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Hello and welcome back to Bahana Bada Podcast with Me Paul Victoria. We are carrying on with How to Be You by Ellie Middleton. We're on chapter 5, Flexibility. One of my very favorite stories that my parents often tell me about, my childhood, is perhaps a great way to introduce this chapter on flexibility. By the time I was around four years old, my parents had quickly learned that they couldn't say the word McDonald's out loud. This was because if they had mentioned in passing that, if you're a good girl, today we might be able to stop for McDonald's on the way home, then I would take it as gospel and never let them hear the end of it. This is just one example of how my differences or struggles with flexibility have shown up throughout my life as someone who takes things very literally, sees things in quite a black and white way, doesn't cope well with change, and likes to have things planned out in advance. Being flexible is something that is incredibly important in an ever-changing world to allow us to keep up with changing demands, changing expectations, changing plans, and the people around us who are constantly changing too. However, for some of the reasons mentioned above and a whole load more, we'll explore throughout the chapter. It's something that can be very tricky for neurodivergent folks who rely on structure, sameness, and routine. In this chapter, we will explore what is flexibility? Which systems have affected the way we think about flexibility? How can we support ourselves with flexibility? Five things to consider putting in place for your flexibility. Flexibility is much more difficult when you have the added responsibility of ensuring that your needs are met and that the new plan, environment, or circumstances are accessible to you. As an autistic ADHD who is in the minority in most social and professional environments, it is almost always on me to adapt to the people around me rather than them adapting to my needs or even meeting me in the middle. What is flexibility? When we hear the word flexibility, we might immediately think of a gymnast doing the splits. However, when it comes to executive functioning, what we're actually talking about is something called cognitive flexibility. Flexibility is defined as the ability to adapt and adjust to changing circumstances, perceptives, or demands, and refers to the way that we need to mould and bend our behaviors, ways of working, plans of action, and ways of being in order to react to the changes in the world around us. An example of something that caused the whole world to demonstrate a huge amount of flexibility was the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns. Overnight we had to change the way we worked, the way we learned, the way we socialized, the way we took care of ourselves, the way we communicated, and the things we prioritized. While the pandemic forced us to be flexible on a huge scale, we're all faced with changes, however big or small, that we must adapt to every single day. Maybe your train is delayed, which seems to be almost always be the case if you're traveling from Manchester. So you have to plan a different route or mode of transport for your journey. Maybe someone asks you something that you weren't expecting, so you have to quickly come up with a response that you hadn't planned ahead. Maybe you learn something new which takes a project you're working on in a new direction. Maybe the restaurant you plan to eat at doesn't have any tables available, so you have to find someplace else to eat. Maybe you switch from a corporate environment with your colleagues to a more relaxed social environment with your friends. So you switch up the way you communicate in a short space of time. Whatever those changing demands, circumstances, or perspectives might be, only one thing is certain that everything is always changing all the time. As an autistic person, I think flexibility is probably one of the executive functioning skills that causes me the most discomfort and anxiety. I don't like being caught off guard, and I don't like last-minute changes. I like things to be neatly and nicely planned out in advance so I can run over them a hundred times in my head to make sure that everything will run smoothly. When something does change that makes my plan go off course, it feels like the world is ending, and I think that this is down to a few different traits that fall under the autism spectrum. Literal thinking or processing. As literal thinkers or processors, we will often take what we are told as gospel. This means that if somebody tells us something, we will always believe it to be true. And so even if it was just a possibility or an option, if it was communicated to us, we'll think it to be a dead cert, leaving little room for expecting things to change. Black and white thinking. Similarly, black and white or all or nothing thinking can lead us to see things without any room for grey. If the plan was to meet somebody at 3pm and it gets to 3.05 pm and there is no sign of them, this feels like everything is wrong. And with that, all or nothing thinking. We're prone to thinking that as soon as one small thing goes wrong, and therefore the day is no longer perfect, it must be completely bad. Repeated behaviors or routines. Autistic people are often reliant on routines and structures to ease our anxiety and keep our nervous system regulated. For me, I think this comes from a need to feel like in an ever-changing world, there is always at least one thing that remains constant and under my control. If these routines, all repeated behaviors, are affected or disrupted, this can cause a huge amount of anxiety, which then leaves us feeling on edge and not in the most positive frame of mind to adapt to the change. Struggles with transitioning. Thanks to something called autistic inertia, we can struggle to