Unpacking Our Executive Functioning System

Executive functioning skills are the brain’s management system — the invisible engine behind how we manage life. They are the set of mental processes that help us organize our days, manage time, regulate emotions, stay focused, adapt, and follow through on what matters. When these skills are working well, life feels doable. When they’re not, even bright, capable people can feel stuck, overwhelmed, or constantly behind.

In this first episode of our Executive Functioning Series, we take a deep, practical look at what executive functions actually are, why they are essential for success across school, work, relationships, and daily life, and how they show up in real-world behavior — not just in textbooks or testing reports.

In this episode we unpack the full executive functioning system, including:

• Organization
 • Time management
 • Planning and prioritizing
 • Working memory
 • Self-regulation and emotional control
 • Self-monitoring
 • Task initiation
 • Cognitive flexibility
 • Sustained attention and focus

These skills don’t operate in isolation — they work together as an interconnected system. Challenges in one area often ripple into others, which is why executive functioning difficulties are commonly seen in individuals with ADHD, learning differences, anxiety, and in many high-achieving people who simply feel overwhelmed by competing demands.

This episode lays the foundation for understanding why someone can be intelligent, motivated, and full of potential — yet still struggle with organization, productivity, follow-through, or consistency.

This conversation kicks off an ongoing series. Every third episode of NET Collective will focus on a specific executive functioning skill, with future episodes offering practical strategies, supports, and tools for children, teens, college students, professionals, parents, and educators.

If you’ve ever wondered why getting started feels so hard, why time slips away, why plans don’t translate into action, or why daily life can feel more exhausting than it “should,” this series is designed to give you clarity, language, and direction.

👉 Visit our website for companion handouts and resources aligned with each episode at: www.netcollective.org

Because understanding how your brain manages life isn’t just necessary — it’s empowering.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome to Net Collective, where we navigate everything together. From classroom to college to careers and beyond. I'm Kay McBrudy, career coach and founder of Waterville Partners.

Ruth 0:09

I'm Ruth Hayes, founder and managing partner at Fulso Prep, a boutique tutoring firm.

Vinita 0:14

I'm Vanita Patel, school psychologist and private practice. You can find me at vanitapatel.com.

Ruth 0:23

Today we're going to be having a conversation that I know we've all been looking forward to. We're going to talk about executive functioning, which is very much at the nexus of what we're all working on and I think comes up a lot in our conversations. So I'll turn over to you, Vanita, as the expert among experts. What is executive functioning?

Vinita 0:39

So our executive functioning system, it's a complex set of skills that help us manage tasks that we have to do every day. And it incorporates a number of different skills, and we're going to go over each one of those skills. So in this specific episode, what I'd like to for us to focus on is because it's such a complex topic and we use our executive functioning skills every day, I want to make sure that our listeners really understand all of the various skills and behaviors that go into our executive functioning system. And so for this episode, you're just going to be learning about those specific skills and what they look like in the real world. And then in the next episode, which is directly after this one, we're going to talk about what strategies you can use for each one of those skills if there is a weakness or an area or, you know, like a gap area in that. How many skills are there? How many skills are there? Well, I'm going to be talking today about the top 10. Okay. Yeah. And there has been there has been some theories in in the field about how executive functioning skills are anywhere from one to 23. So I'm picking the top ten that I have seen in my practice as being the ones that get in the way of being the most productive that you can be.

SPEAKER_01 2:04

Okay. Okay, cool. Yeah.

