← ADHD for Smart Ass Women with Tracy Otsuka
ADHD for Smart Ass Women with Tracy Otsuka
EP. 366: You Don’t Need a New Year. You Need a New Lens.
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Before we start, quick pause. Your ADHD brain is not broken. It just never came with a user's manual. So we are going to build one together. That's what our three days to fall in love with your ADHD brain is all about. We will start on January 6th, and you can sign up for free at tracyoutsuka.com ilovemybrain. Richard Branson. Michael Phelps, Justin Timberlake, James Carville. Wait a minute. Where are the women? Greta Gerwig, Lisa Ling, Audra McDonald, Simone Biles. That sounds like a list of highly successful titans in a variety of industries. They all have 88, but you don't hear much about that now, do you? You know what else you don't hear about are the 43% of people with ADHD who are in excellent mental health. Why aren't we talking about them and what they're doing right? I'm your host, Tracy Adsuka, and that's exactly what we do here. I'm a lawyer, not a doctor, a lifelong student, and now the author of my new book, ADHD for Smartass Women. I'm also a certified ADHD coach and the creator of youf ADHD Brain is a ok, a patented system that helps ADHD women just like you get unstuck and fall in love with their brilliant brains. Here we embrace our too muchness, and we focus on our strengths. My guests and I credit our ADHD for some of our greatest gifts. And to those who still think they're too much, too impulsive, too scattered, too disorganized, I say no one ever made a difference by being too little. Foreign. Hello, I am your host, Tracy Otsuka. Welcome to another episode of ADHD for Smartass Women. My goal is always to show you who you are and then inspire you to be it. So thank you so much for being here. As we head into a new year, there's a lot of noise about fresh starts, right? New goals, new habits, new versions of you. But here's what I want to offer today. You don't need a new year. You just need a new lens. Because real change, it doesn't come from flipping the calendar. No, it comes from changing how you see yourself, how you interpret what's happening, and how you relate to your own mind. Most of us, well, we don't struggle because we're not trying hard enough. We struggle because we're looking at our lives through a lens, and that tells us we're behind, broken, or failing. And once that lens is in place, everything that you think, feel and do gets filtered through It. This episode is about what actually changes your lives. Not more effort, not more discipline, not another system. It's about learning how your thoughts shape your emotional world, how your emotional world drives your actions, and how shifting that inner lens changes everything that comes, comes after. So if you've been telling yourself that next year will be different or this year will be different, if you just get it together, stay with me, you may not need to do more at all. You may just need to see differently. Enjoy the episode. Have you checked the news lately? Oh, my gosh. Who wouldn't be anxious, right? It's like everywhere. Physical on tv, local news, cable news, social media. It can be completely overwhelming if you let it be. But this is the thing. We can't control anything that happens outside of ourselves. And that includes circumstances, things that happen to us, things that happen to other people. We can't control other people either. Right. We also can't change what's happened in our past. It's past, right? It already happened. What we can control, however, is our thoughts today. How we choose to feel, how we act, and what results we get from all of this. I think that most people believe that they have no control over what they think. Well, they're wrong. You know, we have something like 6,000 thoughts a day, and we can decide what those 6,000 thoughts are if we learn how to manage our mind and start with paying attention to what we're thinking. Mindfulness, right? Because this is the deal. Our thoughts are what dictate how we feel our emotions, Right? Which is especially important for our ADHD brains. You hear me all the time talking about how we need to be in positive emotion in order to feel good, in order to feel inspired so that we can move our lives forward with intention. If we're in negative emotion, it's really hard to do anything. We just kind of spin. You know what I mean? Right. Transforming your inner world, however, can have as much of an impact as transforming the outer world. So by focusing on positive thoughts, we can change how we feel and act, leading to better outcomes in our lives. You know, we talked about the fact that we often have this, what I call hyperactivity of the mind, right? We can disastrousize and catastrophize. We can ruminate. We can do all of this really well. But this is the deal. You need to know that if you want to, you can get off this ride. It is your choice. So when we're thinking, thinking, thinking, ruminating, right? We're not acting at all. We're going through all of these scenarios in our head, but we really have no idea what's actually going to happen. And so instead, what do we feel? More anxiety, more fear. We're worrying about things that we have no control over and we don't know how they're going to