transition between tasks or modes, making adapting to changes difficult. If we're in the flow working on one thing, and suddenly a change of circumstances means we need to jump to another task, it's tricky for our brains to first of all wind down from the motion of the first task to stop, then to switch to the new task, and then to get going again with that. Social rules, cues, and hierarchies. Flexibility could also refer to our ability to adapt to our behavior or communication style depending on the different circumstances or environments that we are faced with. For example, switching up the way we communicate depending on whether we are chatting with our friends in the pub or talking to our manager in a meeting. Since, as autistic people, we don't always put as much weight or importance on social hierarchies as neurotypical people do, we might not be as flexible in changing our communication styles, as we don't see a need to behave any differently just because someone is more senior than us in a hierarchy, whether that's subconsciously in communicating in a certain way or making a conscious decision not to alter our communication styles. Similarly, since we're not always able to read unspoken social cues, such as body language or facial expressions, we might not notice that somebody's attitude or emotions have changed during a conversation. And so we might not be able to adapt to suit these changes. Essentially, a lot of autistic experience means that adapting to change without warning can be incredibly tricky. And this is also true for many other neurodivergent and disabled people, as disabled and neurodivergent people who live in a world that was never designed with our needs in mind and often need accommodating. It isn't as easy to swap and change things quickly while making sure that these accommodations remain in place. An example of this, which might help make things clearer, could be that if a physically disabled wheelchair user discovers that their train is cancelled and so needs to find another way of getting to their destination, they would need to know what the method of transport had a wheelchair space, that the station had step-free access, that there were disabled toilets on the way, and so on and so forth. Flexibility is much more difficult when you have the added responsibility of ensuring that your needs are met and that the new plan, environment, or circumstances are accessible to you. Which systems have affected the way we think about flexibility? Flexibility allows us to adapt our behaviors, ways of working, and ways of thinking in order to suit changing circumstances. However, the biases and systems of oppression that are rife within our culture mean that it has often been skewed as to who needs to be flexible and in what ways. The norm, especially in workplaces and positions of power, have been considered to be those who hold the most privilege, cisgender, heterosexual, non-disabled, neurotypical white men, and those who fall outside these norms, and therefore who are marginalized by systems of oppression, such as women and people marginalized for their gender, people of color, queer and trans people, and disabled people, are expected to be more flexible to suit those who hold the privilege. For example, autistic and otherwise neurodivergent people are expected to mask in order to appear more neurotypical. Queer people have often had to attempt to pass a strait or keep their queerness a secret to remain safe in straight spaces. And black people often have to code switch and assimilate in order to remain safe in our white supremacy culture. This white supremacy culture, when combined with the capitalist society that we all operate under, also puts a huge weight on the amount that we are able to achieve, which Tima Okun describes as progress is bigger slash more in her white supremacy culture characteristics. Progress is bigger slash more explains the way that we, as a capitalist society, always seem to be striving for more, bigger, or better. We define success as having more money, more employees, a bigger house, more cars, more holidays, etc. When in reality, that might not feel like success to many people. This way of thinking does not allow for the fact that people might have their own personal definitions of progress or success, and that progress might be nonlinear or less visible from an outside perspective. It also does not account for the cost that comes with progress. For example, I might be seen as more and more successful as I gain more followers on social media, but there is no consideration of the fact that this means that I might be under more pressure, might have to commit more time to the work, or might not be able to enjoy certain spaces in the same way anymore. This is obviously an incredibly privileged example. It is just the first thing that sprang to mind. Defining progress as bigger or more also causes us to value those who have progressed over those who haven't. For example, those who have climbed up the corporate ladder, built a large business, bought expensive houses, or gained multiple degrees. How progress is bigger slash more affects the way we see flexibility and executive functioning. An emphasizing bigger slash more creates an environment with constant pressure to achieve and earn more, work faster and juggle more plates, which means that the executive functioning skills of flexibility is deemed to have huge significance, which we are always striving to achieve more and work at a faster pace. We're faced with more changes and challenges to overcome and are expected to overcome or adapt to them at a much faster pace. This added significance is also placed on some of our other executive functioning skills. Task initiation, prioritization, planning and organization. Additionally, we are constantly encouraged to add more to our plate, take on more projects, or do more complicated