Shownotes
Welcome to the seventh episode in the Entrepreneurs with ADHD series, an interview with my good friend, Cathy Rashidian, who is a corporate dropout turned ADHD coach and works with professionals and business owners.
Cathy is one of my favorite thought partners and content collaborators (we have a monthly LinkedIn Live on ADHD-related topics like toxic resilience and later in life discover of neurodivergence.
In this convo, Cathy and I dig into the weighty subject of decision making and the variety of challenges folks with ADHD have, from impulsive choices we didn’t think through all the way to overthinking to the point where we don’t decide at all. No matter what your tendency, there are actionable insights in this episode that you can begin using today.
Here are some of the highlights:
🌟 How to intentionally step into your thought processes to prevent ADHD from hijacking your decision-making.
💡 Deciding with your “3 Brains” by tapping into logical thinking, emotional awareness, and gut instincts to make balanced decisions.
💪 Embrace the importance of self-awareness and accepting imperfect decisions with grace, ultimately leading to more confident and intentional choices.
🧠 Strategies for reducing cognitive load, making repetitive choices, and prioritizing important decisions to balance rigidity and flexibility
📘 Book Recommendation: Barbara Sher’s "Refuse to Choose" can revolutionize your approach to decision-making and provide the permission to not always choose, giving you the liberation you need.
Cathy mentioned during the interview:
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If this conversation helped you recognize that you are ready for some decision support in your business? I might be just the thought partner, brainstorm buddy and professional accountability partner you need. The first step is to book a free consultation here. Let’s see if we’re a good fit.
Want to connect with Cathy Rashidian of Ready Set Choose Coaching?
Transcripts
H: You and I have a lot of similar thoughts about a lot of things, including being an adult with ADHD, being self employed with ADHD, and the struggles and strengths that we have as individuals with ADHD. And one of the things that I love talking about, especially with you, is the challenges that we have making decisions that we like as much later as when we made them. So, Cathy, I've been dying to ask you this question, and I keep forgetting, thank you, ADHD, why you chose the specific name for your company, ready, set, choose, because that's what we're here to talk about today. So let's start with that.
G: Yeah. Good question, nobody's ever asked me that, and I'm so glad you brought it up. The reason I chose that name and talk about decision making. What do you call yourself? What do you call your company name? Blah blah blah. And is this the brand all of those things as entrepreneur when you're deciding. It wasn't till I took, my first certification in coaching through IPEC that I learned about making conscious choices and that's when the plane landed for me.
So the idea of ready, set, choose is when we are in the state of awareness, we know what's going on. We're seeing things, we're like, oh, now this is clicking. The ADHD late in life diagnosis all of a sudden clicked a whole lot of things for me. I was ready, so it's awareness equals you're ready for the next step. And then it's the, great, now that I'm ready, do I wanna accept this for what it is? So you go through this phase of acceptance right?
So you're getting yourself set up to make the choices. So in that phase of acceptance of what is, oh, this is my brain wiring, it has always been that way. There's no such thing as adult onset ADHD. That I've just was at the right place at the right time doing the right things, so I just chugged along. So then I'm setting myself up for what's next and the next is choosing, but choosing from a place of conscious choice. From a place of I know what's happening, I'm accepting for what is.
Now consciously choosing from a place of purpose, from a place of informed decision, not from a place of analysis paralysis, but from a place of truly standing in my own power so that when I say to my loved ones, I am ready to become an entrepreneur, and they're like, what the f are you thinking? Well, here's 20 ways from Sunday why I think this is gonna be great for me. And sticking with it and not allowing them to inject their own life experiences and their own fears into that decision. So Ready, Set, Choose came from that of awareness, acceptance, conscious choice.