turn out. What we're really fearing is our own thoughts and the feelings that we get from these thoughts around this uncertainty. We worry and we think that that means we're actually working on the problem like we're in action around it by worrying, right? Because we're thinking through all these scenarios, trying to make things feel less uncertain, but all we're doing is ruminating there's no actual action, so how could we possibly make things more certain? That's why the future is uncertain. And in truth, it's not the actual circumstances that we fear because we're not even sure what they are, right? We fear how we might feel in the future. And we think that all these thoughts that we're thinking are actually true, when often they're not. Beyond all this, there are so many things that when they happen to you, you think, oh my gosh, this is the worst possible outcome in the moment, right? But then hours, days, weeks, months, even years later, with some distance, some hindsight, we realize that what happened was probably one of the best things that could have ever happened to us. If we can learn to see everything that happens as happening for us, even if in the moment it doesn't seem like it at all, if we can see life and everything in it as a journey, then you realize that no matter what happens to you, you don't need to be certain of the outcome because you've already decided up front that this is all part of your journey. There's something to learn from it, right? You can't yet see the outcome, but you can trust that it will all work out. It will be just fine. I always talk about looking for the open door. Mine is always red. And so I see myself in a long hallway of doors going through the options, right? And there's one door that I would really love to open, but I try to open it and it doesn't open. So then I think, okay, but where's the actual open door? Where is the red door that I am meant to walk through? And but for that door not opening the regular white door, I would have never been led to this red door with this new amazing experience that is actually the one that I meant to have. But the thing about it is, all of this starts with our thoughts, right? Our thoughts dictate our feelings or emotions, which in turn controls our actions, what we choose to do or not do. And our actions determine what are the results that we are going to end up with. Fear is just an emotion like any emotion, right? And it's created by our thoughts. The opposite of that would be a feeling of safety. Right? Safety is also an option that is created by our thoughts. It's the absence of feeling fear because you're not thinking thoughts that make you feel fearful. So let me give you my favorite example. And I heard something similar to this years ago. It's always clicked with me. And so I want to prove to you that what I'm saying is actually true. So I love those horrible shows, you know, 48 hours, Dateline 2020, you know, those crime shows, they're part of my cooking ritual. And so if I'm cooking for friends or family, that's what I watch. And I never really know what's going on, which is probably why I can watch them. But I'm always trying to find whoever did it, right? And I'm usually right using just my intuition because, again, I'm only paying half attention because I'm reading recipes and I'm measuring ingredients. But. But when I watch the shows that way, I have no fear watching these during the day, right? Which is hilarious because I am truly the biggest chicken ever, certainly at nighttime. The problem is, every once in a while, I'll watch one of these shows during the day, and for whatever reason, it sticks with me. So I'll be in bed, and I'll all of a sudden remember an especially horrifying scene. And so I'll be tucked in bed, feeling safe as can be. And all of a sudden, I'll think about that episode and. And then I start hearing all kinds of noises and terrifying myself that someone is outside my patio door. We live in the country, and so. And we have a lot of windows and a lot of doors. And of course, there's one literally right by my bed. So I'll hear the sound and I'll try to remind myself, right, that what was responsible for my sudden fear? Nothing but my thoughts. Now, I could have not a worry in the world, like, none of these thoughts whatsoever. And there could actually be someone right outside my door. But because I don't know about them, I'm not worried at all, right? So there's zero fear. Like, I'm not even thinking that there might be a problem. Or I could be so fearful because I think there's someone outside that door, despite the fact that there's no one there. Again, it's my thoughts that are creating these emotions and feelings of fear. Whether there's anything at all to fear or not to fear, our thoughts are what control our feelings. And you've probably heard me say this before, but everything we do in life is with the goal of feeling better. The job we take, the person we're partners with, having children, not having children, buying that dress, going on that vacation, having that glass of wine, having that second glass of wine, having that third glass of wine. Right? Everything we do is with the goal of feeling better. If your feelings are caused by your thoughts and everything you do in life is to feel better, then wouldn't it be