#26 — What ADHD coaching is (and what it's not): Christian Ehmen

Hello, this is Joseph Pack and welcome to the Drug-Free ADHD Podcast. On today's episode, I speak with ADHD coach Christian Emin. You know, we've known each other for a couple of years, but this is the first time we've sat down to have a proper chat and record the thing.

You know, we talk about what ADHD coaching is supposed to do. It's a really important discussion because at the moment, with the ease of access to funding in the UK throughout via Access to Work, there are many, many... shit adhd coaches infiltrating the area which brings us on to another point we talk about which is how to spot a shit coach we also talk about why coaching isn't for everyone with adhd

And finally, why psychiatry has just too much to lose. Without further ado, here is Christian Emin. So, obviously we talk a lot on... linkedin or we comment on each of the stuff we comment and we speak in that way we haven't had too many conversations yeah we had this we had a lot of conversations like in the dms

um i'm commenting much more on your stuff than you on mine well i don't comment on anyone's no but but like there was a time where i um where i think commented on your stuff every morning well i appreciate that and i really should comment on other people's stuff but it's more about i don't like spending much time on social media yeah i mean like exactly it's not like that you know oh i comment on yours so you have to come to mine otherwise you know

No, that would be a little bit nitpicky. But obviously there was a conversation that we'd had a little bit about how... I don't think about ADHD a lot. Because you even asked me a question the other day. You said something like, what's the typical ADHD advice that is often, boilerplate advice that...

is given a lot that you've tried that doesn't work for you. And I actually had to scratch my head to answer that question because I spend such a minute amount of time learning about ADHD from experts.

yeah i mean i can tell you where this is coming from because there is like a plethora of advice out there um you know and i think in the beginning it can be like interesting to help like to try out different things But eventually it's all that, you know, if you go down the road, it's all like our craving for the quick fixes, the shiny hacks, you know, we have a problem and we want like the proven formula to solve it.

And then, you know, there's a person who found a way for them to make it work. And then we have quick to think, oh, so I can teach you or so it must work for you as well without really considering that.

you know, that any advice or any tips, you know, has come into existence at a particular point in time, under particular circumstances, and working for that particular person, which doesn't mean it never will work for you, but it's... is yeah i mean we limit ourselves a lot if we just believe in the shiny hacks and then we beat ourselves up more if it doesn't work for us oh everybody says use the pomodoro timer and then you are

like in flow not necessarily hyper focus i mean there's a difference right flow and hyper focus maybe maybe another topic but and then oh but according to that rule i have to stop now after 25 minutes And I saw several people saying, it's not working for me. But it's often sold as like, okay, this is what you have to do. You have ADHD. So use a Pomotoro timer, use a color-coded calendar.

use um i don't know that's why i was curious and i just asked around a couple of people i know so what is like the adhd advice that people are always talking about but it hasn't been working for you because what i realized when and probably you as well when working with clients that eventually like everybody comes up with their own way of handling things right and and i think i'm wondering if we're in age where we where we trust ourselves less and less

and listen to ourselves less and less because we get swamped by information by experts and even though it might work and even that might be like you know it might be proven in studies and such i think we deprive ourselves of the opportunity to really listen to ourselves and really trust ourselves that hey it might look weird it might sound work weird but it's working for me

But it shouldn't work for me, according to theory X, Y, and Z. Yeah, and we should trust ourselves. Yeah. It's interesting you say the word experts as well, and it's... Yeah, we are barraged with information constantly on social media. It's like there's so much information thrown at us all the time that we don't even have time to think for ourselves if we are lost in it. There's a thing that Nassim Taleb would say.

how he would say the only way to define an expert is someone who knows what they don't know as in like they know they don't know everything that they know what they don't know as in like say that you're an electrician and you know everything apart from rewiring a warehouse building. They know they don't know that bit, but they know everything else. If you don't know what you don't know, you're not an expert. Therefore...

