SuccessFULL With ADHD
Do you struggle with overwhelm, chaos, and negative self-beliefs when trying to accomplish life with ADHD?
As a late-diagnosed ADHD Coach, ADHD Expert for over 20 years, and managing an ADHD household of 5, I understand the struggles that come along with living a life of unmanaged ADHD.
The SuccessFULL With ADHD podcast shares my guests' journeys with ADHD, how they overcame their struggles, tips for other individuals with ADHD, and what life looks like now for them!
Additionally, experts including Dr. Hallowell, Dr. Amen, Dr. Sharon Saline, The Sleep Doctor, Dr. Gabor Maté, Jim Kwik, and Chris Voss, join the SuccessFULL With ADHD podcast to provide insight on ADHD and their tools to manage it.
Tune in to “SuccessFULL with ADHD” and start your journey towards success today!
* The content in this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.*
SuccessFULL With ADHD
From Distractibility to Creativity with Dr. Ned Hallowell: A Favorite Rerun Episode
This is A Fan Favorite Rerun Episode
Today, we're diving deep into the ADHD world with none other than Dr. Ned Hallowell, a leading authority on the subject. This episode is set to revolutionize your understanding of ADHD and inspire you to view your unique brain wiring in a new, empowering light.
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Even the three core symptoms, you turn them on its head and you get a positive the flip side of distractibility is curiosity, the major asset, the flip side of impulsivity is creativity and other major asset you don't plan to have a creative idea they pop, they come impulsively. And the flip side of hyperactivity is energy. You know, I'm glad at my age to have all the energy I've got so embrace the condition. As I like to say you unwrap the gift it doesn't unwrap itself, it takes work to unwrap this gift.
Brooke Schnittman:Welcome back everyone to successful with ADHD. I'm your host, Brooke shinnimin, CEO and founder of coaching with Brooke and award winning globally recognized ADHD and executive function coaching company for all ages. And today we have something a little different for you. As many of you know, I love to bring you the best content and sometimes that means revisiting some of mine and my listeners favorite episodes. Whether you're a longtime listener, or new to our show, today's rerun is one of those must listen moments, originally airing in 2023. This episode features some of the most popular and needed information for ADHD ears out there today. All right, without further ado, let's jump back into time and enjoy this classic episode of successful with ADHD. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to successful with ADHD today I have the great Dr. Halliwell. If you know anything about ADHD, you know this guy staring right in front of us. He is an expert in the field of board certified child and adult psychiatrists and a leading world's authority. He's graduated from none other than Harvard, and he actually worked there for 21 years as well. He graduated from Tulane. He's the founder of the Halliwell ADHD centers in Boston, New York City, San Francisco, Palo Alto, Seattle, Metro West, he has spent over 40 years helping 1000s of adults and children live more productive and happy lives with his strength based approach, which we'll definitely hopefully talk about today. And he has ADHD and dyslexia himself. He is the leading author of ADHD 2.0. And also driven to distraction. He's the co author with Dr. John Ratey. I know all of you have seen this book or read it, and or skimmed it. And he's also been featured in Oprah 20 2060 minutes. And then the today show goes on and on and on and on. And, unfortunately, I don't have 30 minutes to talk and highlight all of the work that you've done, because we need to get into it. But thank you, Dr. Halliwell, for being here. I know, it's been a long time coming for us. And you were so supportive of the ADHD community that we got on a call this morning. And you said, Okay, let's do it. So, so happy to see. Yeah, no, I
Unknown:love what you're doing. And it's tremendous. I mean, that's the, the big need is to get the word out, you know that. And folks like you, grassroots, that's where it's happening. So I'm very glad to join. Yeah,
Brooke Schnittman:thank you to give
Dr. Ned Hallowell:any any help. I thank you,
