Eric Tivers on ADHD in Adults

We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Eric Tivers, a licensed clinical social worker, coach, podcaster, speaker, consultant, and entrepreneur. He specializes in a d h D and

he's worked extensively with individuals on the autism spectrum. His podcast is a d h D Rewired. Hi, Eric, Welcome to the show. Thanks so much, Glad to be here. It's a pleasure to have you on. I was on your podcast not too long ago, and we had such a great conversation, and so I think the same thing will happen again, hopefully here for our audience. But before we get into the meat of it, let's start like we always do with the parable. There's a grandfather who's

talking to this grandson. He says, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a second, and he looks up at his grandfather and he says, well, grandfather, which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed.

So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. What that really means to me is there's all kinds of things that come to our awareness, right including that the thoughts that are pervasive in our mind, but the negative praise to thoughts, the

positive appraise thoughts, and just the more neutral ones. And you know, our brain is this fascinating piece of machinery that generates these chemical electrical reactions that are somehow stamped with the language, and we make sense of it. But just because we think it doesn't mean it's true. So by now it putting too much attachment to the thoughts that we have, because the more we think things, the

more we think things, right, So it's by acknowledging. Oh, I mean, I look at a great example this morning, I was leaving my house and I heard a lot of sirens. So in like a ten second period, I had a thought, oh my god, there's been a shooting at my son's school. Oh I got like I went through this whole scenario on my head, and I'm just like, brain,

what's going on? And I just took a deep breath, and so I just sort of noticed that I went into this real fast, weird, like catastrophic thinking, Luke, just because these sirens were a little bit more than usual, not like to leave like five blocks from a hospital, but I still seem a little bit more than usual.

So the anxiety was uh fed by because I was listening to that thought for a moment, right I was feeding that, and then when I was able to take a step back observe brain and I try to separate mind and brain right and just recognize the absurdity of it, it was able to you know, starved out wolf and then feed the wise minds and combody. I was mentioned to you before. I just got back from a long, silent retreat, and one thing that a retreat like that will do is show you just what your brain does.

And it occurred to me just not that I don't know this, but you go on something like that and it becomes so much more aware. I'm like, my brain says the stupidest things, and it says them over and over and over and it never shuts up, and it's inane. And I was like, if I had a friend who talked this much about such stupid things, we'd be friends

for like three minutes. That'd be it we that we would take me three minutes to be like this friendship is over, and yet like that's or we live, yeah, and it's it's just my brain doesn't usually jumped that catastrophically, So that's kind of why that stood out to me today. It's like, huh, well, that was interesting. Even when it's not catastrophic though, it's just the repetitive sort of just I just you know, like I said, being on retreat, that's the one thing because there's nothing else to do.

You meditate and then you walk around and live with your brain because you're not you know, at least the ones that I'm doing. You're encouraged not to read, not to listen to music. You've got nothing to do except listen, and you're like, oh man, there's a lot. Boy, there's a lot going on up there, and most of it is completely irrelevant, but it seems so relevant when you don't have that awareness that you're talking about it. We just we just sort of follow it around like on

a leash. So your podcast is called a d h D Rewired and you are focused on adult a d h D. So let's let's sort of start there with, you know, what is um adult a d h D. What are some of the signs the symptoms, like how you know, how would somebody if they don't already know they have it, if they haven't been formally diagnosed. What are some surefire signs this might be something you're dealing with. So the first signs you might be an adult. Yeah. Um,

that's the first criteria. And I mean we we call adult a d h D, but like there's not a specific thing called a belt d h D, just a d h D. And adults, now there is a different criteria, though a slightly different criteria for adults. Because you know, a d h D is it's a cluster of three, um, three short categories of behavior. You have your your impulsivity and hyperactivity, the sort of stereotype of a d h DS.

