Comment by smugglerFlynn
5 hours ago
> My goals for the end of 2027 are as follows:
> Stop making stupid mistakes. I want to be able to finish a task fully without missing or skipping a step. One way to do this is to make a plan for everything you do, and only do that thing. Nothing else.
If you are neurodivergent or have other things influencing you mentally, you are _NOT_ going to snap out of it. You are not going to just build a better planning system one day.
HN comments are _NOT_ going to help debugging your mental state. People here have trouble agreeing on engineering, product and business practices they specialise in. They are _NOT_ going to guide you in the right direction on mental health topics.
Please OP, close HN, reach out to people, get help, and (importantly) learn to navigate your mind, not fight with it.
> HN comments are _NOT_ going to help debugging your mental state.
Nice paradox you've created there.
> People here have trouble agreeing on engineering, product and business practices they specialise in. They are _NOT_ going to guide you in the right direction on mental health topics.
I don't know that that follows logically. Whatever people they might reach out to in the real world -- be they friends, relatives, therapists -- also actually disagree about things and don't have all the answers. HN comments come from the same general pool of people, who also potentially have experiences and insights a like-minded individual might find valuable.
> You are not going to just build a better planning system one day.
No but you may be able to over time, through trial and error, and connecting with others and hearing about their experiences. I don't think there's anything wrong or unhealthy about exploring it in this fashion and I don't understand your choice of tone.
I do agree that setting a goal for the year of "not making stupid mistakes" is a (stupid?) mistake. It is more of a lifelong journey and process, of striving rather than achieving, and not setting unrealistic expectations for yourself.
Thank you for this reply. I thought the parent comment was blunt, and perhaps honest. But perhaps it could have added some positive and constructive commentary rather than saying what not to do. I hardly think these things are so binary anyways.
I would say "get (professional) help!" is advice that always sounds good and can be good for X percent of people and not so good for the rest.
I am part of project that offers food and resources to unhoused people outside the usual state and regulated private agencies and without conditions. So by that fact I see many people who the mental health system fails to help for one reason or another. I can't tell you what percentage of people that is but I can tell you it's more than zero percent. I have no advice about what works but I can't see what's wrong with creating a structure that could help you.
OTOH, reading some wise comments on hn can help you get out of your biases.
It was initially some hn comment that convinced me that ADHD is not lazy people's excuse, but an actual thing (even if overhyped on some hn alternatives -- social media). And that led to a diagnosis after some time.
I would highly recommend the book "Four Thousand Weeks" by Oliver Burkeman. The main theme of it is that many of our anxieties stem from inability to accept our inherent limitations as humans, and that trying to come up with the perfect productivity system / planning / etc. are all coping mechanisms for that angst that only fuel it over time.
As someone who has struggled greatly with these issues, it was an enlightening read.
To loosely quote the book, shifting your perspective doesn't erase the anxiety, but makes it not quite so unbearable.
That is re-assuring. Neurodivergence would explain a lot. For the time being, I am still in a state where I cannot get tested (for anyone that has experience with depression, the symptoms go hand in hand with ADD).
I was not planning on opening HN, but it has actually helped me :) I do have to admit I first asked a chat bot what the overall tone was before I opened it up myself.
Thank you very much, I needed to hear this.
As an aside, as of the DSM-V, ADD is no longer used. It’s been combined with ADHD, which has split into 3 subtypes, which are inattentive (basically what used to be ADD,) impulsive (basically what used to be ADHD,) and Combined, which has some combination of traits from both.
I’ve heard, but not confirmed, that depression is a comorbidity among 80% of people with ADHD.
They neuropsychological testing with reaction times and very granular memory tests was quite interesting. If you get the chance to have someone deem it medically necessary, I recommend doing so.
