Can you structure yourself?

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what I mean by that is can you provide your own routine or do you rely on the routine of the workplace or school/college

I am unable to provide my own routine I don't know why, I feel that I am lazy but I know really its not that I just can't organise myself, I think its a sequencing issue. Anyone have similar issues?

Since leaving university this has become a big problem, currently not got a job either so I have fallen into this state of almost nothingness. its disturbing I don't feel like I am in reality

I have a structured routine that I wrote out with my parents.
I guess it is set up pretty much like with school or how it might be in a workplace.
If i let it slide like during vacation, nothing gets done.
Even stuff like brushing my teeth has to be done on schedule or it gets neglected.

perhaps I might try and write out a routine with my parents as well, I think that you need an organised environment to have an organised brain to do things.

Welcome to my world.
Well, sort of. I lack the motivation to structure myself, this might not be the case with you.
Sounds like you have severe adhd, but I don't really know.

I am thinking of doing that too. (Not with my parents, I am a bit too old for that, but there are other persons that can help me.)

As I wrote on another post, I am currently not well organized, but I am also quite anxious and sometimes depressed, and analysing the patterns of organisation and disorganisation in my past history clearly show that the more structure I can put into my life, the more things are achieved, and the less anxious and happier I am overall. I could not really acknowledge that until recently because I used to associate routine with things like boredom and dullness, probably because my parents are both followers of routine and rather dull persons. But I am starting to realize that having a frame means you are free to do whatever you want within it.

you seem very similar to myself, I get anxious as well as depressed, like you I was much better with a structure that comes from school or college. do you find your mood switches quite a bit, I have days of feeling really quite low then I switch back to my normal state of what I think it contentment.

Basically, yes I work in the same way. It is a bit the same mechanism as the depression cycle (you can't do anything, so you get worse and worse because you can't do anything) except now I can ususally do at least some things so I'm not actually depressed, and when I manage to do things I really like I feel good. (That's what makes me write that I am out of clinical depression, even if I still have depressive tendencies ; deep depression is horrible because even doing things you (usually) really like doesn't make things much better.) But I am only feeling really alive (and content) when I am working or achieving things that are of personal relevance to me. (Or at least when those things are globally making progress at the moment ; I can sometimes get obsessed by a topic or problem but I am not a 24/7 workaholic overall ^^)

About organization, to be fair it could also be the other way around : whenever I get depressed, my life loses structure. (I don't think you can keep much structure in your life when you are in depression, AS or not.) But the more I analyse it, the less likely that seems. There are several occurrences when my life started losing structure and I only got worse a few months later, probably as a result of continually living in a more unpredictable and stressful world.

I still have things I like the same but I don't really have routines these days. I prefer to do things as and when I feel like them as much as possible. Sleep is probably the one exception. I do like a regular bedtime. I like to work or do things when when I am feeling most inspired to do them.

Before school age, I was basically miserable because I was expected to train myself to do all of my self-care, but I couldn't. I never have and I never will be able to do it alone. After 26 years of life and more than 15 of those years only focusing on improving the self-care routine by myself, there's no denying it.

I am truly a miserable depressed anxious nervous wreck without a highly structured routine. I have even designed many routines that would be acceptable for me. My family has always been far too disruptive of a presence on my life for me to stick to any kind of routine, and I have asked everyone else if they would help me train, and they declined. I would need at least two weeks of uninterrupted routine in order to make it a habit, and any interruptions would have to be minor, and the people around me would have to help me stabilize from them.

That's why I'm considering moving to Seattle to get help. Hopefully I'll find someone who is willing to help me implement structure before I am forced to live on the streets like a bum. I do enjoy coping by eating pizza and kit-kat bars and playing The Sims 3 every day, but it's not healthy!

It depends. If I know what I'm doing or supposed to do, I can structure myself. If I am on a deadline and absolutely must get something done, I can structure myself. If I build a task into a routine, I can structure myself.

If I can't, then no, I can't structure myself. This is a problem in the ambiguous world that is the workplace. I either need to be able to do something I can obsess over and have full control over or need clear direction and expectations and deadlines. If I have neither—which is often the case—I won't get much of anything done.

Things become boring with too much structure. Either set routine or I'll just do the first thing according to my thought pattern, with an ideal mix of structure and freedom (disregarding unnecessary structure or what I don't understand to create my own rules). Both paths lead to the same result, usually my way is more effective for me but can also get me in trouble.

A great issue though, is a complete lack of structure (or not enough) in a group setting. Drives me f*****g crazy, very stressful, to where I'll try to create structure and if that fails I shut down (become indifferent/dispassionate). Mentally it feels like chaos, and I must detach to deal with it.

In terms of time management, I like to get things done as soon as possible. I like to leave for school the same time each day and show up 30 minutes early. My sleep schedule is erratic, I don't mind.

In terms of organization, I have always been moderately disorganized. It is helpful to be organized, heh. I actually enjoy organizing stuff (well... numbers and information).

I have that problem, too. When I finished high school and got into uni, it was a shock that I had to decide what to do, when to do it etc all by myself. That was when I realized I had this particular weakness. It's also to do with my pathological indecisiveness and OCD. I just keep trying to organize my short-term and long-term schedules in my head and on paper but I just keep going around and around and organizing itself becomes the major task and I cannot actually do anything else.

As other people here suggested, I think it helps a lot to have someone else to go through the process of structuring your plan/schedule/routine. Other people could come up with ideas that didn't even cross your mind.

I have to have structure. I have two kids, I'm a PhD student, and I have a professional job. I've got too much that can fall apart in a heartbeat if I miss something. I've got a to-do list app on my phone, and a time-keeping app on my computer for scholarly stuff (Pomodoro, for anyone else who has to write papers).

The downside is, I do not do well if my routine is disturbed. I've got it in my head that we need to be out the door at 7:10AM. If it's 7:12AM and one of the kids is still getting in the car, I get anxious. It's silly and completely unnecessary, but it happens.

I don't really have a structured schedule unless I'm working.

Structuring my own life has proved very difficult now that I am not in school and do not have a sort of semi-imposed structure on myself. I do try and create routines myself and fail miserably with all of the open time (even with work and family etc.). I am still trying to work on that.

I do like to daydream that I have a sort of personal assistant/coach who tells me what to do when and how. That's wierd.

you sound exactly like me, I never thought I would miss school as much as I do, it gets frustrating trying to structure myself and having trouble doing so.

I don't think daydreaming that is weird, I spend a lot of the day daydreaming about things