You have this hyperactive boy jumping off the walls, right, that's your your art SI center, right, your your stereotype of a d h D. And it's not just the hyperactivity but also the pulsivity. So that's that's another element of that because as you get older, the hyperactivity may uh diminish a bit, but the impulsivity tends to be pretty consistent throughout life. Then you have your your errors

of inattention. So that's the distract ability. That's the disorganization challenges with with time management, troubles with what we call executive functions, so that ability to to plan, to sequence information to sustain your attention when something is kind of boring, um, you know, and people will say, well, everyone is a hard time paying attention and doing things that you're boring like with a d h D. One of the things that I think is so important to understand is that

it's one of the most misunderstood and stigmatized disorders compared to how much information and research is out there. It's like the misinformation wars are still winning around this disorder right sore with the hyperactivity and impulsivity, you're dealing with inattention and distractability. Um. Great at starting projects maybe, but never finished the project. Has a hard time paying attention

to details, forgets what they are about to do. Issues with like working memory, um, even just sustaining motivation is part of that that cluster of behavioral symptoms, and we still do sort of describe it in a behavioral way,

but it is a neurobiological developmental disorder. We can see in group studies that the that brain imaging studies that not only does the blood flow between regions of the brain differ, we have changes in size structure with a certain areas of the brain that are are smaller, uh

and don't work as efficiently. Um, there's just great brain scan or where shows the study of UHO composite image where you have a a cluster of typical adults doing some you know, basic cognitive tasks, and then next to that you have a cluster of adults with doing the same uh ADHD in the same cognitive tasks. With the non A d h D adults, you see just a little region kind of right in the middle of the brain um lighting up, not a lot of not a ton of activity, right, which is what you want to have.

And with the A d h D adults you see two different regions further spread apart also using some of the emotional centers of the brain to do cognitive tasks. So when I when I'm presenting two groups and I say, you know, if we're gonna call um laziness the lack of effort, And when you see more yellow and red and orange on this brain scan meaning more effort, which

brain is putting in more effort? Right? You know? For for me and I have a d H D UM and for so many people in my community, where lazy is it's a shaming kind of trigger work, right, that's you know, someone calling the lazy It's like oh no, uh uh, it's you know, one of the ways I often describe my a d h D is the my engine is revving, but I am a neutral and I

can't get myself to do anything. I know what I have to do, all right, That's what kind of a d h D often adults looks like it's you know what to do, but you can't get yourself to do what you know you need to do. What is the diagnostic criteria of how does the professional go about diagnosing it? So the goal standard of the way you diagnose a d h D is through UH clinical interviews, rating scales

UM and interviewing loved ones in your life. Right, So you have to one have a history of the challenges that I described earlier, you know, in pulsivity around UM, high risk behaviors UM, constantly on the move, you know, the distractibility the teachers said, you know, could do well if they just apply themselves, UM, you know, doesn't turn on their homework. So there has to be that childhood

history of the these issues. And there's evens from controversy around this, but if you look at the the what is accepted now is you gotta have a history of it from childhood. Right, doesn't mean you're diagnosed in childhood. But you have to have a history of these problems. Right. So there's nine symptoms of hyperactivity and impulsivity, right, Six of them are hyperactivity, three or of impulsivity. Then there's

also nine symptoms of inattention. For kids, you need to have six out of the nine, for adults five out of the nine. Right. Uh, These symptoms need to be present for at least six months, and they need to be um the functional impairment, because there needs to be impairment in order for it to be a disorder. Right. Um needs to be present in multiple domains, right, so

work and home right. Um. However, there's even controversy with that because we know that that interest is so important for people with a d h D. So if you happen to growing up, if you were a kid that actually liked school, like you may not have struggled as much if school if school was your jam, right, Um, for most people with a d h D, school is not our jam. Right. Well, there are there there are

some people who are some kids who would describe that. Um. So, yeah, you need to have all those things, those things present. You know there's people like well, I want I want a brain scans to really know. It's like, well, you can go pay for a brain scam, but the science doesn't support it, right, and there are there are people out there who say, yeah, you can get the spec scan. It's like now that you falls positive, So like flip the coin is the front line of treatment symptom management?

