Analyse This

“There’s no limit to how complicated things can get, on account of one thing always leading to another.”      E B White

Apparently, I complicate everything.  I don’t know how I do it, but I can’t keep a thing simple to save my life.  It appears, though, that one of the main techniques I use to inadvertently achieve this state is by analysing everything.  Funny thing is, I didn’t realise that this is how I complicate.  

I was under the illusion that my attempts at analysis, and being specific (trying to attain a definitive explanation for everything) were actually helpful in simplifying things, aiding my ability to understand and accept.  But when I honestly look back at my life, and how much I have achieved by means of this process, the fact is that it has actually hindered rather than helped me to do anything, or to change.  And it continues to do so.  Any change that has taken place in my life has occurred despite my tendency to analyse, rather than because of it.

Much as it wounds me to have to do so, I have to admit that these particular thought processes of mine are part and parcel of that wondrous gift I have for procrastinating.  If I can think my way out of doing a thing then I'll will.   

According to the Chamber’s Dictionary, analyse means “to resolve or separate a thing into its elements or component parts; to ascertain those parts; to trace a thing or things to the source or cause; to discover the general principles underlying individual phenomena by doing this; to psychoanalyse”.  

Umm, yep, sounds like what I do: except that I’d found another word to separately describe the part about separating a thing into its separate elements - I call it compartmentalising.  Of course I would.  Why have one definition when twenty will do?  Let’s face it, keeping things simple is a concept I have only a fleeting relationship with - I tend to wave at it as I’m floating by on my cloud of analysis, getting wrapped up in, and distracted by, the minutiae of life.

But the point is that it’s rather difficult to identify something in myself when I don’t know or recognise what it actually encompasses.  Or perhaps, sometimes, it’s more a case of when I don’t want to know or recognise it.  My self-will has a vested interest in keeping me in the dark, and reinforcing certain beliefs in order that I don’t do anything to change the status quo.  I am, after all, a person who fears, and hates, change, and if I continue to believe that I can’t change then there’s no need for me to deal with the possibility of maybe having to do so. 

I guess the truth is also that I’ve got used to thinking like this, and been doing it so long, that I’ve become convinced that I can’t do it any differently.  And having the handy rationalisation of being autistic/ADHD has become a useful block to change it - I’ve talked myself into believing that my mind is wired to do this, so I can’t not do it.  

I’ve realised, though, that this is not true.  It dawned on me that analysis is only one part of the thinking process, and that I don’t analyse every single thought I have, much as I might feel and appear as if I do sometimes.  Yes, there have been times in my life when I have become completely obsessed with something to the point of analysing myself into a state of paralysis.  But in recent years I have actually made some progress, mostly through the practice of yoga, which has taught me to be in the moment, using the breath or what I’m doing as a way to bring the focus back to the present (rather than on what I’m thinking).  So the actual evidence is that I can manage my tendency to analyse.  I just have to want to.

Of course, there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with analysis - lots of people do it.  It’s one of the functions for which the human brain was designed, I believe.  My problem, though, is that I over-analyse, and I tend to analyse that which doesn’t actually require analysing (which, at its zenith, means basically everything).  I can get to the root of a thing, and then bypass it completely as I whizz by in a tornado of obsession, chewing endlessly over the same thing, trying to find an answer to a question that’s already been answered.     

I frequently don’t notice that I’m doing it, it’s become so much a part of who I am - like breathing.  But then I’ve learnt through yoga that whilst breathing is something that we all do instinctively, not everyone breathes efficiently or effectively.  However, you can learn to change and improve your breathing technique to attain the maximum benefits, which I have done.  

As a recovered alcoholic/addict I cannot risk taking medication at all, so I have had to find a way to manage my anxiety, along with all the attendant difficulties of having ADHD/Aspergers.  Yoga has literally been a God-send, along with the AA Twelve Step programme (which can be adapted to suit any ‘problem’ or condition), and the change in my diet (which came about as the result of me being a compulsive overeater/undereater, bulimic, with a sugar addiction, which was way before I ever knew I’d got ADHD/Aspergers, and that diet could make a difference).  

I no longer eat sugar, except that contained in fruit; I became vegetarian/vegan, so I gave up dairy as part of that change (plus certain foods, like cheese and yoghurt, I could not stop eating once I started); and I prepare everything from scratch, and don’t eat pre-prepared meals, processed food, junk food, or anything instant.  I believe that, like everything else, being a compulsive overeater is a blessing, the necessary motivation for having to change my diet, because God knew in advance that it was going to help manage what I wasn’t aware of at that time - especially the ADHD. 

Of course, none of this happened as the result of me overanalysing any of it.  In fact, my insistence on analysing and questioning everything kept me delaying taking the necessary action to bring about any of these changes.  It’s only when I stopped thinking, and started doing, that anything different happened.  As it says in the AA Big Book (page 449, third edition): 

“When I stopped living in the problem and began living in the answer, the problem went away."