ADHD Chatter
Bonus | The No.1 ADHD Expert: How To Level Up Your ADHD | Dr Ned Hallowell
Fri, 04 Apr 2025
Dr Ned Hallowell is a Harvard educated psychiatrist, author, and the world's No.1 authority on ADHD. Today, in this special bonus virtual episode, he shares how you can level up your ADHD! Chapters: 00:19 Common ADHD tough patches 01:28 Common ADHD blind spots 03:50 What can feeling lost, or different, do to the human brain and its development? 10:22 Why is it important to fit "into the pack" and what effect does it have on a person's self-esteem 13:02 In a person's upbringing, how important is it to have the understanding and support of their parents 16:15 Evolutionary, what effect does our parent's opinion have on us that is specific to that parental relationship? 22:41 Do we seek our parent's approval even if we believe them to be wrong? 28:40 What are some common comments ADHDers might receive from Neurotypicals 32:18 With childhood trauma, I've heard that you stay at the age you are when this trauma is inflicted, is this true and why does it keep you stuck in this time? 34:22 How can having people constantly doubting you or seeing your eccentricities as faults impact your self-esteem and then inflict on that person's capacity for shame? 37:47 What is shame and does shame have a purpose? 52:25 How to conquer the ‘boom and bust’ cycle 01:01:03 Is it a curse to suffer from RSD, or can it be a blessing to feel emotions so deeply? 01:03:55 Other than just "fitting in", does masking serve other purposes? 01:05:32 Do you think people mask because it’s is a good way to not have the "true them" rejected? 01:06:04 What would you say to the female community who have had a diagnosis later in their life 01:09:16 What would you say to the ADHD community who have been told that they are "too much" in past relationships 01:12:10 Can being misunderstood manifest itself in anger or even hatred? 01:15:01 Have you experienced people with ADHD in your practice that are so overwhelmed that they just can't function 01:19:42 Do you have a mental list of eccentric behaviours that, if there are some undiagnosed people watching, might help them put 2 and 2 together and seek a diagnosis 01:24:11 ADHD positives 01:30:30 Reframing ADHD to VAST 01:33:45 For those listening at home now who are thinking "I really wish I didn't have this ADHD thing" in two minutes, explain to them why they should want it. Dr. Hallowell's website: https://drhallowell.com/ Buy Ned's books 👉 https://drhallowell.com/read/books-by-ned/ Buy Alex's book 👉 https://linktr.ee/adhdchatter?utm_source=linktree_profile_share<sid=cb124ab3-861b-48e7-85c0-0d8ada9c777e Producer: Timon Woodward Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What are common tough patches experienced by people with ADHD?
I want to, your first episode did incredibly well, and I really wanted to follow on from there. And I suppose a foundational question to sort of set the tone for the whole episode. What do you think are some common tough patches that you notice in people that you've treated with ADHD?
Well, until it gets diagnosed and treated, or as I like to put it, the gift gets unwrapped. The main problem is just a tremendous sense of underachievement. You know, I haven't done what I know I could do, and I don't know why I haven't done it. And then what I call the moral diagnosis starts piling in. I'm lazy, I'm bad, I'm undisciplined.
I haven't taken advantage of the advantages I've been given. I mean, just this slew of morally tinged versions of I'm a bad person. I mean, and so that's when they come to see me as adults and they have not been diagnosed. That's the person I meet. The extraordinarily talented person who is hanged down on themselves and just doesn't know what to do.
And somebody said, well, maybe it's ADD, so they come to see me.
Chapter 2: What are common ADHD blind spots that confuse the community?
Do you see a common theme in there? I'm going to use the word blind spots, like a common theme in their blind spots, or to put it another way, are there shared behaviors within the ADHD community that confuse that same community until they hear others are doing the same, and then suddenly it makes a lot of sense to them?
Oh, absolutely. I mean, until they get the unifying concept of ADHD, which, by the way, is a terrible term, that brings it all together, then it's all the sort of helter-skelter patches of problems. You know, the disorganization or laziness, so-called laziness, or... wrong job, bad marriage, you know, impulsive, just this collection, this smorgasbord of life problems.
And until you see the unifying concept that brings them all together, it's like whack-a-mole. You take care of one and something else pops up. And that creates a problem of its own. You're running around all the time trying to fix things up, And you can't do it because they keep falling apart.