Is it behavioral? Is it medicinal? Is it all of the above? I mean, you know, I'm more I'm more familiar with with depression as a as a thing, and I know that the answer to that is all of the of the evidence based treatment for a d h D is referred to as the multimodal treatment of a d h D. And so so yes it is and all of the above, with the biggest uh slice of the pie being medication. No, a d h D medication is effective for most people, right, not everybody, but most people.

And hey, there's so much misinformation and fear around a d s D medication. The story I like to share is UM, when I was diagnosed with a d s D. I was in college, my my my first year, UM, my freshman year of college, my first semester, I got a two point to g P a UM and I might have been opening up more beers and books. I opened up the books, did a lot of studying, spent a lot of time in the library, and I got at one point eight. I was like, cool, Well, that

wasn't a kind of positive reinforceton. I was looking for right, And as someone with a d h D, one of our common trait is um if we were passionate about something, we can argue ourselves on any situations. I was able to convince my parents to give you one more chance,

m H right. And I just happened to have good luck by having a meeting with a friend who was sharing with me that she was diagnosed uh and that long ago with a d h D. And she was describing some of the challenges that she had, and for the very first time, I felt like, oh my god, this person is describing what it's like inside my brain. Right.

She was one of the things that she said that like that It was that for me, that light bulb moment of you know, she was saying, I would I'll be reading the stuff in my my books and then I would you know, I thought it would be triggered by something I was reading, and now I'm thinking about that thought. But I'm continuing to read, and I'm like, this is my entire life of school. Right, It's like I would read the chapter I was assigned. I had

no idea what I just read. So I went the first week back at school and I made an appointment to get an evaluation um and after the evaluation said, you passed this test with flying colors, meaning wow, how are you not diagnosed with a d h D when you were younger? It's so I scored really high on the inattentive presentation of H. Right, So I wasn't the kid bouncing off the walls. I had some impulsivity growing up and still still do, but my main symptoms were

in attention, right, I was. I was in my own head and completely you know, content there. So I was diagnosed and I was given a prescription for adderall. And that first that I remember, I was reading this book. It was called Crested Kimono. It was about the comparative Japanese uh business family, right, And I think just the

fact I can remember that says something, right. And I remember I was sitting there in my room at college and I got to the end of this chapter in this book, and for the first time in my entire life. I knew what I had read, and I told the story probably a thousand times, and I still get choked up every time I tell it. There was life before that, in life after that moment, because it was like I would have been living in this fog for my entire life, but because it's all I ever knew, I didn't know

that I was living in this fog. It was like, oh my god, I could have just one thought at a time. I didn't know that was a possible. I didn't know that was a thing that happened. I was able to read the book and actually like I'm thinking about the words I'm reading and I'm pausing to reflect, and I'm noticing if my mind doing something else, and I can bring it back. And it was this feeling of feeling normal for the first time in my life. And I can't tell you how many people I have

talked to who have said those exact same words. And what I find sad is how many people are, Oh, I don't I'm against medication. I don't believe in medication, and yet there's strong cockling so profoundly, And I said, you know what, be against medication for you when you try a couple of medications at a couple of different noses and the side effects are outweighing the benefit at that point, be against medication. Right. It probably saved my life. And it's just it's this message that I want to

tell people. Don't be afraid of it. You know, people say, well, I don't want to get to it. What we're gonna People with a d h G have a higher rate of addiction, but it's lower if you're on medication. I lost my very best friend to addiction if he wasn't managing it. Well, you know, so it's not these these disorders. It's it's a good news diagnosis because it's treatable. It's because it's not a cure for it. But as I said, it's it's multimodal treatment. Right, So the medication is the

biggest piece of the pie, you know. Circling back to your question, environmental management, right, set up your environment to be conducive for what you need. So all those things that you need to remember to do, don't keep those

in your head. Set up your environment to you know, I just tell people at the top, you know, lie that people with a d you tell themselves don't really believe is I'll remember that, you know, when I was on your show, we we debated whether you know, I have I have symptoms of a d h D or not and or I guess we didn't really debate it