Your description does sound like ADHD to me but even a diagnosis and treatment is only one part of what you’ll need. In addition to a therapist I think you really need a mentor to help you navigate the professional side of things. There are lots of shapes that can take but I would definitely prioritize it; if a lot of your stress and unhappiness is due to work there is a limit to what most types of traditional therapy can help with.
get your eyesight check, at some point in life I was having difficulties staying focus and even started having headaches... and I needed prescription glasses...
Also very important, try to sleep the best you can and do exercise... I remember reading here about exercise in some cases exceeding the benefits of ADHD medications...
If you are overdosing things... don't... caffeine can be overdosed and the effects are nasty and lingering... caffeine is meant to be a zero sum game, where it gets you speed in the morning and when it wears off then you go to sleep... if you over dose it then you are making your body over exert and at some point the body will communicate the results via extreme tiredness, bad humor, etc...
Don't be hard on yourself, from everyone we are the most hard on ourselves when we should be the most kind of them all.
Volunteer. Always had good experiences with it and made some nice memories and connections I would not have otherwise.
This is on my list! I do think that in my current environment I mostly hear what I have done wrong, and helping others would probably give a better outcome.
I know that's a very objective way of looking at it, I mean ofcourse volunteering is a good thing! But I wasn't sure if I was mentally prepared for it. I will definitely reach out to one nearby place that I know of.
This... I finally changed my life by talking to a psychiatrist after 40+ years of suffering and trying a myriad of things. Mental illnesses are real and need real treatment.
> talking to a psychiatrist
Would you mind sharing what solutions they recommended for you to try? Also any meds?
Yep - meds. Tried a bunch and duloxetine is making a massive difference for me. On them for 4 months so far.
Also picked up therapy yet again but tbh I never found therapy to really solve things - it helps me understand myself better at a logical level but the underlying anxiety / depression (including suicidal ideation) has never really gone away until the meds.
I’m feeling generally content and happy about life for the first time ever.
I know anti depressants have a lot of bad press and I’ve even had therapists tell me it’s a crutch. So I’ve generally been hesitant to start them. But they work, not sure why they work, but they do for me at least and I’m glad I stuck with it to find the right one.
"HN comments are _NOT_ going to help debugging your mental state" ... I mean in aggregate, sure. But of course there could be people that are offering useful advice, in a well meaning way - that could actually help OP. You're being really negative here, and I think it's unwarranted.
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It is when folks like you come around and vomit this kind of thing.
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Yeah, it's really tempting to try to fundamentally change the way you interface with the world but it's rarely very sustainable. I've found that trying to change my social environment, and also build skills to make specific tasks easier, are more effective options.
I can not agree harder.
A rando that knows a little therapy language and has good intentions is dangerous. Turn and run.
The trouble is, in my experience, a lot of professional therapists are some rando who know a little therapy language. I had several therapists before one said, 'you appear to be showing signs of x, you need to talk to y'. They are supposed to 'signpost' you, but they have a short- term commercial incentive not to.
The best thing you can do for yourself, at all junctures, is develop your own sense of truth. Listen to people, consider what they have to say, but ultimately decide for yourself. Don't place too much faith in any particular source or signifier or heuristic. The rando could have something useful to you, the expert could lead you astray.
What does neurodivergent mean? If there's a spectrum, what is considered normal, and how is that measured?
IANAD, Clinically, the measurement for diagnosis is if symptoms disturb your day to day life. In some countries they need to disturb multiple (1<) spheres of life. (Work, family, health etc.)
Then you'd have people with symptoms, but who's life is not affected by them.
I wonder myself if it's just the first group that is classified as neurodivergent or both.
As someone that is "neurodivergent," I agree. A lot of advice, especially surrounding executive dysfunction, could be boiled down into a single step -- step 1: do not have executive dysfunction.
Now, I am not trying to say there is nothing anyone can do to improve themselves or their situation, but I do find a lot of advice falls short. Common advice is to set reminders, make lists, etc.. However, none of that is helpful when one has to remember to even create/check the reminders, lists, etc.. I notoriously create to-do lists only to never look at them ever again.