Vinita 2:05

What's the first one? Okay, so the first one, and I always like to start with organization, and that is because organization or disorganization is something that we can readily observe. You know, you can see someone at, you know, pretty much anywhere, and walk through the door and you can see whether they're an organized or put together or not. You know, I've had students come into my office with their backpack hanging off of their shoulder, there's papers just, you know, kind of rattled in there. There's really no system to their material. So when I talk about organization, it really means your space, your material, and how chaotic that space is, whether it's your workspace, your desk at home, your locker, your car, you know, your your bedroom, you know, are you able to find the things that you need, that you need to do whatever it is that you need to do? Okay. Or are you spending an inordinate amount of time trying to search for your keys or that assignment that you know you did, but you don't know where it is. Okay. So it's really putting things into place. Okay. Now, but so the one thing about organization that I also want to expand upon is that's physical organization. Okay, that's stuff that we can readily see. Okay. But there's also something called your internal organization. Okay. And what that means is um being able to get your thoughts across in a way where they're not disorganized. Have you ever had moments where you want to tell a story and you want to try to tell it in a in a nice order or in a sequential order, but you're you're not doing that, and it's kind of going, you know, like the middle part is coming first and the last part is coming first, you know, and all of that. So so I also talk about the internal organization of our of the students and individuals that I work with. So if you are physically organized, if you're organized on the outside, chances are you're gonna be more organized with your thoughts on the inside. Okay. Okay. I wonder some ways that you get insights into how internally organized people are. Well, okay, so what that would look like is if you're telling a story or if you're retelling a story, or we see it a lot with essay writing, you know. So if your thoughts are kind of all over the place, then you really don't have that internal organization so that you can get those thoughts down on paper. You know, or if someone's giving you, let's say, um, or if you're giving someone directions, you're not really, you know, systematically intern, you know, expressing them in a way where it would make sense.

unknown 4:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 4:43

So here's a question. The internal organization and the external organization, I've heard it said that your external world is reflective of your internal world. So that if you are disheveled and disorganized externally, chances are you don't you aren't in alignment or you know, organized internally. Is that yes, that they they absolutely work together.

Vinita 5:03

I didn't I didn't know if that was just an old wives tale or adage or if that was No, there's actually research on that. So that's what I say is like what if you're working with me for executive functioning skills, well, let's work from the outside in. Okay. And let's make sure that you have the materials you need, your space makes sense. Now, I I'm not here to say everyone needs to have, you know, a super clean, super organized, anything like that. We're not we're not in the military here. Right. However, um, and there is there are some people that thrive in chaos, you know. I don't recommend that for our teens, adolescents or college students. If you're if you're that way as an adult, that's one thing, you know, but you're an adult, so you can make those choices. But you know, early on, I think it's important to have a system where you can find things, where you can um place items where they properly need to be placed. And so to your point, Kay, you're you're right about that, is that they go hand in hand. Okay. So let's work from the outside in. Okay. So that your external world meets your internal world. Okay. So that's organization. And I like to start with that when we talk about, you know, executive functions because that is something that is readily observable. All right. Okay? What's next? So, what's next is let's let's talk about time management. You know, that uh time management. So, what does that really mean? I mean, it it's fairly self-explanatory, but it's really um allotting the right amount of time or an appropriate amount of time to get whatever task it is that's done. You know, so oftentimes individuals who have time management issues tend to either overestimate or underestimate how long something will take them. I can't tell you the number of times that students have said to me, Oh, this will only take five minutes. This will only take five minutes. And it's like, I guess it could take five minutes, but the consequence of this assignment taking five minutes is that it's not complete. Right. You've done it poorly, you didn't put the integrity in there. You know? So time management is really having an awareness of how long something will take you. Um these are also individuals that may have what we call time blindness. So that that's I'm not familiar with that term. Yeah, time blindness meaning that you don't have that urgency. Time isn't a factor. When you're thinking about planning something out, or when you're thinking about doing whatever it is, whether it's an assignment, whether it's driving from place A to place B, you're not really considering how long things take you. So that individual may end up being very late. Well, I didn't know. I didn't factor in that there would be traffic, or I didn't factor in that there was a detour. I just assumed that I would get there when I get there and not think about the consequences of what time, how important time can really be. Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 8:02

Yeah. There's, I mean, we all have 168 hours in a week. Where are you going to spend your time? Right. Right. No, being very mindful of that.