so much as we just discussed it. And but it was one of one of those things that you know, I realized that, you know, years ago, I finally gave up and on trying to remember anything, and I put systems in place that kind of keep everything in order for me, because without them, I I really struggle, and

with them I seem to do okay. Yeah, yeah, um so yeah, it's it's uh, you know, learning the strategies around using a calendar and becoming more I call it teaching time wisdom versus time management, because you know, you can't really manage our time if you just manage ourselves across time, and so time wisdom is all about sort of accepting the fact that we're time blind, right, and then take a look at the beginning of those tasks

that you think, um like, just make predictions. How long do you think it takes you to make breakfast to uh, you know, to get yourself already in the morning, to you know, respond to email, just make predictions of how long think those things take you, and actually track how longst it takes you, right, Because when I'm trying to project and help my clients project how long things will take them, first, you gotta know how longs it actually take you, right, Compare that to how long you thought

it was gonna take you. And so when I am looking at a tennis and I say, okay, for sure, that's an hour, Like, no more than an hour, I know that means three hours, right, that's wisdom. Right. It's like take my gut tells me, and then the go by what my history tells me to do that. We have to let go of shame. We have to let go of this feeling of well I shouldn't have to do that, or why should this taking so you know this long? It's like let go of all the shitty thoughts, right,

and just look at what is and let's deal with it. Right. Exercise, too, is a huge part of any issue management. Um. You know sleep. So many people you have sleep issues, and it's not outstaying asleep. For most people, it's about getting yourself to get to bed. There's a very specific type of procrastination. Uh that I first show this term by A Tim the Pitchel is a procrastination. He was a podcast. We had him on the show. Yeah, it's great, great,

so interesting. Um sleep procrastination And I first heard that, I was like, that's exactly what I do. It's so frustrating because when I get up in the morning, the six thirty a m version of myself, I'm like, I am going to bed early tonight. I'm gonna be in bed on time. And then it comes ten o'clock and I'm like, one more thing, one more thing, one more thing, right, and then it's midnight. I'm like, damn it, let's try to get tomorrow. Focusing on doing like a morning routine

is the thing that most people miss. Is like the most important part of that is a nighttime routine. You know. It's like it's counterintuitive, but not really if you think about it, it's like, well, yeah, if you want to get up at six thirty, you you have to make yourself go to bed. And that's where you know, and and our world is designed to just keep us doing

one thing after the other after the other. I have this thing I call it the the A D H D productivity sleep cycle where we uh we stay up late to finish work, so we're tired the next day and not very focused, so we have to and stay up late to finish work. Yep, right, yeah, it's then repeat. Yeah for me, that's that's my one of my biggest turtles. It's uh, um, something I've started with three years and years and years. I may like three months of really

good progress. Uh this the start of this year, and so I do these these tendantly coaching groups, and then in between my seasons of coaching start three weeks. In between seasons, like nine hours of my structure of my week just like went away and start did all the progress in my sleep. It's like no, So it's uh, you know, it's this mountain that I keep us up and down and climbing back up. Yeah, you know. I more and more I start to think that that's kind

of the nature of a lot of things. Yeah, you know, is that like we make progress and we do really well, and then we just don't and the sooner that we just sort of go, oh, yep, all right, I did it again. Without out to use your word earlier, shame or remorse or all kinds of guilt and just go oh yeah, all right, kind of slipped out of that time to get back to it. It's one of the things I work with with coaching clients on and why we try and structure our relationship to last long enough

so that that's inevitably, inevitably that's going to happen. You're going to do well, then you're not, and fine, now how do we get back on track? As sure as we get on track, we get off of it, it seems to me, and then you're just nothing to do

but get back on that's right, you know. And and one of the you know that there's the kind of Hite sized phrases that we use for for a d h D, and one of them is that a d h D is consistently inconsistent, right, like you're you're rocking it for a few days and then you can't get anything done right. And for a while I used to focus on this is what a lot of the research and the treatment literature say, like, focus on helping your