You cannot have an expert in ADHD. Because if you pulled all the scientific research together, you wouldn't come up with anything. It's such a mess. If we define an expert as like the oracle who knows everything and everything there always will be to know, then we limit ourselves, right? I mean, it's like there's more and more research coming to light, I think.

and you're spot on i think what makes an expert is somebody who is who stays curious and is also willing to have his own assumptions even like his own findings be you know contested i mean i just finished um my my master degree and in um educational leadership and management something i've been like doing for five i mean i've been doing this on the side and finally i finished it now and i really didn't want to finish and i was like oh it's worthless

whatnot, you know, all the things I've been telling myself. But in the end, you know, it was, I mean, what I was reminded of, like what research is all about, that it's not about, you know, verifying your assumptions. It's also... you know um and i think you even put a post on that like finding the joy in being challenged or being contested which which is hard for us to do right because we like to be right we like to um

and uh and when somebody challenges us we spend so much time and energy on proving the other person wrong instead of being curious about huh what might be like a good point or what might be the biggest flaw in how i think about things and And I think that's also true in coaching. The biggest mistake you can do as a coach is projecting your experience on somebody else. And because then you leave out... Actually, coaching is research, right? I mean, like you...

I mean, you are helping a person to become expert of their own lived experience. And if I look back, and probably you as well, like on... like how differently ADHD plays out for different people. I mean, there are like commonalities, right? There is like the neurobiology and such and such, maybe like similar things, but they all still play out differently.

every person needs something else or slightly different coming from them because they're not only adhd they're much more than that sometimes we forget to consider right it's like and in the end like we work or we coach or we support a person not not a label i'm not sure like how i how i ended up here right now no well that's good because i agree completely

This is one of the reasons why I don't use the word ADHD very often in coaching calls, because we are dealing with an individual. And the moment that you use the word ADHD, it's easy for a person's mind just to go back to that boilerplate description of ADHD. blah, blah, blah. But my coach, Meg, she told me that she was doing a big presentation, like to loads of people with ADHD. And she brought up all like maybe four different competing theories of ADHD.

And she went through them and she didn't draw any conclusions. And then at the end, someone said, okay, which one's right? And she just went, we don't know. And anyone telling you that we know is lying to you. And she's right about that. And it was really great. I thought it was genius, actually, that she'd left it open. She didn't. Yeah, nice. She said nothing. And that's true.

And this goes back again. I've mentioned him already, but Nassim Taleb, I think it was in either Skin in the Game or Antifragile. He talks about the difference between physics and maths, like physics as a science and psychology as a science. And he said, like, physics is like... very very easy to prove whether or not something is true and they use a process of something called falsification so they're constantly trying to prove themselves wrong by

And that's literally their process. And the more they try to prove themselves wrong, if something is true, it gets proved even more right. Whereas psychology never does that. And he goes through and he comes to the conclusion after analyzing like millions of papers of psychology, he comes to the conclusion that 99% of them were wrong.

99% of the psychology papers he studied were wrong because none of them could... be proven wrong like it wasn't just the fact that they didn't replicate it was the fact that the way that the studies were built weren't in a robust enough way to be able to it's funny because like in any good research

or whenever you write a research paper, you have to write down an entire chapter on limitations of your study. Yeah. Where you include like, you know, what are the limitations of my study? Like the sample I'm looking at is maybe not representative for X, Y, Z. So this is actually like the... the heart of research right and and that's what i think when i did my degree like the most interesting like sometimes the most painful or the most because

whether you want it or not like we always say science is objective or research is supposed to be objective right but it isn't because you are because you pick a research topic because you have a certain hidden agenda yeah Or you have a direct agenda, or if you don't have an agenda, you still have a hidden agenda. Because you're passionate about a certain topic and you want to maybe use the research to kind of verify your message.

but it might very well be that it gets falsified you know and his point is in physics you can't do that ego ego affected and you have to remind yourself i'm not doing this for me i'm doing this for something bigger than me yeah right and uh for certain like because i want to serve right it's supposed to provide value um not to feed my ego but like to a problem i want to solve or like something i want to develop a deeper understanding about

And but if you approach it from this topic, and I think that's the perfect thing to coaching. Like curiosity, like I think this is like the number one skill I think I would have, like in almost everything you do.

in whether you do research, whether you do coaching, whether you do business. It hurts, like, you know, doing something for six months because you think it works and it doesn't work. But the lessons you do from that can be... so valuable and um and i think i noticed like in the very beginning of coaching i think i am very sure i had some sessions where i thought okay this is like a method that

even though I'm putting the coaching ad off now, that I can use now with my client, realizing it didn't work at all. And I was like, oh shit, but supposed to. But no, like what I noticed back then, I haven't been like open and curious enough.

