...they can?
this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2026
282 points (92.5% liked)
ADHD memes
12032 readers
167 users here now
ADHD Memes
The lighter side of ADHD
Rules
Other ND communities
- !adhd@lemmy.world - Generic discussion
- !ausomememes@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- !autism@lemmy.world
- !autisticandadhd
- !neurodivergence@beehaw.org
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
The mythology of neurotypical/neurodivergent discourse is ten times as fascinating as the actual science.
Yeah I'm not sure that I believe this
Of course they can't. They just have a greater ability to shut it up and repress things than most of us. That's not necessarily healthy.
I… do not think that’s accurate
I recall an Indian guru in a YouTube video once quipping "Many followers have asked me, how do I quiet my brain. I tell them 'your brain can be cleared of all thoughts only once, and then your family holds your funeral.' Meditation is not the absence of thoughts but the acceptance of thoughts without interaction."
I always considered meditation a kind-of inward focus. Like, you're not ridding yourself of thoughts. You're deliberately ignoring outside stimulus. That's why people meditating will typically close their eyes, relax their body, play some kind of white noise to deaden outside sounds, burn some incense to occlude any distracting scents, etc. Also why some kind of physical practice like long distance running or yoga is helpful - you're leveraging exhaustion to encourage relaxation.
For someone with ADHD, that probably does feel like a superpower. But it's more like a muscle that you develop over time. Little kids are notoriously bad at it. Much older people tend to fall into a meditative state more easily.
the brain can be cleared of all thoughts only once, and then your family holds your funeral
It's too bad these events aren't consecutive. My FIL cleared his brain of all thought decades ago but he ain't dead yet. Fox told him what to fill it with.
Then it's not clear, you're confusing cleared of thoughts with filled with stupid, malicious thoughts.
This explains all the people who react to someone else's depression with, "Why don't you just think positively?"
My friend, if it were that easy for everyone, depression wouldn't be a thing. When I'm off my Lexapro, literally any given topic can be driven to a depressing topic. Cute kitten pictures? Now I'm sad thinking of how short their lives are. Looking at flowers? Great, now I'm thinking about how many bees are dying. I can't even look at the sky without thinking about space debris cluttering low Earth orbits or something.
Thank goodness for anti-depressants. They're the only way I can derail the sad trains of thought that my brain drives me down.
They're onto something though.
'Trains of thought' is a good metaphor, because your thoughts do run on rails, and they do track improvement and maintenance each time you use one pathway.
That's why it's not that simple, to just think positively, and maybe you need antidepressants to even do that. But it's part of therapy to try to leave those trails more often and lay new tracks that lead to more positive places so you hopefully won't need antidepressants for the rest of your life.
Hard agree. I have a health condition that is frightening to experience and went undiagnosed for decades. Feeling anything reminiscent of its symptoms now spikes my anxiety just as much as if it was the condition itself. I'm slowly deconditioning myself, but that track is so well worn that it's going to take persistence and a lot of time.
Just found out that people without disabilities have complete control of their body, like you can just fly whenever you want? How
Excellent analogy
Could not be further from the truth.
Misinfo, we can't do this lmao
Well you say "we" but...
I know! I've got a friend who's just like "I can just think about whatever I want". She also has a great relationship with her family. It's unfair
I think this generally takes practice, i.e. meditation. The Buddhist lore from the ages is that people can only do this for a few seconds naturally, slowly extending the amount of time, unless they are in a flow state of an activity - like driving a racecar or dancing. But yes it is a superpower, being able to control your mind and emotions, and shut them off
I can do it but I've never trained in meditation. The yapping stops but then I feel weird not thinking thoughts "outloud". It makes be feel like an animal, tbh. Lol
That's a good way to put it, like an animal. Aware but without reflection, chatter, analysis etc.
Is it all the way silent or are there a different layer of kinda quieter meta-thoughts about how you're not thinking thoughts rn?
Oh yeah, it's complete silence unless I accidentally read something or a thought slips through.
That's great! Not that you asked for advice, but the other pieces of enlightenment are (1) work on really broad awareness at the edges of your senses - distant sounds, the weight of your clothes, edges of your vision (2) a joyful gratitude for everything you see / experience. Try doing all of that at once, while on a walk or whatever
Will try it, thanks! Definitely need that today. 🙏
To me this sounds more like using your intuition or something to "think" faster than you could say the words in your head. I do it sometimes and saying the thoughts afterwards in English is like the slo-mo repeat version
I don't think that this is what the person in the picture means, but the ability to focus on one thing while ignoring/put aside all the noise in your head. With ADHD the inside of your head sounds like being in the center of a fun fair, where it's almost impossible to hear your "own" thoughts.
Pretty sure they are all your own thoughts, or none of them are. I'm unclear where thoughts come from. Either way, a big part of meditation is focus training, and while people differ in this ability, everyone can improve - like exercise
Of course they are your own thoughs, well at least I hope so. It's just not the thoughts you want to follow now, and that takes a huge amount of energy to do so. Because they are all the same "volume". Not only that, the thoughts get mashed together and it can be impossible to distinguish between them.
So you sooner or later inevitably start following the wrong thought which spawns a dozen other seemingly random thoughts (but they are not random for you) and then you get yelled at because you're slow and made a lot of errors and hear once again "just focus on the task" or "why don't you just concentrate on what you're doing".
So if neurotypicals can simply focus by ignoring or by putting aside other thoughts, for neurodiverse this is "silence". Not in the meditative "empty your head, let all thoughts go" way, that's another huge step.
The dumb ones certainly can. They just can't turn it on again.
Me when I have anendophasia and don't have internal monologue at every single waking moment.
It's not neurotypical to be able make their inner voice shut up on a whim. I realise later in life that plenty of folks have inner voices in every waking moment, from picking up a can of coke to wanting to sit down. If do those things, I just do by instinct without an inner monologue. But when I do get an inner voice, it's more like detached, if that makes sense. Or it is kinda like an interview where I am talking to another person. I tend to visualise my thoughts more than mentally verbalising it.
My anendophasia explains a lot why I can't relate when someone says about silencing their inner voices. I get a confuddled face, before, everytime someone talks about. I don't really get negative thoughts but when if I do, I imagine the thoughts flowing away. I've been doing that before I heard that therapist recommend this technique called "flowing river", imagining thoughts away like a river flowing away.
I had a dream where this happened to me. Not control over it but the silence part.
It felt so good. If that is really what it's like no wonder I can't accomplish anything in my life.
Bastards(I'm honestly just jealous)
That was the first thing I noticed when taking meds for the first time: silence!
I can make my brain silent. It's amazing. Nature helps.
Sorry buddy, the people who can turn their brains off are not healthy.
You might as well say the people that can stop talking are not healthy.
Such a dumb take. NDs can also do this, it just requires practice through meditation.
It's interesting that you know how it works for everyone.
I specifically did not say all NDs can do this, simply that it is not unique to NTs
Maybe not everyone, but as an ND (with ADHD) who can do this after meditation practice, it's certainly possible for some.
One way to describe it is I found a 'muscle' in the mind that I can flex to suppress intrusive thought. I also learned to wiggle my ears, by finding the right muscle to flex. It's like that.
I found the muscle too. Then I picked up chronic sinus pain on top of ADHD and the mental energy to get there is just gone. I'm sure that for many it doesn't take a sinus headache.
It's a fine line to encourage people to do what they think they can't without shaming those who really can't get there.