Honestly, if I have learned anything in life, it is that I cannot be left to my own devices. I need lots of forced, external structure which makes me rather uncomfortable because I do not want to burden others with the responsibility of managing my disability.
> I need lots of forced, external structure
Me as well, which is a really "fun" time when my specific blend of neurodivergence also causes me to immediately resent said authority and external structure and view it as removing my agency.
What I've learned as I've gotten older is just how much of our struggle comes down to our social model of disability. A lot of these "symptoms" are only disorders because we've built such rigid, uncompromising systems for interacting with and participating in society.
Modern psychology has a tendency to pathologize an individual's ability to conform to this rigidity instead of doing the hard work of promoting the building of flexible environments that are more accommodating of different ways of thinking and working. Instead, we work really hard to force a square peg into the round hole.
Its incredibly isolating, tbh.
It's a lot harder to change the shape of the hole. But I do agree that there is too much emphasis on the pathology of it. I think therapy needs a major rebranding and it shouldn't be seen as something that we do to "fix" "broken" people.
It should just be about more deeply understanding ourselves as individuals, and understanding the world around us (particularly other people), so that we may navigate it better.
I saw a video of a comedian (a woman) doing crowd work, and kind of playfully bullying someone (a man), asking them about their therapy. I thought it was funny, but a lot of the comments were along the lines of "that's not cool, how dare you."
But that audience member was at a comedy club, where comics do that kind of thing. Going to therapy isn't about collectively making sure the world babysits and coddles everyones needs. It's about giving you the tools to handle what you can't change.
Quick correction that HN are people too my friends
Reach out to... people?
Yes, people. Friends, coworkers, family.
I think a lot of people with mental health problems could attest that this is not always very effective, most often you exchange the reality you’ve been living in for some kind words and then inevitably the normalisation of your problem.
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What's going on with all the open proselytizing on HN these days? I don't remember seeing them five years ago but now in every thread about personal struggles there is someone trying to convert people. Always to the same religion, too.
Edit: some people have replied saying why religion is helpful. Ok. But that doesn't answer my question of why is it showing up so much on HN lately.
Feels a lot more like an offer than a hard sell to me.
I do sense the same thing you do, though; that there’s something of a religious revival swelling, at least in the West that’s overwhelmingly represented here:
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2025/10/20/growing-shar...
Economist via archive: https://archive.ph/M7NW0
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Turning yourself over to a "higher power" and recognizing that you cannot fix yourself by yourself can be very helpful for some. It won't always be the right answer of course.
That's probably because the religion itself naturally results in trying to help others.
Are we talking about the same church where children were raped, "witches" were burned, non-believers were tortured, gays are demonized, women are treated as lower beings, ..? Yeah, so good for our souls?
Yes, but it isn't a requirement for doing those things. Atheists are just bad at doing things together.
If that means we should burn all the bibles I leave as an exercise for the reader.
> Consider becoming more involved with a local church. Go to services, meet people, join a Bible study.
That is contingent on actually believing in the religion, no? In my experiences, church attendees do not tend to take kindly to people attending with anterior motives.
When I was in school, I attended a few churches to meet new people. They were rather apprehensive when they learned I did not believe in any of it and was just faking it all.
> That is contingent on actually believing in the religion, no?
You're there to learn. It's called Bible study for a reason.
When I came back to church after 10 years as an avowed agnostic/atheist I didn't believe. I did listen and pay attention a lot better than I did as a child. Listening with an open mind and an unhardened heart make a difference.
There are different types of churches too. In my experience most "mega churches" truly cater to this more curious audience. It's more of the movie going experience where you can walk in like anyone else, without having to know anybody, sit down and just listen to the service. Then get up and leave without talking to anybody if you don't want to. Messages tend to be tailored to the idea that any given week you're going to have people who have never set foot in a church before in life.