and asking more questions right um so which brings us back to like helping people to be an expert of themselves and staying curious and really listening deeply yeah but at the same time being able to provide leadership enough to to nudge people as well because then there's also you know your experience like i think you were talking about like having skin in the game right so

it's the worthwhile to share your experience and what you learned from it without, you know, without, but still making people aware that this is not dogmatic advice. Well, skin in the game is like, if I, give bad advice i should be harmed if that advice harms another but that's not the case the internet is just full of bad advice with people who are not being harmed if they give bad advice

Like harmed in what way? Not necessarily like physically, like financially or punch that person in the face. Yeah. Or, you know, reputationally or whatever. Like, for example, an airline pilot. Like if he makes a mistake, he dies too. So he has skin in the game. Oh, that's what you mean. Yeah. So that someone who just gives advice for a living often.

doesn't have skin in the game so they can just say whatever the fuck they want and get away with it if it's wrong or if it harms another and i've often i've thought this a lot about obviously with the nature of what i do um helping people not use medication um i do hear from some psychiatrists who are very positive about what i'm doing but some psychiatrists who are very upset about it and i often sit thinking about it sometimes i'm like psychiatrists can earn 500 pounds an hour

in the UK, it's very unlikely that they are going to want that taken away from them. So it's tricky for me to take their concerns seriously. Because you think there's so much for them personally to lose by medication not being so valuable. Okay, so it was a bit of a medication conversation. uh do do do you feel like there is like the like what would you what it feels like because it sounds like to me there's like you know like a like unified opinion shared by all

And this opinion is being upheld regardless what counter evidence there is in order to protect themselves. I mean, is that what you mean? Well, it's like. They'll say things like medication is the gold standard in ADHD treatment and it should be used in conjunction with all these other things like diet and exercise and whatever. I was like...

Okay, the way that you're wording this, Mr. Psychiatrist, is that you're saying it should be used in conjunction. But what happens if that person is not using medication and they're doing exercise and diet and all these things and they're perfectly fine? Should they still consider medication? And they'll sometimes say yes.

So that's just your bias because you get paid so much money and whatever. Also, it takes up like 10, nine or 10 years to train to be a psychiatrist. So you've got so much to lose if it's not working, if it's not.

the right option i think maybe like another perspective could be yes it could be about the money but also i think if you've been in in the weeds of a certain area and have with like very narrow focus on this area then it's very, like, especially if you're doing this for years and decades, and then it's hard to, you know, when...

I would say counter-evidence comes in, but then you genuinely believe it, right? It's like, in an almost dogmatic way, I think this can happen in many professions, like, this is how we've... always been doing it this is like how the world works like the earth is flat right it's always been flat will always be flat um until it's challenged and then okay

So there's a lot of people listening to this podcast now, like more and more. So what Christian, I think, is saying, and you can tell me if you're wrong, is you've got to find your own way because you can't trust me and you can't trust the psychiatrists. Because they basically are just doing what they've always done. So you've got to find your own. That's what I mean. I'm not saying you can't trust psychiatrists, but I think it's important to equip people with the skills and abilities.

to be open-minded and question. Whilst at the same time, I think there should be, and maybe this is like wishful thinking. It's like you hire an expert for a reason because otherwise you would have to do all the work yourself. And the other side of the coin is, okay, what if I cannot trust anybody anymore? I think that shouldn't happen either. But I think what is important is that have an open mind, especially when it's about your body, when it's about your well-being.

And somebody tells you, this is how you should be doing this. Of course, there are certain, like, me and my wife talk about this right now. Like, you know, our voice is like nine months years old. Nine months, nine months years old.

nine nine months old so especially i'm not sure how the medical system or healthcare system uk works but of course there are like lots of vaccinations in the beginning against all everything um and there's like the overall recommendation that a certain vaccination should happen in the 11th month our doctor said it should but no we do it at the 10th month the thing is like but they wouldn't explain why right so

While it's like the overarching institution gives an explanation, helping me to understand why that is important. While the other person doesn't give us an explanation. So there is a certain agenda or certain reasoning behind it that the person is either withheld from us or doesn't want to let us know. Of course, there are many interpretations around this, like why this might be. But I think it's always important to.

equip people with the abilities to be curious open-minded and also know that the things are always going to change and that we shouldn't take things as a dogmatic black and white advice. I think this is what people need to be equipped with. Not to say, don't trust anybody anymore. I think that's not healthy either. There is something valid.

in what people have to say, especially if they've been trained for that long. But at the same time, you also need to be aware that... I think that could be like another entirely... So there's always more to that. I could go in even deeper there because obviously we have two young kids as well. And so I am an obsessive in learning about these things.

