Solving executive dysfunction: a more holistic approach

Have you ever found yourself buried under a mountain of work, procrastinating more than ever despite your best intentions?

Or maybe you're a fountain of groundbreaking business ideas that, frustratingly, remain just that—ideas, because when it's time to roll up your sleeves, you hit an invisible barrier.

Or maybe, it's the starting-and-stopping dilemma that seems to impair the quality of your professional life?

If these scenarios resonate with you, especially as a sensitive and neurodiverse individual, you might be grappling with something known as executive dysfunction. But worry not—I'm here to guide you through understanding executive dysfunction and tackling it properly.

What Exactly Is Executive Dysfunction?

In traditional terms, executive dysfunction refers to difficulties in managing and regulating cognitive processes crucial for goal-directed behavior.

This often manifests as challenges in planning, organizing, strategizing, paying attention to and remembering details, and managing time and space.

That course whose creation has been on your to-do list for months?

You'll start tomorrow.

The client you need to call to see if he's in or out?

Not today.

The invoice that needs to be sent or the bill that needs to be paid?

You'll do it, just not now.

And so on and so forth.

Conventionally, remedies for executive dysfunction focus on establishing routines, adhering to to-do lists, and focusing on short-win strategies.

Yet, this approach frequently falls short when it comes to neurodiverse people.

Why?

Because it’s not about urgence/importance of the task (we know it’s very urgent and most of the time extremely important), but it’s our literal inability to do what we know needs to be done.

And that has very little to do with will power, determination, motivation or importance.

And has everything to do with the way we feel.

In other words, it’s not about what we do or don’t do.

It’s about how our feelings are enabling or disabling us to do anything.

The Interconnection Between Freeze State and Executive Dysfunction

The true antagonist in this drama is a perpetual sense of fear—ironically and illogically, a fear of success as much as a fear of failure/criticism/visibility.

Most of the time it’s both since both of those fears are merely different sides of the same coin.

This fear triggers trauma response,catapulting us into a freeze state (state of immobilization) which is further manifested as an executive dysfunction.

Imagine having all the knowledge, expertise, and talent at your fingertips, yet struggling with execution, consistency, and professional discipline.

This isn't just about procrastination; it's about being immobilized by your nervous system, which interprets our success or our failure as a direct threat to its survival.

Why Traditional Approaches Often Fail

The critical oversight in traditional methods is their failure to address the root cause of executive dysfunction which is fear itself and not lack of dopamine, poor organization skills or lack of will power. These are indeed present, but are nothing but symptoms, and not a root cause.

While many attribute this dysfunction to a shortage of neurochemicals like dopamine (hello, fellow ADHDers), I argue that this is merely a piece of the puzzle, not the cause. My experiences and observations have led me to understand that executive dysfunction is just the tip of the iceberg, masking a deeper issue: a nervous system response known as the freeze state.

It's Not Your Fault: Understanding the Trauma Response

It's crucial to recognize that freeze state is a trauma response, meaning you can't simply "think your way out" of this predicament because the issue doesn't reside in the mind.

Trauma resides in the body and not in the mind and can therefore not be extracted from the “place” in which it doesn’t exist.

It also means that your own nervous system is actually protecting you from success (and all the perceived danger it brings) or failure (and all the perceived danger it brings) by disallowing you to “go anywhere/do anything”.

Consequently, the pathway back to productivity necessitates a return to a state of safety first. Only upon establishing a sense of relative safety can we shift back into action mode.

A Novel Solution Beyond Deep Trauma Work

Ideally, we'd seek help and focus extensively on extracting trauma from our nervous system, dismantling our core beliefs, and continuously working on our mindset/emotion/energy.

And this is undoubtedly the best long-term strategy.

However, this approach carries the risk of pausing our passions, ideas, and projects until an undefined future time when we're healed or "healed enough," which I'm not particularly fond of.

So, while I find deep trauma work invaluable and highly recommend it, I've discovered an alternative solution for regaining control over executive dysfunction without constantly delving into the depths of one's psyche.

This involves daily efforts to create an environment and inner feeling of safety and stability through specifically designed short breathing exercises, self-soothing affirmations, therapeutic writing prompts, a guide for tea drinking practices, short exercise videos, and meditations.

The objective is to utilize these prompts and tools in a structured way to manage executive dysfunction on a daily basis, practicing feeling safe & stable through daily repetition until this mode of operation becomes second nature.

The aim is to train our nervous system to switch back to the rest & digest state and then to a proactive state on demand, aiding our return to a productive mode and completing the tasks we set for ourselves.

As we know, making any behavior habitual requires active repetition for 90 (minimum) to 120 days, on a daily basis. This practice is no exception.

Interested in Learning More?

If this method resonates with you, and you find yourself drawn to the idea of overcoming executive dysfunction with the support of emotional safety and stability, keep an eye out for more information coming your way soon!

I'm eager to dive deeper into this topic and share additional insights with you.

For those who feel a strong connection to this journey of navigating executive dysfunction and are seeking tailored advice, I invite you to schedule a discovery session with me. This will be our opportunity to explore:

• Our compatibility and how well we can work together

• The potential of my expertise to facilitate your growth

Until we connect,

Keep being extraordinary!

Witch mucho love and zero fluff,

Your girl

Tena