And then you get the depression thrown in or the just, you know, give up-edness thrown in or the why did I do wrong? I mean, you know, these sort of existential problems that only make it much worse because then you start to lose your most important asset, which is hope. And when hope deserts you, then, you know, you're really in trouble.
Yeah, I mean, it's quite emotional hearing you say that because it's such an echo of my experience and so many people I've spoken to on this podcast. You kind of go through years and years and years of not knowing why your behavior is the way it is. And I suppose with that lack of understanding comes a feeling of being different.
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Chapter 3: How does feeling lost or different affect the human brain and its development?
and different in a bad way different in a bad way yeah and i guess like that feeling of difference and feeling lost how can that affect the human brain in its early development oh in real bad way it's sort of like having a a high fever that doesn't go away you you know you kind of cook your brain and and it doesn't do well in response to that you you lose your native juices.
You lose your enthusiasm, your buoyancy, your natural, innovative nature where you can handle anything. I mean, we are the most resilient people you'll ever find as long as we understand what's going on. What the kiss of death, or not death, but close to death, is the negativity. I'm a lousy person. I'm a loser. I have not... I deserve to be punished. I deserve to suffer.
That, the weight of that... you know, can knock the stuffing out of anybody. But the good news, once you get the diagnosis, it's like a whole new sunshine shines through. Oh, you mean I'm not just a loser? Oh, you mean there's a reason for this beyond my lack of discipline or these amorphous moral concepts? Yeah, there's a neurological reason for it. Your brain is different indeed. But guess what?
It's different in a good way. That's the real kicker. I mean, yeah, you've known you were different all along, but you thought you were different in a bad way. And so, no, truth is, if you manage it right, you're different in a really good way. And you have whoever invented the wheel, whatever that person had, you have.
And it's what's really advanced our civilization from the invention of the wheel to where we are today. And it's all because of us. We ADDers, again, a terrible term, but it is the trait that is responsible for the advance of civilization. It's led by our incredible curiosity, by our incredible creativity, our incredible resilience, and we just keep on trying until we get there.
And that's what our contribution to world civilization has been, Nothing less. And what's the crying shame, is tragic shame, is that many more people don't know about it than know about it.
And the ones who don't know about it are the ones, you know, that's the prison population, the addicted population, the multiply divorced, the out of work, just the down and out, the people who are frozen in a kind of existential depression. I mean, it's a terrible thing having this wonderful gift not recognized, and instead the damage it can do.
And, you know, it's an odd fact that this condition that can be so extraordinarily bountiful and generative and, you know, advance the world can also be a horrible curse. That, you know, Russ Barkley, one of the researchers, has shown that untreated ADD on average costs a person 13 years of their life, which makes it more dangerous than cigarette smoking.
you know, or diabetes, you know, the leading killers. And that's why I, and you too, I mean, it means so much to me to give people this good news. And then the skeptics trash it and, you know, they do what skeptics do. They, you know, they can take any celebration and turn it into a funeral. But the truth is on our side and that's always heartening to know. And
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Chapter 4: Why is fitting into a tribe important for self-esteem?
classified and stereotyped and all that but within our tribe there's enormous variety but the reason it's important to find other people who have similar traits than we do is because otherwise you feel isolated and alone and in many ways that's the worst thing a person can feel and you know in ancient times the worst punishment was not death it was it was to be expelled
to be put out of the group, and that was considered worse than death. Well, the same principle applies. Isolation, which, by the way, is rampant around the world today, particularly in the United States, feeling not a part of something larger than yourself. I mean, our surgeon general named loneliness as the number one medical problem, not psychological, medical problem in the United States.
Because loneliness leads to all the killers. Loneliness leads to stress and inflammation, which leads to cancer and diabetes and heart disease, the big killers. And, you know, we associate loneliness with depression, which is itself a killer. But it's bigger than that. And... And the good news is loneliness is eminently fixable.
Even though people don't fix it because they don't know that they could fix it, you know, it's really good news. The best thing you could possibly do for yourself is make a friend, you know, or get a dog. People say, I can't make friends. Well, get a dog. Dogs are better than humans. You know, and...
So if you're feeling lonely, by all means, just run down to the local shelter and pick up a dog and you won't be lonely ever again.
Totally agree. I've always had dogs. I've got a French Bulldog now, Milo. Wonderful. Wonderful. My whole world.
