A Monthly Challenge! Will I Succeed?

Having some executive functioning issues, memory issues, and attention issues...I don't finish many projects that I start. It's not that I don't want to complete the project but if I get derailed or become obsessed about something else, I could actually forget it exists. But this time I will succeed! Some people may see this challenge as easy, as many people tend to go for year-long challenges, but that's ok. Each person has their own limit and I want to challenge where mine is now.

My challenge: write a blog post every day for the month of July!

That means 31 posts this month! I will try to keep them somewhat related to a July theme but we will see what comes up.

Why so suddenly? Because I've been observing how a lot of our videos these days are centered around personal reaction: people wanting to learn about how others live or react. We live in a world where we seek connection. We want to see new items or people and how people respond such as new tools, services, or food. From there we usually see if it may be something we would be interested in trying based on who we are watching. This could be based on the actual item being reviewed or the person reviewing it. Or, we just want to learn more about this person and have opportunities to see more about them.

Either way, we live in a world where we need a community and connection. Even if we never actually meet the person, we can feel a strong bond with them.

These revelations also help us learn more about ourselves and help in our personal growth. Hopefully, you will be able to learn a little more about yourself, as well as a little bit about what it's like for someone to live with Autism and PTSD.

I realized how many people around the world (or even in your own neighborhood) will lead completely different lives. Some not having to make adjustments for illnesses and thus never realizing that different lifestyles are adapted to compensate for this.

Take for example our life versus my parent's life. Since John and I are Autistic with PTSD, we have to be very careful on sound levels, brightness, and how much energy we use throughout the day. We can easily go into sensory overload which is both painful and exhausting. On top of that, we have to rest frequently and often. We plan out what we are going to do, when we are going to do it and how we will go about this. Doing too many things a day, or expecting to do too many things ends up putting us in a fog as we jump from activity to activity (if we manage to keep up). I personally don't do well switching from task to task too often each day. Our brain becomes confused and I will sit in a blank fog trying to remember what I was supposed to do. So we end up accomplishing many things a lot slower or with unique twists to get tasks done.

My family, however, doesn't have these restrictions. My mother used to drag me on vacations and then expect us to go out every day for most of the day to do things. For me, a vacation means REST and my rest involves not doing much if anything. At most one or two things a day that takes up to four hours and then hunker down at home for the rest of the day. The traveling was also tiring, even though I never drove or gave directions. As a kid, I always came home from vacations more exhausted than when I got there. She was very 'go! go! go!' while my husband and I are more 'rest! rest! rest!'. They may see us as lazy, but we work on different schedules. It doesn't help that my most active time would be more around 2am-6am. At a time of the day, I need to be the quietest because the rest of the community is sleeping.

We just live different lives and have very different lifestyles. Sometimes we forget that we have to step out of our world and realize that what we see as normal is far from normal elsewhere or with others. Taking time to accept that people adapt their way of living to fit their resources or means.

That explains a lot of YouTube channels I tend to follow. Such as Harald Baldr, Bald and Bankrupt, and Best Ever Food Review Show. These three specific channels have the main host traveling around and exploring different cultures. Showing how different people live, how they eat, how they interact, and much more. We also have specific react channels that watch certain individuals reacting to various stimuli: music, food, movies, gadgets etc.

You may think that your life is boring and normal but it is a WILD story to someone else who doesn't live where you do. That is kind of what I wanted to do with this blog. To share our lives and our experiences. I recommend you do this too! Even if it's in a personal journal that you don't show anyone.

So here begins this journey! Let's GO!