prepare to come about.....HARD TO LEE!!!
If you do not sail or have never been on a sail boat....you probably wouldn't have a clue to what this means? Even if you had a vague idea, it still probably wouldn't register until it was too late before being hit on the head and flung into the water with the jib sheet wrapped around your neck. Or, if you were lucky, you might have grabbed a spinnaker fair lead , stanchion guy wire or boom vang before going over the gunwale and overboard. That is unless you grabbed a lee shroud or are standing forward the mast which in that case, you'd have nothing to worry about anyway. That's assuming you weren't flying a spinnaker or running wing on wing of course...which as everyone knows is a completely different story. Technically speaking when running down wind under any sail configuration....you aren't actually changing tack when setting a new course. Still clueless? Of course you are because without a klew, you wouldn't be sailing in the first place since you have to have a klew to have a sail. Everyone knows that !!
These are all concrete terms for parts of a sailboat. Don't ask me where they came up with these names but it is a completely different language. Still, once you know them you will pretty much know where all the parts are on any sailboat no matter where you go or what boat you are on. To the point? So everyone is talking the same language so there is no confusion ever.
I just discovered why ADHD'ers have so much trouble communicating in a concrete way of thinking....because we are concrete thinking challenged and think and speak in abstracts predominately and have a very hard time being concrete at all times!! This is where I discovered communicating with my wife gets so difficult. She is definitely a concrete thinker and I appear to have be almost completely incapacitated when required to think and speak at the same time and be concrete.
However..if I am on a sailboat I do just fine even though everything about sailing is concrete and there is nothing abstract in the language or the terms and what they mean. The conclusion here for people with ADHD.....we need to be concrete when we talk to people unless we don't want them to understand what we are saying. This might be wishful thinking,... but does anyone know how to become better at thinking concretely?
There appears to be plenty of information and learning tools on how to think more abstractly, but very little info on how to be become better at thinking concretely ? ( the other way around of course which without asking...I already can guess the answer lol )
J
Thinking Outside the Box....
Submitted by kellyj on
I also discovered along with abstractions a sort of revelation. From our point of view, we're already in the box so to speak. Our box is abstract thinking and speaking. The only reason I'm saying this is to remind myself that most people see this the other way around! ha ha I think for anyone with ADHD, this might be a good place to start in our thinking for the future. This is one place that we really need to accept that this is our challenge not everyone else's. When in Rome right? oops There I go again:) Of course if we know what we want to say, it's not a problem. Speaking to your spouse about your feelings in the moment is hard to do if the moment strikes and you need to say something that is on your mind and can find the words.
It would be really helpful to get some input from the other side for suggestions here....along with my previous thoughts about being more concrete and direct?
Abstract vs concrete....It depends....
Submitted by c ur self on
When I try to relate to my wife with abstract philosophical generalizations concerning life issues like marriage, Job requirements, child rearing, etc....She most always takes it as if I was directing it toward her personally....
I guess it's harder for some people (add or not) to engage in open ended conversation where only thought patterns are discussed....Especially if some of the subject matter is relative to painful areas of one's not so resent past....
It's kind of like burying your 20 year old dog on Monday...And asking her if she wants a new puppy on Tuesday....Sometimes our ability to think abstractly can have a few concrete limitations:)
I should remember this*
I Think in Part This is a Gener Difference Too...
Submitted by kellyj on
I was at the hardware store today and over heard a conversation of a couple discussing a home improvement project and picking out the materials.....she said...." I like that color and started to walk away ( not from disinterest ) and I overheard the man saying..."wait honey, there's more involved than just that"...as I walked away and heard him launch into the entire game plan/process and smiled thinking...."this sounds so familiar." So many times, I think it's a difficult balance between being patient and not sounding condescending or acting dismissive at the same time. Also a good reminder for me:)
J
That's right J Patients is nice...