H: I knew you'd have a superb answer, and you did not disappoint. You are one of my very favorite thought partners as a fellow woman with ADHD, later in life diagnosis, track record of success before you knew you had ADHD and now choosing to use your gifts and talents to help other people with their ADHD. And something that I think about all the time because of how ADHD affects our executive functions, and it's like the command control center of our brain. If there's any impairment there, and we know there is, otherwise, we wouldn't qualify for the diagnosis. One of the areas that it profoundly impacts us is decision making. And I'm talking everything from, should I eat the carrot or the cookie?
of:G: Do you want me to expand on that?
H: Well, I mean, we have so much we can unpack, about this. But I one of the things I wanted to talk about with you today on this is that, in my observation, people with ADHD kind of tend to skew towards one end of the decision making spectrum or the other. And on one end is impulsive decisions. Impulsive decisions that are not well thought out, there's not a plan. It's reactive, not proactive. It isn't really thought through, we might not know what we're getting into.
And trust me, I have many, many impulsive and probably regrettable decisions in my life. And then you go all the way to the other side of the spectrum, and you tend to have a lot more overthinking, procrastinating, analysis paralysis. And even once the decision is finally, painfully made, there's a lot of doubt about whether it's the right decision. So, like, more research, second guessing, self doubting, those are both impaired states of decision making right?
G: Yeah. Absolutely, I think personally for me, I live to this day still on the impulsive side of it. I am a risk taker at my core, but I've now learned how to tame it in a way that suits me so that down the road I don't go, oh, shit, I just self sabotaged myself on that decision, didn't I? But also, if somebody says, did you have a well lived life? I can truly say, yes, I did. Because my decision making, the impulsivity part of it has brought me to where I am today, so no regrets.
H: No, I also embrace the no regrets philosophy because in truth, whatever I'm regretting is in the past. And I know we're gonna talk about, you know, past, present, future focus, but whatever I'm regretting is in the past. The past has already happened, I have no time machine. I have no time travel capacities. I can't go back and make things any different than they were. So any amount of energy, effort, emotion I expend on regretting it, doubting it, feeling guilty about it, feeling ashamed about it, wishing it were different, beating myself up for doing it. Colossal waste of time.
But like you, I tend to be more impulsive. And I gotta tell you something, my daughter mentioned, she is more on the inattentive, distractible type. And I am combined type, so I've got a lot more features of impulsivity. She mentioned to me recently, you know, mom, I think you're having a lot more fun with ADHD than I am. And at first, I was like, it hurt my mother's heart. But I really started thinking, why did she say that? And of course, we talked further and I realized it's because I am more impulsive.
I take more risks. I make more decisions. I am much more prone to act instead of thinking too much. And she associates that with fun because here's my theory, I'd love to hear yours. I think because I'm more prone to action and impulsive, non impulsive, I'm making more decisions. I'm executing more things. I've become more resilient, and I've learned how to laugh at myself. I've learned how to see, like, the humor in some of the decisions that I've made. And so I think she's right, I think the impulsivity and the resiliency that I've developed because of it, I think I am having more fun. Certainly the people I know who literally are paralyzed by every decision and have to do an enormous amount of research. And even once they decide, they're like, oh, but is it the right thing? I'd love to know what you think about that.
G: Yeah and I think it it's that what you said about kind of living in the past, living in the future, and if we were to talk about a little bit more about both types of the impulsive or the inattentive, the overthinker, they each serve a purpose, I think. The overthinker that sits there and goes, I need to think about this in 20 ways from Sunday, what actually is happening is they're stimulating themselves with dreamland. And their brain goes, this is so much fun, keep dreaming it up. And this way and that way, and they're getting the dopamine hit. And it does make it interesting for them. But what it's doing is now your ADHD is in the driver's seat going on this drive down the highway to nowhere, right?
But look at the scenery, oh, it's so beautiful over here. We could stop and have a picnic, but, oh, let me give you some more. Let's go over there and so you never stop to be present to experience all of those beautiful little thoughts that you had along the way of the journey. And with impulsivity, I think it's, oh, let us pull over and see what happens. And then, oh, let us pull over here and see what happens. Oh, let's pick up a stranger, perfect stranger, because they, you know, we need they need help.
