moment when you opted to do one thing, instead of another. When, in not knowing what to do, but still trying to do something, you settled on one course of action. And in that moment, you were thinking something.
It's that moment that's key. Learn to spot it, to pay attention to it. When you become aware enough of that moment, you can jump into it; change it.
PS - I don't really like this post, but I still wanna talk about this stuff, and I can't figure out what to change :P
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