Submitted by c ur self on
My wife told me the other day when I reply to her and my lead in begins with...But the thing is....(LOL where have I heard this lately??)....She feels like I have just dismissed every thing she was saying with that statement...Ouch!....I might as well get me another good reminder out here:)
Thing Is C
Submitted by kellyj on
I lost my train of thought:)
J
The hopelessness of my efforts....
Submitted by c ur self on
J...Have you ever just set back and watched, listened and studied people? I'm coming to realize just how hard people work ( Me included, definitely me!) to be right. I've noticed a pattern in my own life, the more I seek to daily live a life of self-awareness....One ultimately where I'm at rest living with-in my own convictions. The more I see, the more I see a longing in me to measure things and people by my view and understanding of the subject matter...(maybe as children we're taught to do this) No matter if it's baseball, hunting or just the daily living of life....This last one is the monster that haunts me....We human's really have to resist the place's our minds seek to roam, and on the other hand....Force them to roam in the places they fear or resist...For me, this effort at acceptance has been a bitter pill, but, it has been fruitful in all of my relationships, especially, my marriage relationship...So daily acceptance vs. expectations must continue to be a focal point, or I will just find myself placing expectations because of my dogged determination to be right.
Because I'm fleshly, it is so easy to jump back on the merry-go-round of living life with-in the Illusion that I'm right....What is right short for....Righteous:( Yep! we all want to be the righteous one or is just me fighting this fight:) ??
I do pray for acceptance and peace for you and your wife's relationship....Sometimes we have a two-fold disease working against our relationship's...Our desire to be right and our fear. There are many realities with-in each of our minds....And one of them is our true feelings concerning our spouses....Based on the many comments on this forum, to go along with my own experiences, I would say this following statement covers it for many of us.....
"Many of us abhor the way our spouse lives life a huge percentage of the time...we experience the fall-out of their lack of responsible effort. Their intrusive nature becomes very tiring...We love them, and are committed to them, but feel taken advantage of much of the time...This forces those who choose to be faithful and committed into a life no one would ever choose. A miserable, lonely existence filled w/ unavoidable challenges is our realities"
The true hell for me though hasn't come because the Horse is Black....No, the true hells I've been suffering has been coming by my own hands, in my futile efforts to force the black horse to be White....
So if I swallow the bitter pill of acceptance each day, knowing, I'm just as repulsive in my own depraved ways....Then I can find peace in just trying to deal with all the danger I see in the mirror...
On the Contrary C..You've Helped Me Tremendously
Submitted by kellyj on
with my wife and everyone I know including yourself in connecting on a much deeper level. Let me share my thoughts and what I believe (not my believe system) and what I own, and already know and believe in myself.
Enlightenment. Where knowing, understanding and self join together as one..... Join...... not coexists as separate entities. To be separate...is not to be one with. One existing as part within the greater whole. Not part of, but to become a part within. Not separate but connected on a spiritual level that transcends physical form. When this happens faith is no longer needed because you know it to be true. Believing becomes understanding. Meaning becomes self, and self becomes meaningless because it does not exist anymore in that level of consciousness when self dissolves and you become spirit and join with everything as one. There is no wanting or need for anything. Desire disappears and there is no need for anything more. You have everything you need already and are at peace within. Completely with no need for support from anything outside or yourself in the physical sense but on a deeper spiritual one that comes when you experience this connection. it's not a belief or faith becomes that is replaced with knowing....not knowledge....knowing. To have this peace is to know without question.
I had this experience. I own it and nothing can change this. It is a memory but it transcends that only in that I have to keep it in mind but it's not something that can be lost.
These are my own words and I didn't get this from reading something. It was an experience that I own that is as real as putting your hand on a burning stove. You know it without question. Faith is no longer needed to believe this is true because when it happens....it's your forever...no one can take it from you but......it's good to remind yourself of this on occasion to keep it fresh...not in your mind...but to keep connecting to the experience. You do forget to sometimes that is true...but the path is already there like a paved road in stone and the destination you have been there before so you know that too....you just need to go visit it from time to time like going on vacation to the beach once in a while to "reset your jets"! :) Same thing.