H: What could happen?
G: Let's go do that too, so then you're delayed into getting to your destination. So either way, your brain is in control and you're getting the dopamine hit. It is meeting your basic needs of an ADHD person that says I need interest. I need novelty. It's hitting all the marks. But is it strategically hitting all the marks? Which for me then goes, you're going from creating accidental success, which I did most of my career, to now I'm creating intentional success, where I'm thoughtfully doing it a little bit.
Let me be impulsive. Let me be an overthinker. So and it goes back to yesterday we're talking about this, I think, in another conversation, about finding your golden mean of how do you use this brain so that it works for you, so that you don't overdo it, and, you know, kinda extend yourself from one side of the extreme to the other side. So what you brought up, that was it for me, is understanding how our brain truly works and when is it in the driver's seat versus us in the driver's seat and we can talk about so much more.
H: Well, I love your perspective around it's all about the dope. Like, whatever we do and however we do it, whether it's acting on impulse and, like, whoo. Like, it's like what I call the fuck around and find out philosophy of life. Like, what let's see what could happen you know? And sometimes you're like, oh, jeez, I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've heard myself say, wow, I didn't see this coming.
You're the only one that didn't. But then the I'm doing that because I'm getting dopamine from it. I'm indulging my curiosity. I'm indulging my interest. I'm indulging, you know, wanting to explore, wanting to have an adventure, wanting to try something new. That's dopamine seeking behavior, and so is research that becomes a rabbit hole. That's how they get their dope. This is how I get mine but that is what drives us.
So if you can understand that about yourself, I always say know who you are and know how you are. And if you can, like, peel the shame and the self consciousness and the guilt and the comparing yourself to neurotypicals and all that and go, okay. Am I satisfied with the quality of dope I'm getting? Is this, like, high quality dope, or am I settling for, like…
G: The good one?
H: And could I get as much dopamine or a better quality of dopamine or more lasting dopamine or dopamine that doesn't make me feel shitty about myself later and still make a decision. Because, honestly, I think most decisions don't feel bad in the moment. It's how they play over time and what we make it mean that we chose what we chose.
G: Yeah, and it goes so then, going back to the what happened in the past and what's in the future. And I think for us, we like to have certainty. I mean, every brain live thrives on certainty. If we don't know what's going on, the brain goes in defense mode, amygdala is hijacked, hijacking your brain and you're in emotional flood going, oh my god, I don't know what's gonna happen 10 days from now. Or the past, last time I did this, here's the evidence that it's gonna happen again. So this beautiful meaning making machine is always and I like what you say is, like, your brain is not your friend. It's so true.
It isn't, and here we are, so how do we do it? And for me, this mindfulness mindful decision making and I know people don't come after me with mindfulness and ADHD and all of that. I get it but it makes sense now. And here's how it makes sense for me. If I'm about to make a decision and I'm tapping into past Cathy, past Cathy, probably 7 years ago, didn't know what she knows now. So if I made those decisions back then, I was making it based on the life experiences and all the influence around me based on that skill set. This Cathy today knows a lot more and continues to know more.
So it would be actually pretty unfair to say last time we made this decision, this happened, so don't do it again. So there's one criteria and then if I go into the future, I'm gonna bring in Russell Barkley that says time blindness, also people. It's about not, you know, not having a good understanding of the future. It's not just about not knowing how to manage your time. It's not grabbing into your future self. I have clients that don't know, well, they'll be 3 years from now. And, actually, that's not a good question to ask anybody with ADHD. Where do you wanna be in 5 years from now? We don't know. We cannot…
H: I don't know what I'm having for dinner. Shut up.
