Is procrastination an AS trait?

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AFAIK the problem is in the executive function of the brain?

We need to be told specifically what exactly (details!) is expected of us to create. We often need very precise requirements. If we don't know we can not start, we need to figure out what is required first. So we wait, until we are told or more often, when we see what some one else did. Only then can we start....

So long we don't know the exact requirements we can not think of anything smaller then almost the whole universe. We are overwhelmed by the solution space: too many options to choose from. So we don't know where to start, what to do next, we can not organise or schedule anything. And because our executive function is limited we can not choose, so we wait until the solution space becomes more limited.

A large part of this is also that we communicate more directly/literally.

So it looks just like procrastination, but in reality is just that we need more and different instructions to get to work.

I've always procrastinated but not in the "put off today what you can to tomorrow" sense of the word. Sometimes before I do something, even if it's something that I really enjoy doing, I will have to first spend a frustratingly long time trying to talk myself into getting under way.

Yes, that's true. And though NTs may procrastinate too, the aspie procrastination / inertia / executive dysfunction isn't the same. It's more than just the common kind.
Though NTs use to tell me that "everybody do that". Well, no, not everyone uses 2½ year writing a 30 pages long paper, you see??
I am executively dysfunctional too. Big time.

Has anyone seen Ellen DeGeneres' stand up special "Here and Now"? Well, her line at the end is "Procrastinate now, don't put it off." Words to live by.

I discovered that when explaining AS to someone it's often helpful to compare the brain or mind to a huge corporation. In a corporation every department has its function and depending on a lot of factors some departments are better in this corporation and others in other corporations.

The problem which people which AS have is mostly that their corporation has dysfunctional management[1]. So, while the PR* department is capable, it never is used effectively[2]. While the R&D* department is brilliant it's talents are often wasted on useless endeavours which, once started are never halted and often not even managed[3]. Anything needing co-ordinated activity of multiple departments will never get of the ground and you can forget about any interdepartmental communication[4].

[1]: executive dysfunction
[2]: communication with other people
[3]: Obsessions, mostly intellectual.
[4]: "He! I'm bleeding... When did I cut myself?"

* just some examples, there is a natural variation among all people.

While reading this, I felt as if someone had taken this all straight from out of my head, this is exactly what happens to me, and how I feel.

Here's another example of mine... this one makes me feel ret*d in many ways...

I've mentioned before that four years ago I lost both of my parents and my oldest brother... 2 years later, I lost my brother who was four years older than me. My oldest brother's services, and life were taken care of by his wife. My name is on the death certificates of my Mom, my Dad, and my other brother ....meaning, I arranged funeral services (with a LOT of help from well meaning people I might add), I was also suposed to set up estate accounts for each of them to settle their debts. To make a long story short, I got LOST in the whole process, and to this day I still haven't opened the appropriate accounts, or even filed their last year of taxes. My brother still has no headstone (trust me, if there were any kind of inheritence, he'd surely have one) and creditors call every single day, over a phone bill my dad owed. I feel like I'd be able to get all of these things done, if I had someone to walk me through each step, literally. I don't have a diagnosis, and for whatever reason have put it off and off too, so it feels like I have no legit way t explain why things haven't been taken care of, even our in home family counsellor months back responded with "Yeah ...I'm not really sure what you would have to do in those situations (she's young, new in her work, and with no diagnosis on my end, I could see how she might not truly understand how difficult these things are for me. Or perhaps she thought I was likely 'depressed' and just needed time.). I need help and don't even know how to begin getting it. So instead, I don't answer the phone to the creditors, because I simply don't know what to tell them. And it gets put on the back burner....

yet, it weighs on me everyday knowing there are so many things that need taking care of, and also knowing I don't have what it takes to get it done. Very frustrating.

I agree with Meta too.

Also, I'm a person who needs routine. I found it difficult to sit down and write for ages until I made it into a routine. So, now in the afternoons after a coffee I will site down and write. Drinking coffee in the afternoon has now unknowingly become part of my routine.

Definitely everyone procrastinates. But I also agree that Aspies/NLDers also have executive functioning issues that exacerbate the problem. Do NTs tend to procrastinate on things they really *want* to do also? Because I do that all the time, simply because of inertia. I might really want to do something (like go for a bike ride, or go watch a movie), but I just seem to get stuck and can't manage it.

