Does anyone else have ‘intrusive ideas’?

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I know this isn’t actually ‘a thing’ but I don’t know how else to describe it. I don’t even know if this has anything to do with ASD. I tried looking it up and all I found was intrusive thoughts brought on by anxiety and such. I do have anxiety, but these aren’t those. Technically they are intrusive thoughts but they are ideas. Here is a better way to explain it by describing one of the more disruptive thoughts:

I had finally found enough motivation to make myself focus on taking an SAT practice test which I’ve been putting off for a week. I sat down, I’m doing pretty good. I read 2 passages, answered the questions, moving along just fine. Then, I try to read the third passage and I legitimately couldn’t ‘read’ it even though I was reading it. The reason being that all of a sudden an image/idea popped into my head of myself crocheting a square out of thin paracord, then fashioning this layer in between two pieces of durable fabric (I could ‘feel’ the texture) sewing three sides together in such a way that all four corners were drawn together, but leaving one side open as an entrance. Then I attached a zipper to the open side, and ran a paracord strap that I made to two sides to make a durable outdoor use bag. Such as for hiking. It was a completely unwanted thought and I tried to get rid of it because it wouldn’t let me think of anything else. I could barely hear myself telling myself to focus.

After about 10 minutes, I decided I wasn’t getting anywhere and had to stop even trying to read this passage. These thoughts are always related to my special interests. I have thoughts like that often, just ‘sudden inspiration’. I often let them distract me, so I never really thought of them as hard to get rid of because I never tried that hard. This time however, I needed to focus and actively tried to cease this thought. This is the first time I realized how disruptive and distracting they really are. I don’t know what I’ll do if I get these while taking the actual SAT this Saturday. I honestly don’t think it will matter though because I can barely bring myself to start or continue studying anyway.

Does anyone relate to this? Is this related to ASD? Or could this be indicative of ADD (which I do not have a diagnosis of)?

Yeah, I think it's something everyone deals with though. I read a lot of articles about it, its your mind trying to figure the world out and organizing information. The key is training yourself to draw your attention back to the task as hand, which is why things like meditation exist. It's important not to beat yourself up in your head because that reinforces negative thinking, allow the thoughts to pass and if you can say "I'm off topic". Everytime you can catch yourself, you're training your mind to be aware of what you are thinking. Each time you redirect yourself you're making that a mental habit, so the more you do it the easier it will get to focus. You don't need to go along with every little thought you have.

That sounds right - intrusive thoughts might be more of an issue for folks with ASD or ADD/ADHD, but NTs describe having them too. I used to meditate in a manner where thoughts were allowed to cease. The trick was not to fight a thought that arose, but to acknowledge it or just observe it coming and going without reacting and thereby creating even more thoughts. That helped quite a bit. Other times I would meditate by focusing slowly on one word after another of something familiar, like the prayer of St. Francis - at first I'd have to go more quickly through the words or else thoughts would intrude, but with practice I could go slower and slower without losing focus. When I've exercised or gone running regularly, I would synchronize breathing with movement and that was really great - my mind would sort of just let go of thoughts and float along in inner and outer perception. If something gets under my skin now, I do better at letting it just run its course and fading away. When I was younger something a person said could intrude into my thought and feelings for days and days.