things. Instead of being able to focus on maintaining our current levels of functioning and increasing our happiness and confidence. This means we're constantly having to be flexible in switching between all these tasks or projects, rather than being content focusing on one thing at a time and doing it well. This mindset can set unrealistic expectations of progress or success, causing frustration, stress, and a sense of failure if you cannot meet these incredibly high standards. Additionally, in patriarchal, heteronormative relationships and marriages, women are generally still expected to take on unpaid roles as homemakers, which often includes taking on the majority of childcare responsibilities. This means we're constantly having to be flexible in switching between all these tasks or projects, rather than being content focusing on one thing at a time and doing it well. This mindset can set unrealistic expectations of progress or success, causing frustration, stress, and sense of failure if you cannot meet these incredibly high standards. This requires a great deal of flexibility, as looking after a young baby who can only communicate their needs by crying is perhaps one of the environments which requires us to adapt the most. A mother might think a baby is crying because they are hungry, and therefore go to feed them, but then find that they are not interested in their bottle, and so they have to adapt and problem solve to work out what it is that their child is trying to communicate, and therefore how to meet their needs. Then, as the child grows older, mothers are often required to stop what they are doing at the drop of a hat in order to meet the child's needs. Whether this is rushing from work to pick them up from school if they are unwell, stopping what they are doing in order to comfort the child if they are upset, or interrupting their evening routine if the child isn't able to sleep. Life becomes even more unpredictable when you have a whole other human to take care of, which requires an even greater deal of flexibility to work around. Finally, as touched on above, I believe that the ableism and neuronormativity that are present throughout our society mean that neurodivergent and disabled people are required to be disproportionately flexible compared to their neurotypical or non-disabled counterparts. As an autistic ADHD who is in the minority in most social and professional environments, it is almost always on me to adapt to the people around me, rather than them adapting to my needs or even meeting me in the middle. I don't pick up on the same cues, whether that's facial expressions or nonverbal communication, and I can't read between the lines like the other people in the room. So I am having to navigate situations and conversations with a huge amount of missing context. This tied with the ostracization and exclusion that most of us have faced throughout our lives. Means that we are often hyper-vigilant and walking on eggshells to adapt and change our tone of voice, communication style, facial expressions, body language, and overall ways of being in order to stop things from going off course. This requires a huge amount of flexibility, a skill which we know is already delayed or affected in neurodivergent people, and so it is no surprise that our capacity to adapt to other circumstances or changes might be delated. How can we support ourselves with flexibility? As with all the executive functioning skills that we'll be exploring throughout the book, flexibility is a huge important unnecessary skill. As much as I'd like it to be otherwise, the world around us is always changing and will continue to change for as long as it exists. This happens both on the macro level, like cultural changes as we move towards more inclusive and accessible society, and on the micro level, like having to adapt your plans last minute thanks to a change in the weather, and can be both positive and negative, or a combination of the two. Change is inevitable, and we are always going to have to be able to adapt to it. That is human nature. However, as we have explored above, many of the examples, the expectations placed on marginalized people to be flexible and adapt their ways of working, thinking, communicating, and being or impacted by the systems of oppression and biases in our society. Yes, we will always have to adapt to change, but we should never have to adapt who we are in order to be accepted, included, or safe. As I have often said when I felt deflated, after having to leave an environment because of sensory overload causing a meltdown or shutdown, this is never a personal failing on your part. It is an accessibility failing on the part of the venue or event organizer. Obviously, the world we live in is far from perfect, and it is often necessary for those of us who are marginalized by multiple systems of oppression to adapt and change our behaviors to remain safe. And this is especially true of black people, people of colour, and trans people. However, I am hopeful that over time we will see a more inclusive and accepting society which allows us to let go of the expectation that we have to adapt who we are depending on our surroundings. I am also a big believer that being inflexible in certain situations gives us more capacity to be flexible in others. We are faced with a huge number of changes, challenges, and decisions every single day, which can be increasingly overwhelming. But by maintaining consistency across certain situations and decisions, we ease off some of the pressure that is constantly applied to our cognitive flexibility. One example of this is the infamous Steve Jobs uniform. Steve Jobs, the late co-founder and CEO of Apple, became notorious for wearing the same signature look every day: a black turtleneck, blue jeans, and a pair of new balance trainers. He would wear this same combination of clothes each day, no matter