Thinking about my thinking process.

1. Processing abstract information
2. Finding the limit of my thoughts

So I had figured out that I talk to myself to solve abstract problems. I figured that since the behavior has a purpose there should be a natural border. Some place to stop talking.

BTW When I say I’m talking to myself that’s not completely true. In my fantasy I’m having a discussion with some one who is an interested party in the problem I’m trying to solve.
I tell him the story of the problem plus every solution I’ve found up till now.
Sometimes I get stuck and I will repeat the same few sentences over and over for hours. Sometimes even for days.
You can imagine how annoying that can get.

It took me a while but I finally found out that there is actually a very obvious answer to this question.
For me the whole world is connected. Every problem is connected to every other problem – I’m told that this has either something to do with being autistic or with having a visual thought process – So when I start analysing some problem I can’t stop because the problem goes on and on.

But I can greatly reduce the number of problems I have to solve if I simply apply the rule that every problem I solve has to improve my life.
So Dutch unemployment crisis, as interesting it might be, is not something I should be thinking about. Same holds true for the famine in Africa.
But Promen’s (my employer) embezzlement of reimbursement of travelling expenses is a problem I should try to solve. Not only because it is costing me money. But there’s the simple matter of people doing what they are supposed to do. I should follow the rules and so should upper management. (What can I say. I’m autistic. People acting the way there supposed to, is more important to me then money )
(More about this when I’ve solved it.)

So I’ve been living by this rule for a few days and it helps.
A bit.
After a few days I found that even when I limited myself to problems that actually influence my live. I still spend a lot of time talking to myself.

Turns out that I’m somewhat impatience.
When I run into a problem I tend to think about it until I’ve found the first 10 solutions. Then I implement the first solution.
But instead of waiting to find out if the solution works I continue thinking about new solutions. Which is a waste of time because the first one usually works.

But some times it doesn’t. Some problems are a little more complicated. Like the problems with my embezzling employer. And that is when I run into the real problem.
Turns out the there is no logic in the way I solve problems. Possible solutions come at random intervals.
There’s no way of knowing if I’ve found every solution or whether there are still a few more.
And as I said sometimes I get stuck and repeat the same few sentences over and over again.
Sometimes I follow a train of though to it’s bitter end. Only to find that it wouldn’t work.

And then I stop.

And I have no idea whether I stop because I’ve reached the end of a school of thought. Or the end of a series of solutions.
Or just stop because I don’t feel like thinking abstract anymore.

The thing is that if I stop because I’ve reached the end of the school of thought or the end of the series of solutions. It would imply that I do know how many solutions I might expect.
If that’s the case it stands to reason that me getting stuck has more to do with my own annoyance then with my thinking process.

To Be Continued…