Investigating my Executive Function

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I'm trying to ascertain strengths and deficits in my brain's executive function center...

organizational and planning abilities
working memory
inhibition and impulse control
self-reflection and self-monitoring
time management and prioritizing
understanding complex or abstract concepts
using new strategies
setting goals
attending selectively

I've found it helps me focus my thinking if I have other people's examples to go by... it often illuminates some aspect I never would have otherwise considered.

So I'd like to hear how other's brains express (or not) these functions...

For example, this morning--looking at the list--I realized I had good short term planning skills, but long term... lousy. Nearly non-existent. I have absolutely no clue about what I might like to be doing by this time next year, can't even wrap my head around it beyond being healthy and still in a loving relationship.

I can go to either extreme with time management... down to the minute or completely scattered... depends on the urgency and importance of the day.

Thanks in advance...
DonkeyBuster

I know what you mean about this. I have a professor who likes to ask where I think I'll be in five years. How should I know? I could be hit by a train next week. My daughter makes plans for five, ten and fifteen years down the road and I have no clue how she does it. Aside from that, what do I want to do with my education? Not a clue. Don't even really know what I want for my thesis topic yet. I'm horribly intimidated by the kids who already do and have planned out their entire careers. I only have the vaguest of ideas. It's been my experience, though, that these things tend to work themselves out if I keep my eyes open and keep an open mind about opportunities.

Regards,

Patricia

Patricia,
Thanks. In general, I have always just waited for things to show themselves to me. Now that I'm in my 50's, I'm beginning to think it's time to be a little more directive... as my older friends keep telling me, old age is not for wimps! I want to do what I can to have a comfortable crone-dom.

Lemme see... that'd be utilizing the self-reflection aspect to recognize an executive deficit in the planning department while activating the abstract concept department to grasp the idea that I might actually be alive in 10-15 years, and setting a short term goal (a strength) to ask my therapist to help me develop a new strategy (moderate on that function) for growing old.

What about the other functions on the list? Any thoughts on them?

I can't do housework on a regular basis.

I can clean the house to the nth degree in an all day one off and I can do it if it happens at the same time on a certain day as long as I have the list to hand or the routine has been established forever but change the time, day or something else and I can't do it. I used to have a cleaner and I would follow her around with a damp cloth and duster then she left and I tried doing it at the same time on the same day until one day I had to go out and that was the end of that routine

Another thing that stays in my brain and doesn't execute is when I need to do something I don't normally do, I can think about it, I can know it has to be done and I can picture it but sometimes it just doesn't happen. I have to keep really focussed on it, maybe writing it down and doing it first or it just stays in my head.

If I can get a strong routine going, its a winner.

Boy, does that sound familiar... stays in my brain and doesn't execute.

Housework... er... crisis spot cleaning unless someone is coming over, then I can get motivated to do the whole place. Like today... we're going out of town and will have a house sitter, so the place will be spic and span for her.

I don't know where the boundary is between true executive function problems and plain old lack of motivation due to lack of interest/excitement about life in general. I have both problems and each one seems to compound the other.

Thinking about where I want to be 5 years from now is just depressing. What's the point? Yea, I'll be 5 years closer to my time of death, what a pleasant thought. I hate change and uncertainty and I can't see anything in my future exciting enough to overcome these negative emotions. Therefore I'm not able to think about the future.

This is a standard job interview question to assess ambition. When my brother-in-law asked this question, he was trained to hear a ludicrous response like "Vice President", like a new hire will become an executive in 5 years. My answer always disqualifies me from jobs leading to management: "To be a recognized leader in my field of endeavor." That's pretty ambitious, just not what interviewers want to hear. Well, I would make a terrible manager.

Oh, I hate that question. I always want to answer, "Not the victim of the Peter Principle."