where he was going, what he was doing, or who he was meeting. It is claimed that his reasoning for doing this, so was that he knew that the less time he made making mundane decisions like about what to wear, the more time, energy, and capacity he had for the things that were more important to him, like bigger decisions and creativity. In a 2012 interview with Vanity Fair, Barack Obama, then President of the United States, explained his reasoning behind making a similar decision. You'll see I only wear only grey or blue suits. I'm trying to pare down decisions. I don't want to make decisions about what I'm eating or wearing because I have too many other decisions to make. You need to focus your decision-making energy. You need to routinalize yourself. You can't be going through the day distracted by trivia. Essentially, flexibility is a necessary skill, but that does not mean it is necessary, or even a good idea. For us to be flexible about everything all the time, if maintaining rigidity, consistency, and reliability in certain aspects of your life eases your anxiety, feels more comfortable, and requires less energy, then that is a perfectly okay thing to do. Like all our executive functioning skills, it's about finding the balance of which expectations and norms we can let go of, and which are the times that flexibility is truly necessary, and then finding ways of supporting ourselves through these situations. The best way that I have found to support myself with being flexible in times of change and turbulence is to be inflexible and rigid in the things that are under my control, and therefore maintaining some level of consistency and safety throughout the change. This might look like sticking to the same morning routine every day, no matter what your plans are for the day, having the same breakfast every morning, sticking to the same bedtime every night, taking your own pillow when you go on holiday, having your same non-negotiables scheduled in, like going for a walk or reading before bed, even when the rest of your schedule is all over the place. Listening to the same songs on repeat throughout times of change. Locating a safe food at a fast food chain that's widely available across the globe. I know I can get my McNuggets fix if I'm feeling low, whether I'm at home in Manchester, in London for work, or abroad on holiday. A list of things that are absolutely fine. Sticking to a routine that suits you and asking other people and their demands to work around that. Rather than you always having to work around them, needing a little bit of extra time to get used to changes or switch between different tasks. Saying no to something you previously said yes to, if the expectations or demands change and would have influenced your decision had you known that information to start off with. Having non-negotiable rules such as only being able to travel if you have three days' notice, or needing an agenda within a certain amount of time before a meeting. Admitting you were previously wrong and updating your views, thoughts, or beliefs as you learn. This one is a very tricky one, I know. Doing things a certain way or following certain routines if doing so eases your anxiety or makes you feel better, even if these things don't make sense to other people. Showing up as yourself in different environments, whether that's wearing what you feel most comfortable in, not wearing makeup when you might be expected to, or communicating in the same way no matter what you're communicating with. Eating the same things every day or wearing the same clothes every day, or buying multiple of the same item of clothing so you can keep on wearing it even when one is in the wash. Needing to go over things or process things verbally when something changes to be able to get your head around it. Asking for extra information about a change before agreeing to it or going ahead. Tip 21, energy rating by Charlie Rewildling, she her autistic and ADHD content creator and writer. My energy fluctuates day-to-day. I struggle to intuitively predict how long tasks will take, and I often find it difficult to take breaks and shift between tasks. This makes day-to-day life stressful and challenging. Before I understood my brain, I internalized these challenges and felt like I was stupid. But now that I understand my brain better, I use certain tactics that help make daily tasks more accessible to me while simultaneously managing my energy levels. For example, I realize that traditional to-do lists don't help me with day-to-day living. But there are a few ways I can adapt my to-do lists to make it more likely that I complete the tasks I have while mitigating my risk of burning out. My main consideration now is not how much I can get done in a specific period of time, but instead how much energy I have available to allocate between tasks. I colour code my to-do list with green, meaning this task will take minimal energy. Yellow, meaning this task will take a fair amount of energy. Red, meaning this task will take a lot of energy. Depending on the energy I have for a given day, I use this visual color-coded system to help me prioritize tasks or shift them to another day. For example, I might focus on green-coded tasks on days when I'm lacking energy because I have been faced with a last minute change of my plans. Or, if I wake up with more energy than I was anticipating, I might choose to tackle the red coded tasks first. Having this colour-coded system allows me to adjust to changing circumstances and demands while reminding me to prioritize my needs and feel accomplished in completing daily tasks. You can write out your own to-do list in a table with space to colour each code, each task, by how much energy it will take. Feel free to copy the table out into your own notebook or planner if you need more space. One side says to-do and the other side says energy rating. Tip 22 Four