But you said in the topic that you made recently that you have similar problems with doing things that you want to do. This suggests that there's something more than just laziness going on.



Me too. It's like I forget how much I enjoy certain things, and I have to talk myself into doing them.

I am a real bad procrastinator. Some of the reasons why I procrastinate are to avoid something that takes too much mental effort (ADD thing), I have trouble switching routines, poor time management, and a lot of times, because I don't have much energy to do these things.

I am supposed to be writing my major paper for my summer course right now. I'll do it in a couple hours.............................

I don't think my problem is so much procrastination, but unorganization that leads to it. I have a lot of difficulty putting tasks in any sort of order if I am not interested in them, or if I look at the house and say "wow, it's a mess... I need to clean it". I start looking around, and my list gets so incredibly long, and I want it in order of importance, that I spend a whole day (the day I'm motivated to clean), making the list and getting it perfect. Then by the next day, I don't feel like doing it anymore, or need to reorganize my list.

I used to have a technique that worked really well. I taped index cards of what needed to be done in the rooms, by everything. For instance, a reminder that dishes need to be done right next to the sink. That way every time I looked at it, I'd finally get tired of looking at that one and do the dishes just so I could remove the index card... and that would get the ball rolling on my cleaning. I'd just do things to get the pesky index cards off of places that they didnt look like they needed to be at.

Reading this was like looking into a mirror! I never seem able to keep a task list short.....I just keep adding to it until it's so long that to put it all into order of importance would be in itself a very long task. I hardly ever get down to actually using the list. Usually I find it again months later, and I find I did a lot of the things on it without needing the list at all, and I wonder why I wasted my time writing it.

Shopping lists are something of an exception, I guess that's because they're so specific....also there's the time constraint (I never write it till Saturday morning, and I'm always anxious to get out there before the crowds build up, and I see Saturdays as my only window of time for shopping - that's a hangover from the days when the shops were closed outside normal working hours), and my powerful sense of frugality keeps it brief, because I limit what I spend and always want to carry it all home on the bicycle to save bus and taxi fares.



I love mnemonic devices I tend to leave a key item in the right place to jog my memory - e.g. if I want to make a phone call at lunchtime, I'll leave my list of phone numbers on my chair before I go to work. I pin notes to the front door to remind me to take this or that with me. Lots of simple jobs I have to just do the moment I think of them, like taking a loaf out of the freezer......it's annoying because I often have to interrupt what I'm doing to go and do that, but if I don't, I just forget all about it. Worst is when I'm in the bathroom and I realise I need to buy more toothpaste or soap - I'll do that maybe ten times before I manage to remember to write it on my wish list downstairs. Though that's not really procrastination, it's memory. I guess procrastination is when you're aware that a task needs doing but you don't do it in a timely manner.

Mine is procrastination to an extent. I do look at what needs to be done many times before actually doing it.... but it always looks like such a big job to me, it's intimidating, lol. If I don't have a list of what I need to do, I'll literally walk in circles for half the day trying to figure out where to start, what needs to be done, etc., and I'll finally give up on figuring it out and sit down and do nothing. I just get overwhelmed by it. The index cards at least helped, as it made it look like one job at a time, so it generally got done after a few times of looking at it.

I'm the same way about the smaller things that need to be done around the house. I've had my bathroom light out for... a week or so now, and every time I go to the store, I forget to get the bulbs to fix it. Today, since I just wrote about that, I think I'll be able to remember when I go to the store, lol... if not, it waits a few more days at least. I think I may get some more index cards while I'm at it...

I also see 2 component in not doing things or postponing:
a) not being part of a routine
and
b) being overwhelmed by the whole task

so I try to make routines at home and when I have an overwhelming task I try to split it in my mind and focus on subtasks.
another way of going further is to keep my self busy - how can I explain: I need to clean the house - I allow myself to jump from dishes to laundry as long I as keep busy cleaning and not sitting at PC

I don't say it always works, sometimes just sending an email at work seems overwhelming

I think "overwhelming" comes from the fact that my mind is running full speed in a backtracking algorithm to find the best solution

PS - let's not forget component c) - being really really lazy and/or tired at the moment