Vinita 8:10

Yeah, and and that time, time urgency. Yeah. You know, there that urgency of, well, gosh, you know, if my appointment, I always tell my my my my own kids and my students, if you're on time, you're already late. So get there a few minutes early so that you can um, you know, accommodate for anything else that could go wrong. The elevator's broken or the train was on the train tracks or whatever. Yeah. Exactly, all of that kind of stuff. And so individuals who ha m struggle with time management don't have that urgency or see time as a concept that's that's relevant and significant. So would you consider sleep hygiene a part of that? Well, y yes, I I would, and it's very important to get sleep because you know the proper amount of sleep for you know where you are at developmentally. Um but I would say that sleep has more to do with like planning out your day. And so let's talk about the next two we can actually put together. And those two skills that fall under executive functioning are planning and prioritizing. So planning and prioritizing, and we can certainly um address the sleep uh question that you had, Ruth, which is a good one. So, what that what I mean by that is, you know, we all have a bunch of things to do, right? Throughout throughout the day, throughout the week, throughout the month, etc. They're not all of equal importance or of equal priority, right? When we have five things to do in a day, something has to come first and something has to go last, right? And so it forces us to think about what's my priority. And when you ask yourself that, what is my priority of the things that I have to do? And it it forces you to come up with an order and a sequence. And then you ask yourself, well, why is that coming first? Why is that coming second? You know, so for example, if I'm working with a student on all the homework assignments they have to do that evening, you know, we'll prioritize the homework assignments that need to be due tomorrow, or maybe that are late, that we don't want them to be further past the due date, et cetera. So prioritizing um gives us a really good roadmap as to what can come first, second, third, and fourth, and the why. You know, why I want my individual clients to always think about why they are putting it in that order because it brings that to their awareness. Okay. Okay. Along with the prioritizing, now you have to plan things out, you know. And by planning, um, what's really important to do is to think about the task and break it down into manageable units. Because any task, whether it's it's an academic task or whether it is a house chore or planning a vacation, can be broken down into manageable units so that you can really understand all the different aspects of that task.

SPEAKER_02 11:19

Yeah, it's funny because we were talking about breaking things down, and even when we were talking before, I said I always use the analogy eating the elephant one bite at a time. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Because you can't do everything at once. Or if you've got a buffet in front of you, you can't eat everything at once.

Vinita 11:34

You've got to prioritize what's most important, in what order you want to do it, and it really helps with um anxiety levels. Oh. And it also helps with doing things and doing things well, right? When we know the the manageable chunks that we can ingest at once. And so, Ruth, your question about prioritizing sleep or planning a sleep, a sleep hygiene. Yeah, so if you know that you need to get nine hours of sleep before you take the, I'm making this up, the SAT test, by the way. SATs are this is the SAT A C T time for many of our college students. If you know you want to get at least nine hours of sleep, work backwards. You know, lights out by 10 a.m. because you have to get up at, you know, early the next morning. Unless you really like to nap. Nap at 10. Yes, exactly. So lights out at 10 p.m., work backwards so that you know that you're getting enough sleep and you're prioritizing your sleep, and then you know, go backwards from that time. And so planning, prioritizing, I like to just clump them together because you know, they go hand in hand. You prioritize what need what needs to be done in what order and why that makes sense, and you plan it out based on that. So you're creating a roadmap for what needs to be completed within that time frame.

Ruth 13:00

Yeah, that's that's a really good point because a lot of the anxiety I see around getting especially academic tasks done is around that moment of, well, what am I gonna do right now? Like what am I gonna do next? And how do I decide what to pick up?

