autism – The ADHDruid

I have always been very connected to the seasons. It’s part of the reason why I feel so at home with Druidry. In the winter, I become withdrawn and often depressed. But in Spring, I am absolutely and almost painfully bursting with life, energy, and creative fertility. I feel as though I’ve hit a geyser of inspiration, motivation, and creativity but I have no vessel or focus to contain it or do anything useful with it. It’s very frustrating. I sometimes feel like I’ve overdosed from Cerridwen’s cauldron.

In case you’re unfamiliar with Awen, there’s a great article that explains it pretty well on OBOD’s website druidry.org.

While generally Awen is a good thing, you know what they say about too much of a good thing. My ADHD sends me in every possible direction at the same time and I can’t settle on just one. Or even get started toward any of them. I want to sing and make music, but I need to learn how to make music. But I also want to paint and make art, but I need to take the time to set up the art supplies and make space in my office for it. But I can’t do that because I need to clean my office first. But I also want to work on this blog, but I can’t think of what to write next because I want to write EVERYTHING! But I have so many books to read, I really should read them. But but but…

And I’m certain this is all just my ADHD coupled with the upswing in energy and mood coming out of winter due to Seasonal Affective Disorder. Studying Druidism has just given me a new perspective on it.

What do you do when you want to do everything? How is there time for everything? And even if there was time, how do you decide what to do first? How do you decide what to do with the time you do have? When I have the structure of my work day, I can easily decide what to do. Though it’s difficult to focus on work when my brain is frolicking in the fields and dreaming about writing songs and painting my feelings and building some new invention and my next business idea and on and on forever. I have an abundance of want and a deficit of focus or ability to get anything done.

Anyways, I just needed to get that out and I figured this is the best place for it. Hey, that means I was able to complete more than one post on this blog! Progress!!

Contextual Update August 18, 2023:
This post was originally written when I first started this blog and had only intended for it to be a personal blog. I’ve kept it intact for historical reference, but this is now a community blog with multiple contributors.

Hello, I’m Kendria. I have ADHD and ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder), and I’m a Druid. Welcome to my blog! I’ve never been very good at keeping blogs in the past because, well, ADHD. But the difference now is that I didn’t know that I had ADHD before. So now that I know, I can hopefully figure out how to get past the roadblocks that were holding me back before.

Who is This Blog For?

This blog is mostly for myself, to document my journey at this point in my life. I find that if I try to blog specifically for an audience, I overthink things and then get frustrated, feeling like I’m letting everyone down. But this is also for anyone who is neurodivergent and on the Druid path, or maybe seeking insight from this perspective.

This will definitely be a very personal blog, so don’t expect any great pearls of wisdom or advice, at least at the beginning. There will be a lot of inner dialogue and there may not seem to be any clear sense of direction. I probably won’t be very consistent with my posts, but I am going to try my very best to write at least one post per month. Once per week would be ideal, but I’m trying to set realistic expectations here.

There I went, veering off of the main question… I guess this blog is for anyone who finds this stuff interesting and wants to follow along with me in my quest.

What is The Goal of This Quest?

When I turned 40 a few months ago, I set some goals for myself. I see myself as entering a new phase of my life and I am taking control of how I define this phase. I try to keep these goals in mind as I go on this journey of self-evolution.

Stop Caring So Much About What Others Think

My life so far has been ruled by worrying about how I appear to others. As others with ADHD and/or ASD know well, masking is huge, and usually expected. We get so good at masking that we no longer know who we are. We have been rejected for being who we are, and have learned to conform ourselves to what we are expected to be. At this point, I just want to be myself and learn to deal with the fact that who I really am will not appeal to everyone. Some people in my life may not like it, and that’s okay. And part of this is learning who I really am underneath this mask I’ve been wearing most of my life.

Learn to Love Myself

This definitely ties into the first goal. I have taken past rejections very personally and learned to feel that I’m not enough. I have always felt inadequate because I just could never live up to how “normal” people look and act. Being a woman with all the unrealistic beauty standards in the media has definitely made me feel physically inadequate too. As I work on not caring as much about what others think, I will in turn learn to be more forgiving to myself, which will eventually lead to me accomplishing the goal of loving myself.

Discover My Spirituality

I have never been a religious person. I’ve been an atheist most of my life. I’ll go into more detail about all my spiritual phases in a later post. For now, I’ll just say that lately I’ve felt like my life was missing something. My search to find a religion or spirituality that aligns with my beliefs and values has lead me to Druidry. I’ll also go into what exactly led me there and why I chose Druidry in a later post. For now I’ll just say that it completely fits me and I have come to realize that I’ve been a Druid my whole life but never had a name for it until now.

You may be thinking: “haven’t you already completed this goal?” Well, yes and no. I have discovered which spiritual path I’d like to follow, but I still have to follow it. I need to prove to myself that I can follow through in my Druidic studies and that this isn’t just another one of my many hyperfixations that I will eventually drop when I find a new one.

So, Welcome to My Blog!

I hope that you find it enlightening, entertaining, or whatever you need to get from it. And if not, that’s okay because that just means it’s not for you. I wish you well on your path, wherever it may lead you.

/|\ Kendria

Tag: autism

Spring, Too Much Awen?

Introduction