Brooke Schnittman:Dr. Halliwell terms, the quote, ADHD is like having a Ferrari brain with bicycle brakes. And there have been many versions and variations of this, I mean, other ADHD people, but strengthening the brace, you can have a champion. So can you tell us a little bit more about how you came up with that quote, Dr. Halliwell, and how that is reference to the ADHD brain?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Well, you know, early on, I learned about this, when I was, how old was a 30 something. And in 1981, before doing a fellowship in child psychiatry, I had never heard of add up until then it was called add, by the way back then. And I had heard a lecture in July of 1981, was a really momentous moment in my life, because all of a sudden, it hit me I had this condition that I was hearing described. At the same time, I realized that the medical model, the deficit disorder model, left out all the good parts left out the strengths and you know, but that's what we do is as doctors, we zero in on pathology. You don't go to the doctor because you feel so good. But when it comes to the mind, it's a big mistake, just to talk about pathology. Because we identify with our minds, you know, we don't identify with our kidney if you say you have a sick kidney, the person doesn't feel personally slighted or you know, but if you say you have a sick brain, that that's your brain is you and so that's that's a that's an insult and so we He had created the diagnosis, the name of which was demeaning and pathologizing of an entire person. And it'd be one thing if that were accurate. But I also realized that it was completely not accurate. Even though the term Deficit Disorder is wrong, we don't have a deficit of attention. We have an abundance of attention. Our challenge is to control it. And so I knew I needed some kind of metaphor, some kind of analogy. That would be quick and easy to understand. But it was also accurate. And I wanted the headline to be positive in the footnote to be negative. So just came to me have a Ferrari engine for a brain you've got a race car for a brain, your brain goes lickety split mile a minute, runaway brain. The problem is you have bicycle brakes, your braking system is not strong enough to control this incredibly fast, powerful brain you've got. And so you know, my job is to help people strengthen their brakes, so they can win races instead of spinning out on curves. And the beauty of that analogy is it's accurate as well as being descriptive. You know, Ross Barkley, who is one of the great researchers in the field, has conceptualized add, I still call it add, but
Brooke Schnittman:that's okay. A lot of people do.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Russ conceptualises add has a relative deficiency in inhibition, your inhibitory circuits, the brain has inhibitory circuits and excitatory circuits, and an add your inhibitory circuits aren't as active hence, you can't screen out incoming stimuli, which makes you distractible and you can't screen out outgoing impulses, which makes you impulsive and hyperactive. The three sort of identifying symptoms of ADHD that's a fancy way of saying weak brakes, deficiency and inhibition currently problems with inhibiting although that's what brakes do they inhibit movement or they slow it down. So it's worked very well, that analogy because kids get it, adults get it, and it's accurate they can and when someone is, is acting up, instead of saying, You bad boy, because it's usually a boy who's disruptive. You say your brakes are failing. There's no shaman, you know? So yeah, I gotta work on my brain and work on my breaks.
Brooke Schnittman:Yeah. And I know that you quote Dr. Barclay, in your book, ADHD 2.0, and talk about the 13 years less, on average of an individual with ADHD. That's scary. But I also want to, since you brought him up, talk about the dmn and TPM because what you were sharing definitely appeared to me as referencing those two things and how that really impacts individuals with ADHD compared to neurotypicals. Would you mind differentiating? Sure,
Dr. Ned Hallowell:this is this is relatively new research. And it's it wasn't around when I wrote driven to distraction in 1994. But it's very exciting that we have this information now. And and it turns out, when you're doing something constructive, when your imagination is engaged, it's cooking a meal, writing a paper, designing a boat, whatever it might happen to be, when your imagination is engaged, you super focus. And that's when we're at our best. And that's when add becomes a superpower becomes a tremendous ally, because we tend to be highly creative. And our our greatest asset or most distinguishing feature, is we have a prodigious imagination, we're often not aware of it, because we've always had it and we