One of the biggest mental traps my clients fall into is comparing themselves to… 

...to everyone and everything. 

To celebrities.

To other moms.

To neighbors.

To friends.

To colleagues.

To more wealthy people.

To the Cleavers.

To the Greatest Generation.

To some Platonic ideal.

To perfection.

None of it is worth it. Your experience is your own. It is unique. Own it. Love it. Work on yourself. Especially this time of year, be grateful for what you have and feel free to strive for more. But meet yourself where you are and work from there because that’s the only place you are. 

So, other than Thanksgiving, where did this topic come from? Well, if you know me, you know that I’ve been fighting debilitating plantar fasciitis for several years. I haven’t been able to run consistently since 2018 or maybe early 2019. I’ve gained weight. It’s been brutal for managing my ADHD, anxiety, and depression. Well, almost a year after a funky non-surgical procedure and painstakingly slowly (torturously so for an ADHDer) working my way back from walking for 10 minutes all the way back up to running 4 miles, I’m back to being able to run every other day for that distance. I’m still a couple minutes per mile slower than I was. I’m still fatter than I want to be. And, now I’m older. 

But I am so grateful that I’m able to be out there on these beautiful fall days breathing the fresh air as the sun glints off the fallen leaves. My whole body aches the next day, but in a good way. And I’m able to take my 7-year-old with me. (He bikes while I run.) And it’s been amazing for him, his mood, his ADHD, and helped him get through his 14 day COVID  isolation without going totally coco-bananas.

So, we’re out there the other day and I’m feeling good… all things considered. We’re about to hit the three mile mark and a woman who looked about 10 - 15 years older than I am, wearing a single Boston Marathon logo’d layer to my three layers (plus gloves and a hat) came tearing out of a side street in front of us. So, she didn’t, strictly speaking, pass me. But she pulled away pretty quickly on Blue Hill Ave. 

My point is that there is always someone who is bigger, stronger, richer… or FASTER. And sometimes that person happens to be a much older, more cold-tolerant, woman. Does that diminish my accomplishment? Not at all. I am pleased that I’m at a point in my life where I could just smile and silently with her well and go back to gutting out my own run, enjoying it for what it is. My personal victory. For that, I am thankful.

(FYI: This is not the actual woman who passed me on my run. I found this lady on the internet. She's 103 and I'm pretty sure I could take her!)

Standard Disclaimer:  In an effort to foil my own perfectionist tendencies, I do not edit my posts much… if at all. Please excuse and typ0s, Miss Steaks, grammatical errors, awkward phrasing. I focus on getting my content out. In my humble opinion, an imperfect post posted is infinitely better than a perfect post conceptualized but unfinished.

I just turned 43. So maybe I’m just getting old. Maybe my brain plasticity is decreasing. Although… They used to say that adults had no brain plasticity. Now they say we do, just less than kids. They long ago figured out that the universe was expanding. I’m taking their word for it. Of course, I also took their word for the fact that it was expanding but slowing down. Now they tell me that the rate of expansion is increasing. Okay. Doesn’t really affect my life either way. So I’m going to roll with it. 

But it can get a little frustrating when science “changes its mind” about things that hit closer to home. I remember when it was a big revelation that the human brain wasn’t fully developed until age 25. This, of course, has huge implications for ADHDers, who generally lag behind in maturity and brain development. I’ve been telling clients and their parents this lovely stat for years. 

Well, today, I opened up my email and there is an article from ADDitude that says, “The brain’s frontal lobes, which are involved in ADHD, continue to mature until we reach age 35.” That seems like a major change. Honestly I haven't even opened the article yet. It threw me for such a loop, I decided to just write this on the spot. It doesn't even really surprise me. Looking back at my own life and at the late 20’s/ early 30’s clients who I’ve had, I could make an argument that for certain people, lags in impulse control, emotional regulation, and maturity persist beyond 25 disproportionately to other ADHD symptoms. Or is that just confirmation bias, now that I’ve read this? I don’t really know. I’m trying to think hard about it before I read the article and look at the source study(s.) 