Quadrants. As a perfectionist and black and white thinker, thanks to being an autistic ADHD, I often struggle with feeling as though if one thing has gone wrong, that's the whole day written off as a bad one. Didn't start working at exactly 9 a.m. on the dot? Well then, I failed. And it's going to be a rubbish day. Haven't had a productive morning? I may as well give up for the day. I personally do work best first thing in the morning. Because if I don't start the day in work mode, I struggle to transition into it later on. More on this later in the chapter. But this is one really hard handy tip that can help you work around that all or nothing thinking. Instead of thinking about your day as one long day, you can split it into four quadrants. Quadrant 1 morning, 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. Quadrant 2, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Quadrant 3 afternoon 2pm to 5pm Quadrant 4 evening 5pm to 8pm. Feel free to shift the timings either way if you're more of an early bird or night owl. It's the concept of splitting it into four chunks that matters. Then when planning out your day, you're going to assign tasks, to-dos, or activities to a specific quadrant. That way, for example, your morning quadrant feels completely unproductive. Not to worry. You have three more chances to start a game from scratch. It's no longer the case that the whole day is ruined or the whole day is going to be unproductive. It was simply a bad quadrant. There is nothing groundbreaking about this tip, but sometimes it is the simplest reframing that helps us the most. We know that we're prone to thinking about thinking in a very all or nothing black and white way. So we can work around that by putting these boundaries into place. Opposite you'll find an example of a four-quadrant temple to split your day with. Bonus tip. Try to stick to one main activity per quadrant if you can. For example, clump together all admin tasks into one quadrant. Task switching can be difficult for busy brains. And regardless of neurotype, jumping between loads of different tasks most likely isn't going to be the most productive way of working. So we have a table. We have quadrant one, two, three, and four. For example, quadrant one says self-care, so shower, eat breakfast, get dressed, do hair, do makeup, plan for the day. Quadrant two is admin tasks, so catch up on emails, complete quick ticks, order prescription, post social media posts, plan content for next week. Quadrant three is creative tasks, record video, edit video, design cover thumbnail for video. Quadrant four is debrief and unwind, so update to-dos with what I've managed to get done, check throughout calendar for tomorrow to make sure I'm prepared. switch off by going for a walk, Make dinner. Tip 23. Winning with waiting mode. One of the things that makes it tricky for me to be flexible is something called waiting mode, a term coined by the ADHD community to explain the frame of mind they often get stuck in when they know they have something coming up later on in the day and therefore can't get anything done beforehand. If, for example, I know I have an appointment at 2pm, the whole day beforehand I'm stuck in waiting mode, counting the seconds until 2pm comes around. For me, I think this comes from a few different places. 1. Working memory. As we discussed in chapter 1, working memory neurodivergent folks can often struggle to juggle as many things at once because of their differences in working memory capacity. If we use that 2pm appointment as an example for me, I know that if I stop thinking about it for a second, it would be so easy for me to forget about it because of all the other stuff that's flying around my brain at any one time. So instead I cling on to thinking about it to make sure I don't miss it. 2. Hyperfocus. Similarly, with a brain that's prone to hyperfocusing, it would be easy to completely miss an appointment. Hyperfocus refers to a really intense state of focus, fixation, or interest in a certain activity for an extended period. It can be explained as a more intense version of neurotypical flow state, or feeling of being in the zone. You become so engrossed in the task at hand that you almost forget the rest of the world around you exists, including any appointments that might be scheduled in for that time. 3. Time blindness. Many ADHDers also experience time blindness, which explains the way that we tend to think of time as now or not now, and find it difficult to judge how long something might take or how much time has passed. Especially if we're in one of those hyperfocused states mentioned above. For this reason, it can be tricky for us to work out what we'd be able to get done between now and our 2 pm appointment, because we have no gauge for what that length of time feels like, leaving us stuck in waiting mode. 4. Decision freeze. Decision freeze, also frequently known as decision paralysis, explains the way that neurodivergent people, ADHDs and autistic people especially, may become overwhelmed when there are too many decisions at hand, and therefore not be able to make any decisions at all. For me, this feels like my brain is unable to compute all the different choices, and the pros and cons for each of these choices, and I need to shower, but I want to go to the gym at some point today, so there's no point in showering before I go to the gym. So I should shower first, but I need to eat before I go to the gym. So I should eat first and then gym and then shower, but I'll need to wait some time between eating and going to the gym. So do I have time to go to the gym? If I eat, that might take about 10 minutes, and then I might need an hour to let my food sett. And then it's 10 minutes to go to the gym. And then how long do I usually spend in the gym? Maybe an hour? And then I can shower. Does that take about 20 minutes? And then I need 10 minutes to get back. But