take it for granted. But most people with ADHD are extremely imaginative. So when you're using your imagination, when it's engaged, then three different regions of your brain light up in four different regions in aggregate, that's called the task positive network, you're positively engaged in performing a task, and you focus you folk focus really well. But when the task comes to an end, the old thinking was, the brain sort of takes a risk. That's not true at all. In fact, the brain uses more oxygen, when it's not in the TPN than when it's in the TPM. Interestingly enough, so what lights up instead, when the task positive network shuts down, is what's called the default mode network, the DM in which I called the demon because dmn sounds like demon but perfect word for it. In people that add the demon tends to send out a stream of negative horrible messages. Remember, it's your imagination. So your imagination cooks up every bad thing. You can think of about you, you're stupid, you're ugly, you're boring, your life is gonna go to hell, everything you've done is you've not made any good use of yourself. All you do is spread bad words bad vibes, and you just just attack yourself in a way you would never attack anyone else. And, and what happens is you sit there in this kind of trance, it's captivating, you see, and we're always looking for stimulation that will engage us. We're always looking for focus. Contentment is too bland. You don't say she was riveted in contentment, it's fine. You do say she was riveted in fear and despair and gloom and doom, and it's absolutely captivating. So you zero in on that. The problem is it's horribly miserable and makes you not like yourself and not like your life and you abuse yourself just treating yourself terribly and it hurts you're gonna have PTSD from beating up on yourself. People with ADHD often have terrible terrible self esteem and, and a lot of the worst damage was inflicted by their their own imaginations that nobody else would talk to anybody like that. And it's and it's also inaccurate, because we, we tend to be very talented, but we tend not to give ourselves credit for that. But if you can understand that this is the what the mistake people they really make is they they take the productions of the demon, the dmn, to be truth. They think, ah, yeah, you really are a horrible person, you really are a talentless goof, you really have nothing to contribute. So they say that's the truth. They believe these lies that the demon is coming up with because we're very much more ready to believe something negative about ourselves than something positive. We're immediately suspicious if someone gives us a positive remark. And if someone criticizes the year, we say, Yeah, you're right. I am a just a rotten person. And that is it's a horrible habit that you want to learn to break. If you can understand that it's a function of, of biology of neurology, that it's not truth. It's not like the God of truth suddenly visited you at all. It's much more like a nightmare that your imagination is creating. Well, if your imagination created it, your imagination can destroy it. Now, how do you do that? How do you destroy something that's going on in your mind, your mind, you redirect its attention, you redirect your attention, instead of looking at the accident on the side of the road, you look at the cornfield on the left of the road. Now, it's hard to do, because the accident on the side of the road is a lot more fascinating. But it's upsetting. Yes. So you have to learn how to redirect your attention, the minute you redirect your attention, the dmn shuts down, all the negative, the negative stuff cannot survive for a second. Without you're feeding it with your attention, then people realize they think they don't have any control over it, they have absolute control over it. It's just that it's not easy to do, it's not easy to disengage from something that's captivating, like getting a kid to get off of videogames, you know, video games, or, you know, and, or an adult to stop watching, you know, something on TV. It's not easy to redirect your attention when you're captivated. But you can do it. And it's worth learning how to do that. Absolutely.
Brooke Schnittman:And I like how you talked about, you know, of course, there's pattern interrupts but that doesn't always work for individuals with ADHD, redirecting the attention changing your environment moving away from that negative thought, can be so much more helpful sometimes.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Absolutely. Absolutely.