Anyway, this is where I go off on a philosophical tangent, if you want to stop reading. I think anyone who actually reads my blog would agree that there is a dangerous backlash against science happening in our society currently. Because math and science are the underpinnings of everything from understanding global warming, to projecting and calculating election results, to how and why vaccines are safe and effective, an anti-science revolution is one of the most dangerous prospects we face today. But, on some level, I understand the seed from which grows this distrust. Science presents itself as a black and white thing. And, in some ways it is. But it is also a living, breathing, evolving thing. The earth was flat… until it wasn’t. The sun orbited the earth… until it didn’t. 

So much of science is theory. But theory is presented as fact. And, then when that theory changes some day and is replaced by another one, people feel like they are having the rug pulled out from under them. They feel like what used to be a fact isn’t a fact any more. Then it’s open season on all facts. Combine this with the sheer pace of change and add in how specialized our society is now. Just think of how little you understand of the things you use in your everyday life. I can’t fix my computer, or my phone, or my car, or my washing machine, or my fridge. Most nor-rural people can’t grow their own food or hunt. A lot of people don’t even know how to cook. We are so dependent on other people in this specialized economy and that’s scary. And fear creates pushback. 

I guess my point is that we are in a loop of science being more black and white to push back against the pushback. But that probably only makes it worse. We live in a hella complicated modern world. I don’t think the pace of change is going to slow down anytime soon. As a society we need to start embracing the gray areas and talking about them despite the fact that they make us all uncomfortable, no matter how fully formed our prefrontal lobes are. We desperately need science. But sometimes science is a best guess or a working theory. But that is always better than willful ignorance. Especially for those of us with young kids. As my buddy said a few days ago on our beers after dinner zoom, It’s hard not to worry that we’ve brought them “into a dystopian hellscape.” 

With that, here’s a link to the article: https://additudemag.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=05c078d02e79a07f64018da62&id=506b812e04&e=56e9d42595

Also, my youngest brought COVID home from school 2 days after the vaccine was approved for his age group and one week before he was scheduled to get his first dose. Then he gave it to my wife. So, I’m not going to postdate this. I’m going to count this as my post for last week and next week and give myself credit for posting at all. Yay, personal growth!

Standard Disclaimer:  In an effort to foil my own perfectionist tendencies, I do not edit my posts much… if at all. Please excuse and typ0s, Miss Steaks, grammatical errors, awkward phrasing. I focus on getting my content out. In my humble opinion, an imperfect post posted is infinitely better than a perfect post conceptualized but unfinished.

As my faithful 28 readers know, I like to post schedules once in a while as a demo for my clients. Scheduling is one of the main skills we work on in coaching. After we learn to keep track of our tasks with the To Do List, we work on managing those tasks in time by using a daily schedule. 

I've written much in the past about how and why I post schedules that an objective observer would deem a staggering success. I've also written about why I post schedules that have, to be kind, not at all gone according to plan. But, really, the point is that I view both of those outcomes as a success. Why? The very act of planning, of making a schedule, evaluating tasks, prioritizing, vetting the time something will take - even if I'm wrong- giving one's self structure, following through on a plan, being forced to adjust and be flexible, dealing with curveballs, and making choices as we move through the plan are all tremendously valuable skills. Skills that you will get better at the more you do them. 

AND ANY DAY WITH A PLAN IS GOING TO BE BETTER THAN A DAY WITHOUT A PLAN. Of course I'm speaking of productivity here. A totally unplanned, spontaneous day while you're on vacation in Costa Rica might be amazing. But your average Sunday, when your list is as long as your arm and you stress level level is threatening to over take the levys, needs a plan. 

The brief context here is that my wife was actually not working this weekend, for once. Yay! One kid was at my parents for part of the weekend. The other kid was wildly dysregulated and needed lost of support. And, there were some activities mixed in with an English project. I also had a TON to do around the house, in the garden/yard. And we had to get ready for halloween. It was an expanse of 48 hours + with not much structure and no time to dawdle. The perfect time to make a schedule. Saturday was a little more by the book, a series of normal Saturday tasks until I was exhausted. 