clients be more consistent. And you know, the more I sort of lived through that, I found that that's it's a false notion. I think I think we have a better Um, a better chance of overall doing better for longer if we just accept that we're going to fall off the horse and skip the whole part of beating yourself up when you notice you falling down and just get back up. I agree. I could not agree more. I think that is so fundamental. And and again I don't you know it's it's funny when you when you

start to talk about some of these things. Um, it's the same way I think with depression. Is like you start to describe symptoms of depression, and a lot of people will go, yeah, I got that, I got that, I got that right A D H D two. It sounds like, right, there's some of these symptoms you're describing that I think our matters of degree that everybody probably wrestles with to some extent, And and that I think the nature of inconsistency. Although there are some people who

appear to be robots, most people simply are not. And you know it's and life is not you know, life doesn't kind of roll at us the same way over and over and over and and and so like you said, I think I love what you just said. They're about the sooner we accept that we're going to get off track, the better because then we could just get you know,

with the business of getting back on track. I mean when I'm when I'm working with my coaching groups, Um, you know, one of the things I make sure that they understand I don't have all my ship together, right, because you know, I'm leaving them in these groups and I think I have all my ship together, and it's like no, no no, no, Like all the stuff I'm teaching you right now about planning and everything else, I'm like,

I sometimes don't do this stuff too right. So it's like I'm teaching this stuff, but I just wanted to be fully aware and here here's like the action plan for when I fall off the horse, right. You know, we're now we're working through long term planning, and for for most of the people in my groups, they've never planned beyond like a week letter on a year, which is we're working on right now, right right, Like how do you actually like plan a year? And then how

do you actually use that the plan your week? And that's that's what we're doing for someone. And you could see the emotion and so many people that are in these groups through the overwhelmed, the like how am I doing this, and like, well, if some accounts, does that mean I have to commit to It's like it's just a placeholder, that's all it is. You can move it like you know, It's just it's it's putting down an

intention you have in this moment for a moment. It is not this moment, right, And then you revisit it and he decided is this still relevant? Right? Yeah, you articulated something so well that that that I spend a lot of time thinking about and and focusing on. It was separate decision from action. Yeah, so explain that one a little bit more So. Many of the things that I that I really teach this is because I've learned,

like like I read about it. But then I'm like, oh, yeah, I've struggled with this thing for so long, and then I, you know, try to figure out how to you know, what are the strategies and the workarounds and all the things that you know, I amn't. However, decision making is also an executive function that we tend to struggle with with a D H D. Right, So if we are going to make a decision about something, don't then go

next to the action. So if you're looking at you're planning, right, decide maybe in the morning, all right, what's so maybe the first two things you're gonna work on that day? Right, don't first look at your calendar. I'll go sit down with your calendar, glance at all the stuff you got to do, and then decide in that moment what you're gonna work on. And then I start working on it.

I plan ahead of time, and I had a time, could just spick an hour ahead of time, you know whatever, and say, all right, this is gonna be the first task I'm gonna do, and when I finished this, this will be the next task, because you've already made that decision, right, And then I want to tend to sit down and work. Then you know, you don't have to figure out, all right, should I do this or should I do that? Like separate those things because executive function, our decision making is

an executive function. So when I was a kid, eric the most stressful things when my dad took me to the bakery and I did make a choice between one of like fifty delicious looking like doughnuts. It stressed me out so much. I don't know, I don't know what I want um and one of the things that I learned is that you know, the the pros and cons for most choices are about the same. So when they are about the same, just flip a coin, go with it. It's so funny how often I use flipping a coin.