When I came back, I went to one of these for about 6 years (New Spring Church in South Carolina). Eventually, I wanted more and we switched to a more traditional church with Adult Sunday School and a men's (or women's) Bible study one night a week.
Churches are welcoming places but everybody there is going to be different. If you tell somebody you don't believe, some people are going to be thankful that you're there and others aren't going to have any idea what to say. That's pretty normal. Faking it is a little different though. No reason to fake it. Just be honest that you don't believe but you're here and willing to listen.
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Don’t tell them?
I’m pretty sure quite a few people who bring children to church don’t literally believe in the stuff themselves and just think the social elements and the morality are good for their children.
Were you trying to meet friends or trying to date though? If the latter I think it would feel a lot weirder.
Also if it bothers you to lie by omission I think one could come up with an explanation that wasn’t simply “I’m faking” and is more along the lines of “my grandparents were Christian and I think we lost something culturally when a lot of people stopped doing this” or something like that, assuming those are true for you. God is a metaphor, etc etc.
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In my experience, Unitarian Universalists have always been very accepting of people who have come just to meet and talk.
The solution to neurodivergence is church? I'm sorry but come on, this blatant proselytizing is not appropriate here.
I feel like that presumes that neurodivergence is in fact the “problem” or the underlying concern.
Which it might be, and it might not be—any more than we can conclude that the solution to “my throat hurts” is “take antibiotics.” (If it’s bacterial, that could cure it near-instantly; if it’s viral, it won’t do anything and might hurt in the aggregate)
In that analogy, to my thinking, church is maybe like “gargle some salt water”—the underlying biological processes may or may not be addressable by modern medicine, and you should probably talk to the doctor too—but the salt water may well make you feel better regardless.
And some people hate salt! More power to them! But I’m not coming at the folk remedy person for offering “have you thought about it.”
For that matter “church” can take many forms, even ostensibly secular ones. My raver friends, for example, speak of the dance floor as “church,” and think about it rather explicitly in terms of spiritual reconnection.
Sometimes the secular and the organized churches even cross paths…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilherme_Peixoto
Headline was mental health. I'm just offering one more suggestion for the OP to consider.
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You don't need to go to church to find community, a better response would be what you're saying but something where you don't pressure people to join an institution that might be extremely hostile to women or minorities.
Anyone can find a community nearby, churches aren't the only way.
Glad it worked out for you, but it doesn't for many people and that's okay. There are other communities out there.
Also Church is no substitute for mental health professions. Would you tell someone to "pray the cancer away?" I hope not, you'd tell then to speak to a qualified professional. That's where therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, or even guidance councilers come into play.
Many churches have professionally trained counsellors. No, they wouldn't tell you to "pray the cancer away" (though there are prosperity-"gospel" preaching churches that would say "donate to make the cancer go away"–beware), but they would counsel you from a biblical perspective, which is extremely helpful. And they would also tell you to seek professional help elsewhere if you need it and they couldn't provide it.
> might be extremely hostile to women or minorities
This isn't accurate at all. Christian churches welcome everyone but there are no zoning laws directing people to specific churches. Many happen to be very homogeneous as a side effect of people often being more comfortable. There are numerous "black", "hispanic", "chinese", etc churches that are out there by perception but not by requirement. None of these churches are going to turn you away if you don't look like them anymore than a predominantly white church would.
Regarding women, I'm not sure what you've been reading to make that suggestion? There's probably no institution in the world that cares for women more than the Christian church. Strong families are part of the bedrock. Visit one on Mother's Day sometime. Check out the low cost and sometimes even free child care available (Mother's morning out, VBC, etc). Jesus treatment of women was radical in the context of the time period.
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Take your proselytizing elsewhere.
To all you downvoters Jesus is watching you and will send you to hell for it. -John 3:16
Is help narrowly chemical here or is help in general? Someone else replied suggesting psychiatry - curious if that is what you meant.