G: So that that's exactly it right? So to wanting to do something that actually is not aligned to your brain wiring, and this is what we talk about strength based coaching, work with what you have. What do you know for certain right now, today, in this moment? That's where mindful decision making comes in, which then it's not about if I make this decision 10 years from now or 5 years from now. Who knows? But what you know for certain is this and to me, that's where you calm that brain from being in panic mode. And when you're not in a place of panic or stress or overwhelm, that executive functioning we talked about, you actually have more access to it versus, oh my god. What's gonna happen, all of that. You're just doing yourself a disservice by tripping your brain into emotional dysregulation, which then you really don't have access to all of your brain faculty to begin with. That's what I wanted to share on that one.
H: You know what I'm thinking is that, you know, it's a known fact that we are probably about 10% of humanity, like neurodivergent people, Masamena. Which means the other white meat, 90% of everybody that surrounds us is neurotypical, which means with few exceptions, the world we live in has been made by and for neurotypicals. And I think for me, one of the most insidious, damaging, and really disruptive things about being neurodivergent in a neurotypical world is the gradual loss of trust in ourselves.
Now when it comes to decision making, and, of course, then you throw in the brain's negativity bias, where every screw up, every mistake, every regrettable that you have, your brain's like you know, I got all the flashcards. Let me just, you know so when you're in the moment where you're like, I have an important decision to make, or maybe not even really important decision to make, a decision, I wanna make a good decision. Now you're already not being impulsive if you're thinking I wanna make a good decision right?
Can I make a good decision? Can I trust myself to make a good decision? Well, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior so let's just go into the stacks. Let's go into the archives, let's go into the microfiche and see what evidence there is of my past decision making. Well, your brain's gonna be like, hey. What about this time and then remember when you did that? And, boy, this one's legendary, and you're still trying to live down this one. That does not help because you are on, you know, a repeat loop of your past mistakes and failures, which over time, coupled with the fact that we're surrounded by neurotypicals who are often saying things that I personally find very triggering, like, what were you thinking?
Matter of fact, I wasn't. Or so what's the plan here? Or where is this going? You know, those type of questions, there's nothing wrong with those questions. But what they absolutely do in the moment is highlight the fact that we make decisions differently, and how we feel about those decisions is also different. And when people are asking you, like, the typical interview question, where do you wanna be in 10 years? And if you're impulsive, you might blurt out, I don't know where I'm gonna be in 10 minutes and you're like, next.
You know, when I first found out about time blindness, which I still prefer to call time optimism, because I always think I have more time than I do. And another friend of mine you're gonna love this, Cathy. Another friend of mine introduced me to a new version this week, she calls it time confetti. Like, whee, you know like, I never know how much time I have. But this notion that we should know where we're gonna be in 10 years or 5 years or 3 years or a year. You need an annual plan, you need a 90 day plan. A neurotypical person's time horizon, on average, 12 to 16 weeks. When I heard that, I was like, first of all, oh, shit, I think mine's like 12 to 16 minutes.
But it, like, instantly realized, that's how long a semester of college is, 12 to 16 weeks. That's how far ahead of time you need to submit your request for time off if you work for a big company. That's how far ahead you have to book hotels and airplanes because you get a better deal. And I instantly realized, well, I really do have impairment in my executive functioning because of this time blindness, time optimism, time confetti, my time horizon doesn't work the same way. So, of course, my decision making is gonna be impaired one way or the other or probably both ways.
G: That's right, you know, it's interesting, you're bringing up, this other thought that I often practice with my clients around, and this comes from my tech days. Whenever we would work with software developers, there's a project management approach called agile project management. And in agile, we do things by sprints, and every sprint informs the next sprint and the next sprint. Did the product work? What do we need to modify and so forth? So when it comes to decision making, also, I think there is a time and a place where we can just kinda chill and say, look.
Let me just take it one step at a time as opposed to this need that our brain has that I need to know exactly from beginning to the end how this decision is gonna unfold. Versus and this also supports those with ADHD to tap into curiosity. So when you're going 1 week at a time, 1 quarter at a time, 1 from 12 weeks at a time, the brain goes, oh, this is interesting, oh, there's novelty in this, oh, it's gonna change. It's not my forever solution. It's not my forever decision and I think that, again, emotional dysregulation calms down, goes, okay.