They have the most extraordinary face. That's it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's my boy. He's six. And yeah, a great deal of joy comes from walking him and just being with him.
Yes, my niece had one. She named him Fang because he had these two little teeth.
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Chapter 5: How crucial is parental understanding and support in a person's upbringing?
And if it didn't work, well, beat them more often. Beat them harder. Kids died, literally died under these beatings. And if they didn't die, their self-esteem perished. And self-esteem is one of the great predictors of how you're going to do in life. If you have a high self-esteem, you're going to probably do well. And if you don't, you're probably going to do poorly.
And that's something that parents and teachers... have in their control, so much as genetics. But this, if you want to love your child and grow him or her lovingly, that's one way to go. And if you're sort of the militaristic, judgmental Satan, and you whip your child every time he or she does something inappropriate, That's your choice as well. And we allow parents to have that choice.
I didn't have to take an exam before we had our children. And I didn't have to make any promises that I was going to treat them properly. And children are handed over by God to whoever receives them. And then that person has said, do whatever you want, pretty much. I mean, there are some agencies that try to look out for kids, but... It's open season.
Now, having said that, it's a great opportunity to do what you need to do to turn out a beautiful, wonderful changer of civilization. It's just that we are more difficult to parent than your average child because we tend to do what we want. We tend to be headstrong. We tend to be stubborn. We tend to do the opposite of what we're told to do. We're not naturally obedient.
We're naturally disobedient. We are the natural rebels, the natural iconoclasts, the natural the king has no clothes people. And that can be annoying to have a child telling you the truth. That can be very annoying. You want to shut that child up. Just keep it secret. No one's supposed to know we're a bunch of drunks at home. Yeah. No one is supposed to know, you know, this stuff. And so...
You know, it's very high stakes poker. So true. From the point of view of that child who is kind of wanting to go their own way, could be quite stubborn. Evolutionarily speaking, what effect does our parents' opinion have on us that is specific to that parental relationship? In other words, why do we seek our parents' approval? Oh.
That's in the genes. That's in nature. That's the ducklings following the goose, you know, the mother duck. I mean, it's really sweet and tender and quite remarkable. And it's a good thing it happens. Otherwise, we'd be helpless and, you know, not able to care. But you watch like the March of the Penguin.
It's wonderful to see in nature how we do bond with our and how the mother particularly will bond. die protecting us. It's a genetic, natural, instinctual force that we need and is quite beautiful to watch. When it goes sour, then, you know, among all animals, human parents have the greatest capacity and tendency to be cruel, to torment, torture their offspring. Most animals don't do that.
If they want to get rid of their offspring, they abandon them or eat them. And they do that to offspring that are not going to survive. But humans, we're given carte blanche. And if the child keeps us up awake at night, we go in and smother them and say it was crib death or something. The amount of absolute torture of children that people get away with is horrifying. And what to me is horrifying is
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Chapter 6: What evolutionary effects do parents' opinions have on us?
The ones who are very down on themselves, they've lost touch with their beauty part. They've lost touch with their assets. And the ones who get... carried away and do bad things, they're the ones who fall in thrall of their beast side.
Because the beast is very compelling, you know, I mean, causing pain and hurting people is fun at a certain level because it allows us to exert power over chaos and that's always rewarding. If you're doing it in a way that causes great suffering, you hope you have this faculty called a conscience that will pull you back from doing that.
And then there are those weird, horrible, despicable, dangerous people who have no conscience. Zero conscience whatsoever. They have carte blanche to do whatever they want in this world. Take advantage of everyone and everything and cause unlimited pain and suffering. And then you hope that those of us who have a conscience will stand up and say, no, you can't do that.
It's a sad day when people who see what's wrong don't have the courage to name it. And unfortunately, we're seeing that in the United States all the time. What is the line? The best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate intensity. that's from Yeats, your poet over there, you know, the best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate intensity.
And we're seeing that in the United States right now. The best are standing off to the side, you know, chewing their nails. And the worst are making, you know, making sounds like they want to take over, become king and subjugate all the rest of us and technology will rule and I'm a natural optimist, so I believe somehow or other checks and balances will emerge.
But right now, I've never seen things that people are checking off on, allowing to happen. We'll see. Interesting times.
If you're an ADHD child, Ned, and with everything that comes with that, like the stubbornness, maybe the justice sensitivity, and you see this evil or this wrong in your parents, do you still seek their approval?