Vinita 13:13

Yes, and it also helps, and we'll talk about this in a few minutes. When you have a plan, um, it helps with you with with decreasing some of that sense of overwhelm. And you're more likely to start it if you have a plan for it. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. What's next? So working memory. Let's talk about working memory. Working memory, you know, we use our working memory all day, every day. Okay. That is our ability to hold on to information in our short-term memory reserve and use that information to execute a task. So right now our listeners are tapping into our your working memory. You're listening to this podcast, you're listening to um me talk about working memory, and maybe thinking about a follow-up question or a comment. You know, and how we see working memory really play out in school is uh, you know, the teachers giving a lecture on, let's say, the Civil War or, you know, um whatever the topic may be, and students are taking notes. You know, you're in taking the information and you're doing something with it significant with that information. So working memory is is is an incredibly important aspect of executive functioning that we use all day, every day. And and not and not just in the school setting, but in conversation. If you're at a cocktail party, you know, there's a banter back and forth. You're listening to someone and you're, you know, getting ready for a follow-up question. You know, so it's working memory is not only important in in academic settings, but also in social settings. You know, you have to be able to hold on to what people are saying and be ready for a response or to to provide a response.

SPEAKER_02 15:08

Well, and listen. I mean you have to be able to listen. And I mean, we have two ears and one mouth. We're supposed to use the ears twice as much as the mouth, but I think that sometimes people are so excited to get their thought in that they're not necessarily absorbing what somebody else is saying around them.

Vinita 15:24

So that was working memory. Um yes, there that that that's probably one of the more complex uh skills within our executive functioning. And so the next one, let's talk about cognitive shifting, or also known as mental flexibility. So this is the brain's capacity to move from one topic to another seamlessly, or one, or make transition from one activity to the next. So oftentimes individuals who have trouble with cognitive shifting or mental flexibility, they they pretty much are synonymous in in the term terminology. Um they often need uh extra time to get ready to the new setting or the new topic, or if you know, so let's say you're in school and you know you're in um history class, or you know, that the topic is some type of a historical um subject, and then you know, right away or or soon thereafter the the topic shifts into a completely different subject, that student may still be thinking about that previous subject or topic. So mental flexibility is the mind's way of being fluid and moving on to the next task task or topic or environment.

Ruth 16:47

Interesting. And so is that always something that, you know, more flexibility is better? Or can you be so flexible that you're kind of not holding on to the current topic?

Vinita 16:56

Uh yeah, I think the the best scenario is to be able to be flexible enough to receive whatever new information is coming at you, right? So I wouldn't say that, you know, I do I do worry about the the the individuals that are are rigid, that are, you know, so the opposite of mental flexibility is mental rigidity. Yeah. You know, the ones who had a really difficult time moving on and that are that are stuck, or you know, um, you know, they see see the world more with like black and white or maybe with blinders. So I would say that those are the individuals that I, you know, worry about more when it comes to this topic. And and if that's the case, obviously we want to look at other things that might be going on with them and how they perceive the world. But in general, as long as an individual, student, work, you know, associate can can be flexible and move along and move with the current of the changes of the environment, the topic, the situation, you know, more that that's obviously ideal. Yeah. Being able to ride the wave. Exactly, ride the wave. And by the way, one thing that um I I want our listeners to understand is our executive functioning skills are the last skills to to fully mature and adapt in our in our brains, you know. Cortex. Yeah, exactly, right? So they're they're housed in um in the frontal low part of our brain in an area called the prefrontal cortex, and that is the last part of our brain to fully to fully fuse. Okay. Okay. And so if these skills that we're talking about today are still lagging, that's okay, depending on where you are developmentally. But research has shown that our executive functioning skills um don't fully develop, like fully develop until our mid-twenties. Okay and and sometimes for men it it's actually later, like late late 20s. Okay. And if you've been someone um who's struggled with your executive functioning skills your whole life, or maybe have, you know, ADHD along with that, you know, uh then even later. So sometimes all you need is time. Okay, so there should be some comfort in knowing that.

SPEAKER_02 19:16

Well, and I see that play out with clients as they're I mean, we're asking teenagers to pick majors for colleges and careers and those types of things. And they don't maybe have all the information yet. I mean, and they they aren't organized.

Vinita 19:33

Right. And and you know, it's a lot of big decisions to make for a non a fully non-developed brand. Right. Right. And that's why having the right supports along the way is crucial. Yeah, yeah. It's very helpful. Yeah.