I could on in lengthy detail of how this happened but that would only be to verify or validate it for you in for your need to understand. I ask that you just believe this is true for me and accept that much. Is this unusual?......oh yes.....the how and why is a great story but again would only be for your understanding...trust that I know this without question because I don't question it....it happened:)
So....at the end of everything that you said....So if I swallow the bitter pill of acceptance each day, knowing, I'm just as repulsive in my own depraved ways....Then I can find peace in just trying to deal with all the danger I see in the mirror...
In the kindest and respectful way I can say this to you now for your own understanding of me......there is no bitter pill to swallow for me. Acceptance is easy if I just access the memory of the experience to use this as my navigation system (not a belief system) Acceptance that I experienced already that I can use as a means to guide me everyday.....(or take the occasional trip to the beach to refresh this memory and experience in my mind).
I can't make you believe this. I can't explain it to you or tell you how to get there.....only to say, I have been there and know it. Before this happened to me I was without this experience and just a guy who was suffering a lot! A lot of suffering for sure. Bitter pill of acceptance? OMG yes!! Everything was bitter..my life was bitter and I was looking for anything to take that taste out of my mouth on a physical level....that is very much a fact of my life in the past. But I still needed to heal from the past and that's the journey I'm still on...healing. And that's what I've been doing ever since.
What I did here on the forum with you was to connect my experience to my Christian up bringing in a way that suddenly I realized the true meaning of the spirit within. I had the meaning and understanding already from my experience and now I have a written guide that gives the tools and reminders to guide me better and use it as yet another way to return to my experience. How cool is that!! I don't have to believe the word....I know it's true. I'm not struggling to get there...I've been there already but reconnected to the incomplete meaning and message I had learned from my past. I don't understand it's true....I know that it is.
C...you were instrumental in helping connect this kind of knowing from my experience in a way that speaks to me now when it didn't before. I have both to work from now but in the sense that I'm saying.....I don't need to get there. Spiritually saying...if you have this kind of knowing from having your Christian faith....then you and I are on the same page.
My guess.....not getting there in this way myself......what I experienced would be the same experience as someone who is "born again" or has a "born again" experience and getting their through faith (Christian Faith). Since I didn't get using that path...I'm more than sure that it's the same thing only in the descriptions of others and the overwhelming "peace" and "joy" that comes from it as I felt could be a different thing....adding all the things I said above as a cross reference.
Were your efforts (which appear obvious to me) for me to share with you the same thing that you share? Yes! The Thing is.....we share it if this is true. Did your effort to connect me with my Christian upbringing that I had dismissed earliest in life help do this for me. Yes...without question. Did your efforts to help me connect to the word and message of Jesus and God in a way that I can now explain and connect to the same as you? Yes...you helped to that too. I have never not believed Jesus and have always believed in his words...always have. No problem there. His words are truth. So are all the meanings and messages in the bible. My experience tells me they are. I believe this without question. I can't tell you how I know this but I heard these words spoken within from my time here and that just happened.....I heard it from within because it was there already. It took me a while because I wasn't noticing it at first until it clicked and then it was easy....already knew the source but just needed to refresh my memory to now connect to it in a way I wasn't before.
Did I have a born again experience. No. I already had mine in that sense and was already there. I don't need the answer. And the detail or facts of the stories (the parables) are all that I need. The deeper meaning and connection is now what I can access the same as my trip to the beach analogy. You mentioned this earlier in a reference and I new exactly what you were saying even then.
And the reason I'm saying all this to you is based on my own personal experience especially pertaining to my sisters now. I've actually begun to say these same things to her because she believes in her heart of hearts that I don't understand and need to understand it from her perspective. Her perspective tells her the only way to get there is exactly the same as she did so therefor....I am not there either. Which isn't true. In essence....she keeps selling instead of connecting with me and not believing that I already am there.