But I ended the day by making this schedule for Sunday. I annotated it in Red as I went, which I may or may not have done if I hadn't planned to post if for y'all. I think I'd suggest doing that for beginning schedulers. I don't think it is important to take detailed notes and study the times. Just making note of a time difference for a task here or there can help you attend deeper and start to internalize how long things really take. I added the blue this morning as sort of a break down of the the overall outcome. 

Some good take aways. 

1. Against my own advice, I didn't break down the largest task into its smaller sections. That being the porch, shed, garden winter flip. As a result, my estimate was not so accurate. 

2. I built in going to pick up wood for the winter and unpacking it on the porch. But I had a feeling that I wasn't going to have time because I had a feeling that I was underestimating the previous task. So that was my buffer/ "if I have time" task. Not a failure by any means that I didn't get to it. 

3. English project got done, and I had budgeted time to help in a supportive and non-rushed way.

4. What's left of the garden/shed/yard flip is smaller more discrete tasks easy to knock off next weekend. 

5. I still got my workout in, just moved it to earlier in the day. 

So, even when your schedule ends up out of order, and one big thing (the least important) doesn't get done, and one big things has a few odds and ends left to finish next weekend, and some stuff gets done out of order, your day and your schedule can still be 100% successful. I got more done with less stress than if I hadn't scheduled!

I’ve been writing a lot about mindfulness lately because I think it is so important for us ADHDers. And, yes, we can talk about meditation, yoga, certain forms of exercise, breathing, and countless other forms of mindfulness. But what do we really mean by mindfulness? To me, what we are talking about is being present in the moment. 

This is one of those areas where ADHDers are mystifying to the rest of the world because we are one of two things that happen to be diametrically opposed. Many of us are going a mile a minute and are never really present in the moment. These ADHDers  are always on to the next thing. They often forget what they’re doing, lose things, and don’t finish what they start. It is as if they are constantly being thrust ahead by a jet stream current that only they can feel. 

But there are also ADHDers who are obsessively in the moment. They are like giant toddlers. The experience time as: yesterday, right now, and… later.  And, all that really concerns them is right now. They don’t, won’t, or can’t plan for the future. As a result, they are often late, missing, or  unprepared. 

And, I don’t know, it may take an ADHDer themselves to realize that these two profiles can even be of the same person. These behaviors can exist simultaneously or at alternating intervals within the same ADHD brain. We are not all the same. And we are not the same all the time. This can be one of the hardest things for the world to understand about us, and a hard thing for us to know about ourselves. 

So, am I just pointing this out in the hopes of creating greater self awareness? No. I have been building up to articulating a proposal for a solution over the past several months through my client work and through my writing. This is my first shot at writing it down in a cohesive way. I’d appreciate any concise feedback about how much this makes sense. 

My theory about one important thing we need to do to be successful as ADHDers is to effectively balance being firmly rooted in the present moment, while constantly being aware of what is coming next. It is mindfulness, but beyond mindfulness. It is not impulsively moving on to the next thing, but keeping the vision of what the next thing is and while going slower making better decisions about what that next thing is. It allows us to follow through in the moment and actually finish things. But then it allows us to optimally transition, a thing that we struggle with, to the next task… along down the line. When we become more aware that life exists beyond the here and now, we are more likely to plan. When we slow down, we are more likely to execute that plan. 

Practically speaking, this means making a plan in the first place. I’ll write more about that soon. That way you always know what’s coming next. So you can devote 95% of your mind to what you are doing and 5% is already thinking about the next task. The transition has already begun in some small way. (Random % numbers brought to you by my imagination!) If you always know what’s next, it’s hard to “lose time.” LIke I said, I’d appreciate thoughts. I’ve got more on this. It’s just not fully baked yet. I’ll let you know when it’s out of the oven.

Standard Disclaimer:  In an effort to foil my own perfectionist tendencies, I do not edit my posts much… if at all. Please excuse and typ0s, Miss Steaks, grammatical errors, awkward phrasing. I focus on getting my content out. In my humble opinion, an imperfect post posted is infinitely better than a perfect post conceptualized but unfinished.