Is Have Nothing In Head Even When Overwhelmed Cause Something Traumatic Happened And Yet Unable To Think

Executive Dysfunction but make it Hunter x Hunter

So here's an analogy ( Spoiler alert if you haven't seen heavens arena arc )

Know how Gon and Killua can't pass the corridor when they reached the 200th floor because Hisoka stop them from crossing? When Hisoka caught them with his nen, the boys knew that they needed to move away. They desperately want to move away, they even thought that if they stay any much longer they were sure they would die. But no matter how much they tried, they can't. They're just stuck there, unable to do anything except to just wait until it's all over.

And that's how executive dysfunction feels. It's exactly like that.

No matter how much you want to do something, whether its a fun activity, maybe a hobby or a very important thing that you have to get done you just cant. Your brain decided to stop you from doing anything and it fucking sucks. You're just stuck in silence and you're forced to wait until its over. Executive dysfunction is clearly not about having no will power or not enough motivation. Just like how Killua and Gon desperately wanted to get away from Hisoka but they can't, because they're stuck. It's like that.

You know you have bad memories when you forget about something that seems like its impossible to forget and when you tell anyone that you forget about it it sounds like a lie? Yeah so, I forgot I have tumors in my arms, even when I touched the lipomas underneath my skin it didn't occur to me that I have tumors lmao

Short Story Plot: How to Use Ideas and Structure to Plot a Short Story

Do you want to write a short story, but are unsure about how to develop a short story plot?

Short stories rarely require extensive plotting. They’re short, after all. But a bit of an outline, just to get the basic idea down, can help you craft a strong plot.

Plotting your short stories will give you an end story goal and will help you avoid getting stuck in the middle, or accidentally creating plot holes. You’ll have fewer unfinished stories if you learn to do a little planning before you start writing.

And in this article, you can learn how to take your short story’s primary conflict, and build a plot around it.

Definition of Plot and Structure

I see the terms “plot” and “structure” thrown around interchangeably quite a bit, so I’d like to correct that before we move on.

Plot is a series of events that make up your story.

Structure is the overall layout of your story.

Plot is (most likely) unique to your story, but there are a handful of basic structures that are universal and used over and over again. (We’ll get into the basic three act structure in a later post.) Structure is the bones and plot is what fills it out.

You can learn more about plot and structure in this article, or the different story types here.

The Strength of a Short Story Idea

When I first started out writing short stories, I had no idea where I was going with any of them. Absolutely none. I see this time and time again with newer writers. I think it’s because we’re conditioned to think any kind of art is only driven by that infamous and often elusive muse rather than hard work. I felt the same way.

And then I started getting more stories under my belt. Some I finished. Some I didn’t.

You know what the difference was? The stories I finished, I plotted before I wrote.

Now I know a lot of writers loathe plotting or outlining stories—of any length, but especially short stories. They have various reasons for this dislike, but the most common one I hear is planning or outlining takes all the “magic” out of writing. “Creative writing is about being creative!”

I won’t get into the idea that writing is actually a job here—it is. That’s not what this article is about.

Instead, I’m going to propose a different reason for planning a short story with one important question: Is your idea even a story?

Planning out your story, even if it’s short, can give you an answer to this question. It will determine whether or not your central character can work towards achieving a goal (and simultaneously the plot moves towards a climax), or if your idea ends there—at the idea.

Writer’s tip: If you’re feeling stuck on coming up with an idea that could withstand a story’s length, try looking at the types of plots discussed in this article.

Is It a Story or Just a Story Idea?

Don’t panic. I don’t plan extensively. But what I’ve found was absolutely no planning whatsoever more often than not leads to wasted time. Nobody has time to waste.

If I don’t plot at all, I’ll get maybe a third of the way through the story and get stuck. I’ll have no idea where it was going, and without that goal in mind, I’ll flounder. I might tinker around with the idea a little longer, but most of the time I’ll end up abandoning the story.

A few weeks ago, I had the infamous muse visit me. I grabbed my notebook and started writing. It was great writing. The prose was good, the main character was crazy interesting, ditto for the secondary character, and I’d set up a mystery that made you want to turn the page. The problem was I had no idea what the mystery was. I had set up and no payoff. This story idea fizzled out at the start of the second act.

Now, to be clear, I do indulge my muse every once in a while. It does feel good to be taken over by an idea, even if you don’t know where it’s going. It’s all very “artisty.”

But the fact is I’ve sold one story that I finished without plotting it beforehand. One. Out of dozens I’ve started. That one took me about a week to write and it was torture for me, for my characters, and, I’m sure, for the backspace on my keyboard. Everything about the story reads as forced. It’s uninspired. And you know what?

That’s the one my muse started me on! Inspiration is supposed to be the point of the muse, right? But a muse can only get you started; it can’t keep you going.

Your muse won’t finish a story for you.

When your muse starts poking at you and you don’t know if your idea is a story, ask yourself a couple of questions:

Am I going to remember this idea tomorrow? Yes, it’s nice to be taken over by inspiration. Feel free to indulge that every so often. But also be prepared to have an unfinished story on your hands. You don’t necessarily have to wait until tomorrow to write the thing (especially when we’re talking about shorts), but you do need to know if your enthusiasm is going to wan a few minutes down the road when your muse decides to go take a nap, leaving you with nothing but frustration. (That story I mentioned a moment ago? I haven’t completely forgotten about it, but it does not sit at the top of my mind.)