Can you imagine how annoying it would be if you just bought a new car that day that you already own, and drive into a car dealership sitting in the exact car that's sitting new on the lot....and having a car salesman keep hammering on you to buy the same car that you are sitting in and telling you how much better his is than the one you just bought? It would be extremely frustrating and annoying (car salespeople have a tendency to be a little pushy and annoying anyway lol ) That is what trying to connect to my sister is like and she simply tunes out anything I say and keeps trying to sell me. That is the completely frustrating and annoying relationship I have with her and it keeps us from connecting...But, now I can connect with here using the language and means that she understands and that is fine with me too. Either way...it's all the same to me even if it isn't for her. That's Okay too.
My wife on the other hand is a different story....she doesn't believe of have any system to believe in. You and I connect in the same. In order for her to have this understanding, she would need to come to the same place where I am. I've made references to the things I'm doing based on your understandings based on the same premise with you...so you can hear me and know we are on the same page. If I hear you now....I can see the dilemma with my wife and she needs something as you are saying to get her there...possibly? That's what I see too. How to get her there now for me will take a lot of learning....learning because spreading the word has not been something I've done. I don't see her responding well or being open to this from the things she's said. I see my ability to access her and connect with her will take a different approach with the same message being said. if I hear you right? This is what you are saying? If we're on the same page and forgetting my references here for your benefit....this is the deeper connection I must find with her and I agree. She is without this herself and she can't see the light (so to speak) she doesn't have the access or ability that I have and I can see directly to the source....that is what's missing. Straight to the point. It was my experience here the other day that told me that too. But a lifetime of patience will not get her there nor....seeing my ability to get her there either? What's to do? Yes...I can set examples and speak in parables or wisdom to her but I have to say frankly....I'm not the one to do this and it won't work. In time with patience? Questionable. Therapy is a beginning for her...but I went into therapy with my experience already in place as my foundation. This was instrumental in my ability to use it and weigh the things I was learning on my own without my therapist help. I don't see this as the case with my wife. She needs spiritual guidance even more than therapy in less words.
Should I leave her and give up? No. I'm committed to the deeper meaning of life and a relationship. What came out of what happened to us yesterday did produce something that I remembered from a past experience and something she said...in a moment of fear and anger she blurted out "I have abandonment issues" in her words. I realized myself before my experience....alone, fearful, searching for something to fill me, empty, suffering, pain and hopelessness. She believes that I can ( or someone or something) can provide this for her as I believed in my past which is impossible. I can't get her there in the way I did this but there are other options. Her spirit is dying and I can't help her myself....supportive yes...but I am not the answer for her in anyway in what she needs.
If in what you were saying were your efforts....free your mind in that. My hopelessness efforts?(or in a spiritual way?)........I need to find a better way but first I need to establish some boundaries and yesterday was a warning shot over her bow. Sometimes people need a wake up call just to get their attention. That was all I did and in that much....I did get her to listen. Patience is golden but it's not the key. I also shared my connection to her fears and the abandonment statement she made in the past in a way to speak directly to the source as I see it, once she was listening to me. She left this morning in better spirits after we talked. Repeating I love her despite her reaction is going to be my main course of action and showing it to her as much as possible. The abandonment memory I think was really key. Go right to the source and ask the horse in this case. ha ha
Unfortunately....I am no spiritual Guru but, I do have the experience itself. I can see many paths in getting to enlightenment but helping her find it will be the question?
J
C Whether You Realized This...
Submitted by kellyj on
or not. You just helped again. Remembering the concept of what I was taught and even in context to what I heard others say to me (one person in particular, not a family member) who said once "well if the story of Jesus (the literal words) were not exactly true...(the miracles and after life promised).....then there would be no the reason to believe it at all in the first place?" I remembered being floored by this??? In my mind, the only reason to believe is to live your life as he said now and be prepared for the life after by doing so?? That is ,the message in the story which is why they are in parables instead of directions in a hand book for washing machine repair. This confounded me at the time thinking he was missing the point?