Brooke Schnittman:And you were saying that when we get these negative signals, and thank you for explaining dmn and TPN. Let me get these negative signals. We definitely very often believe them. And that can correlate into our rejection sensitive dysphoria. You also mentioned that we don't always believe positive feedback, and I know that you termed Rs. E which is recognition, sensitive euphoria. Would you mind explaining that?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Sure, well, RSD rejection sensitive dysphoria is a term that William Dodson is made famous is common in people with ADHD and other people get it too. We're exquisitely sensitive, overly sensitive to perceived criticism, rejection, I say perceived because often it's not intended at all. Someone says, I like your dress, and the person hears that as saying, I don't like your shoes. So you know, they create rejection or criticism out of nothing. But again, that's the imagination at work and And then they go into this horrible place of feeling left out to sequestered alone, you know, once again, not in with the in crowd and it just it brings back all the years they've lived with rejection or perceived rejection feeling different in a negative way. And it's a real problem doesn't there's a couple of meds he recommends for it, but it's mostly a learning that it happens. And be Well, if that's a creation of my imagination, I can destroy it, because it's not real. And that takes some practice to learn how to do that. Now I because I always looking for the positive, I said, Okay, if there's rejection sensitive dysphoria, about recognition, sensitive euphoria. And that's also true, we tend to be especially responsive to praise we love it, that doesn't mean we're narcissistic. It's more that we're deprived of praise, we, you know, we're like the poor little flower that hasn't been watered, and you give it a little water, and it just brightens up. It's so happy and blessed. You've given me some water, now I can bloom and these can feed off of me and all that. And so, again, it's, we get so preoccupied with the negative that we forget the positive, we need. And I asked for it myself, people are often taken aback because it's not most people are not confident enough to I'll ask you, do you like me? You know, do you like this thing I did, right? They'll say yes, I do. I'm good. I just want to make sure. Instead of living with the insecurity, I ask straight out for reassurance. But in general, if you're dealing with some will add it really, if you're dealing with anyone pass along positive remarks that you've heard, or positive observations you have, most people don't get enough of that. Adults anyway, it's a great favor, you can do them. The euphoria can last a week, you know, you can dine out on it, you know, the one compliment the person gave you on the nice of the smart thing you said at the conference, or the beautiful dress you're wearing, or whatever it happens to be, you can hold on to that for a while I encourage people to do that don't feel like you're being self indulgent, you need to feed yourself, you see. And that's, that's another term I use. You want to be able to metabolize praise, metabolize positive remarks. And what do I mean by that? I mean, just as you metabolize a tuna fish sandwich, when you eat it, you break it down in your stomach into its component parts and ultimately into its various molecules. And then it passes along through your intestines and your body absorbs the nutrients and then they're taken through your bloodstream to every cell in your body. And that that process of nourishing yourself from food, you should be able to do the same thing with with positive with praise, to break it down, to own it, to metabolize it and to let it feed you and most people with ADHD can't do it. They block it. They don't even let it in. It's like they've got a they've got a porcelain wall. You know, they know that. And so the praise, they say thank you and that bounces right off and falls to the floor. I can see them doing it. I'll say God, you're really smart. Oh, thank you. And I think you're right, haven't taken it in. Why not? You don't even give it that much thought. Just reflexively they don't take it in. They don't consider it. They don't own it at all. They give me a knee jerk. Thank you because they're polite, but I can see it's had no impact on them whatsoever. On the other hand, if I said boy, are you stupid? They'd remember that for a long time. Dr. Halliwell called me stupid. You know what a jerky?
Brooke Schnittman:It's a highly sensitive ADHD person. Right? Exactly, exactly. But then you tell that to a neurotypical, and it might not resonate the same.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Yeah, they say say you're stupid to Mother words, combat, you know, whatever. Yeah, just for things, right. And then particularly our way of being friendly is to insult one another. You know, how are you doing a year old son?
Brooke Schnittman:So, you are a leading doctor, and most doctors, like you said, think about the gap, rather than the strengths. I'm just curious. Obviously, there's a lot of different treatments out there for ADHD. What do you believe to be like the gold standard of treating ADHD?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:As of now, the best treatment includes diagnosis, education, coaching, and a trial of medication. Those are sort of the Four Mainstays You obviously you have to have a diagnosis to know what's going on. And then you want to learn about it. And hopefully you learn my strength based approach because it's a lot more accurate and more in bolding. And then a trial of medication, you don't have to remember a lot of people get upset about meds. The fact is, meds are very safe. If they use properly, you don't have to do it. But it's, it's seems silly to me to pass up an opportunity to have a, an intervention that is so powerful, it makes everything else you do all the non medication interventions, enhanced. Yeah. And then, and then coaching, which is sort of the most effective of the non medication interventions in which you you do is very effective is as long as you want to do it. You've got to have a coach that you like, and who likes you, and as to what coaching is, you know, who invented coaching? You? Correct? I know that distraction? Yes. I said to add, don't need a therapist, they need a coach. And some people made fun of me and saying, Oh, I thought that was for baseball players. As they know, we have trouble getting out the door not because of how our mother treated us. But because we didn't remember to put our socks on. And
