I mean everyone talks about conscious and subconscious, i think we’re just waaaaaaaaay more aware of this and we know more precisely where the conscious ends and the subconscious begins.
The average allistic person just has no reason to think much about it, the two systems work in lockstep such that it never affects them, but for neurodivergent people we regularly have to deal with the subconscious stuff not doing what we want it to, and either just deal with it or take over the reigns and do it ourselves which is extremely exhausting.
I guess you could compare it to flying an airplane: when everything works smoothly the computer systems do a lot of the work for the pilot and they focus on the radio and the conditions outside, but if the systems go offline or don’t work as expected suddenly the pilots have to do things manually and work around the weirdness and that makes the job very stressful and tends to lead to mistakes.
I’d describe it that way with my ADHD. My subconscious is literally overriding my conscious in real-time. I’ll be in deep decision paralysis while the thoughts of the consequences of not doing the thing at all become too stressful, then I’ll hyperfocus and cram as much work as humanly possible in a very unhealthy period of time. The guilt also tends to build up, but I just can’t get started without something tangible to scare me up. I called it anxiety-based productivity before knowing what it was lol. It’s a really vicious loop too, cause I got away with it too often as I grew up (the ADHD-PI/somewhat gifted combo that often falls through the cracks).