Ruth 19:48

Especially the kind of work you do, Kay. I feel like that you're right there kind of trying to help people sort themselves out and develop that kind of internal organization. They know what they want to do.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

Well, and interestingly enough, I mean, the reason why I refer clients to Venita is because they may have, you know, a plan and a direction. I may be helping them with all these different pieces of their career or their, you know, college experience, but I can tell that they're not able to execute, they're not organized, or they've got, you know, time management issues, or but they're not they're not delivering. And I my you know, my learning over time is that their frontal lobe isn't fully developed yet, and they need help and they need scaffolding, and that's that's the great resource that you provide.

Vinita 20:32

And you know, sometimes that individual can have a plan. They can you know, I've had clients come to me with all sorts of beautiful planners, all sorts of beautiful handwriting that's just mapped out their entire week, did not miss a B on what they need to do from the time they wake up to the time, you know, um that they that they sleep. And but the execution is missing. And so then we have to peel the layers and say, okay, well, what got in the way? What got in the way of you starting that paper? You know, what got in the way of not preparing for that interview, and therefore you say you bombed it? You know, what is it? And so it's different for for for different people, right? But I will say planning things out and prioritizing, organizing is is a really great first and second step. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Awesome. Okay, what's next? So, yeah, let's keep moving on. We're on a roll here. So, self-monitoring. This to me is the crux of our executive functioning system. And what that means, um, when we can self monitor, we are aware and we're having that internal dialogue with ourselves about how to get things done. We are giving ourselves feedback, we're talking things through. So it's like that little voice in our heads that say, Okay, I have to be there at this meeting at 10 o'clock. But I also have to do a drop-off at 8:30. Oh, and I have to pick up coffee for the group, and I have to prepare my notes for that presentation that I'm going to be presenting for my meeting at 10 o'clock. And so, you know, you may not always have a chance to write out this roadmap, but you have an internal roadmap that's always telling you to, or most of the time that is, guiding you on how to do things. Got it. When to do it, and to be prepared for things that could come up and derail you along the way. So our self-monitoring skills are really that that's that uh voice in our head that helps us, that just helps guide us. It's kind of like our our, you know, it's our it's our lighthouse. Yeah, it's our internal lighthouse. It's our it's our not to steal your turn, Kate, but our internal compass for um putting that awareness into our head, you know, so that we can get things done. And not just get things done, but get things done well with integrity. And then to follow up with some good feedback. Yeah. That worked, that didn't work. Well, next time I have to give myself extra time. Or, you know, goodness, I I forgot to say this in that meeting. So next time I'm gonna make sure, or I'm gonna follow up with an email because I didn't articulate myself as nicely as I wanted to.

Ruth 23:31

Got it. And I think that's a lot of what I do as a tutor a lot of the time is kind of being that little voice for someone until they can kind of take it over themselves.

Vinita 23:39

Perfect. And the nice thing about all of these skills that we're talking about is they can be taught. They can be explicitly taught. It's not like if you you have it or you don't. It's not like that, you know. Um yes, we're all wired differently, but our executive functioning skills are skills that can be enhanced. They can be taught and they can be supported. Awesome. Okay. So that you know, I just I I I just feel so passionately about the self-monitoring. So I just want to make sure that you guys understand it if you have any other questions. No, no, no, that makes sense. Okay, good.

Ruth 24:11

Well, I was actually gonna bring up one thing that I have heard from several students is that it's funny you can call it self-monitoring because something they talk about is body doubling. Have you heard of that? Oh yeah.

Vinita 24:20

Yeah, body doubling, right? Yeah, so do you want to explain what that is?

Ruth 24:27

So you know, having someone come over and you know, in college if you want to just work together. I do that with, you know, friends of mine working now if you want to go to a cafe and knock out some stuff. Just having someone else there observing you makes it easier to do the thing.