And again, I think it's so funny you can look at this stuff because I think you and I are looking at things through slightly different lens. But you know, that's like such a common depression symptom, which is, you know, an inability to decide. Yeah, the thing I love about flipping a coin is that you don't necessarily have to choose the thing, because a lot of times I'll be like, I don't know, I don't know. I'll flip a coin and then I'll get an answer, but like that's not

the answer I wanted. And then I know exactly and then that's that's it, you know. And one other thing I want to bring up to is, you know, people will say, oh, it's you know, it's just a D H D. Right. I just interviewed uh and and Head

on the Podcasters on episode two seventy one. Uh Dr Russell Barkley, who was a kind of the world leading researcher around a d h D and UH And he just diday a study looking at the life expectancy for people with a d h D. And it took all all these different variables that I found correlating with some of these um actually real calculators that some of the insurance companies made available, and he showed that you know, you can compare to smoking, uh not exercising, heavy drinking,

always risk actors that as a society we spend a lot of money, time and effort on minimizing the health risks. A d h D has a greater uh negative correlation with life expectancy. So when people say it's just a d h D, in the point he's trying to make in this research that this is not just a mental

health disorder, this is a public health crisis. The good news of this is when we look at you know, the the Big five personality traits, right that for people who had a rated high on levels of conscientiousness, all those respectors seem to kind of diminish, right, because a d h D in a sense is a it's such a sort of self regulation, right, and so if you're conscientious, you're self monitoring, your self regulating you're checking in with yourself,

You're you're taking into consideration. You know, if I eat five donuts, I'm not going to maybe feel so good tomorrow. Or if I don't start exercising and maintain this exercise, you know. Um, And so the good news is all the risk factors that were identified are all changeable things. There's a lot of people don't like this particular researcher because we're like, he's so negative and he's also glue.

Like he's a researcher reporting the science right. And you can bar your head in the sand and say you don't like what it says, right, but that doesn't mean that, you know, just because you don't like the factive Global

warning is happening, doesn't mean it's not happening. More and more, I seem to see so many things through the lens of self regulation, This ability to sort of decide what's important to us, know what's important to us, and manage ourselves along the way to kind of get there, to to realize like, oh, you know, here's what's going on inside me. You know, talk to so many different people and so many different things. You know, whether we're talking

about a d H D depression, procrastination, anxiety. I mean, they all have this element of that learning to self regulate. Hell everything it really is. I mean, this this idea that you no attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is a really bad name for what it actually is because it's not that we always have a hard time with. It's not it's a deficit of attention, right. Sometimes we're paying way

too much attention, too long to the wrong phone. Right, It's a it's an issue of regulation, right, Like if you're interested in something, I mean it's like a hyper focus like I eat. You can hyper focus for like ten hours and something you're interested in because it's a really high likelihood. That's a d h D. If that happens to you regularly. It's not just flow. I can

feel like flow sometimes. But the challenge with with with hype, with hyper focus d h D is that it drains that executive function fuel tank, which is willpower, right, and we don't have the same one of willpower every day and throughout the throughout the day. We the more we use those executive functions, the more they diminished. And so when we get into hyper focused, one of the things that happens is it is now harder for a rain to restore those those executive functions, so it takes us

longer to recharge. Uh So for creative types, you like, need to kind of have that full immersion and a creative project. Right, It's okay if thy need to do that, but then they also need to plan for that recovery time.

So what are some other top strategies? So we've talked about time wisdom because I mentioned earlier that I do these uh these coaching and accountability groups, and because a d h D is a disorder where we know what to do, but we don't always do what we know, accountability is such an important part of managing this disorder. And I'm really specific with my group members and it's this shame free accountability. But we also provide each other, uh what I refer to as compassionate asking, you know.

