Cross Referencial Thinking

[FayetheADHDsquirrel]

Does anyone else relate strongly to making a lot of cross referencial associations (eg. someone offers you cotton candy but the fluffyness reminds you of some cumulous clouds you saw outside so instead of answering yes or no you blurt out something like "Those were some beautiful clouds this morning weren't they!" or you glance up at the ceiling and the texture reminds you of cottage cheese so you start commenting on how long it's been since you ate cottage cheese with potato chips or someone says "Oh no! The coffee mug has a chip on it!" and you instantly blurt out "Those really were some of the best barbeque chips ever weren't they?!" Then you have to backtrack the conversation and get the conversation straightened out.

 

[Outdated]

Although I don't usually blurt out irrelevant comments that's almost exactly how my memory works, and also why I'm able to remember so much more than most people.

All of my memories are tied in to each other so much that it's not really possible for me to forget things. I might struggle to recall a particular memory on demand but if given the right trigger that same memory will jump to the forefront of my mind unbidden.

(that sort of memory is different to trying to remember where I put my glasses down or trying to remember an appointment date)

 

[Jumpinbare]

Although I don't usually blurt out irrelevant comments that's almost exactly how my memory works, and also why I'm able to remember so much more than most people.

All of my memories are tied in to each other so much that it's not really possible for me to forget things. I might struggle to recall a particular memory on demand but if given the right trigger that same memory will jump to the forefront of my mind unbidden.

(that sort of memory is different to trying to remember where I put my glasses down or trying to remember an appointment date)

Wow, Outdated, you literally made all my points for me. I tell people I have a photographic memory, but that all the pictures are randomly tossed in a shoebox where I can't just pull out what I'm looking for but it's all in there. When there is a trigger, suddenly memories pop out in fresh detail.

When I was first doing my post diagnosis research to disprove said diagnosis, one of my objections was that I didn't have meltdowns. I honestly believed that, until a memory of my grandmother brought back a conversation with her when I was still young where she told me if I didn't get my angry outbursts under control I might have a stroke. That memory triggered memories of intense rage I had had back then which objectively looking back could only be considered meltdowns. Yesterday, I was listening to an old song that triggered memories of the time where I left a stable job due to extreme burnout. It was a shock, because when I read about burnout, I believed I had never had it, but the feelings the song trigggered brought the memory of that time back clearly.

In Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agecny, the main character touted "the fundamental interconnectedness of all things". I loved the expression, because that's how my memory has always worked.

 

[Shamar]

Does anyone else relate strongly to making a lot of cross referencial associations (eg. someone offers you cotton candy but the fluffyness reminds you of some cumulous clouds you saw outside so instead of answering yes or no you blurt out something like "Those were some beautiful clouds this morning weren't they!" or you glance up at the ceiling and the texture reminds you of cottage cheese so you start commenting on how long it's been since you ate cottage cheese with potato chips or someone says "Oh no! The coffee mug has a chip on it!" and you instantly blurt out "Those really were some of the best barbeque chips ever weren't they?!" Then you have to backtrack the conversation and get the conversation straightened out.

I do something like this all the time. Someone will say something that triggers an old memory that is unrelated but still relevant. Drives people crazy. Good, the more people like me, the better.

 

[Neonatal RRT]

Does anyone else relate strongly to making a lot of cross referencial associations (eg. someone offers you cotton candy but the fluffyness reminds you of some cumulous clouds you saw outside so instead of answering yes or no you blurt out something like "Those were some beautiful clouds this morning weren't they!" or you glance up at the ceiling and the texture reminds you of cottage cheese so you start commenting on how long it's been since you ate cottage cheese with potato chips or someone says "Oh no! The coffee mug has a chip on it!" and you instantly blurt out "Those really were some of the best barbeque chips ever weren't they?!" Then you have to backtrack the conversation and get the conversation straightened out.

That is a beautiful mind at work... being able to make connections like that. I know, your examples seem to be a bit silly... but if applied in a scientific or artistic way, that creative process and thinking can be very useful.