Well, you do, but you also begin to realize that it's wrong and you recoil from it. And what happened, at least what happened to me, is you go look elsewhere, right? So I found substitute parents all over the place because mine were unable, unwilling, or not inclined to give me what I needed, in fact, to give me quite the opposite. I found it in other people's parents, in friends, in teachers.
Teachers saved my life, no doubt about it. I mean, I have, there's a score called the ACEs score. It's a very systematic rating of the degree of severity of childhood adverse experiences. And if you have out of 10 items, if you have four or more, your chances of living anything like a good life are virtually non-existent. You'll likely be dead or addicted or out of work by the age of 30 or 40.
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Chapter 7: Do we seek our parents' approval even when we believe they are wrong?
And that woman speaking for mercy at her daughter's sentencing hearing seems to me the ultimate example of a person overriding the primitive human tendencies we all have.
So interesting.
We're off the topic from ADD, I know. But that's why I tend to wander hither and yon.
No, it's fascinating. And I mean, I like to think that everyone would agree that animal cruelty is... I don't understand. Social media is awful because it serves you videos that you don't want to see sometimes. And occasionally I'm scrolling Instagram and for some reason it decides to show me the most horrendous video. And you scroll on. But it's a little reminder that there is of the evil...
that is out there um yeah if i can't imagine if someone got if someone tried to do something to my milo i uh yeah i might be one of the adhd people who ends up in jail i'll tell you what ned i think um
Going back to the finding support elsewhere outside of your family unit, if you are a child who's going elsewhere, an ADHD child going out into the world trying to find support elsewhere, what sort of comments do you think that that child could encounter from a neurotypical who doesn't emphasise with the neurodivergent brain? And how might that stifle that kid's development?
Well, we see it every day. And what we get is most people saying, cut it out, shut up, you know, conform. Can't you get with the program? Can't you clean up your act? Can't you be like other people and, you know, not cause a disturbance? And that's what most people will do. Now, the ones of us like me who luck out, bump into someone who says, no, I kind of like you the way you are.
And let's see if I can't help direct you in a direction that will prove fruitful as opposed to self-destructive. And those are great people called teachers, guides, wise people, whoever. They are out there is all I'm saying, not everyone. is a rigid, judgmental, on the sadistic side, adult.
And we do need some of those people to make the trains run on time, but fortunately there are enough people out there who have a heart and who do understand that the broad parameters of what should be considered acceptable, as opposed to the narrow, narrow band that we call normal, which is, you know, human existence is so much wider than that band called normal.
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Chapter 8: What are common comments ADHD individuals receive from neurotypicals?
the power of love to heal is greater than the power of evil to hurt. And in some ways they are competing forces, you know, within human existence. And as one who's lived through both, love wins, which is, you know, that's why I urge people to have children. But not everyone should have children. If you don't want to have children, don't have children.
If you don't want to have a dog, get a dog anyway, because the dog will change your mind.
Do you think having people constantly doubting you or seeing your eccentricities as faults, does that kind of feedback impact your self-esteem and then inflict on your ability to feel shame?
Yes. In fact, that's why I'm writing a book about self-esteem right now. In some ways, it's a message to myself. The title is You're Better Than You Think You Are. And like I say, it's a message to myself, but it's a message to the many, many millions of people out there who don't know how good they are. They sell themselves short.
For various reasons, but the message is, just what the title says, the fact is you are better than you think you are. So let's open your eyes to that and get past the kind of magnetism that self-hatred can create within you. You keep drawn to the negative version of yourself. You claw your way up to a positive version, then the negative version comes in and pulls you back down again.
And you're constantly having to claw your way up from the negative view to a positive view, then you're pulled back down again, and then you claw your way back up again. And what I'm trying to do in this new book is just provide better methods than just clawing, you know, better methods than, you know, accepting as your default position that I am a worthless person.
Now, remember, I started going to church, I was an Episcopalian, Anglican, in your terms, in the 1950s, and every Sunday I would say in church, I have erred and strayed like lost sheep, I have done those things that I ought not to have done, I have not done those things that I ought to have done, and there is no health in us. No health in us. And say that, affirm that, weekly.