really important to know what we're thinking? And nobody teaches us this, right? Everything you want in life is because of a feeling, the feeling you think you will have when you get it, or the feeling that you think you will avoid in not getting it. So if you want a promotion at work, you think, okay, I want that promotion at work, because then I'll feel the feelings of pride, accomplishment, and financial security that come with it. Conversely, you fear the feelings of disappointment, inadequacy, and financial insecurity if you don't get that promotion. All of these feelings stem from your thoughts. For instance, thinking, if I get promoted, I will feel successful and secure, and that's what drives your desire to achieve it. On the other hand, thinking, if I don't get promoted, I'm going to feel like I'm not good enough, drives your fear of not achieving it, of not getting that promotion. If you want an intimate relationship, you might say to yourself, well, I want this intimate relationship because I desire feeling those feelings of love, companionship, and happiness. And I fear those feelings of loneliness, rejection, and sadness if I remain single. But both sets of feelings are caused by your thoughts. The thought of if I find a partner, I will feel loved and happy motivates your search for a relationship. Conversely, the thought, if I don't find a partner, I will feel lonely and unworthy fuels your fear of being alone. All of these feelings are caused by your thoughts. And who's to say any of this is true? Who's to say that you can't feel pride, accomplishment, and financial security without that job, that promotion? And who's to say that you can't feel loved and happy even if you don't have a romantic partner? I mean, people feel that way all the time without a romantic partner. They just have different thoughts. Our feelings drive all of our actions because every action in Your life is because of a feeling, and every feeling is because of a thought that you have. If you are taking action or you're not taking action, it's because of the way you feel. Quick break. If you have ADHD and you've tried everything to make things work, listen closely. Adhd, well, you know, it's not a disorder. It's a different operating system and different brains need different strategies. In three days to fall in love with your ADHD brain, we talk about how your brain actually works, how ADHD shows up differently in women, and how to replace shame with pride. Then we build your ADHD user's manual together. One that fits you, supports confident decisions, and quiets that ruminating brain. If you are ready to stop fighting your brain and start working with it, sign up for free@tracyotsuka.com Ilovemybrain we start on January 6th. Now let's go back to the episode. I talk about this in the ADHD brain all the time. We struggle to move forward and feel inspired so we don't act if we're feeling negative emotion. We're gold star people. We need to be in positive emotion. And we know that our actions will determine our results. Right? So again, this is the formula. Your thoughts create your feelings and your feelings drive your actions. Your actions create your results. Like what you do, right? So clearly changing what you're thinking, changing our thoughts will give us different, hopefully better results. So how do we change what we think? Well, again, many people think, I don't have any control over what I think. Right? We think our thoughts and feelings, they just happen to us and we have no control. We think our brain just does what our brain does. And again, we have no control over it. No, this isn't true. Most of us don't know how to even witness our thinking. And it's not that hard. It just takes a pause. And then getting into your body and separating yourself from your mind, you need to learn how to watch yourself think. And the way I see it is I see myself as an adult looking down at my child self and watching what my brain is thinking, what my mind is thinking. And I'm very protective about my child self, so I don't let my adult self beat my child self up. When you start realizing that a lot of your problems are a result of what you're thinking, you suddenly start paying attention to all the negative thoughts that you think and it's horrifying. Again, if we have 6,000 thoughts a day and most of them aren't positive because you know, the human brain has a negativity bias. What you say to yourself if in your thinking really matters. When you start witnessing your thinking, you suddenly realize that your brain is a brat and has been completely unsupervised and you would never allow someone else to talk to you the way you've allowed your unsupervised brat brain to talk to you. Right? And this is exactly why, with our ADHD brains, trying to force ourselves to act can sometimes be so difficult. We haven't corrected the thoughts, so we're left with these feelings that are pure negative emotion. So no wonder we struggle to get into action right around the things that we want to accomplish. We need to change the thought first, which will change the emotions, the feelings that we feel next in order to change the action that we're taking or frankly, even be able to act, which will then give you different results that you actually want. And as I always say, this is all so