We had a nurse doctor say to us, oh, you can never have too many vaccinations. So I knew that was not true instantly. This is a trained person, by the way, with decades of experience said this. And I was like, does she really mean that? So I questioned her on it. I said, you're saying verbatim that you can never have too many vaccinations. Oh, yeah. I was like, OK, well, I don't think that's true at all. And then I gave her my reasons.

And then I went on to research a little bit about some of the vaccinations that are given to children. Like, for example, rubella vaccine, which is part of the MMR. Boys can't get rubella. So they give it to all boys. So you're talking in tongues to me right now. So that's one of the... I've read about this a lot. And there is a huge... About maybe 30...

to 40% of the vaccinations they give to children, there's very, very, very little evidence that they actually work. Some of them do, and some of them are essential, of course. But they just give them out like blanket. And also in the UK, which may be very different to Germany, they try to be really efficient with their vaccinations because obviously they're all free, like on the NHS. So they give these like six in one jabs. They can be both ineffective and quite dangerous.

So there are alternative paths, which is what we've chosen with our kids, where you have to pay. So it's like private vaccinations. It's not cheap. And the vaccinations are given in individual jabs, much more spaced out.

yeah i mean like again i'm not an expert investigation maybe that this is not um that that would go beyond no but it's a good point because it's similar to adhd but like yeah to talk about like i was just i was trying to make a connection there um like i mean the way it's handled here it's like you know in intervals because they're different kind of vaccinations i don't know what the english

um a term term for us because like they're different kind of like they're seen some are like living live vaccines yeah live vaccines and some are not live and There needs to be like a distance between them. And you're always being told that this has to be the case. Right now, I'm actually like, I'm participating in a study to get a dengue vaccine.

because we're gonna go to brazil in january it's summer is hot and there's like and i had dengue before if you had dengue the second time you get that dengue it can it can be worse and even deadly so yeah and i participated in the study because otherwise like the job would be 400 euros including so um and i i felt very well informed uh i must say about both like the

the the risks as well of taking part um and and also um what i should not do in between or that if i get another scene but don't do it too close to the other one so i feel sounded well i'm not sure like in the uk but it also might depend on like the institution the system i mean like this at the institute of tropical medicine um which is here in hamburg

I think it's here in Hamburg because, you know, it's a port city and I think there's a history of like semen bringing diseases from other places. Anyway, yeah. I mean, I'm not... We've had vaccines to go to Asia and South America and all over this place. I'm not an anti-vaxxer in any way whatsoever, but I'm very, very... I just look into things in detail, especially when it comes to children.

my own children and i think that people could do whatever the hell they want and that's the same with the adhd medication argument i i mean this i couldn't give a shit what other what people choose to do that's their choice but i think people who are on the fence then there is an argument against using it. And I was just saying, like, just circling back to our original point of, like, you know, especially like, as an AHD, what we need to help people to equip with is...

I think the skills to, first of all, trust the instinct. Like people talk about spidey senses, right? And when you feel something is off, then usually it's worthwhile going down the pathway. And it's not that you should not trust trained people or experts. Absolutely not. That you should not trust them, right? Especially if they've been to the training, regardless of what profession it is. However...

you should be open enough that, but you should be able to ask questions because then the, then the expert should be able to give you an appropriate response and explain it to you. Right. And if they can't.

Well, there's something you have to question maybe. And if they don't like it that you're asking the question, then that's a massive red flag. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So I think it's important that... you know giving people the skills like if you feel something is off you know ask you know ask i always say when it comes or when it comes to the coaching and the person is in the room with me um

I think I'll put a post around that. Like, how do you feel with me in the room? Do you feel safe? Do you feel hurt? Do you feel I'm listening to you? Or do you feel something is off? Because if you feel something is off, I can be like the greatest coach in the world. I might be not the best coach for you.