She has an out, there is a exit strategy if we wanted to come out of this decision versus, you know, it's like the decision is made now it's our forever decision oh, shit. They're no, you go and work for another company. You can quit. You have permission to leave. You have permission to stay. You create partnerships. You can walk away whenever you want. This whole, like, this is my forever thing you know? Even life is not forever people, last time I checked so can we just be in the moment of it?
H: No. It's true. I mean, I think it's, this all or nothing thinking. And everyone in the ADHD community talks about this all or nothing thinking. If I can't commit to this wholeheartedly without reservation indefinitely, then I'm not gonna do it. Do you know how boring our lives would be if we lived by that? I refer to that as pick and stick and I know it's a lot of people find incredible meaning and satisfaction and security, neurotypical people, mind you, with this notion of I chose a life partner, I chose a lifestyle, kids, no kids, dogs, travel, apartment, house like, I chose these things.
I chose a career path. I chose the amount of education I need for that path. I chose, like, an income standard of living, church, not church. And now I'm just gonna stick with it, and I'm gonna deepen that commitment over time, and I'm gonna draw other people into my life who have similar choices. And the goal is to just maintain this all the way to the finish line. I have known countless people who have at least attempted that and find that you know, I mean, I know people who they go vacation the same week or weeks of the year, every year. They go to the same resort. Oh, they book the same room, I know you're like…
G: I can't, I can't.
H: Kill me now! But they're neurotypical, and that creates security, predictability, and a deep sense of satisfaction. They know they're not gonna be disappointed because they've already been satisfied with that thing again and again. That to me sounds like a version of hell on earth.
G: And, you know, so here's the part, I would respect that to a bit from a decision making perspective and I always do this with my clients. I take a cup of water that's full, and I say, from the minute you're waking up, and what am I gonna eat? And what am I gonna wear? And, oh my god, my kid is freaking out. And what what am I gonna do for her lunch? You are taking away your cognitive resources one bit at a time with every decision. So there's a time and a place where we wanna kinda be efficient with our decisions, where the structure and routine comes in, two words that I cannot stand. But also, it's efficiency of decision, in certain things, it makes sense.
But then also, it's what am I depriving of my myself of if I don't have flexibility? So it's this you go from no decision making to rigid decision making. And again, what's the happy medium and I keep coming back to this. For those of us on the neurodivergence spectrum, we can get a little rigid in our thinking. So checking in on that so that if but you know what it is too is because we work so damn hard to make the decision. And now what you want me I have permission to change the decision, but I worked so hard to make it there. Yes, you have permission to modify it. Or else, we wouldn't have devices like the Apple today that it is. It would still be the flip phones if they decided that that would be the permanent solution to all communication needs right? So talk about innovation. If you looked at it that way, there wouldn't be innovation.
H: No. It's true, and you you're absolutely right. We're talking about decision fatigue, and you're calling it decision efficiency. Not all decisions are created equal. Not all decisions have equal importance, deserve equal weight, deserve equal prioritization, deserve equal amounts of thought and attention and energy and effort put into making them. I personally like eliminating decisions by like, I buy all my clothes from just 2 different companies. The bottoms are pretty much all the same, just different colors. The tops are all the same, different colors. People always comment, oh, you always look so put together.
And I'm thinking, it's a freaking uniform. But it's a uniform that, like, I don't have to decide, am I gonna wear a dress and heels? Or am I and I do have a couple of dresses. But, basically, I have a uniform, and I know that it suits my body, and I know that it's minimal ironing because that's a must for me. And I can go look inside my closet, and if it's ironed, if none of the buttons are missing and there's no stains, the decision is like blue, white, or green. It's not, oh my god, what the fuck am I gonna wear today? So I appreciate that I've reduced the cognitive load on my executive functions, which are challenged from the jump. And I know that, you know, some people with ADHD, their brains are not fully charged in the morning.