You know, you don't have to think too hard where our negative version of ourself might come from, you know, that we are You know, we are fallen. I mean, that's the whole thing. We are fallen, and then we ate from the tree that we shouldn't have eaten from, and that's original sin, and that's why we're so flawed. You know, you look at all the religions, they come back to that.
All the Christian religions, they come back to that over and over again. So in some ways, we're taught and we recite as our holiest of holy prayers, you know, that our fundamental... wretchedness or fundamental unacceptability. And I take issue with that. You see, I think the real message of the God I worship is love. And you love yourself. Don't abase yourself.
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Chapter 9: Does childhood trauma keep a part of a person stuck at the trauma age?
Well, the people who dared do that and then discovered it's not a sustainable way of living, then they became Prince Al, King Henry.
Why do you think people with ADHD are so scared of putting boundaries in place and saying no to things that aren't a good fit for themselves? Why do you think there is so much shame in this community?
Well, I think we don't want to be hemmed in. We don't want to give up our freedom. And that's why we don't want to obey rules. We don't want to give up what we see to be our... I mean, I did a survey a while ago What are the two most driving, most powerful forces within you? And number one was the drive to be independent. We want to be free. Above everything else, we want to be free.
Chapter 10: How does constant doubt and judgment impact self-esteem and shame?
And that's why so many are in the United States. I mean, we were a country that was founded on the idea of freedom. And then number two is the desire to build and create. We want to build and create. And so I tell people, getting a creative outlet is maybe the most important thing you can do to find joy in life with ADD. And we just have this need.
I mean, it certainly is stronger than the need to make money, although making money can be a creative outlet. But we... This is why I write so many books. If I don't have a book going, I get depressed. I literally get depressed. And so I know it's like a cow needs to be milked. I know I've got to go out there and write another book. And it's just biological fact.
I've learned about myself over many years. And I think those two things, we're, so that makes us resistant to being regimented or we want to be free. Although there have been, the military is a hotbed of ADD, and that's because we also need structure. So if structure applied the right way, then we can feel independent. People who say structure is bad, and they say it impedes my creativity.
Look at Shakespeare and Mozart, two of maybe the most creative geniuses who ever lived. They both worked under incredibly tight structure. Shakespeare was all iambic pentameter. Mozart, these very tight musical forms. Within those tight structures, they created infinite variety. And that's the message that structure potentiates creativity, does not inhibit it. Without structure, you have chaos.
And that's not art. That's chaos. That's ugly. And it's not beauty. It's the opposite. And so what you want to do is make friends with structure, and then make friends with the best you have in you, the best you have in humanity. And try always to side with that. Everything we do will be ambivalent. Everything. There's two sides to everything.
But side with the side of you that wants to live, basically. Side with the side of you that says yes to life. And recognize you have a side of you that says no to life. But try to keep that one in abeyance. Don't try to make it go away, because you can't make it go away. You make it stronger by trying to make it go away.
that's the failure of willpower and inhibition just strengthens the other side but but if you can if you can side with the affirmation and recognize but don't give power to the denial side the destructive side can structure be forced upon us and oh yes it's called that's called dictatorship
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Chapter 11: What is shame and does it serve a purpose?
More internally, I mean, for example, if you've got a project during a week, but you haven't got structure, you haven't got a work schedule, so you don't do it, you procrastinate. But then it gets to the night before the project's due, and suddenly the structure is forced on you because it's due tomorrow. So you do it.
And I know we spoke last time that the adrenaline kicks in, it's the last minute rush and you get it done. But is there an element of structure coming in here? You're forcing structure, you're putting it in the picture and therefore it creates the compulsion to start?
Yeah, yeah. You're self-medicating with adrenaline and it works, but it's not the best way to do it. You're stressing out your system. You're resorting to an extreme measure to do something that you could do naturally. If you were willing to work with a coach, for example.
If you were willing to put yourself on a schedule that wasn't, you know, over-the-top, hard-driving, you know, type A kind of thing, getting it done like a ramrod. If you could learn a different method, you'd do it even better, and it would be more sustainable. You know, some of these folks die of a heart attack early on. Because their system just can't take it.
Even though they may say they like it, they fall in love with the high energy, high intensity life. But it's not really sustainable.
What about impulsiveness, Ned?
Oh, that's the impulsivity. Creativity is impulsivity gone right. So your impulsive side is very valuable. If there were no impulsivity, we basically define it as acting without reflecting. you know, fire-ready aim. And everyone says, that's very bad, that's very bad. And in my own life, it's illustrated by the fact that I can't tell you how many women I asked to marry me on the first date.