And to the point, this particular individual did appear to be missing the message compared to his behaviors which seemed to me in many ways, somewhat unconscious to the journey itself...the journey of life. This does apply to my family in many ways is why I was thinking about this.
It occurred to me as I was thinking about my wife and this discussion we're having about abstract concepts......the beauty of faith (Christianity in particular) is that it works for anyone and everyone and accounts for all the differences. No matter how you see it....it will lead you to your inner self. No one really knows exactly ( in the literal sense) what will happen or what even heaven for example will really be like if you will. But if you are struggling in your life and have nothing to guide you.....having a reward at the end ot the line will give you a goal and some hope along the way and you will discover things as you go as the benefit your present life in preparation for the future. It will serve the same thing regardless...that's the perfection. So as far as this individuals path is concerned....this worked for him and he was still working to maintain as straight a path as he could along the way even without focusing on the journey itself. For him, it would not work without the carrot and the reward was what he was after. I still think this misses the message yet for him....it was the best he could do and gave him what he could get from doing it even if there was more than he was missing along the way.
For me this didn't work, all things considered but....I still used what I had learned and focused on using it as much as possible for the here and now without any promise or carrot in front of me. To each his own? It still works but the message has always been the meaning for me not the literal translation. For my friend...this is what being saved was all about and his experience from it over time eventually got him to the same place and experience.( like my sister thinking?) Perhaps but still no way to know. For me, being saved meant digging a whole lot deeper to start with until I found the message to be saved in the sense of the here and now which ended up by going from A to Z all at one time with my experience that I described. My thinking has always been trying to find the quickest and deepest way to hit the bottom of meaning. ADHD can make you a bit impatient when you are young!! ha ha
But for my wife in a sense in my thinking, she will need a goal or reward to shoot for like my friend. Something concrete that she can grasp conceptually or there is no purpose doing it. Abstract vs concrete....very much the difference. Which, was already my thought in seeing the difference between us in our thinking so I can understand her and be of some help. That really is the difficulty for us with ADHD....not for us but the differences between us and other people and finding the common way to reach each other.
And of course within your comments in that trying to show the other person our thinking is not the best way to approach each other either unless there is the understanding in the first place.
This really is useful insight for me when thinking about what my wife needs from me....in addition to discovering this from my experience here...teaching versus showing the way. The tuff part is that is to get her thinking of a different goal than she believes is the right one. No answer to that yet. In the mean time it is very good food for thought.
Thinking back to my friend and my sister....both have a need to teach in this way as they needed to learn. I have had the same need to teach without realizing it until I got myself up to speed in my thinking. Not to say that won't still happen but the concept and the difference in how people learn is really helpful in so many ways. I know this is so true from just being in school and having to kind of re-teach myself by just taking notes and then researching myself to get the same understanding that other students appeared to be getting right there in the moment. I can't tell you often I needed to do that. It became my self directed alternate way to learn when things were not presented in a way I could understand them even if everyone else seemed to be getting. I got used to doing this and it just became a requirement for me at school.
J
Journey...
Submitted by c ur self on
J your journey is an interesting one for sure. I think I understand you a little better after reading this. I want try to respond to all you've said, but, I would like to...LOL
I will reply to a few things...I do believe you've had some kind of enlightenment. I'm not sure what that is, but, I think I've had a similar experience....I will use some biblical terminology because of what I believe about the creator....So I will just call me experience "Being Exchanged" and like you I don't have to believe it, I know it, and like you, I too need to (close to your words "Visit it often")...And like you it's not a process/or belief system....It's real, living and powerful....I want use the word enlightenment like you, but it's the same thing...I will call it a revelation...The best description I have for it is: To be taken or delivered to a place of "No want". To be moved from the Vertical to the Horizontal....It's a place where the corruptible experiences the incorruptible and the eternal.....A joining of spirits where there is "No Want".....And it's a person.