Do I have a “What if?” question and an answer to that question? If you’re thinking about beautiful sentences where nothing is happening, that’s probably not a story. If you can’t think of an end goal for your character, that’s probably not a story. See the next section for more on “What if?” and the answer. (The story I didn’t finish did not have a goal in mind.)

Do you have a character? This one seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how often I used to start “stories” and just ramble on with purple prose. No people, no action, no story.

If the answer to all these questions is “yes,” then you most likely have a finishable story. If it’s “no” tell your muse to go back to its hole until it can come up with something better.

If you must, explore the idea a little more and see if you can’t plot a little something. (Do not write yet!)

Enter the “What if?” question.

What If? How Asking This Question Can Plot a Short Story

In the last post, I told you my favorite way to think of a short story idea is the “What If?” question. This question can help you think about various ways to put your central character into a conflict, like: What if X happened? It’s your own mind giving itself creative writing prompts.

Let’s expand on that method a bit. Notice it’s a question. And questions often have answers, do they not? Knowing the answer to your “What If?” question is the most basic outline of a story.

Let’s start with a basic question.

Q: What if someone knocked on my door?

A: I’d probably ignore it.

That’s it. That’s the story. It’s kind of crappy, right?

Notice that answer is my immediate reaction to the knock. It’s not something that happens down the road. That’s part of what makes this scenario NOT a story.

The other issue here is there is no conflict. I don’t answer the door, the person goes away, and I’m left to my own devices. There are no consequences for my decisions, so nothing happens—and nobody reading about this incident cares.

Without conflict, there are no stakes in a story. No conflict equals no story.

What Makes a Good Conflict?

Remember conflict can come in many forms and doesn’t have to be a shoot ’em up kind of situation. Internal conflict can also make a short story. But there MUST be conflict.

So, on multiple levels, this question and answer session is a loser.

Now, let’s say I don’t answer the door. (I’m a millennial. I’d rather not talk to people if I can help it, so this really is the most likely thing to happen.) The person assumes I’m not home. But wait! They’re a burglar. They now try to break into my house. The “What If?’ question has now changed to “What if someone tried to break into my house while I was home?”

See how the central character has to do something now? Even if they don’t, there will be consequences.

Because the story idea establishes stakes, I know I’ve got something. How do I know? There are myriad possibilities here. I could call the cops. I could run out and confront them myself. I could freeze and run upstairs and hide. I could sic my dog on them. I could wait for them to get inside and invite them to join me in having a cup of tea.

Whatever I choose to do, there will be a cause and effect trajectory of events. Which means more stakes, and more opportunities that force my protagonist to face their conflict. They have to make decisions, which will lead to a whole slew of other “What If?” questions:

What if they get in before the cops get here?

What if they break a window?

What if my dog was outside and they hurt him?

What if a neighbor sees them and comes running over?

What if they “break in” but it’s really just my sister needing in my house for something?

What if I’m hiding under the bed and they find me?

What if they hate tea?

What if … and the list goes on.

These are all more interesting scenarios than just ignoring the door and the person going away. But we’re still looking for the answer to the initial “What If?” question. The answer solves the question and puts it to bed. It doesn’t lead to other questions.

Don’t Forget to Answer Your What If Questions

A short story only has one to three scenes normally, so your answer needs to come in a short span of time. It can’t come years down the road. Any span of time longer than a few hours, maybe a day or two, is probably too long.

Q: What if someone tried to break into my house while I was home?

A: I would call the cops, but also grab my bat and be ready to use it.

But wait. That still doesn’t answer the question, not in a final way. There’s still an open ending there, still questions. (Did I use the bat? What happened if I did?) Let’s try again.

A: I would decide not to use my bat and would talk to them until the police got there.

That’s better. With this scenario, I can think of a couple of things that would happen after the police got there, but at that point the situation is over. I’ve done it. I’ve defeated the burglar. Anything afterwards is a conclusion to the story.

The best part is, I’ve actually done it in a way that means change for me as a central character. I didn’t want to talk to anyone to begin with, which is what led to the whole situation. But I have to overcome that aversion by talking to someone in order to solve the problem.

Short Story Structure

We’ve got two important elements of the story narrowed down now: the “What If?” question and its ultimate answer.

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you might have come across the many posts we have about plot structure. In a story you need six things:

Exposition (Background and setup.)

Inciting Incident (A major event happens to your character.)

Rising Action (or progressive complications, a sequence of events where things get worse.)

Crisis (Ah, what is your character going to do?)

Climax (Showdown based on what your character decided to do.)

Denouement (Finish it up.)

Need a refresher on these plot elements? Dive further into story structure here.

A short story is often only one to three scenes. That means this structure, these six elements, stretch over the entire story to form the framework. (The scenario I’ve presented would most likely be a one-scene story.) Notice I’m talking about framework here. These six elements are your story structure.