 

[FayetheADHDsquirrel]

It can come in handy at times. For example, not being able to retrieve a can or jar from the top shelf at the grocery store so you take off and come skipping back excitedly with a curve topped walking cane, hook it around desired product, slide it forward and TAA- DAA!

 

[Outdated]

It can come in handy at times. For example, not being able to retrieve a can or jar from the top shelf at the grocery store....

My mother was really short - 5 foot nothing. When I was in my teens she used to take me shopping with her because I could reach things on the top shelf. One day I asked her what she was going to do after I leave home and she said "The same as I did when you were little." then started climbing the shelves.

 

[Masked Man]

I may think these things but I hardly ever say them because it tends to demonstrate to the other person that I wasn't listening. I have found that people don't like that.

 

[Tired]

That would make me think that you are slightly low intelligence. One thing is having connections in your mind (we all have that), another one is blurting them out and expecting another person to understand.

 

[Judge]

Do you consider this a voluntary process to cross-reference something which may or may not be related, or is it an involuntary process ?

I ask, wondering about the possibilities of how some of us may process a conversation or part of an exchange that we were not actually prepared for. Particularly if this amounts to an involuntary reaction. Which might also have roots in OCD.

That it might amount to our way of "filling a void" where otherwise our reaction might amount to being speechless, which can be that much more awkward.

 

[FayetheADHDsquirrel]

That would make me think that you are slightly low intelligence. One thing is having connections in your mind (we all have that), another one is blurting them out and expecting another person to understand.

I have 99th percentile vocabulary, come up with poems to describe some of my own photographs, and come up with my own original riddles. Some of my riddles require esoteric knowledge to find the answer. I have also given someone a gift before with a poem that had my name hidden within the wording and teased in a couple of the lines that if they looked closely they would find that it had indeed been signed.

 

[FayetheADHDsquirrel]

@Judge I think it is the hyperactive/impulsive traits of ADHD perhaps fueled by a hyperthymic leaning temperament. Part of it may be as simple as personality.

 

[Tired]

I have 99th percentile vocabulary, come up with poems to describe some of my own photographs, and come up with my own original riddles. Some of my riddles require esoteric knowledge to find the answer. I have also given someone a gift before with a poem that had my name hidden within the wording and teased in a couple of the lines that if they looked closely they would find that it had indeed been signed.

I know that you are smart, I am telling you how you may look in the eyes of the NT who doesn't know you.

 

[Dagan]

This style of thinking is exactly why I catch contradictions and point them out so often. I don't even want to find them. They either exist, or they don't. Oops.

 

[TBRS1]

I do this all the time.

It slows down my speaking because I have to sort out "stuff they need to know" from "stuff that is mentally related in my mind."

It is most obvious when I write (actually type). I write 10 pages, then edit down to 2.

Subjectively, I feel like I am dumbing stuff down, but objectively, I am removing non essential junk for clarity.

 

[Jumpinbare]

Subjectively, I feel like I am dumbing stuff down, but objectively, I am removing non essential junk for clarity.

This was the hardest thing for me to learn about writing. "Of course" everyone wants to share all the rich related details associated with my main writing point! I mean, who would want to turn down free knowledge? /S.

It was the mandatory effective writing course I took in the Air Force that convinced me not include the "bonus information".

 

[the_tortoise]

(that sort of memory is different to trying to remember where I put my glasses down or trying to remember an appointment date)

I think I might understand this. For myself, it would be because I might have countless memories of my glasses in the past day alone, and none of them are time-stamped because truly not a single memory I have is ever naturally time-stamped -- nor automatically organized in any kind of linear sequence, let alone a temporal linear sequence. I have to work out when something happened by context clues, always, or I can't do it.

None of my memories are stored with time as a salient piece of information ... it probably sounds weird to say, but time doesn't really exist as a thing for me like it seems to for everyone else -- I have almost zero sense of it, i struggled to form any concept of it at all as a child, my mind doesn't naturally store time-related data, and it's very hard for me to work with. Yesterday and 20 years ago don't actually feel different, even though I know intellectually they are - and the memories that are of yesterday contain different emotional and physical context than memories that are from 20 years ago.

