blanc writes:

...

I suppose you don't understand what it might be like for someone to be unable to do their work no matter how heavy the threat against them if they don't, and no matter how easy it is. There are people out there who can't get themselves to pay a phone bill or throw out the newspapers for months on end -- they just can't get themselves to dance around into the task no matter how hard they try, no matter how great the threat (job loss, etc) to them is. [...] There are times when people have been totally unmotivated to take care of themselves or the mundane matters in life because they were not involved in the pursuits which were of true value to them, and life "lost its meaning".

Blanc, you really aren't listening. There are people out there who are desperately unhappy. They can't concentrate at all. They love what they do for a living, if only they could actually manage to do it four days out of five. They are not in the least scared of cleaning their homes, except for the fact that they are frightened of the fact that they can't manage to do it no matter what they try. They'd like to pay the light bill -- really -- but every time they start they get distracted, or they get distracted before they start. Sometimes they get bursts of hyperconcentration and they can work for two days straight on some project, and they end it and realize that the phone's been cut off because they completely spaced dealing with it or anything else. Sometimes they feel very pissed off because people tell them to just "apply themselves" more or "manage their time" better or "get a more motivating job". Such people aren't upset that life has lost its meaning. They are often perfectly intelligent, capable of being happy in their pursuits, and not bad individuals. They suffer, however, from an inability to keep from twitching. They ritualistically play with common objects -- rubber bands, paperclips, etc, folding and unfolding them, winding and unwinding them, etc. You can spot them -- they're the people who even as adults can be placed in a nearly empty room and will find a small object to play with. Their workspaces are littered with small fidget toys they have purloined or created. These people aren't unhappy with their jobs except for the fact that they wish they could get their work done, they sit in front of their work for hours on end, and can't get anywhere. They don't need new pursuits. Even with newere and "better" jobs, most people on earth have to occassionally maintain their attention long enough to pay their landlord or what have you.

Putting one's priorities into perspective can do a lot towards feeling motivated to attend to life's minor contingencies, while elevating the lesser items to the top of the hierarchy can totally dissipitate one's energies and interest.

Look, quit trying to tell people who have ADD that they are in the wrong jobs, that they are unmotivated, that they are "lazy", or whatever. Calling them "nuts" is actually far better. It at least acknowledges that there is something wrong that isn't readily fixed by the nostrums of people who have no idea whatsoever what they are going through. Perhaps, of course, we can just get all the suicidal people on earth to quit wanting to kill themselves by intoning to them "don't be sad" over and over again. I doubt it, though.

Maybe Ritalin could make them forgot their true interest which was lying dormant, pushed away by who-knows-what kind of arguments against it, and help them to start paying attention again to those mundane, irrelevant aspects of existence.

Or maybe, when they take it, the noise in their heads stops, the world focuses and clears up, and suddenly it doesn't seem like its so hard to finish that two paragraph status summary after all. Maybe they take it and suddenly they can function long enough to finish their resume and get another job. Maybe you should quit telling other people how to get through life when you haven't lived inside their heads.

You're right, Perry, that no one should be making that decision for others. I do think, though, that achieving self-command by a conscious knowledge of what is right for one's nature is actually the most beneficial (and less controversial).

Its always better to not need to use chemicals to help yourself out. However, we acknowledge in our society that when someone has an infected leg we decide that they aren't being "bad" by taking drugs to stop the infection. Perry