My daughter in law came downstairs last night and she was saying how she really wished my son could just stop and rest and empty his mind for a while. I'm sure I gave her a confused look then she continued. "He's always working, planning or doing something. He even comes to bed with his notebook making plans for work projects." By the way, he loves what he does and is really good at it - wood working/carpentry. She was saying she wished he could just relax and clear his head and think of absolutely nothing. I said, that's impossible. She said, no, she does it all the time.
HOW??? I can't not be doing something. I can't sit and watch tv and not be doing something else. And I definitely can't stop the thinking or turn it off. It's a continuous cycle, never ending, never slowing down. Are some people really capable of turning off their thoughts, clearing their heads, emptying their minds? And I always went to bed with a notepad and pen, too. Thinking and planning what next project I want to start on. It's even harder on my mind when I slow down. It's like if I'm busy, my mind is working at a slower pace because I'm having to keep part of it on what I'm doing. When I'm not doing something my mind is absolutely going crazy - shifting thoughts so fast it's hard to keep up with them. In a 30 second time span my mind will go to memories that make me feel guilty or sad, to wants, to plans, to possibilities and probably 50 other subjects. So I guess you can say, at rest my mind is going about 60 subjects a minute, when at work it's only going 30 subjects a minute because between each subject it has to revert back to what I'm doing.
This is one of those things I wish I knew what it was like to be neurotypical. Not saying I want to be that - just give me a day to feel what it's like.