Neurodiversity and inertia

What is inertia and what does it feel like?

Noun: a tendency to do nothing or to remain unchanged.

In Physics: ‘Inertia’ is the term for Newton’s first law of motion, which is the tendency of a body to stay in the same state of motion unless acted on by an external force.

A friend with ADHD/ASC was telling me the other day how they found it incredibly difficult to get started some days. They usually knew they had to do some work and what to do.... but found themselves stuck. They also found it exhausting being in this place.

Other terms associated with it interestingly with inertia in the dictionary are:

inactivity; dormancy; passivity; apathy; malaise; stagnation; dullness; sluggishness; lethargy; torpor; indolence; laziness; sloth; immobility.

Is inertia the big sibling of procrastination?

Your inertia can be seen from two viewpoints:

·     How I feel and act

·     How others perceive me.

What I may be feeling or (not) doing and what could be some of the reasons for this?

·     Executive functioning- What’s the plan and I don’t know where to start?

·     Motivation – Not sufficiently interested to do so.

·     Poor motor skills – Planning movements such as handwriting make it harder me to write down my ideas

·     Switching - I can't easily move from what I am doing to something else

·     Fear of failure – last time it didn’t go well

·     Anxiety – I don’t know if I can do it

·     Preference- I prefer to do what I am doing now

·     Depression – I am not motivated to do so

·     Distractible - Other things distract me from the ‘thing’ I am supposed to be doing

And.....

What do others think of me?

Repeated comments of 'just get started'.. and 'if only you were more organised' don't seem to be helpful.

When people make a comment like " just get started" as if it was easy it can drive self-esteem down further.

Other comments may be:

·     "They are just lazy, can’t be bothered, doesn’t want to even try

·     "They can do it but want to be spoon-fed every time"

·    " Once they get started, they are off and away.. if only they took the first step"

Is inertia associated with some neurodivergent traits?

Inertia has been associated with ADHD. It has been suggested to be associated with lower dopamine levels. Often the catalyst to ‘get going' comes from external pressures e.g., and also needing someone to help map out what needs to be done.

As Lewis Carroll said:

“If you don't know where you are going any road can take you there”

The trouble happens when you spend time going on the wrong route again and again!

Some people use the term ‘autistic inertia”

Buckle and colleagues recently published a study with adults on the autism spectrum about autistic inertia. They consider that “inertia overlaps with the concept of ‘monotropism’ (Murray et al., 2005), or the autistic tendency to focus narrowly and deeply on topics or objects of interest, which has both positive and negative aspects.” They go on to suggest that “Catatonia, a complex psychomotor syndrome, is typically envisaged as a lack of responsiveness to the environment (stupor) and freezing in awkward positions (posturing)” may present in different forms and may be part of the inertia picture.

Developmental Coordination Disorder (also known as Dyspraxia) is all about movement. I have personally seen the difficulties my children have had when it comes to the act of handwriting and the effort it takes to put pen on paper and make shapes others can read. The disappointment in their eyes when they see what is produced despite the ideas present.

As a younger child, my son would do a variety of avoidance tactics when homework was needing to be completed. These were often subconscious but included needing to go to the toilet ( again and again) or getting a drink for himself, or offering to make me a drink too.

As a teenager, we worked out a) have a chat about the work first and he would verbalize some great ideas b)he would then dictate his answers to me, and I would record them. This suddenly freed him up and you would see his real abilities shining.

But it was still difficult because he needed help with staging and ordering the responses. Once we had developed 'writing frames' his anxiety levels dropped.

The downside of this was it was still exhausting for him (and for me too, both as a parent and someone who finds this hard to do too!).

Seeing what is the first step

Executive functioning skills include the ability to flexibly start, stop and switch tasks. This may mean that breaking down a task into parts is incredibly difficult to do.

From my experience, many people can't even see the first step to get started.

Interestingly this was also described by others in Buckle and colleague’s paper.

Harriet describes in the paper:

“Too many different things need doing – can’t prioritize. Very easily overwhelmed by amount/number of things to do. […] Difficult to separate the ‘blob’ of ‘lots to do’ into small, potentially doable bits.”

Another comment from the paper from a man called Brian talks about the energy needed to make the action:

“I can’t unpick what I need to do, where to start or how to find the energy to get beyond the thinking about things… and then 3 h just goes out the window”.

What are the results of inertia?

·     Exhaustion

·     Anger

·     Frustration

·     Lowered self-esteem

·     Depression

·     Impact on relationships with others

·     Decreased productivity

What helps?

“Over every mountain, there is a path, although it may not be seen from the valley.”

said Theodore Roethke

My thoughts and experiences working with many, many children and adults are that sometimes you require some help with planning and creating the path and the steps to get there. This is scaffolding. You need a map reader to help plan the journey. A positive word can help to encourage action. A negative comment can drive you back into the depths of inertia.

It is hard sometimes also to get the car to change gears. Motivation and interest are the oil that allows this to happen otherwise they remain sticky. (Sorry about all the metaphors!).

If your mood is continuously low, then gaining some help from professionals may be important. Learning approaches like CBT and taking exercise may help. Addressing sleep disturbance if this is problematic can also help to increase energy levels.

There can be an assumption that lists, reminders, and alarms will be the answer but while this can help many people for some this can be another disappointing approach that may work some of the time but not always.

For some, the act of writing a list can be challenging. Where to start and how to prioritize is THE problem.

Lists can also spawn lists and end up being endless ‘to- do’ lists with no prioritization and add to the array of paperwork surrounding you. A spiral leading you back to inertia.

 So, what do you think and what are your experiences?

There is no one reason for the inertia. However, others can (mis) judge what they see and end not realizing the effort to stay still is huge and is nothing about laziness or sloth at all.

The blog author

Professor Amanda Kirby is CEO of Do-IT Solutions- a tech-for-good company that provides training for organizations about neurodiversity in education and the workplace. Do-IT has developed screening tools to measure the spiky profiles we are talking about.

She is one of the 20 UK LinkedIn Voices for 2020.

She is also co-author with Theo Smith of the recently published best-selling book Neurodiversity at Work, Drive, Innovation, performance, and productivity in a neurodiverse workforce.