Because coaching is something very, very personal. It's a thing in partnership. And in a partnership, like, there needs to be, like, both need to be vibing together, right? And it's not always working. It's like... You know, when you are in the room with a person and everything seems to be right, but there's like, you just cannot put the thing on it, right? Well, that's really good of you. It comes back to like trusting your instincts or trusting yourself.

However, to be fair, I've been also in a, I was at a discovery call with a coach. I ended up her picking her as my coach. And I felt something is off a little bit, but I went anyway because. Again, I think it was by the sense that something was telling me, hey, this is the right way. And we could go down the pathway of knowing how to choose the right coach. And I was thinking of that, of course.

in the shower this morning um and again coming back to our original topic like not proving myself wrong but like looking from a different perspective because i was saying do you feel safe with that person

But then also, do you feel challenged a little bit? Like you put out a testimonial recently, I think yesterday, where the person said, first, I thought Joseph is a dick. So obviously, you know, the person... maybe didn't have i'm not sure like how open she was that with that in the beginning didn't have a good feeling but there must have been something that made her believe in you that made her think you know what i think i think we're gonna give this a shot yeah

right and um because what people i think forget is like a coach is not your friend like a coach is not your brother a coach is somebody who yes is able to provide you a safe space where you should feel you can open up and let it go in a you know without being judged for it yeah

Somebody is helping you to catch yourself on your own self-judgment. In the end, it's also somebody who can challenge you. And this is like why it's so important to contracting that you really communicate what coaching is and what coaching isn't.

Because I still have sometimes people like filling out the form, like I need advice on X, Y, Z. And that brings us back to people looking for advice. I want it now. Instead of like... yeah and it's so important to equip people with that skills like to to trust themselves but also spotting the patterns and and sometimes

And this is like me as well. I'm always trying to find like a unified explanation or theory of why certain things are the way they are or why I'm good at certain things the way I am. And then I was like, well, maybe I'm just... I am good at it. Maybe there isn't an explanation. There doesn't have to be an explanation, but the proof is in the pudding that I can do this for whatever reason. So, well, big topic again. The thing is, so again, with Carly, you left me that.

testimonial what she was referring to is that she'd seen my content on social media and she thought that i was a dick because i was making managing adhd without medication seem really easy That was why. And then when on the first call, she was very hesitant to actually even have the call, but she felt I was the only person who was talking about managing ADHD without medication. And she wanted to get off it because.

side effects were horrific and she was on the highest dose and it wasn't really working anymore which i hear every day yeah so Anyway. Like the only hot dog stand in town with a hungry crowd. Yeah, exactly. And then, yeah, exactly. And then we started.

the sessions and then she changed the tune quickly for two reasons one she realized that i really wasn't being a dick i was genuinely telling the truth and she realized that within a few months that it was true that it was actually quite easy and she's now She hasn't taken medication since, I think, March. We're in, what, November now, basically. Can I catch you on the several months? I think there's something important there.

It takes time. Like growth takes time. Transformation takes time. Building a business takes time. And we forget that. Even I forget that because on social media, we always see like, you know. seven figures in seven days i join my six week course and get 375 leads um and it's easy to always feel behind and that you should be catching up with something else. But really letting that sink in, that things or transformation does take time. I wish we all understood this a little bit more.

Yeah. You know, and I can recall like coaching, like I've been working with like up to this point, I had coaching from, I think four different people in the last couple of years. And, you know, sometimes the insights from the coaching, they always, I mean, usually they don't always like drop in the session. Like, oh, session's over. Here's your seven step plan too.

