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A weekly newsletter for creative and innovative people, like you, with ADHD who want timely, helpful, and interesting resources for leading and living well with ADHD.
Monday, July 1, 2019
Tick Tock, Tick Tock
"The clock is my kryptonite. I just cannot seem to get things done on time."
This is the most common lament I hear from my ADHD clients. Procrastination and lack of time-management skills is profoundly effecting their professional and personal lives. And because of their lack of follow through they are losing credibility with others and themselves and consequentially losing faith in their abilities and strengths.
There isn’t a human being on earth who doesn’t procrastinate and use time unwisely to some degree or another. We all have things we’d rather not think about today and will put off until tomorrow, or next week, or next month, or….never.
As adults with ADHD we take procrastination to an art form. If we don’t want to do something or think about something we don’t. Especially if we feel overwhelmed and uninterested.
It’s as if it doesn’t exist. It’s not NOW so it could just as well be NEVER.
Until it is NOW and it DOES exist
And...
We’re scrambling to get that report done for our boss due today
Frantically finishing our thesis paper tonight for tomorrow
Paying late fees on our credit cards because we haven’t checked the mail all month and forgot about them
Are speeding to the airport to catch a flight because we got a late start and didn't account for traffic
Are apologizing to our kids again for being late picking them up from school or practice
Are running out at midnight to buy cookies for a child’s classroom snack
I’ve lived these scenarios. I have clients who make six figure incomes who've lived these scenarios. Not because we don’t have the time, money, or brains to attend to things. It’s because our brains hate the tedium and boredom of paperwork and routine tasks and we forgot to pay the bill, about the time, our kid’s practice, or the due date.
We can either beat ourselves up with shame and blame and stay stuck
OR
We can leverage our strengths and natural problem solving abilities to outsmart time and use it to our advantage.
We can have self-compassion and hold the tension of being a flawed human being with the ability to grow and develop.
Re-framing Time:
Trading that old mindset and old results for a new mindset and new results.
For most adults with ADHD we have to overcome the cultural and historic moral judgements surrounding time-management and procrastination before we can even begin to consider using time to our advantage.
Webster's Dictionary defines procrastination as:
to put off intentionally and habitually
to put off intentionally the doing of something that should be done
to move or act slowly so as to fall behind.
it typically implies blameworthy delay especially through laziness or apathy.
Not one of my clients or colleagues with ADHD has a set intention to be weak and lazy, to be irresponsible and disrespectful of other's time and resources.
we want to follow through
we want to get stuff done
we want to show up as our best selves
we want to feel satisfied with a job well done
we want to be reliable and trustworthy
we want to feel motivated
Before we can use time to our advantage we have to take blame and self-reproach out of the equation.
I submit that we re-define procrastination as
The desire to accomplish tasks and projects while being hindered by my brain chemistry
Putting stuff off that is boring and uninteresting to me yet willing to do what it takes to get it done
I am not lazy or stupid because I struggle with time, I can outsmart time
In order to outsmart time we need to understand a few things:
Basic ADHD brain chemistry and the challenge it provides
The time-shame spiral
People with ADHD's unique way of experiencing time
The five secrets to outsmarting time
First, a Little Brain-Chemistry Insight
Anecdotally, in 1 million years I never thought I'd be excited abut chemistry. I hated it in high school and college. I required tutors to pass. Any math/numbers related course has historically been a shame-filled experience because my brain is not wired for numbers. (Time is numbers. UGH!)
But, learning about my ADHD brain and the chemistry behind it has been eye-opening, life-giving, and freeing. I hope it is for you as well.
As adults with neuro-a-typcical ADHD brains and executive function we tend to be very hard on ourselves. We lack self-compassion and self-empathy for our lack of time-management skills, and for not accomplishing the tasks and projects we are responsible for on time. We have a great sense of letting ourselves and others down and begin to lose faith in our own strengths, talents, and abilities.
It's not your fault.
Not one of my ADHD clients wants to be late or unreliable.
Not One.
Here's the deal:
The ADHD brain has lower dopamine levels, the neurotransmitter that regulates movement, attention, learning, and emotional responses. Dopamine is a key ingredient for interest and stimulation. Because we lack dopamine ADHD brains are often underwhelmed by the lack of interest spark. Therefore for our brains enter a kind of limbic-lag or brain-freeze when it comes to time and getting stuff done.
Interest and stimulation releases dopamine and fires up the brain to accomplishing task and projects. Many times tasks and projects can feel tortuously boring to the ADHD adult brain. Boredom does not encourage dopamine production.
The problematic
time-shame spiral
We need dopamine to stimulate interest and motivation
Our ADHD brains have lower dopamine levels
We have tasks and projects we are responsible for
The tasks and projects may not spark interest so our brain is not stimulated--low dopamine situation
We feel overwhelmed by the task and anxious about not feeling motivated to get started or re-start
Our brain is unable to create the necessary interest so we are stimulated enough to get started
We feel overwhelmed by the task or project
We feel overwhelmed by the "pre-shame" we're experiencing for letting others down again
The brain experiences overwhelm as a threat to to whole body
The brain signals the body to produce cortisol as defense
Cortisol amplifies brain fog, anxiety, and brain freeze, it can also cause short term memory loss
Unlike adrenaline or dopamine which dissipate quickly cortisol lingers in the body
We are frozen in the moment and any energy or motivation we were feeling has been drained out of us. We are in snail mode.
