Executive Functioning

What is "executive functioning?"

It's not just one thing.

It's a set of cognitive skills that allow individuals to plan, organize, focus, and manage their thoughts, emotions, and actions to achieve goals.

I have a goal...

Planning: Where should I start? What’s the first step? What do I need?
Prioritizing: What steps are most important right now?
Task Initiation: Should I start now? I don’t really feel like it.
Metacognition: Did I do that step right? Should I go back and try it again?
Working Memory: What was that information I just needed?
Sustained attention: There’s a lot going on in my head and life. I need to stay focused on this goal right now.
Organization: I need to keep this information where I can find it later.
Time Management: This is taking longer than I thought.
Stress Tolerance: Ug, this is a lot! I can handle it. Keep going.
Emotional Control: This is pretty boring, but I need to keep working anyway.
Response Inhibition: My phone just buzzed, maybe I should check it.
Self-Regulation: This is getting really frustrating! I should take a breath.
Flexibility: That didn’t work. I need to do it differently.
Goal-Directed Persistence: This is taking a long time. Is it worth it?

This self-assessment and resource guide is a great place to start!

Executive Functioning Assessment.pdf

Where do I even start?

You can't possibly focus on every executive functioning skill at once. It's unrealistic.

Instead, start with a self-assessment and find where your relative strengths and struggles are. Then, select a specific skill to work on. This doesn't have to be your lowest score. It can be which ever one you feel most motivated to improve. Maybe it's the skill that you feel is most important for you right now. Maybe you want to grow your biggest strength.

Just pick one. Then identify strategies for supporting yourself with that skill and new ways you can practice the skill to improve.

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