So it's like, all right, we all get it. Like you said, you renna do the thing. We didn't do the thing, right, we're not going to stop it. Okay, I do that too. We can start with yeah, I do that too. Okay, so when's your next opportunity to do that? Um? You know, we'll do things like you know, One of the the the challenges that a lot of people THEIA do you have is with transitioning from stopping one task and going onto the next, UM I asked, referred to as brake failure right or even faulty on

off switch hard, getting hard, starting hard, stopping right. So let's say I have to to leave my office at five o'clock. Right, I might share with my accountability UH partners a selfie of myself in the car at a specific time that I said I would do it. So it's like, yes, I know that I need to do this. I also know that UH, I do better with external accountability. And that's so true for so many of the people

that I work with. So UM looking at other strategies like looking at how do we look at our to do list? How do we actually right our to do list? UH? One of the exercises that I do in my groups is UH it's called the Anatomy of a to do list, where we really break down the language that we use in our to do lists. And it's amazing how many people, how many UM, just nouns I'll see on people's to do list just doctor that means doctor, Like what doctor they're like, um, I don't know how long has that

been in there? To the list A while? I think I know why? You don't even know what this means? Right, So it's not just like call doctor, it's like the what, the why, the how, the when? Right? Um talking about you know, really not just verbing you know your to do list? But I use the phrase of using a vision verb, so a word that can help you see the action that you're going to be taking. So instead of um, you know, look into or find out these

are some of my favorite pseudo verbs. Right, it's look into unless you're your task involves like opening a drawer to find something. All right, look into should not be on your to do list? Right? Google is a great vision verb because you know exactly what that screen looks like when you're a Google. Um, you know, talk to you is another one. I've talked talked to Eric about this, Well, how am I going to talk to Eric? Right? Is it a text? Is it is a phone call? Is

it an email? Right? So use that as division verbs. Now. One of the other issues with a d h D is you know we need the why, like why do we need to do this? What? What's you know? It was in the moment, when we're writing it down, we feel the importance of it, but when we come to look at it again later, we forgot the importance of it.

So I always see, is this what without at why? So. One of the things that that I have started doing with my my groups and my clients is having the study of raise your y Q right, So playing words of I Q right, raise your why so w h y cue. So don't just have the reminder of what you need to do, have do your mind you about why you said you wanted to do it right, Because if you think that you're going to be able to recall that in the moment, just another law you're telling yourself,

all right, and no, no shame. It's just your brain kind of disconnects that the emotional reasons why you want to do certain things, and so by scaffolding that around you, by by putting that okay, So, does it take another minute to write all that information on into the list? Sure does, But how much times it saved by you know, trying to figure out what the heck you meant by this task and looking for information. So yeah, I mean, it's really like breaking down the details of all this

stuff you know. It's it's sometimes we just don't realize that we haven't identified what that first action step is. Um, you know, so I just like getting started. And on my on my podcast, one of the the sort of opening phrase of the podcast is, we know the starting is the hardest part, so let's get started. I'm always asking you, all right, what is that very first action step? And and for so many people, for you know, they really start understanding how how to think through this stuff.

They're thinking so big and not realizing that sometimes the first step is just to get your butt out of the chair, right and be like, oh, because sometimes our brain needs it broken down that much, right. I mean it's funny. I I have a slide to one of my presentations. I said, you know we could change the world.

We just have a hard time changing the laundry, right, because if it's boring, boring is a painful experience when you got a d h D. So doing things that can help sort of the neurochemistry, exercise, getting things that are excitement rewards, um, you know, are all helpful for for managing. So you can look at a number of ways so we can look at brain. So um, like exercise, in between boring activities. So just getting more blood flow

to the brain is going to help. UM. If you can gamify stuff, that's that's great for a lot of people with a d H d UM having even friendly competitions to get tasks done. We have something in my coaching groups that we call adult Study Hall, and basically what adult study all is, so we all have these things that are that I refer to as important. Stuff that's boring but important, right, and stuff that we just like we'd rather like poking gills in our eyes than

that have to actually do these things. But we have to do these things. So what we do is we do them together on zoom right video conference. So we're all on on camera, all of our microphones are muted, but we're just working on our own stuff. And it's just it's like silly, how effective this is? You know. It's like, all I gotta work on writing this this report. And then I'm like, all right, I wonder about this thing.