In order to get out of the frozen, overwhelmed, shame-spiral we do something interesting that has nothing to do with the task or project at hand
This is why you may find yourself walking around the office talking to people rather than at your desk working on a project due next week. You got stuck or bored, you felt drained of energy and focus. The project suddenly felt overwhelming, cortisol began to flood your system, your brain "read" this as a threat and signaled you to get away from the threat: THE BORING PROJECT
This is why you may find yourself binge watching "The Great British Baking Show" rather than doing laundry. The pile was overwhelming and you didn't know where to start so your brain signaled you to get away from the threat: THE NEVER ENDING PILE OF LAUNDRY
This is why you may not be able to make those return phone calls or make simple appointments. You didn't know how long the call would take or maybe what would be expected of you. It feels overwhelming. Your brain feels threatened, releases cortisol, you feel even more anxious, and your brain signals you to move away from the threat: THE DREADED PHONE CALLS
It's not your fault.
And we can do something about it.
The ADHD Brain's
Unique Way of Experiencing Time
It's not that those of us with ADHD don't understand time, it's that we experience time very differently from the non-ADHD brain.
Because our ADHD brain is wired for stimulation we experience time as Now/Not Now, experience Time Blindness, and short Time Horizons.
NOW/NOT NOW:
NOW: This is whatever interesting and stimulating task, project, person, or idea is in front of us right now. This is what we can take action on to the exclusion of everything else.
NOT NOW: Everything else. No matter how important it is or how essential it is to our success and sense of personal satisfaction.
TIME BLINDNESS
A good sense of time is one critical executive function. It involves knowing what time it is now, how much time is left, and how quickly time is passing. People with ADHD have a tendency to be "time blind," an unawareness that time is ticking away and it hinders our ability to use time effectively.
THE TIME HORIZON
The “time horizon" is about our ability to look into the future and plan ahead. People with ADHD often have shorter time horizons than do neuro-typical people. Think of it this way.
Neuro-typical people stand on the shore and see the ship off in the distance on the horizon. They have an awareness that the ship is slowly drawing closer and closer. Therefore it is not a surprise when the ship finally arrives and docks.
Neuro-a-typical people with ADHD stand on that same shore and see that same ship off in the distant horizon. They are completely unaware that the ship is moving closer. When the ship arrives and docks people with ADHD are completely surprised. When did this happen? How did this happen? It was on the horizon and suddenly now it's here! People with ADHD are "blind" to the slow and steady advancement of the ship moving towards them. Just like time.
The really great news is that we can outsmart time
by leveraging our strengths
and ADHD problem solving abilities to our advantage.
The Five Secrets of
Using Time to Your Advantage
Self-compassion and kindness
This is being warm and understanding toward ourselves when we fail, or feel inadequate. It's a recognition that to be human is to be imperfect and it is a shared experience.
Self-compassion says "it's stressful to fall behind and fail again, but I am not alone, we all fail, we all struggle in some way or another. It's okay. What can you do to outsmart time?"
Make the clock work for you and your learning style
Time Timer : A visual depiction of how much time has passed and how much time is left. It's a great time stress-management tool. Great for visual and kinesthetic learners as well.
Alarms: This is a simple and effective tool to make you more aware of time, especially if you are an auditory learner. Alarms break into your consciousness and jolt you out of whatever you’re doing. A great use of your smart phone! Some of my clients set multiple alarms that require them to get up and move to shut off the alarm. Just getting up and moving can help with resetting and focusing on what's next.
Apps: There are a wealth of helpful apps out there. Here's a couple to consider based on my client recommendations:
Pomodoro: These apps use time as a valuable ally in accomplishing what we want to do in the way we want to do it, and to enable us to improve continually the way we work or study
Focus@Will: Lyric-free audio tracks designed to help you focus and lets you make a note of how productive you felt while listening, which it tracks over time. Great for auditory learners
Your learning style: Understanding HOW you learn and process information is key to implementing tools and strategies that work for you. There are a lot of assessments out there but I like this one from NC State. It's free and focuses on a student/classroom perspective but all questions can easily be asked/viewed through a workplace lens. It also offers free and informative PDFs with a lot of helpful tips for each learning style.
I'm an active-visual-verbal learner. The secret to time-management for me is a combination of my Time Timer, talking through the time sequence with someone, often writing it down on my whiteboard or post-it-notes, and my iphone/apple watch combo. I love that appointments show up on my watch at a glance and I've set my watch to buzz on my wrist 30 and 15 minutes before I need to transition or leave.
Your strengths: Understanding WHAT you do best raises your self-awareness and helps you understand how the time is impacting you and how you impact time. I like the Clifton's Strengths Finder assessment, there is a nominal fee, around $20, but once you've takenthe assessment you are provided with a wealth of information, written, audio, and video, about each of the strengths and how to leverage them.
My #1 strength is achiever. The secret to time-management for me is often making getting stuff done a game, can I beat the clock? or a competition with myself.
Enlist a coach: If alarms and clocks aren't working for you, enlist the help of a professional ADHD Coach. ADHD Coaches help their clients live more effective and satisfying lives by deepening their learning, improving their performance, and enhancing their quality of life.
Coach Pam