I feel like you see your sister pretty well:)...She is offering you the same hope that changed her. The only way she knows how.....And if she has her way, your going to open up and chew buddy..LOL...We all want to share our good stuff:)
You are absolutely right about your wife....These next words I didn't get from you Ha Ha....Our creator has supplied everything she will need in this life and the next one just for her....But, she must come and dine for herself, the table is set:)...The impact we have on others is minimal, unless of course the creator is using one of us as a specific tool to show her himself....He does that with his children....
David wrote in Psalms...The earth is the Lord's, and fullness there of. The world and the people in it....
That don't leave much for us to claim now does it?? :)
Thanks J for sharing...You have an awesome ability with the use of the English language.
C
Ha Ha I've Had Lots of Pratice!!! C
Submitted by kellyj on
using the English language (talking TOO much at times ha ha... all or nothing:) I do love to hear other peoples insights to their own unexplained experiences like yours. Always interesting...always fascinating. And I do learn a great deal from hearing them...at least mostly from the positive ones. I think we all share similar negative one experiences and they are commonly negative! lol Not much new there in that respect.
But back to what we were talking about (the THING is?:) I do believe my wife is suffering from something out of the norm and she doesn't know what it is. She does know there's something though and it's likely, there is little that can be done in the big picture. I haven't heard too many details but i suspect actually FAS (fetal alcohol syndrome) from the descriptions of here mother along with PTSD. I don't think it's all that important for me to know too much more only if it is something like that, I can be compassionate and caring and not expect her to change any more than me having ADHD and changing dramatically over night. I did look this up as I suspect and some of her behaviors are ones associated with it including the problem ones for me. Saying, no amount of reasoning or teaching is going to do much good. Already coming to these conclusions myself. Also in light of what we are talking about.....this is where the acceptance comes into play. Just like with ADHD.....if you don't understand at least...why you are seeing and experiencing the things that are affecting you negatively....it's also more difficult to accept if acceptance is your goal? I think few of us can really be that enlightened no matter HOW enlightened you are.....Mother Teresa? lol
I'm not good with setting boundaries in general....not so much for myself but for other people to respect....too much unspoken expectations on my part in the past. Practice is needed for sure in that area but....to a point? I have read about your process about your wife and the steps you've had to take over time and the concept of "what is a marriage?" I think more flexibility is better than less here too....no one really knows what another person is thinking when they say they want the "same things." The Thing is...............ha ha That really is the journey and some of us are more rigid in thinking that others. It's all sooooo confusing!! lol
J
I'm going to point out a few things because I love u...:)
Submitted by c ur self on
I can be compassionate and caring and not expect her to change any more than me having ADHD and changing dramatically over night. What jumps out at you (or doesn't :)) when you read this?
I've read so many posts you've written and have learned a lot from you about add/ADHD and plenty else....Your smart and a deep thinker....But, your comment up at the top of the page that got rosereds attention, got mine too...LOL...One way you can help your wife is with an apology for provoking her into that ugly outburst....Let me apologize now if you didn't do it...But, based on your post I got a mental image of a man that was going to press until he got some kind of reaction, even though it seemed you only wanted her to admit to leaving the mess....It reminded me of myself:(...Pressing when the ability to respond isn't there...
You still there?....OK, I'll stop this....Sorry.
About boundaries I feel just like you to some degree....But, in reality....If you take two independent know it all control freaks, one 46 and one 50, a 16 and 21 year old, wife w/ severe add, 16 and 21 year olds both possibly have mild adhd...Stir that up and expect it to mix....Your living in a dream world....And that was exactly where I was living when I baled off into this....So simple boundaries had to come into play...
As for as Acceptance goes, we have no choice....When I think I have a choice....I slip back into that world of Illusion where I become Doctor Spock.....The Mind Control Wizard...LOL...
C