But the most powerful sessions are that where the client lands on an insight that totally changes the perspective and which, you know, impacts their life in a sustainable way, because now you see things differently. And when that means when you have a certain encounter, maybe like weeks or months later, you approach it in a different way than you would have done it before the coaching. So this is what I mean. Like when, you know, when I approach a certain thing.

in a way when I have a new encounter whatever I do I notice like how like the long-term impact of the coaching in that sense yeah people want the quick fixes they want it now And, you know, I catch myself on that too, like all the time, all the time. I could be further ahead. I should be here. I should have this and that many clients and all these different kinds of things.

um well in the uk we have this thing called access to work funding which is like um you heard of that yeah yeah i did that means now that in the uk there is a barrage of shit coaches Because there's a lot of people desperate to make money from this thing. And I'm not saying that just as my opinion. I'm saying that because over the past nine or 12 months, the number of clients I've received...

from people who have had a coach for a couple of months or a month and then they've left them and then come to me and then stayed with me for months. Yeah, you told me about that. crazy and it's just growing constantly and the things they tell me about what these coaches are doing is not coaching like I hear things like oh

They just basically got up a PowerPoint presentation and then just kept telling me about these different things to do with ADHD. Well, that's not coaching. No, not at all. So they're not a coach. They're basically just on the bandwagon of this.

of this acturing yeah so therefore um yeah it's a problem and it's a problem in one way there's a problem because it affects the um the people with adhd who are buying the coaching uh but you know for people like you and me who are doing the right thing it's good because it reinforces our ability to do what we do yeah i want to go as far and say it's good because especially if it's good for us

Yeah, yeah. I don't think it's good for that individual person. I just wish that, you know, I just wish this wouldn't have to happen. Well, the thing is, this is another part of integral part of my coaching, which is dealing with reality, which is it's like it is happening and it always will whenever money into anything. So better off just.

seeing the positives in it which is actually that yeah and actually the quicker people can work out that their coach is a fake yeah and this they can move to someone who can do we need help people need help to understand what coaching is what it isn't and because it's also not like the question what code is right for you but also when coaching is good for you and when not like um because

and this is like my view like as an outsider but i felt like and and and a pushback if you if you think i'm wrong with this but i feel like the message is that Coaching is for every person with ADHD. However, I disagree with that because it depends on where you are on your journey, really. Yeah. For some like a therapeutic approach at a certain point in time is much better because.

Like when you want to really go with the coaching route, you need to be in a situation where you are in a position that you can like be curious, question yourself and also.

doing the inner work in a way that you can look forward, right? Because I hear this from other coaches also who do take access to workline. I talk to... a coach recently and she said i have people on the call say tell me what to do tell me what to do so and so there seems to be like a disconnect of what like people are being told coaching is but what coaching actually is And I don't, I don't say that. I really say that from like, you know, from love really is like coaching is not always.

I won't say always the answer, but you have to be in a certain position, in a certain state to make coaching really work for you. Because otherwise, just... wasting your time and energy and money and you might be feeling worse off right so and that's why we as coaches when we have somebody on the call we also genuinely feel i mean we have spider senses too that you know

I don't think I'm the right person to serve you right now. Let me also do that and not think, okay, but I really need a client. That's not going to be... great for for either parties and that makes people actually feel worse and actually you know happened to me that um i don't want to say i still beat myself not really but like

I think one and a half years ago, I had somebody on the call who was like very desperate and very frustrated. She was a referral by a previous client. And she asked me, can you help me? Can you help me? And inside, I was doubting that I can, or I knew I can't based on where she is right now and what she needs. But then I felt like I cannot say no. How can I say no to a person who needs help?

luckily she didn't take on the coaching so i was off the hook but like this was a big lesson for me back then that when you realize you cannot serve that particular person on the call that you need to be very honest about that and you don't you're not mean to the person saying i can't help you you're actually doing the person a big favor because um otherwise you would create like a very rocky shaker relationship leaving the person worse off

And it's also going to be a bad experience for you as a coach, right? So the question of whether the client is the right fit is also a question of like, you know, it's also a question like for you. It's not only like whether the client fits to you, but also whether you fit to the client. Yeah, exactly.

And ever since, I mean, it has been evolving with whom I specifically work with. After doing lots of research with my past clients, I had the best experience with this. But it's like also why one of my favorite questions is not like, who is your ideal client? Like, this is like, I think like, you know, hypothetical, wishful thinking. Yeah. We'd love to ask the question, like who was the favorite person or the.

What's your favorite client experience? What's his name? What's her name? What made this relationship special? And this is like where... you know the insights get mined and where people will think oh this is what makes the person a great client and these are the people i want to work with because of this experience right so yeah exactly hey do you need to go yeah i need to go okay

Wonderful to chat. Yeah. And we obviously have to continue this conversation to have to book that in. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.