I know that I usually get distracted, so I probably need to allow an extra hour in total to make sure I'm not late for an appointment. Actually, I think my car probably needs some petrol before I set off. So how far out the way is that? And how long will it take for me to get to the appointment? So do I have time for all of that? And then, because I've spent so much time going backwards and forwards about all the different options and ideas, my brain becomes incredibly overwhelmed and decides, actually, we won't do any of that. And I just get stuck in waiting mode until the appointment. Although it's easy to understand why waiting mode comes about, it can still be incredibly annoying sometimes. It wastes big chunks of time when you could be getting on with something important, and also can just feel torturous when you're an impatient, impulsive ADHD. However, I've found a few ways that you can beat waiting mode. Where possible, schedule all meetings and appointments as early as you can. That way you can get them out the way first thing in the morning, and then have the rest of the day to do what you please instead of waiting around for an afternoon appointment. Start recording and making a list of how long certain tasks generally take. That way you know exactly which you can do and can't fit into the time between now and your appointment. Without having to get stuck in the chaotic cycle of thoughts we went through above, you can find some space to do this on the following page. If you do have any appointments in the afternoon, set alarms or reminders for them on your phone or home assistant, like Suri or Alexa. If you set a reminder for say 10 minutes before the start of the appointment or before you need to leave the house, you know that no matter how engrossed you get in a task, you won't miss your appointment later. So now we have a table which says task, and opposite that it says how long it takes. Tip 24. Inertia insight. Another thing that can make being flexible tricky is autistic inertia. To understand what autistic inertia is, it's helpful to start by defining what actual inertia is. In physics, inertia explains the tendency of objects to stay in their current state. Objects that are already in motion will stay in motion, and objects that are at rest will stay at rest unless an external force causes their speed or direction to change. Hypothetically, if you were to push an object in a perfect vacuum without any gravity, friction, or air resistance to slow it down, that object would continue to move forever in the same direction. Similarly, an object that is still will never move unless acted upon by an outside force. Once we understand inertia, we can put this into the context of autistic inertia. Autistic inertia is the tendency that autistic people have to want to remain in a constant state. As Quincy Hansen explains in the speaking of autism, when we're asleep, we want to stay asleep. When we're awake, we want to stay awake. When we're working on one thing, we want to keep working on it. When we're doing one thing, we want to keep doing that one time, that one thing, etc. Now, yes, this tendency exists in everybody, but you must understand that this is often significantly more produced in autistic people. This explains the way that it can be really tricky for us to go from not doing anything to starting a task. And similarly, once we get into our flow with a task, it can be really hard for us to stop or switch to another task. This might explain the way that you say just one minute when someone asks you to stop what you're doing, because it's hard to force your brain to a hard stop. And quite often even neurotypical people can accidentally keep doing it for another long while. Imagine that feeling but on every task, hobby, and action throughout every day. This concept of autistic inertia can be applied on a more macro scale too. For example, when I'm going through a really busy period of time, even if I know that I need to rest, it can be really hard for me to transition out of my state of busyness. And once I do manage to stop, for example, when everything winds down around Christmas and New Year's time, it can be really tricky to get back into the swing of things. Autistic inertia is something that I really struggle with personally. And when researching tips to include in this Book, I came across a suggestion on Reddit from user timorous Alice that made me audibly gasp because of how genius it was, and I knew I needed to include it to share with you. To help with autistic inertia. When switching between tasks or states, you need to find something that can stay constant across both states. Timorus Alice gave the example of playing an audiobook and explained, I put on the audiobook on my phone while doing task A and keep listening while I start task B. It gives me a little bit of consistency between the two tasks, softening the transition a little. You could also replicate this with putting the same song or album on repeat, listening to a podcast, playing with a fidget toy that you continue to play with when you shift tasks, starting a phone call during task A, which you continue through to task B. The idea is to keep something consistent between the two tasks so that while you are still transitioning, some of your experience is staying constant. This way, your brain isn't as aware of the fact that it's being made to transition. Tip 25, Trial Run by Neurodivergent Lu Shiher, Autistic Content Creator. Being autistic feels like navigating a world where everyone else holds a secret rulebook, guiding them effortlessly through the nuances of daily life. A rulebook that tells them what to do, how to be, and the expected sequence of events. Yet, for some reason, as neurodivergent people, it can feel like we are missing the shared rulebook, navigating in darkness. This feeling of unpredictability becomes particularly amplified