much easier if we start with positive emotion. When you understand yourself, when you understand how your brain works, why you do what you do, what your strengths are, what you value, only then can you change what you'd like to change. Because now you understand yourself and what works for you and what doesn't. What we're talking about is mindfulness. And mindfulness is basically, number one, learning how to pay attention to your thoughts and how you're feeling. And number two, avoiding trying to control anything you can't control, trying to control that which you can't control. It's stressful. And there's science that supports the fact that mindfulness is especially effective for our ADHD brains. We've done many episodes on mindfulness for this podcast. If you want to know more. Off the top of my head, I know episode number 53 is all about mindfulness. Mindfulness. Why does it help? Well, it improves attention, it increases emotional regulation, it decreases anxiety and depression, and it even improves immune function. Science behind all of this. It helps us to be less reactive because we're pausing and we're breathing and we're paying attention to how we feel and, and what our thoughts actually are. It teaches us how to calm our own nervous system, which is one of the most valuable skills that we can teach our ADHD brains. We're asking ourselves, is this really true? What is the evidence you have for this? Could it have been something else? And in the process, we're becoming more and more compassionate to ourselves, which increases our self esteem. And kids can do this too. And studies show that it helps to improve everything from social skills to test scores. So I want to share a dialectical behavior therapy skill called the STOP Skill, and it was developed by a prominent mindfulness researcher, John Cabot Zinn. So the acronym to the STOP Skill is STOP S T O P. Let me give you a little bit of background. So let's say you're all in your head about something that's happened and you're doing that monkey brain thing, right? And your mind is jumping from one doom and gloom scenario to another. Does that ever happen to you? You are all over the place and you're feeling really challenged and frankly, you're feeling fearful. I'm going to apply this to something totally specific. Real world. Example, something that happened to me. You know how much I love Reddit, right? Reddit and book reviews on Goodreads. I should say Reddit and negative book reviews on Goodreads. Oh my gosh, people can be so cruel. And they often don't like me because I focus on the strengths of ADHD and not the weaknesses. And I give mindfulness strategies like this one. And I show ADHD women how they can actually change their brain through neuroplasticity and regulate their own nervous system. And they hate that. I guess what I should just say is just go get a prescription for medication and that's it. And so I'm always being told that I don't believe in medication, like it's a religion or something, which is so untrue because as I've said over and over again, I've seen how incredibly life changing medication can be when it works. But the deal is that medication doesn't work for all of us. And sadly, I am one of the people that it doesn't work for. And regardless of all of this, I'm sorry, but I do not think medication should be the only recommended ADHD protocol, period. I think that exercise, sleep, nutrition, and many other systems and strategies work incredibly well with medication. But also instead of, you know, medication, if medication doesn't work for you. So a couple of months ago I was looking for a podcast episode and so I consulted the Google and I froze because I saw another Reddit thread about me. And you know, I've been talking about these for a couple years now. Every once in a while, right? You think I would know better, but gulp, I saw it, right? And now, you know, with some hindsight, I'm thinking, have I ever read a Reddit thread and felt positive emotion? No, not for years. But still, here I was going down this rabbit hole, I saw it and I Had to go there. I knew it was new. I had to go there. And so I was on this Reddit thread for a good 10 minutes, feeling worse and worse, and then ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, Stop skill started ringing in my brain. So what did I do? How did I apply the stop skill? Okay, S is for stop. And that basically means we talk about this all the time. Pausing, right? Asking yourself, what do I actually need to pay attention to right now to feel better? What is it that I need to be mindful of? So I catch myself on Reddit. I'm feeling a lot of negative emotion reading these comments. So I pull out and I pause. Then I do number two, T S, T O, P T is take a breath. I take three deep breaths. And what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to disconnect my brain and mind from my body, right? My goal is to get out of my mind and into my body. And the easiest way to do that is to breathe deep breaths, get you back into your body. And this gives me a few minutes to settle my nervous system and release some of the pressure that I'm feeling. Okay, what's next? We've got st, then we've got O. Observe. I pay attention to what I'm thinking because remember, our thoughts control our feelings or emotions. So