Vinita 24:39

Yeah, and it helps with the accountability piece too. So, yeah, body doubling, it's it's actually quite common now with um older ADHD individuals. Oh. In in the situations that you just described. Like I don't trust myself to go to the gym by myself, but I know if I have a friend come with me, I'm gonna I'm gonna sweat more. So it's like an accountability partner. It's like an accountability partner. Okay. And it is part of self-monitoring. You know, you're you're you're you're tapping into an outside resource to help you monitor the whatever it is that you're you're you're prioritizing. So a lot of college students will exactly that, will say, hey, let's go to the library together. Even though we're not working on the same things, right? I just need a body double there. I need someone there. So it's actually quite common. And when we get to an episode on ADHD, we will talk about that as one of the strategies.

Ruth 25:31

Very cool. And I think that's also just such an important point to bring up that these are things that can be taught in their skills like any other. Because a lot of times, especially with executive functioning and things like that, people take it so personally, it's like this is a a character flaw or something like that. Right. Whereas it's more like, you know, I don't know how to play piano right now, but I can learn how to do that. And I'm not a bad person because I don't know how to. I just haven't gotten those skills yet.

Vinita 25:53

Well, uh yes, exactly. And thank you for bringing that up because there is some shame or, you know, feelings of, you know, I I I feel lazy. I hear that a lot, you know, or so-and-so is lazy, they're not organized. Look at their room. And and you know, there is that there is no such thing as laziness. That is a symptom of something larger. And as long as we can get to the root cause or why exactly, why things are the way they are, we can we can work with it. And it's mindset too, right? Like, yeah, growth mindset. Mindset theory, growth mindset theory is like yet. Love that word, yet. You're not there yet, but that doesn't mean that you can't be there. And these are life skills, so eventually they're going to catch up with you. And if you give yourself some grace and some time and outside supports or internal supports, you will get there. They will get there. That's awesome. Yeah.

Ruth 26:48

Sounds good.

Vinita 26:49

Yeah, yeah. Okay. And then we have, oh, emotional regulation. Well, let me ask you, when you guys hear that term, what does that mean to you?

Ruth 26:58

Um I I think of little ones like being able to calm yourself if you know your flavor of juice isn't available or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 27:05

I mean, I imagine tantrums.

unknown 27:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

Outbursts, like people not being able to function or to contain their emotions or to keep them in check.

Vinita 27:15

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

I don't know. It's that's kind of an extreme, I guess, but right.

Vinita 27:20

Yeah, that that would be an extreme. Yes. So emotional regulation is finding the right balance internally such that our nervous system isn't at its peak and it's not flatlined. Okay. You know, for for the whatever given situation that we're in. You know, oftentimes we see that um kids with emotional dysregulation issues, you know, they're the kids that you've heard they can go from zero to ten without warning. You know, and some adults do that, right? Can do that as well because they haven't learned how to regulate their emotions, you know. Um, so yeah, it's finding when you're emotionally regulated, you are functioning at a band that is appropriate developmentally, you know. Anxiety is not a bad thing. Sometimes the right amount of anxiety can really serve as a motivator, right? So I'm not just I'm not talking about some of the clinical issues here. I'm talking about if you're in a situation um, or you know, let's say someone got a C or a D on a test and they thought they did what, you know, they thought they might have done better, you know. Well, goodness, they're in the bathroom on their phone calling mom, completely crouched down and, you know, so that's that's an emotional dysregul uh dysregulation. Okay. So that can come with uh maturity, that can come with strategies, which we'll talk about in the next episode on on what can you do when you start feeling your body um become dysregulated. You know, so it's really finding uh the right uh uh uh band in which we can function emotionally.

SPEAKER_02 29:07

And does that uh manifest differently for different clients, like physically? I mean, is there like a spectrum of reactions?

Vinita 29:15

Yes, that's a great question. Some individuals will um become dysregulated externally, where you know, uh watch out if you're in the in the path of that, you know. Okay. And then some can dysregulate internally, and that's harder to see. Uh okay. You know, okay. And so it's really important to find out what type of a um regulator, emotional regulator you are, whether do you internalize these big feelings or do you externalize them and then we deal we can deal with each one. So there certainly is whenever you're doing, whenever I'm doing like executive functioning coaching, there is that sliver of therapeutic approach to it.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

Okay.

