Empirical Ramparts of ADD: How a system of collaborative diversity may be singularly achieved (or not):

Empirical Ramparts of ADD:  How a system of collaborative diversity may be singularly achieved (or not):

It has been suggested that the seemingly random hops between areas of awareness and focus can potentially be harnessed in the presence of adequate meta-cognition and equitable splits between left/right brain personalities.

What follows is an empirical monologue.  Delivered “live”, in one Take, to try and expose the unbridled cognitive wanderings of a single person.  With the question being: has anything meaningful been produced, and could more or less, better or worse have been constructed by a group of more than one?

 

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It’s times like right now that need to be captured.  I've got 10 urgent things to do, from Mom’s birthday, to preparation for an art show, $3M in Legal Contracts to draft by Monday, 2 sorrowfully neglected minor companies that need tending, women, family, and entertainment (which ironically these days, is just a mind game of pretending that maybe some Work is not Work, and is thus Entertainment…..I fail to see the logic in my logic….)

From Business plans to love letters, BDSM Dungeon design to optimized architectural renderings of hospital Emergency Rooms:  Is there a difference?  Didn’t it all come from the same place? It’s not like 3 fingers on my right hand are responsible for the mathematics of Quantum Physics (but that is a very small point), with the other 2 reserved for Legal Contracts.  And what of my other hand, I often use it.  So by every right, its purpose is full, but not tidily aligned to say, charcoal sketches of Giraffes scampering across the grassy perceptions of the outdated shag carpeting that unfortunately adorns my living room, and at Minimum! Should soon be harvested and bailed.  The point being that a concurrent diversity of tasks with seeming similarities in Urgency, can’t exactly be delegated to small teams of my anatomy, with an agreement that we will all meet back together in an hour to discuss progress….”It dudn’t work like thut”, although the geezer in that British Advert can say it better than I can.  The point remains the same, even when the song does not, and that is in no way the fault of LZ!  So please do not take my words out of context and misquote me on that bit.

I tend to be most innovative/creative when its 4th and goal, score tied, 2 seconds on the clock, and I am playing offense, defense, head coach, offense coach, defense coach, team owner, and trying to build a cheerleading squad at the same time.  And I can tell you, that cheerleaders seem like all fun and games from a mile away in the bleacher seats, but they are in fact much better close-up( at least most of the time).

My style appears to be a perfect example of ADHD+CPA+Faux Multi-tasking mixed with Reali-tasking (reality + task list, where tactical reality drives priority, BUT, cross-pollination occurs rapidly and unexpectedly).

But the game is played in Fast Forward, and like a dream, once you wake up, you cannot go back. Why?  It simply is not understood in this day and age how to re-enter a dream after waking…..But I suppose that is not the point. 

I recorded a fantastic piece of video footage not long ago.  I mounted the camera facing sideways out of the car window, so instead of forward looking, what we see is a mess of a blur of “stuff” that smears by at somewhere between 60-100mph, depending.  So the question begging to be asked is: are you the seasoned quarterback? Or the side-liner, whose eyes get all watery from the rush of life screaming past you, kicking up all sort of detritus dislodged from your anchor-like baggage that kept you on the sidelines in the first place.

I will continue as long as you are all either with me, or against me, but, as the exact nature of your participation is completely irrelevant to what I am about to write( it will only be at some point in the future that your position will be determined anyway), so , since I don’t know the thoughts you will be thinking at some point in the future, I will carry on as if I don’t know…….but I do know that I need to focus on something, if I am to in any way expect some cohesiveness to this bit of writing.  Furthermore, I should also make best efforts to ensure that whatever I focus on is as singular as possible (or of course the purpose of focusing is defeated), and I should also make every effort to be relevant.  Well that needs to be qualified: I can write pretty much anything, and be relevant to something, someone, somewhere, at some time.  But even I could be convinced that relevancy should in this case contain pragmatic relevancy, and not so much philosophically vague relevancy. 

"NOW" creates a context of space-time bounded by Not only your deliberate consciousness/awareness, but also by our subconscious that never takes time off (because we include dreams) But the output from our subconscious is not something that can be actively managed with any certainty. The output can often be articulated, but there is no guarantee that what is presented will be useful, helpful or harmful.

But if you listen for the output, and pause to think about it, depending on your meta-cognitive abilities, there quite often is invaluable information included in the package being delivered from that elusive cognitive super computer that never turns off (but it might be even more correct to say that if it does turn off, “we”/I probably would not know…..)

Innovation is driven by the injection of diversity into a process.  Think about this: will a team of 5 people, with identical histories, and identical objectives, have less success at creating something new, than a team of 5 people who "seemingly" have nothing in common?

"Seemingly" being the key word because there is always a common denominator, or mode of knowledge transfer/communication that provides just enough cohesion to enable the crystallization and subsequent articulation of something truly new( at least to the group, if not anyone else.)

Now what if you took that team of 5 entirely diverse minds, and stuffed them into one cognitive entity (without completely fracturing personality)?