You know, this is fun, let's make it last forever. And fortunately, they all were smart enough to say, eh, it's a little bit too soon. But, you know, new ideas, they don't come on demand. They come unbidden. You know, they interrupt your train of thought. They come in the middle of the night. They come in the middle of a conversation. They jump out. That's impulsivity. But it's also creativity.
Now, if what jumps out is helpful, we call it creative. If it's obnoxious, we call it impulsive. You know, so impulsivity has a bad name. You know, I think used properly, the world depends upon it. That's where the new ideas come from. By definition, you can't have a new idea. It has to begin somewhere and then pop out. And unfortunately, our society tries to inhibit the popping out.
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Chapter 12: How can people conquer the ‘boom and bust’ cycle?
They were diagnosed with depressed and anxious and put on SSRIs.
Exactly. I mean, the injustice, it's a travesty what's happened. The whole lost generation coming forward now, having that amazing moment you mentioned with the phoenix rising. But do you think this built up, pent up feeling of misunderstood... getting a diagnosis later in life, can that manifest into anger and hatred?
In other words, can you blame women if they are reacting to a diagnosis with visceral anger?
No, I think you should welcome it and say, you know, let it out. Tell me, please, how you've been fucked over. You know, pardon my language, but tell me how it feels awful to be misunderstood. And tell me about that, and tell me how angry you are about it, because you deserve to be angry about it. And don't think of that as somehow being a spoilsport. No, it's legitimate. It's also finite.
Someone can't go on a tirade forever. It's good to let it out. OK, now let's get down to building. Now that we've done destroying and well-deserved destruction, Now let's build. And women are incredibly good builders. Once they get the rage out of the way, they're ready to go to town and work.
And they are, and I may be wrong about this, but my experience is men are really good at holding grudges, but women are not. They're able to let it go because they want to live. What's in it to hold a grudge? I mean, it just saps your soul of its precious feelings bodily fluids, you know, and women understand that they're ready to get on. Let's have the next baby. Let's do the next project.
Let's build the next business. Let's, you know, let's not waste time in grudge holding. And men will dedicate their whole life to holding a grudge. I mean, you know, Moby Dick or whatever, you know, it's a, and revenge is such a stupid thing. When someone says, I demand justice, what they're really saying is, I demand revenge. I want that other person to hurt as much as I hurt.
And somehow or other, that satisfies their scale of what things should be. No! Confucius said, if you go down the road of revenge, first dig two graves. You know, and... Revenge is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. It's just so stupid. And yet, I wrote a book about forgiveness, and it didn't sell much. And I think if I write another one, I'll call it Get Even.
And that will fly off the shelves, you know.
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Chapter 13: Is Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) a curse or a blessing?
And what's particularly, I mean, we hate those people. At least I do. I hate someone who's trying to fool me into believing they're someone they're not. You know, and politicians are the worst offenders, but the you know, I'm gullible enough as it is. You don't have to try to deceive me, you know, to get your gain, you know, and... But you're so right. We can see through people in a second.
It's a big lesson. When I was 15 years ago, Ned, I started a company which was going really well and I actually needed help. So I got into business with these two people. And I remember the day I met them to sign the paperwork. My intuition was screaming at me saying, these two guys are not on your side. Don't sign this bit of paper. But I didn't listen to it. I didn't trust my gut.
I got kicked out of the business. It started a five-year court case that nearly killed me through drinking alcohol. I've told this story on other podcasts. But it's such a big example of that intuition, that judge of character is there. You just have to be brave enough to trust it and listen to it, especially in situations like that where...
Chapter 14: Beyond fitting in, what purposes does masking serve for people with ADHD?
The people-pleasing versus the internal ability to spot that that person's a wrong-in. On that day, I should have listened to it and I should have said no. But because I was such a people-pleaser and so scared of confrontation, I didn't say no. I signed the bit of paper that I shouldn't have signed. And it triggered a massive legal battle for me that nearly cost me my life.
All because I didn't have this awareness that I was living with ADHD at the time.
Chapter 15: Do people mask to avoid rejection of their true selves?
And also, you were so eager for the good outcome. You know, it's not just that you were, you had a vision that you wanted to see come true. And you didn't see the foreflusher in the people you were dealing with.