Vinita 29:57

You know, because we're we're humans, right? We're complex beings. So it's never just about um one thing or another, you know. There, there's really like I mean, think of all these skills that we're going over that that encompass executive functioning. So it's really there's a therapeutic approach, there's an educational approach, there's an academic approach, there's the advocacy, you know. Yeah. Awesome, all connected. It's all connected, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Next, number nine, right? Oh, yes. So the ninth one, I can't believe we're already on the ninth one. So task initiation. So let me ask you, Ruth, have you ever put something off and procrastinated? Oh, me? Never.

Ruth 30:39

Yes, I have.

Vinita 30:40

Yes, you have. Why do you think that happens? Is there a pattern to it?

Ruth 30:44

There certainly is. I the pattern I notice, especially um, you know, working from home long term, is that I will, it won't be that I'm not doing anything. I'll do something else that needs to be done, but not the thing I need to be doing. So if I need to send an email, I'll like load the dishwasher instead.

Vinita 31:00

You're the only one that might load the dishwasher before something else. That's funny. Okay, what about you?

SPEAKER_02 31:08

Yes. Do you procrastinate? I have procrastinated as well. Um and typically, it's funny now that I now that I know some of these um pieces, I'm like, oh, maybe my procrastination is um because I don't know how to get started, or a fear of failure, or um I mean there's there's I'm trying to now I'm trying to peel back the why. Like why am I procrastinating why am I procrastinating? But typically it's it's either something so big that I I I'm not sure where to start, or um I do think it is uh a fear of you know not doing it well. Right. Um but yes, I I do have a few things that I procrastinate. Okay, but I'm not gonna load the dishwasher and stuff.

Vinita 31:49

Like I read the work on my new website and something rather than everything. Exactly. Okay, so yeah, task initiation is a fancy way of saying procrastination to the point where, you know, whatever it is that you want to get started on and want to get done is taking a lot longer to take to make that initial step to start it, you know. Um and we do that for various reasons. There's a lot of reasons feel of fit, fear of failure, or you know, I'm disorganized. It could be all b because of all of or poor time management. All of the other things that I've talked about thus far, you know. So um we do know that first of all, procrastination, as much as we feel bad about ourselves when we do procrastinate, it is such a rampant issue. We all have a level, it's almost like an epidemic. People that are incredibly high functioning, you know, tend to procrastinate. And the thing you have to ask yourself is well, why am I doing it? What is getting in the way? And then really dig deep in. Use your tap into that self-monitoring skill, you know, check the emotional dysregulation at the door and ask yourself, why am I doing it? Is it because it's too big of a task and I don't know where to begin? Okay, well, then let's do some planning and prioritizing. Let's break that baby down into manageable units so that I can just do step one. And if that step one is opening up my briefcase and you know, turning on the laptop, that that can be step one. That's better than what it was two minutes ago, right? It's infinitely more than nothing. It's infinitely more than nothing, exactly. So, right, so asking yourself, why am I procrastinating on this particular task? You know, so once you can peel that layer and and you're tapping into your think of the things that you're tapping into right there. You're tapping into your self-monitoring skills when you're doing that. You're tapping into cognitive shifting because now you're forcing yourself to think in a way that may be hard for you. You know, you're you're you're tapping into planning and prioritizing because now you know your brain is forcing you to say, okay, well, what would be step one and why is that step one? You know? So you gotta start somewhere, but before you start somewhere, you have to ask yourself, why is this hard for me? Yeah, that's a good question. You know, like why am I why why did it take me so long to, you know, I had to redo my website? We talked about that. Right. Why did it take me so long to redo my website? You know, and only I can answer that, and I know it was because it just felt like a monster. Yeah, it felt like, you know, a really big task, and I really liked some elements of what my original website was, but I knew it needed to be better, and I just didn't quite know what that was. So once I could identify why I was pushing back on that, getting started, and then I was like, okay, we'll just start with one step and then start with another step. So yes, task initiation. That's that's a big one. Okay. Yeah. And the 10th um one that we're gonna, you know, talk about and then we'll stop with with that skill, is is is our sustained attention. And that's really maintaining our focus and concentration on whatever it is that we need to attend to while limiting distractions. Now that's really hard for a lot of our students now, given, you know, all the distractions that there are, aka screens, you know, phones, and you know, when you think about the amount of mental energy and cognitive energy that it takes just to open up your phone and scroll through multiple TikToks, our brains really aren't made to process that much information that quickly. We're just not. And so uh we're kind of rewiring that attention piece. We're rewiring, you know, uh the ability to sustain our attention on the things that need uh attending, you know, when we're competing with other interests. So sustaining attention is really about staying engaged and intaking the information that needs to be, you know, intaking or outtaking or or you know, attending to whatever need is the output, you know, um in the light of a distracting environment. All right. So here's a question.