I'm about to go on the Google rabbit hole and I look up and I see all these other people on the screen. It's like, no, I'm soon still keep writing this report. It's like I'm gonna get myself a snack. It's like, oh, they're gonna see me out of my chair. No, I'm gonna stay her here right in right, report right, And it's it's just it's a funny that way that accountability can you're really really helpful. Just knowing that other people struggle with this kind of stuff and that you're

not alone is so profoundly helpful. And that's why I only do group you know, I used to and I'm training as a as a license clinical social worker, you know, so I used to do one on one therapy. I started doing these these Uh. When I announced my very first coaching group, I totally announced it impulsively while recording

a podcast. I was like, so, I think I'm gonna do these coaching groups and if you're interested, you know, uh, you know, pick me up on my website and I'll have more information next week, which I said for eight weeks in a row, I was as I was trying to figure out, wait, how am I going to do this? Um?

And then I got my first group going. That was about five years ago, and it was just profound being able to see when other people can see themselves in other people, right, and they could see that Wow, Like if you have lawyers and doctors and um, you know, by all measures, people who are my groups are generally be successful, um not not work and has that high

level of education. But but some do right, and then they hear how they view themselves and how they see themselves as as a failure, right, as not enough, And

then you're like, why are you saying this? Like you've done solve these great things, and then you recognize that, wow, what you're saying out loud is the voice in my head right, And there's you know when we talk about conscientiousness and self awareness being one of these huge components that you know that people with a d h D tend to follow on the conscientiousness scale, But this is something that can be taught, right, and when we can

instead of just like intellectualizing, oh yes, this is what other people do, but when you can see it and emotionally connect to other people who are going through some of the same struggles, and then you can see yourself in that. One of the things that so many people in my groups uh say is you know, I can't I join the groups. I want't firm to be more productive. But what I really learned is how to be more

comfortable in my own skin. I look at the work that I do is as a very fortunate and grateful to be able to uh do this work to you know, I've had people go through my groups. You know, I've been over a thousand hours of group facilitation. Um. You know, it's the lives that I've seen change is just you know, one of my my friends as as part of our we have an a d h G rewired podcast network and he just want to call a d G Essentials

and his pous for more for for parents and educators. Um. And one of the phrases that he says, a d h D is like life on hard mode. Right. It's kind of comparing it's like a video game. It's like life on hard right. And yeah, you know, but we can do hard things. And that's the thing where the you know, feeling of hope and encouragement really comes in

in this group setting. Because these groups are intense. We do three times a week for ten weeks, and we have people paired up at their fourth member accountability teams where they're checking every day. Right. It's you know, like you almost can't go to the bathroom by yourself says right, because it's really designed to provide the immersive, intense experience.

And as you were saying, like, you try to bring people through that point where they're they're going to fall off the wagon, right, Such an important like uh sort of phase of coaching is how to help people get through that that point where this thing is no longer new novel are shiny, it's hard, and you don't you don't want to do it anymore? Right, and how do you how do you support them through that? And through that people develop a sense of self confidence because they see, oh,

I can do this for the long run. I wanted to quit and I stayed with this, right, and just see what that instills in in us is is huge. You know, self confidence doesn't come from people saying attaboy. Self confidence comes from you know, doing hard things, persevering, failing and getting back up. I agree. You can't really think your way into confidence something you've kind of how to act your way into well. I think that is

a great point for us to wrap up. Eric. I have really enjoyed talking with you and um I think this interview is going to be so helpful for people. So thank you so much for taking the time to come on. Well, thanks for having me on and letting me going to share a little bit about about a d h D because it's it's a good news diagnosis and don't be afraid to go find out more information about it. Thanks so much, Eric, You and I are

going to continue talking in the post show conversation. We're going to talk about meditation and a d h D. Listeners. If you're interested in getting the post show conversations as well as weekly many episodes, you can go to one you Feed dot Net slash Support. Thanks again so much, Eric for coming on, Thanks so much. Okay, bye m M. If what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider making a donation to the One you Feed podcast. Head over to one you Feed dot net slash Support.

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