 

[the_tortoise]

I may think these things but I hardly ever say them because it tends to demonstrate to the other person that I wasn't listening. I have found that people don't like that.

That is sad - I know what you mean but it is sad, because (unless I misunderstand you) it actually shows you were listening...it's just that your brain does more lateral associative thinking and takes you from one topic to another in a tiny fraction of a second.

It can be exhausting trying to sort out whether whatever comes to mind may be relevent or interesting/of use to the other person and/or how to explain its relevence.

One of my most cherished and, for me, truly relaxing friends to be around was another person with severe combined type ADHD who may have been on spectrum...we could (and did - really it was the only way we normally spoke to each other) have conversations where, to an outsider, it would probably have looked like we were just talking at each other, randomly jumping from thing to thing and not with each other -- but we were in fact talking with each other, and listening, and both remembered quite a lot of what the other person said, as we could show when it mattered

 

[the_tortoise]

That would make me think that you are slightly low intelligence. One thing is having connections in your mind (we all have that), another one is blurting them out and expecting another person to understand.

People also should learn not to assume things about others based on superficial things that could have many explanations.

There are all kinds of ways to be in this world, and to interact with each other, and one is not always better than any other - what matters is if participants in an interaction feel safe and respected and value the exchange, and nobody is harmed.

(And yes I know that typical communicators are harmed by the perception someone is not listening to them or moving away from a topic they want and/or need to stay on - that is important, too -- but it strikes me as unfairly judgy, what you say; And I say this despite being pretty sure you intended your comment as helpful feedback, and that it may be exactly that to many. But it can be helpful and unfairly judgemental simultaneously, and imo demonstrates widespread social ignorance and a pervasive tendency of people in general to jump to huge conclusion based on small things.)

 

[MildredHubble]

All of my memories are tied in to each other so much that it's not really possible for me to forget things. I might struggle to recall a particular memory on demand but if given the right trigger that same memory will jump to the forefront of my mind unbidden.

I tell people I have a photographic memory, but that all the pictures are randomly tossed in a shoebox where I can't just pull out what I'm looking for but it's all in there. When there is a trigger, suddenly memories pop out in fresh detail.

YES!! YESSSSS! Both of these pretty much exactly describe how my experience with memory works. It feels so vindicating to see other people describe the same experience when people look at me like I'm nuts when I've talked about it.

I've often said that I have very good memory, probably almost photographic, but I dont get to choose how memories are stored. It kinda seems like memories are categorized by context or theme. I've often been told (by people in mental health roles) that "I need to learn to let go of past experiences" or that I "spend all my time thinking about past events" they can't seem to understand that I'm not actively focusing on things that I find distressing. It's actually more that if I look at an object I will remember huge amounts of things that are associated with it.

Trying to explain to people that focusing on something I find comforting is not going to work for me as I will also, by necessity, recall things that are deeply distressing. I can't forget because it's like my memories are in a nested linked list of linked lists.

I try and explain that its not just unpleasant things I will remember, I remember completely mundane things just as readily. Its just that the mundane things aren't upsetting or distressing.

I don't have much control over what a random object or situation might cause me to remember. Someone might say "Do you like Kit-Kat biscuits" and immediately I'll think of how they used to have the word "Roundtree's" etched into the chocolate, people used to slide their fingernail across the foil wrapper to cut through it like in the advert, which had a scarecrow who would climb down from his mount to "have a break, have a kit-kat...", I cut my finger when I was 3 trying to replicate the fingernail thing, then I remember my abusive grandmother being in the room last time I remember seeing the advert on our old Fidelity woodgrain TV, which would often break down. When we were loaned a portable Fidelity TV with a remote control, I discovered our TV responded to the remote control and even had teletext...

Its like a cascade. But from everyone else's perspective I was asked " Do you want a Kit-Kat?" and I replied "Oh that reminds me, our old TV from 35 years ago was remote controlled and had teletext built in and we weren't aware..."