SPEAKER_02 36:28

I mean, you talked about social media and uh distractions that our youth have. I mean, I'm gonna guess that this focused attention, the sustained attention was not something that just came in the last couple decades. That was something that was probably when all of this was created or discovered or whatever. We have names to it now.

Vinita 36:51

Okay, we we have we have these really good clinical names to them in the last, you know, I I don't I don't even know decades now. We really we really do. But when when you and I were in school, were people talking about sustained attention, executive functioning? No. We were using those skills. Right. You know, like do you remember before phones when someone gave you their phone number, you had to memorize it. Right. What is that what is that indicative of? You're working memory. Right. Yeah, yeah, you know, right. So yeah, the these are not new. We have clinical names to it, and we're so much more aware of it, which is self-monitoring, which is great.

SPEAKER_02 37:28

Yeah. Well, we're more aware of it, and it's I think it's more pervasive. I think it's more challenging today to have that sustained attention. Because we have competing interests. Yeah, and it's just we're just the all of us are just being bombarded. Our listeners are being bombarded right now. I mean and they may be able to listen to us and load the dishwasher or the something else, um, which is great, or take a walk, which is great. Um, but I just I feel for these youth who are uh and I know we'll do a session later on you know social media and how it's ruining us. Well, you know, and yeah, and how do you how do you um how do you lean into it and compart or compartmentalize it, or how do you, you know, take it all together?

Vinita 38:11

So well you know, we only have so much mental bandwidth, you know, and so my message to our viewers and clients that I work with is you know, have fun, do the things that that you want to do, but make sure you do the things that you have to do with with integrity and value. That's one, you know, those are th my three favorite words when I talk about executive functioning, and I apologize if I haven't used them enough is create the roadmap, do things with integrity, and ask yourself where your value system is with how you want your output to be. And you know, just quickly back backtracking to my comment about mental bandwidth, we only have so much of that available to us. Our cognitive resources are limited, it's not an unlimited resource. So our executive function skills and that system help us to decide what's important, how much time to put into something, what materials we need, when to do what, in what order, um, how to give ourselves the feedback we need, and and and and all of that, and to and to sustain our attention, to attend to things that are are important important. Brains brains working over time. Yeah, yeah, always. So use your cognitive resources widely, white wisely, excuse me, and uh it starts with our executive functioning skills because they do work together. They sure do. Awesome. All right, so tune in to the next episode where we will be revisiting each one of these skills, and we will be talking about strategies on what you can do if you have organizational issues, time management problems, planning, prioritizing gaps, working memory, cognitive shifting, self-monitoring, emotional regulation, task initiation, and sustained attention difficulties. Yeah, perfect. Can't wait. Okay. Until next time. Thanks for listening. Thanks for joining us.

Ruth 40:24

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Vinita 40:34

We are Net Collective, navigating everything together, one conversation at a time. Thanks for joining us.