I can’t work on maths problems: by the time I key a calculation into my calculator I’ve forgotten what I was actually calculating.
When I open my phone to write an email, by the time I have the ‘new email’ screen open I’ve forgotten what I wanted to write and to whom.
When I go off looking for something in another room, I forget what I was looking for by the time I’ve entered it. I constantly mutter ‘What was I doing? What was I doing?’
This is so debilitating – I can’t live like this. What can I do?
Is something tying up one or more of your ~7 registers? It’s hard to do complex tasks when that happens.
Could be a trauma of some sort, some emotion wanting expression, general worrying, loneliness, grief, dunno. It’s just a theory I have that when they all get full, we tend to ‘crash’.
Offloading some stuff to a notes or tasks app might help.
Certain types of music might help as well, to distract some part of your brain.
We’re strange creatures.
It could be a medical issue though, in which case you probably need assistance from someone qualified.
Hmm, I don’t think so. I have no problems programming (where I can focus for hours and within complex class hierarchies). It seems to be more of a problem when the nature/aim of the task is constantly changing (like when solving a physics problem or applying for a grant – that’s when I forget what I’m doing and what the end goal is), and when I get bombarded with irrelevant info (like when opening the app overview or inbox on my tablet). So it seems to be more of a task-/context-switching problem.
Agreed. I use Google Keep/Calendar and timers on my phone to free my mind of as many background to-dos as possible.