when visiting new places for the first time. Autistic brains process on average 42% more information at rest, and processing information about new environments can be even more demanding. Combine this with amplified sensory input, a change in routine and emotional regulation struggles, and there is potential for disaster, such as meltdowns, shutdowns, or feeling very overwhelmed. Yet one way that I have found to constantly avoid being thrown by new places is by using Google Earth Street View to virtually walk through the route before I do it. It allows me to view exactly what the place will look like in advance. I know don't go anywhere new without seeing the place or virtually walking the route. Whether I am going to a supermarket, office, a hospital appointment, or the train station. Throughout my life as a neurodivergent human, I have tried and tested many strategies to create predictability, but this is the one I always come back to. It gives me a chance to work with the detail-oriented nature of my brain, rather than working against it. To have the opportunity to process the environment in my own time and space before I am fully immersed in it. It turns what feels like an out-of-control situation into a situation that is manageable. It makes the unpredictable feel predictable. It creates a concrete visual reference rather than relaying on an abstract idea in my head. For autistic people, imagining what a place looks like without a visual reference can be impossible. Looking at places and routes in advance can help to regulate emotions too, reducing the potential anxiety and distress associated with new environments. Not only does it help with processing the environment, but using Street View can help us recognize potential triggers in a new environment too. It lets us prepare for and mitigate these challenges. For example, recognizing where an environment might be really busy and difficult to navigate, or where sensory overload may be triggered. It empowers us to be able to accommodate ourselves whether that is by using noise-cancelling headphones to reduce the layers of noise in the environment or traveling an alternative route. Flexibility recap. Our fifth executive functioning skill, flexibility, describes our ability to switch between tasks and demands in response to changes in the environment. It is the skill which allows us to adapt and change our behavior depending on different contexts or stimuli in our world. In an ever-changing world, flexibility is one of the most important skills allowing us to stay safe, adapt to our surroundings, problem solve, move between different tasks, and keep up with the challenging demands that are placed on us. However, as with all the executive functioning skills we have explored so far, the ways that we are currently expected to adapt and change rely on us compromising on or even moving completely away from our brain's natural ways of thinking, working and being. While flexibility has its benefits, sometimes remaining rigid around our routines, decisions, and structures frees up the brain space that we need to focus on the big decisions and changes while reducing anxiety and leaving our nervous systems feeling regulated. In this chapter, we have explored what flexibility is, the systems which have affected the way we think about flexibility, some ways we can support ourselves with flexibility, five things to consider putting in place with your flexibility. Your takeaway box. Flexibility is vital in being able to adapt according to changing circumstances, But you should never be expected to change who you are as a person in order to feel included, safe, or accepted. Changing the way that you think about things or problem solving to work around a change of plans are necessary ways of keeping up with the world around you, but that shouldn't require you to be flexible on your non-negotiables, your values, or the ways of being that come naturally to you as a neurodivergent person. By remaining rigid in some areas of life, for example, by following routines, having structures in place, and standardizing certain decisions, we free up the brain space, we need to be flexible in other, more important or necessary areas. It's okay to wear the same clothes, eat the same food, or follow the same morning routine every day if that is what makes you feel the most comfortable. By being aware of our own thought patterns and the changes that generally feel most difficult for us, we can support ourselves to feel more comfortable throughout changing circumstances that might otherwise be overwhelming or anxiety-inducing. We cannot exactly predict the problems that we're going to face each day, or the things that are going to throw us off, but we can prepare ourselves with a plan B or tools that help us feel calmer throughout these changes. Right. This is the end of this episode. I really hope you enjoyed this episode. We were on to chapter 6 next, planning and prioritization. I cannot believe we have done more than half of this book already, and I just I love the idea that I gave myself that I'm gonna do like a little book club every week just to help me read, and I have listeners, and it's so great. I'm so happy. So as we are nearing the end of this book, I think I have an idea of what book I would like to read next. It is going to be about DGLG, adult babies, but I know there's many, many thousands, millions of books out there. So if anybody has any suggestions, because by the end of the year, maybe by the end of November, we will have a new book, which is crazy to think about. Like, I'm actually reading, we are reading. But thank you very much, guys, for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a like, please give a follow. And yeah, thank you so much for supporting the podcast. This has been Paulson Victoria with Behind the Padder Podcast.

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