In fact, I would say that's the majority. They wake up with their brain not fully charged, and then they need the first few hours of the day to get all the way up to charged. I'm one of those people who wakes up with the brain fully charged, but it rapidly diminishes through the day. By, like, 5, 6 o'clock, I'm basically useless, I can barely walk the dogs. So, knowing that, I have to prioritize when I make my most important decisions and eliminate as many of them as possible. What I eat? I eat pretty much the same few things.
What I wear? I wear pretty much the same few things. And I do this very intentionally because I've made lots and lots of, you know, decisions that were not like that, that really wasted a tremendous amount of my brain capacity that could have, had I known, been put to much more meaningful decisions that it would have really moved the needle in my life. And just knowing that, like, hey, you've only got so much executive functioning right?
G: That's right.
H: Not expansive. So how do you want to use it? Do you wanna waste it? Do you wanna spend it? Do you want to invest it? And if you wanna squander a little bit, like, I still do things impulsively. I still overthink on things. I still let myself get ridiculously obsessed over trivial stuff that doesn't make any difference to anything because it's satisfying and because I've put it in check. I do not let myself spend 7 or 8 hours on TikTok because I think we all have the tendency to become obsessed and somewhat addicted, do I can't trust myself. But do I get an enormous amount of satisfaction from 20 minutes with 2 timers? You bet I do.
G: So good.
H: That's the decision I've made.
G: That's it and you're consciously making that decision, going back to the original topic. And, you know, the other piece around this, for me is the conscious choices that we make, whether they're fear based or purpose based. So you choosing not to be on TikTok, it doesn't align with your purpose. For me, I think the damn thing is like a brainwashing the best that they've ever made and I don't have it on my computer. I don't have it on my phone. I don't even know if it's on the computer. But, like, I just refuse to so it doesn't align with my purpose. It doesn't align with my values. It doesn't align with who I am. It won't happen. It's a done decision right? And I think the ones that are fear based is the narrative behind it is I need to. I have to or oh my god, I'm gonna miss out.
So there's 2 criteria on this is when you're thinking, am I making this decision out of fear? That language comes out. The need to, the have to, the fear of missing out. But when you're going into purpose decision making, it goes with the narrative of, I choose to do this right now. It's choice I'm making. I don't have to make it, but let me make it and see what happens. You go with curiosity. You go without any judgment for yourself or what's gonna happen. You go with wonder. Oh, that's such a beautiful place for us with ADHD to be in. The other one, the fear one, it's almost like the 2 little people on our shoulders. Both of them are good. Both of them will give you the satisfaction. The fear based one has its own place, and it can be just as exciting as the other one. But one is longer lasting where the other one is short lived, the guilt, the shame, all of that will creep back in. So fear based versus purpose based.
H: Okay. So something I have a lot of clients ask me, and I have my thoughts about it, and I love to hear yours is, how do I know when I have a decision to make of whatever significance. How do I know when it's intuition versus maybe an influence from somewhere else or unconscious thoughts I don't realize I have. Like, how do we know when the decision that we're making is aligned with our intuition? Because I know something that you talk about, you teach, and you, it's part of your coach approach. Is making sure your decision lines up head, heart, and gut right?
And I mean, we know we have more receptors in the gut than the brain so like, the term gut feeling, pay attention. I always like to say guts don't lie. So is it a matter of, like, having reliable tools and strategies for checking in with the brain, the heart, and the gut. Or is there another way to know, is this my intuition or am I fooling myself or being fooled by someone else?
G: So I don't have statistical research and all of that to back this up. But within our neurodivergence community, there is this narrative that we are highly intuitive people. So and if there's research people, please send them my way, I'll read it. And knowing that, one thing happens. That some of us, that intuition that we have gets shushed at a very young age with, oh, that's an impulsive decision, Cathy, you're gonna make,no, don't do it. Because we give the permission of decisions you're making to others for us. So even though we know in our gut, in our heart of hearts that that this is the thing I wanna do, but society comes in, our family comes in. And for those of us that are in codependent relationships and we've given them the key to make decisions for us, they will shush that intuition.