So what do we have here after all this thinking about questions and answers?

The “What If?” question is your Inciting Incident.

The ultimate answer is your Climax.

Boom. Two elements down. And these two elements happen to be the bulk of what your readers will remember from your story.

We’ve planned a story, believe it or not. And it didn’t even hurt that much.

But wait! There’s more. (Sorry, couldn’t help myself.)

In the process of coming up with these two elements, we’ve inadvertently come up with a couple of others.

Choosing not to use the bat and talking to the burglar instead? That’s the Crisis. All those streams of “What if?” questions? Those are progressive complications.

Whoops. We’ve outlined basically the whole thing, haven’t we? I sort of tricked you there. Sorry, not sorry.

Plotting Doesn’t Hurt—Too Much

Plotting a short story doesn’t have to be a meticulous thing that requires hours of work and a running spreadsheet. It also doesn’t have to take the magic out of writing.

Your plan for your short story can be a simple, loose outline. (By the way, outlines can change if you think of something better! They’re not set in stone.) Really, you just need two elements to get to writing a short story:

A “What If?” question (identifies the Inciting Incident)

The answer (shows the Climax)

And then you’re ready to write!

In future articles, we’ll dive more into writing structure and the essentials and plot elements of a short story. For now, use this “shortcut” to plan out a few short stories of your own! Have fun with it!

Source

so far in life ( i think ) i never make choices around my chronic pain.

It's either the internalized ableism that ruled over or my poor decision making skill that holds the wheel

executive dysfunction but it's in a form of superpower is basically Inumaki Toge from JJK using his power to immobilise you from doing anything

Congratulations! Today, you get to learn the difference between memory and recall. There is an important difference, and understanding that difference will make you a better ally to the disabled community and also more understanding of your own brain!

What is memory?

Memory is the information your brain has stored for later. Let's make an analogy: your memory can be compared to files stored on a computer. Your brain is extremely complex and has a deep, layered filing system.

When your roommate's friend visits and introduces herself, you put her name in one of the many name folders. Our brains are complex enough that we can assume there are thousands of those folders, each for a different type of name and how you know it: friend names, immediate family names, extended family names, classmate names, coworker names, celebrity names, and so on and so forth, forever.

What is recall?

Recall is not whether you have something stored, but whether you can find it. Like that photo of you at summer camp in sixth grade that's stored somewhere on your computer, the information you learn throughout daily life is sorted somewhere into your brain's filing system. The longer ago that you put the information into the system, the harder it is to find, unless you frequently visit those files.

For the average instance of recall, people generally use the equivalent of the search bar of their brain's filing system. The information is sorted precisely so it's, naturally, recalled in the blink of an eye.

However, you may have had moments of recall issues. Everyone does here and there. The sensation of a word being on the tip of your tongue is a common example of issues with recall. You know the word, but it's just not coming up when you search for it.

In instances like these, you end up kind of manually rooting around in your brain's folders, desperately looking for associated folders that it might have been mis-stored in. You're trying to think of a vegetable you know of, so you start listing off other vegetables to yourself, as if sifting through the vegetable folder.

Sometimes, this association game can bring forth the missing file - or in this case, vegetable name. In other cases, you simply have to let it go and wait for it to come to you later. That might mean you smacking your forehead 48 hours later when you're in the middle of driving to work and the name of that vegetable suddenly throws itself right in the middle of your internal monologue.

Recall and disability

So, what does this have to do with disability? Well, the average person may have occasional recall issues, but for many disabled people, these issues are extremely prevalent. For neurodivergent folks or those with brain fog, we can end up having trouble recalling things many times in a day. It is extremely frustrating and can even be embarrassing in social situations.

For example, your roommate's friend, who you've hung out with on multiple occasions and heard numerous stories about might drop by six months later and you might stand there trying to avoid talking while you scramble desperately through your name files trying to recall her name when you know it's in there somewhere. It's a real life reproduction of that scene in SpongeBob where he only knows how to be a waiter. By the time she addresses you, it's too little too late and you have to admit that for some reason her name is evading you. It's humiliating.

Be understanding of recall issues

These issues have little to do with how important something is to a person. If you know someone who's disabled and they have frequent issues recalling words or names, it's just because the search function in their brain sometimes breaks down and they have to rely on manually digging through the billions of memories they have to try and find what they're looking for.

If you know someone with this issue who is comfortable with it, try filling in the gaps for them! It can be a fun bonding experience, especially between two people with recall issues, to immediately offer a word that seems to fit the flow of the sentence as soon as the other starts to draw a blank. The better you know them, the easier it is.

If you know someone with recall issues, be patient when they use you as a living thesaurus. You're saving them countless hours of googling or agonizing over what that word was - you know, the one that's like willingly suffering for an extended period of time about something that may or may not matter? (I just had issues recalling 'agonizing' 😔)

Anyway, that's all for today! I hope you've all learned something new about recall and how it affects people with disabilities differently/more frequently than the average person

have me as a guest on your podcast. im not an expert in anything. i dont work in an interesting industry. i have very few skills. i don’t have anything i want to talk about. my voice is weak and i can’t project it well. im not funny. im the perfect guest for your podcast.