Chapter 16: What advice does Dr Ned have for the female ADHD community diagnosed later in life?
I spoke to your friend, Ned, recently, a brilliant, brilliant man. You know him well, Winford Daw. Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah. Fantastic. He came on the podcast, as did you, in London. Very lucky to have him in the studio as well. And he wants to reframe ADHD to become vast.
Yeah, that was what I put in my book 2.0. That's it.
Yes. Yeah. Could you remind me what VAST stands for?
Chapter 17: What would Dr Ned say to those told they are 'too much' in past relationships?
It stands for V-A-S-T. First of all, ADD is a VAST condition. And I'd like to remind people that it's not just a series of discrete little things. But VAST is an acronym for Variable Attention Stimulus Trait. Variability is the hallmark of this condition. Attention and stimulation are two of the lead qualities. And then trait is to distinguish it from disorder. So it's a trait.
Depending on how you manage it, it can be an asset or a liability. Attention and stimulation are two of the key variables. And then variability, we are never consistent. We're consistently inconsistent. So variable, attention, stimulus, trait. Fast.
Chapter 18: Can being misunderstood manifest as anger or hatred?
Yes, I remember now. I think ADHD is such a wrong acronym.
It's wrong. It's wrong, Alex. It's absolutely wrong. We don't have a deficit of attention. We have an abundance of attention. Our challenge is to control it, you know?
Chapter 19: What happens when people with ADHD become overwhelmed and unable to function?
Absolutely. It's such a competitive world though, Ned. And I'm thinking like, you know, across the board, such a competitive world. And how can we use our neurodivergence to beat competition?
I wouldn't worry about beating the competition. I'd worry about carrying the day ourselves. Let the competition worry about themselves. Because truth will out. And we have truth on our side. We also have vision on our side. We can see what they can't see. So I think it's a mistake to get sidelined worrying about what they're doing.
Chapter 20: Are there eccentric behaviors that might help undiagnosed people seek diagnosis?
We should worry about what we are doing and let the chips fall where they may. I mean, I have total faith that what we are doing will carry the day because it's so in everybody's interest. And the ones who want to tear us down have at it. I mean, go waste your time doing that. And I tell myself, don't get hung up. Don't take the bait. Let them burn themselves out, because that's what will happen.
And I don't even understand why they want to tear down what we're doing, because what we're doing is nothing but helping people. It's not like someone's making a killing at all. So I think just help each other out. It's a cooperative enterprise. You do what you do. I do what I do. The people who are trying to create growth in this world, keep at it. And we're the inventors of growth.
Chapter 21: What are the positives and strengths of having ADHD?
We're the inventors of entrepreneurialism. We're the growth masters, if ever there were any.
This has been truly fascinating, Ned. I want to ask you one final question. One final question before we wrap up. And that is, if someone's listening or watching and they're thinking that they've got... They're thinking, I wish I didn't have this ADHD thing. In just two minutes, explain to them why they should thank God that they do have it.
Chapter 22: How can we reframe ADHD to the concept of VAST (Vigilance, Activity, Sensation, Thinking)?
Well, because you don't know your own gifts. You don't know what you wouldn't have if you didn't have this condition. You're too aware of what you do have that you don't like, and that's why you wish you didn't have it. But you discount or don't even know about what you wouldn't have if you didn't have it.
And what you wouldn't have is your vision, your creativity, your originality, your ability to see into problems and see around corners and see into people. You wouldn't have any of that. And so maybe you'd be on time more often if you didn't have it, or maybe your sock drawer wouldn't be as disorganized, or maybe you wouldn't blurt out inappropriate statements in the middle of a cocktail party.
Chapter 23: Why should people wish to embrace their ADHD instead of rejecting it?
But really, does that matter that much to you? As opposed to what you do have that you take for granted, vision, imagination, tenacity, follow through, generosity. I mean, all of that, you wouldn't have that. You wouldn't have this glowing sunshine of imagination that you carry with you everywhere you go. You wouldn't have that. And you don't appreciate it now because you've always had it.
Yeah. Yeah. Wow. That is truly amazing and such a nice tone to end on. As always, Ned, as before, thank you. Thank you, Alex.
Thank you for the great work you do.
Precious your time is. Absolute honor to have you back on the podcast. And thank you so much.
Me too. Thank you, Alex. Take care.
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