So here's that part of how do we first reignite that you do have that intuitive ability to tap into? How do you make it come alive again? And then also, the framework that I learned that you were talking about, the 3 brains, is tap into holographic thinking, that's what it's called. Bruce Schneider came up with this, the author of Energy Leadership book. He calls it the holographic thinking where you are tapping into your logical side of you, asking all the logical questions, the facts, the data, the heart side of you. What am I feeling about this? What emotions will this create? What are my beliefs? What are my knowings? And then your gut that will essentially, I feel like it's the most powerful one, that goes, I think if you do this, x, y, and z are gonna happen.
Now to do that step that we just talked about, don't do it alone. Please do not do it alone because with ADHD, you're gonna get caught in rumination, catastrophization. It just is, you're doing yourself a disservice. You wanna do it with somebody that can hold space for you, to ask you the questions so that you can talk it out loud and self correct as you're talking it out loud. And the other person, all they're doing is holding a flashlight, in our case, coaches we were like, oh, there's a puddle here. Do you wanna jump in it? Do you wanna go around it? Do you wanna completely avoid it and take another road? And the client will make those decisions. Well, I wanna jump in it because I wanna get my feet wet and I wanna feel like a child again. Great, and then you're gonna go to the other side.
So really doing that with a thinking partner that knows how to hold space, doesn't give you advice, doesn't project their own life experiences onto you. Now the intuition part, one exercise that I like to do with my clients is start looking at your day and tap into that, what would my gut say today? If I made spaghetti versus chicken, what would happen? I think the spaghetti, the family's gonna love it. What you wanna start doing is keeping track of how many times that intuitive hit was on point. And the more you're doing that, the more you're rebuilding that confidence of shit. My intuition was pretty damn good, it was on point. Here's all the new evidence that I have. So it goes back to that being present with creating a log of all the new badassery versus the old stuff that came with a gunk and it was disorganized. So that's my thing on intuition.
H: No, I agree with you, Cathy. I think we are born intuitive, and I don't just think individuals with ADHD are born intuitive. I think human beings and, of course, we vary in how intuitive we are, but I think we're born with that, and I think it gets systematically dismantled by feedback from other people that causes us to doubt it. You know, I think back 20 years old in college, and, I didn't grow up in the kind of family where I had a lot of, you know, support or acceptance or mentorship. So I raised myself up, took myself out in the world and thought, how hard can it be? I'll figure it out, true ADHD fashion. But I do think I had a really intuitive sense of a career path that would be a good fit for my gifts and abilities and interests, that was journalism.
And I thought, well, who am I to know what I wanna do? I'm just a kid, I'm just 20, I don't know. My ass is for my elbow so, of course, I asked the guidance counselor who says, you don't wanna do that, and gives me a few reasons why. Probably a projection of his own experiences or opinions and I just felt totally crushed. But the person I was at 20 was like, well, he's a grown up, he's an expert. I mean, he's a guidance counselor, he must know better. So I guess I'll go in another direction. It took me many years to realize I knew exactly who I was. I knew exactly what I wanted, and I had an intuitive sense of what direction would be really well suited to me. And it wasn't until I launched this podcast, in fact, 4 years ago that I was able to come back and kind of reclaim some of that interest in storytelling and broadcasting and interviewing and all of that.
So I think for me, and, of course, that's a little bit of a wistful story, and thank you for indulging me on it. But I think, you know, I think the more we can really get to know ourselves, really develop our self awareness in collaboration with our self acceptance and begin to unlearn the things that we have been taught to think about ourselves, we can eventually uncover our intuition. And then when we can slow our roll when we're feeling impulsive, and we can speed up a little bit when we're indulging too much, you know, second guessing and overthinking, I think we can feel much better about the decisions we make. This is not an easy thing, I understand.