Brooke Schnittman:that was makes us anxious, we don't want to talk about it, we want to fix it.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:So coaching, if it's done properly, if a coach is pretty much what your mother used to be do minus the Nag factor. So a coach doesn't know you but a coach reminds you helps you plan helps you encourages you bucks you up all that kind of stuff. So those four elements, but then I add a fifth one, because it because I think it's so important that it gets overlooked. And it's one that I'm really focusing on a lot these days is find a creative outlet, most of us will add our creative, if we haven't found where we're creative, you should look for it. Because once you find it, it makes you sing. It's like discovering your violin, you have to learn still learn how to play it, it's not easy, it doesn't play itself. But at least you know, that's the instrument I should be playing. I found my violin and then you can spend the rest of your life trying to make music with it. My violin is writing and I'm still trying to you know, I still do it. And it's still less than perfect. And I'm still trying to make it good. But but you know, I, I'm drawn to that if it's so find what you're. And then because in this is sort of a corollary to that statement. One of the most crippling problems in the world of add relates to self esteem, confidence and motivation. And I'm in the process right now of writing a book on how to how to develop confidence, self esteem and motivation me to
Brooke Schnittman:maybe we can call the manuscripts done. Yeah, that's so cool.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:The most reliable way to build confidence, motivation, and self esteem is to make progress at some tasks that's challenging, that matters to you. It has to be challenging, and God knows writing is challenging in my own case, and it has to matter to you in writing matters a lot to me. And then you have to make progress at it. So and that's, by the way, why you need a coach often to help you make progress. If all you do if you make no progress, that breaks your self esteem, that reduces your confidence and it reduces your motivation so negatively feeds you, it's a vulnerable moment. But so you want to you want to take care to make sure you do make progress. But if you do make progress at whatever this activity might happen to be guaranteed, your self esteem will increase, your confidence will increase your motivation will increase. And that's that's just a wonderful feeling.
Brooke Schnittman:I like that. And it's also with your strength based model. If you know if you are naturally good at then you can make more progress in that and focus on your strengths and feel better. Oh, and
Dr. Ned Hallowell:that's another thing. Don't spend by the time you turn a certain age young adulthood. It's it's time to stop trying to get good at what you're bad at and do what you're good at. And then the rest of it delegate, hire out, whatever. Don't spend your whole adult life trying to get good at what you're bad at. What is your book that you're writing?
Brooke Schnittman:Yeah, sure. So I talk about the ADHD disruption, the 10 disruptors so we go from underwhelmed to overwhelmed and everything in between. So when we're underwhelmed, we're constantly seeking dopamine. So then we get an exciting new idea. We get dopamine, we hyper focus from hyper focus, then we burn out because sometimes we can't manage the hyper focus and then we feed that rich reaction sensitive dysphoria, the negative thoughts and we shut down and they get overwhelmed. So it's a cycle,
Dr. Ned Hallowell:how does self esteem come into play? Sure. So
Brooke Schnittman:I have 12 tips. So we start off small we evaluate the areas of our life, we do a 1% action towards something that has been small but challenging to you just to get it out of your head, we do a mindmap. And from there, we talk about values strengths, and we talk about a y funnel, which is how to find out your intrinsic motivation. Now that you have all of the four other things that we talked about, then we talk about productivity, and throughout 12 weeks, you do that 1%, over and over again. And after those 12 weeks, you feel more confident. Because you're now able to take a task that has been daunting to you, you figured out a lot about yourself, your strengths, your weaknesses, how to focus on your strengths for greater productivity, and you naturally become more competent, because you learn how to break things down rather than doing things all at once. And I recommend both of your books in it for future books. My books I've written 24 Well, yeah, both of your 24 books. 24. Right, so which ones?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:To me? I read your book, you know, I think Well, which one? They're usually referring to Driven to Distraction, because that's probably the best known of them all. But, you know, that came out a long time ago. 1994
Brooke Schnittman:That's crazy. That's when AD D changed to ADHD. Right? 1994. Yeah,
Dr. Ned Hallowell:yeah. It was still add when Reagan came out, but good for you. And the way you laid it out. It sounds wonderful. So you've got to you've got a good book here, and I don't procrastinate.