You just might end up with someone who, just like the team of 5 diverse people, is far more capable of driving innovation than the completely homogenous team that is bounded by the sameness of their individual experiences.

So you by now have come to anticipate the conclusion I am driving towards: IF you can provide a layer of cohesion across the top of the seemingly random hops between tasks so often observable when ADD is present (and no I am not suggesting something alarmist like MPD), and there is enough meta-cognition present to be aware of this cohesive layer, it may be possible to present a thesis that among some small number of people, ADD is a point of self-contained collaborative leverage. 

I also think that an obvious, tangible method of capturing this Cognitive "team", or at least Partially Managed Federation of Awareness Time Slices, comes in potentially 2 forms: that which must be cognitively perceived, I.e. Writing, or that which is sensorily perceived: Art. 

BUT, because of the complexity of the subject matter(s) you must not expect either form of tangible output to make sense to most people.

It must be translated from Actual, to commonly comprehensible

For example: I produce a picture, and it’s certainly going to represent something, nothing, or many things.

It all depends on who you are.

Same in my writing, most people have no idea what I am talking about when I produce an abstract poetic narrative piece, or even when I don’t. 

But if I explain it, or show a video that goes with it; I find the same to be true with my photos, it suddenly becomes obvious to the observer after everything is explained.  No magic there I suppose.

And while that observer might enjoy the pretty picture, or the catchy phrase in the middle of a 3 page narrative; that person will unlikely be able to extrapolate on the work, in any way. 

Now of course, that only matters depending on the reason the observer is observing.

Now look at the “pretty pictures” the “team” has put together.

What do you see?

Are you sure?

Does it matter?

Who. Are. You?  And what have you got to offer?

You see, the party is well hosted, the guest(s) completely shattered.

Schismaticus Rex rears his asymmetrically formed head, one eye looking there, the other looking here, and laughs in a mournful howl of delightful misery. 

But is it really a case of Multiple Reality Disorder?  I mean, after all, the party is contained under one roof, and the only real danger is to danger itself, for it faces the very real possibility of not being recognized, and does this not mean that within the Cognitive playground through which we are rompering, that maybe then it just doesn’t exist?  Like a vampire devoiding a mirror, unrecognized danger, that potentially bears no consequence, may not in fact exist.  And if that logic is not a perfect example of what could be real, trampling over what could real, then I don’t know what is.  But then again, that is precisely why we are here in the first place: I think it was during a great time of cognitive frenzy, in the midst of a very Cold War, that a formula was derived that used lots of Greek letters, and other pagan symbols of so called science, but demonstrated scientifically( which really just means on a chalkboard, as was the custom at the time) that the thoughts, traditionally classified as either distinctly Right Brained or Left brained, could occur at definable frequencies and amplitudes such that some very cool looking wave like patterns could be drawn in chalk.  I have also heard that under the right circumstances, this wave pattern could manifest audibly, and if the frequency and amplitude of these bipolarizations were just so, a harmonic was discernible, but only to dogs.  At the time this was not well understood (except to the poor dogs), and that is likely still true today, but I’ll bet dollars to dog-toys that Rover ain’t gonna tell you….

So how many licks does it take to get to the center of crazy?  I have absolutely no idea, and I cannot confirm or deny that I may or may not be seeking to answer this question.  Only time will tell, but like they say “Things that may only be understood , or at least only heard by dogs, are not easily explained to humans”, with the possible exception of a man named Sam, who, even by today’s standards would unlikely be referred to as a “dog whisperer”, he certainly did claim that he conversed regularly with his dog, who, may not have actually been the source of some very bad ideas, but I think it’s fair to say that as a team, the collaborative results were not exactly in line with the Dr. Doolittle sort of conversations that are the stuff of amusing children’s stories.

Enjoy it while you can. The Freedom that comes from being detached from reality does not often last long, and should be savored, for soon enough, Truth, crashes the crazy party and everyone is required to behave again.  I blame Hobbes.  Maybe wrongly so, be he’s the one who wrote it down….that if we desire an organized society, we have to play by the rules.  So maybe it’s not his fault, but I think we can all agree that he may have spoiled the party just a little…

In conclusion, I suppose I could say just about anything at this point, and no claim could be made that it was not consistent with main portions of this essay.  So I am faced with something of a dilemma: just how do you give a haircut to a Hydra? How do you “end cap” streaking trails of every snap, crackle and pop from the Grand Finale of a 4^th of July fireworks extravaganza?  If this were a movie, we could sort of just fade to black I suppose.  If this were a stage production, we could swing close the curtains. But what could we say that would be the literary equivalent of these “accepted” forms of exit?  I fear that this is where my shortcomings as a writer can no longer be hidden.  If this paper had a back door, I suppose I could quickly exit through it.  And that would be: The End…..but, I think I will take the alternate ending:  

 

" In the absence of light, there is only dark.  And that is indeed something to see…."