G: Yeah. It’s the unlearning part right, it takes time. You got to hear first, you know, however old you are, doing certain things and living a certain way. But I also think on the other side of it now, today, right now, there's certain decisions that I've made in my life that 10 years ago, I would have, like, not made those decisions now. But now I'm like, oh, it has its benefits, it has its moments where some of that impulsivity is now attained. So I'm strategically, truly decision making at a level that I can still be impulsive and not overthink.
There's times where I overthink something. I wanna launch on YouTube, and I've been overthinking it for 6 months you know? It's like, it's certain things, I'll do that. And to catch ourselves so that there is not this, the doubt, the oh my god but what if, what if? And the more we intentionally step into these thought processes so that ADHD doesn't get to be in the driver's seat. I think that, to me, that's the secret formula, is it my ADHD that's driving the decision, or is it truly me with all of my amazing knowing that I have know the life experiences that I've had over the years?
H: And, you know, the reality, and you've alluded to this, several times. No matter how much we know, no matter how much we have developed our ADHD self awareness, self acceptance, we know our triggers. We know what environments help us thrive and which ones we need to avoid. We've developed all these tools and use them regularly. The reality is that we will still choose to make decisions that are not intentional. We will still choose to say, I know that it would be better if I did this, but I'm gonna do this instead. And that's totally okay if you disavow yourself from guilt, shame, and regret. It's like, you know what and I've done this. I do it a lot less than I used to, but I'd be like, I'm probably gonna regret this, but here we go. And that level of just like, hey, listen. I'm just gonna indulge this, but I'm not gonna overindulge it.
G: That's true.
H: I'm gonna let myself like, if I order something that that has too many calories and I'm on a diet, I'm not destroying myself you know? It's like, I can make a better decision next time. I can start again tomorrow, I can grant myself grace. I just think this notion that, you know, however many bad decisions we've made, however much regret we have over our decision making style, however much we wanna commit to only good decisions, You are after all human. It's a terminal condition that none of us can cure ourselves from.
And it's perfectly okay to not be intentional with every decision every time and frankly, that sounds exhausting. I think the things that we've talked about, like lining up with your 3 brains, pumping the brakes if you tend to make decisions too quickly, speeding things up a little bit if you tend to draw them out, and giving yourself the gift of a thought partner to help you think some of this through, but you're still gonna make some decisions that later you go, probably wasn't so good, but I'm good.
G: But it was an experience. Yeah, you learn you learn something new about yourself.
H: And or you reminded yourself of something you already knew.
G: We're not doing this again and I've done that plenty of times. Oh, god, this restaurant, why do we keep coming back here again? Because every time we say we're not gonna come back and we come back again.
H: A car knows its way right?
G: Yes, you know what the as you were saying that you reminded me of the book. And if anything, of all things folks, the book that I would love for everybody to have their hands on and rest in peace, Barbara Schur. It's, Refuse to Choose by Barbara Schur. She didn't write it for those of us with ADHD, but when you read it, you're like, oh my god did she know about ADHD? Did she write this for us exactly? That book was quite profound for me in the last few years.
And I now have my shiny new book ideas in the back there where whenever I have a new idea, a decision I wanna make, it ends up in the book, and then I'll pull it out when I want to. Because this brain of ours is constantly gonna come up with ideas, new things, decision on this. This it can't stop, it just that's what it does. But I love Barbara's permission that that, when I read her book was that, okay, I don't have to always choose. I can parking lot it, put it over here, come back to it when I'm ready to. So that's one book that made a huge impact in my decision making process.
H: Yeah, she has a number of terrific books. And I think just the permission, just the title alone, Refuse to Choose. Like, your life doesn't have to look like everybody else's. Your decisions don't all have to be good. But to the best of your ability and willingness, like, be more present. Not thinking about the past, not worrying about the future, but, like, what's the best decision I can make right now and can I commit to loving and accepting myself, however it turns out?
G: That's it.
