Sigh. And this is why some of us don't tend to admit to things like this. Because the best we can expect is "I don't understand," and more often the response is "infantile" or "lazy" or "lack of discipline" or some other critical character flaw. Same way extroverts cannot understand why introverts need time away from people, or why naturally-thin people don't understand why fat people don't just eat less, or why naturally-athletically-gifted people don't understand why people who aren't don't prioritize getting to the gym because of all the health benefits, or why naturally brilliant people people don't understand why less-gifted folks can't manage the same grades when everything is so obvious to them, or why folks without ADHD cannot understand why folks with ADHD can't just sit still and pay attention.
People are wired differently. We all have things that come naturally and easily to us, and things that don't. It's very, very typical to characterize the former as "normal" and the latter as weird or different or abnormal or lesser-than in some way. But that's very self-limiting. Those differences create opportunity: if you can do something easily and enjoyably that others find difficult or miserable, those others will often pay you a great deal of money to do it for them.* The key to long-term happiness and success is to maximize the benefits you get from those things that come easily to you but not others, and to find ways to work with or work around the other stuff.
Me, I've clearly had undiagnosed ADHD all my life. It is a total pain in the ass when it comes down to forcing myself to engage with something that is boring (like every single social studies class ever) -- I just go off to planet Zuton, and it takes rather ridiculous amounts of mental effort to force my attention back where it belongs (imagine trying to force together the north ends of two rare-earth magnets -- the more you push, the more they just skitter away at the last second). The funny thing is no one ever noticed, because I'm the "distracted" version, not the "hyper" version, so all of that struggle is entirely inside my head, and all that effort is entirely invisible to other people. Honestly, it's fucking exhausting.
On the flip side, when it's something I'm interested in, it grabs me and won't let go until I've figured it out, and all those brain cells activate, and I can churn out something really, really good in a very short time. And it's that gift that has been the key to my success at my job; the folks there think I'm freaking brilliant, which has allowed me to succeed and advance, without actually having to put in the same number of hours that many others do.
It would be great if I could keep my hyperfocus superpower and get rid of my absolute intolerance for boredom. But they're flip sides of the same coin. So, yeah, sometimes the workaround to force myself to do something that needs to be done is to promise myself a treat -- like, I got down to one episode remaining of this show that really grabbed me, and I want to watch it NOW, but I know I have to work, so I tell myself, ok, once I get A, B, and C done, I can quit work early and go watch it, rather than waiting until tonight. And then every time I get distracted from ABC, I remind myself that I have to get that done first. It is a way to impose an internal structure and create some rules when there are no external structures or bosses to control me.
I'm also a great procrastinator. Yeah, it's annoying. OTOH, it is a very effective way to get items 2-20 on the to-do list done, in order to avoid doing that one thing I really truly hate. Also, you'd be amazed how many things just don't actually have to be done if you ignore them long enough. ;-) In a way, that natural tendency toward procrastination helps me be very efficient with my time -- if I hate it enough, I'll either figure out how to make it go away entirely, or find a way to spend one hour instead of three on it.
So, I mean, sure, you can go along feeling morally superior to me, because you can happily do all the boring shit just because you know it needs to be done -- and I can return the favor and pity you, being stuck with all that boring shit, because I figured out how to spend my time doing more interesting stuff. That's certainly one option. But where does any of that get us, each of us running around smugly in our own little self-centered view of the world? I'd rather spread a little more understanding and tolerance about these kinds of differences, which is why I bother to write all this crap out. FWIW.
*A/k/a "how to sum up my career in one sentence."