Brooke Schnittman:Oh, I'm not I'm not definitely not procrastinating. I appreciate you. And I appreciate that. And just some closing thoughts. So you recommend the five things, the five gold standards for ADHD? I love the creativity. One, I love the medication piece. Even if you aren't a fan of medication, fine. Don't do medication, you have these other four things. But with coaching, I know you said you have to have someone who likes you and you like them. And I think that's huge. Because a lot of people will go take a look at the name and look at the letters or see someone on social media and say okay, they look good. Let me go with them. Or they they are a lot of money, they must be really good. How do you with the barrier to entry being so low at this point with ADHD coaching? How do you determine what? Or who is the best ADHD coach for someone interviewing?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Well, you know, the click is the most important thing. If you sit down with this person, say, Boy, I really trust her and I'll let her bossed me around. Because you're giving yourself over to a coach is a very menu, sell very vulnerable if you want to do it properly, and get something out of it. And so you know, am I am I willing to you know, have this this person come into my, the intimate entrails of my life? All the things that I confuse and mess up? And do I feel comfortable with her? That's, that's the most important than the next most important. You want to ask, What experience do you have? If you are the first person they're coaching? You know, you might you might say, well, I'd rather see someone who's has a little bit more experienced than that. But after all, everyone has to start somewhere. And if you really liked the person, and they understand what coaching is, go with that person, liking the person is the most important experiences the next most important, what degree they have is irrelevant. And energy really matters. You know, they can't be too self centered because they've got to make you the center of attention. So are they able to do that? And when you meet with them, you know, do they ask about you? Or is it just they're talking about themselves? I
Brooke Schnittman:appreciate that from the guru who invented ADHD coaching his mouth to God's ears.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Well, you know why, you know i i came up with the idea and then I moved on to other things why I didn't pursue it is I think coaching is so boring. The the doing of the coaching, I really admire you coaches for being able to hang in there and do it because it's so that's why I just said okay, I've thought of it. I know it's helpful, but I don't want to do it. Hey, you, you figured
Brooke Schnittman:out your strengths and your interests and your passions.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:I would be very bad coach. Ah,
Brooke Schnittman:well, you're a great doctor. So how can people get in touch with you if they want to get treated for ADHD around the country around the world?
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Yeah, my website is Dr. halliwell.com. And you know, I have offices in Boston, New York, Palo Alto and Seattle, but my books contain most of what I know. So between my books on my website, you can get a lot of information, and I
Brooke Schnittman:know you have a really good tiktoks
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Oh, yeah, I've got tiktoks Yes. The most important thing is to embrace Don't be afraid of it don't think of it as deficiency that deficit disorder is a terrible term, even the three core symptoms, you turn them on its head and you get a positive the flip side of distractibility is curiosity and major asset. The flip side of impulsivity is creativity and other major asset, you don't plan to have a creative idea, they pop, they come impulsively. And the flip side of hyperactivity is energy, you know, I'm glad at my age to have all the energy of God. So embrace the condition. As I like to say you unwrap the gift, it doesn't unwrap itself, it takes work to unwrap this gift. And obviously, for adults, the two most important things, marry the right person find the right job. So you don't have to marry the right person, but make your primary partner, you know, someone who loves you and supports you. And then the right job is something you're good at that you'd like to do. Usually, usually it's some kind of entrepreneurial interest, but doesn't have to be and I count artists as being entrepreneurs you're trying to grow a piece of art with as opposed to growing a business.
Brooke Schnittman:Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for your time on successful with ADHD. It's a pleasure to talk.
Dr. Ned Hallowell:Well, thank you for what you do. Brooke, I think it's wonderful that you that you took the initiative and did this. This is a perfect example of just terrific, good for you.
Brooke Schnittman:Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for listening to this episode of successful with ADHD. I hope it helps you on your journey. And if you need any additional support for you or a loved one with ADHD, feel free to reach out to us at coaching with brooke.com and all social media platforms at coaching with Brooke and remember, it's Brooke with any Thanks again for listening. See you next time.
