highlights
33 highlights saved, filed under psychology.
- 01
What I didn’t know then but understand now is that we don’t need motivation to take action. In fact, it often happens in reverse: action can generate motivation.
- 02
Ninety percent of the ADHD experience is saying two things on loop: “I’m sorry I got distracted” and “I’m sorry I forgot.” I knew there was a lot to say on this topic.
- 03
While cued recall and serial recall aren’t impaired in ADHD brains, studies done on ADHD children and teens suggest that free recall is. Free recall, also referred to as uncued recall, is the ability to spontaneously remember something without a cue to prompt us.
- 04
Questions that hack our brains: When we ask ourselves a question, such as “Why am I so interested in practicing the piano?” or “Why am I so good at saving money?” our brains are inclined to look for answers: “Oh, because ___.” This can increase intrinsic motivation.
- 05
People don’t think straight when they’re drowning, and they don’t think straight when they’re flooded with emotions, either.
- 06
ADHD brains don’t regulate emotions very well. Not only do they hit us harder and last longer, we also tend to be more reactive to them than someone who is neurotypical. This intensity and reactivity have an enormous impact on how we interact with the world, as well as how the world reacts to us.
- 07
cognitive ability declines as emotions rise, and that includes the cognitive ability required to regulate our emotions. But for those of us with brains that impulsively react to an emotion, there are times we don’t have any window to recognize our rising emotions and even try to regulate them. We skip past yellow and go straight from green to red.
- 08
Research finds that cognitive avoidance—a set of coping mechanisms in which a person uses cognitive techniques like avoidance, suppression, or rumination to escape mental and emotional distress—is particularly common among those with ADHD.
- 09
As psychiatrist Dr. Dan Siegel puts it, you’ve got to “name it to tame it.” Labeling the emotion can diminish the response of the amygdala and limbic system, decreasing our emotional reactivity to negative emotional experiences. And understanding what we’re feeling can help us identify which of our needs may not be getting met
- 10
When we do a “simple” task—say, making a phone call—we’re not just dealing with that task. We’re also dealing with an emotional barrier that has been built from past failures with the task.
- 11
“Learning how to identify what’s causing your mental resistance makes it easier to find or create a tailored solution that addresses those specific feelings.”
- 12
I use the trick Dr. LaCount teaches all his clients: notice when you’re berating yourself and then ask yourself: “What would Coach B say?”
- 13
I often spent so much energy trying to convince myself to do the thing (or figuring out how to do the thing) that I didn’t have enough left to actually complete it.
- 14
ADHD brains aren’t motivated by what’s important. In fact, many of our most important tasks are ones that ADHD brains find viscerally painful to do: the ones that are lengthy, repetitive, or boring. Even if we have the motivation to accomplish a goal, we might still have trouble working toward it. Goals frequently come with multiple tasks, and many of these tasks involve these characteristics, which our brains can’t sustainably tolerate.
- 15
Our brains are understimulated. This is why we wait until right before the deadline to get started on a project. It’s why we might make “simple” tasks overly complicated. It’s why we switch up our writing style or the color pens we’re using, or doodle while taking notes. It’s why we do serious things in silly ways. We’re instinctively stimulating and motivating our brains by adding a sense of urgency, challenge, novelty, and interest.
- 16
This is due to temporal discounting, where we perceive a desired result in the future as less valuable than one we could have now.
- 17
For many of us, projects, tasks, and events exist either “now” or “not now”—and anything “not now” can feel as if it doesn’t exist at all.
- 18
Unfortunately, we often plan our time (or are expected to plan our time) as if these differences don’t exist. We expect ourselves to be able to get things done in the same time frame (and with the same consistency) as someone without ADHD, despite all evidence to the contrary. We expect ourselves to do things when we planned to do them, so rather than giving ourselves the flexibility of hopping around, we drag our feet starting on (or full-on avoid) the task we’re “supposed” to do.
- 19
Prioritizing sleep means no longer seeing sleep as optional, or less important than whatever else needs to happen in our day. None of the other strategies will matter much if we throw sleep out the window the second something comes up.
- 20
We often build systems for the person we’d like to be rather than the person we are. We already have habits, preferences, aversions, strengths, and a history of what does and doesn’t work for them. If we build systems with them in mind, we’ll often be more successful at creating a system that works than if we try to build one from the ground up.
- 21
When you’re getting adjusted to something new, be aware of how many new systems are changing and try to keep as much of your life on automatic as possible.
- 22
ADHD brains are chronically understimulated, which is why treatment involves stimulant medication. When something isn’t interesting to us, it’s harder for us to pay attention to it. Even if we care about learning or doing the thing we’re being asked to do.
- 23
The default mode network is more active in ADHD brains than neurotypical brains.[*3]
- 24
Fight distraction with distraction. One thoughtfully chosen “distraction”—such as music, a TV show, or using a fidget—can provide our brains with enough stimulation so that they don’t have to go searching for it and get distracted by something more exciting.
- 25
Leave yourself “breadcrumbs.” In some situations, we know we really need to stop, but we’re afraid to stop because we’re not sure if we can get started again. When it’s time for a hyperfocus spell to come to an end, use a bit of that remaining mental energy to write down these two things: 1.) What did I just do? 2.) What would I have done if I could keep going?
- 26
Executive function (EF) is like the CEO of the brain. It’s a set of top-down cognitive processes (executive functions) that help us self-regulate so we can effectively plan, prioritize, and sustain effort toward long-term goals.
- 27
The ability to control our focus—also called top-down attentional control—relies on the prefrontal cortex. It is the last part of the brain to develop, and it develops even more slowly in those with ADHD. And even once it is fully developed, it’s still impaired.
- 28
So we learn to mask our ADHD behaviors and do what’s expected of us—be quiet, sit still, pay attention—when we’re in public. We pay the price later—melt down, feel exhausted, stare blankly at a wall, or scroll through social media for hours just trying to recharge.
- 29
We can accomplish great things—but without appropriate support, it tends to come at great expense in other areas of our life, or at the expense of ourselves.
- 30
Whenever you experience that gear-grinding feeling that tells you something isn’t working, don’t try harder. Try different.
- 31
ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder, which means the nervous system, including the brain, develops and functions differently. Fundamental differences in brain development and structure contribute to differences in behavior. This is why behavior strategies that work for neurotypical people are frequently unsuccessful for ADHDers. Our behaviors happen for different reasons.
- 32
I was trying so hard to force myself to fit the stencil cutout of who others expected me to be that I never got to know the person I was. I thought I was working to “meet my potential” and “be my best self,” but what I was actually doing was trying my hardest to be someone I’m not.
- 33
The fact that I could sometimes exceed expectations made it even more frustrating for me—and everyone around me—when I failed to meet the basic ones.