I'm asking, what are you thinking? Okay, how are you feeling? Well, I'm feeling kind of anxious. I'm hurt, I'm super irritated. So then I ask, okay, well, what thought is creating this feeling in my body? What am I saying to myself, that's creating this feeling? Maybe my thought is, I'm feeling anxious and I'm feeling hurt by these comments. I know that my chest usually feels kind of tight, and I'm thinking, oh, my gosh, these criticisms, they're so unfair. You know, my justice sensitivity is rearing its head, and I'm thinking, oh, my Gosh, I do 90% of this work expecting nothing in return, just wanting to help women who are struggling. And all these people can see are the things to be critical about and how cruel are they? That's what I'm thinking, right? They have adhd. They know I have adhd. What is wrong with them? Again, what we want to be doing is being completely objective and nonjudgmental. But I kind of slipped into that judgmental part, right? I'm observing what I'm thinking, and I'm paying attention to it. Okay? The number four stop is proceed. I continue, but with more awareness. I noticed that none of this participating in negative reviews or reading Reddit generates any positive emotion for me, right? After all, I have no control over what people who don't know me write about me, what they think about me, what they say about me. I have none. And paying attention to any of it makes me feel worse. And that certainly doesn't help me help more women. No, it makes me less likely to want to get back on the horse and work hard to positively affect women's lives. So instead, what I decide to do right then and there is I decide you're not reading any more negative comments, and I step away from Reddit. I step away from the nasty reviews on Goodreads by people who, frankly, have never written a book or considered just how hard it is to write a book, right? It's really easy to be a reviewer. It's really hard to write a book. And so what I do instead is I proceed to focus on work that's constructive and actually aligns with my values and purpose, and I can actually make that choice for me. That's what I have control over. So the next time Reddit rears its ugly head, because there is always a next time. And I guess, I guess if they are talking about me, it means I'm still relevant. And so when they stop talking about me, maybe that's what I should worry about. I don't know. But the next time Reddit rears its ugly head, I have a stop system ready to go. Number one, I see Reddit, I stop and close the browser immediately. I see a one star review on Goodreads, I stop and I close the browser immediately. T I take a breath or many and I calm my own nervous system. Number three. Oh, I observe. I identify how the comments have affected me in the past, and I acknowledge how I feel when I read them. I feel criticized, I feel hurt, I feel frustrated, right? So since I already know, since I've already observed that that's how I feel, I can go on to Reddit if I want to. But I ask myself, does that really serve me right? And so I go to P. Proceed. I redirect to something that generates positive emotion for me. And I don't know, maybe I create another podcast episode like this one, right? Or it inspires another program that I might want to create in the future. Let me go through that acronym again. So it's stop, S, T O P. Number one, we stop. So we take a pause. Number two, we take a breath or many and we calm our own nervous system. Number three, we observe and identify how we are Feeling in this moment. I guess we could go back into Reddit if we really wanted to. But again, I'm always now from here on out, I'm going to remember, look, I never feel good, I never feel positive emotion when I do this, so why am I subjecting myself to it? And instead my P for proceed will be to redirect to something that actually generates positive emotion. And it serves to move my intention of helping women with ADHD to understand themselves better, understand their brains better, fall in love with their brain, right? What can I do to make that more likely? Instead of going to Reddit, reading nasty reviews on Goodreads, feeling a lot of negative emotion, and then not being able to move forward in a way that serves myself, but also, you know, serves other women. I want you to remember that what you focus on gets bigger. So if you're focusing on everything, all these thoughts, right, that make you feel fearful, that make you feel less confident, that make you feel less competent and focuses means you're creating these thoughts, right? You will automatically feel more fearful, you will feel less confident, you will feel less competent. If you're focusing, however, on what is working for you, the lives you've been able to impact and dare I say, even change for the better, you will find and see more instances of this. And I guess again, if they're writing about me on Reddit, maybe someone will read it and think, you know, I'd love to know more about what it means to adopt a strength focused view of adhd. I didn't even know there were strengths to adhd and maybe they'll seek me out. So maybe it's not all bad, right? I want you to look for the open door. What is it that you are meant to learn right here, right now? When we excessively focus on our past, it can lead to depression. When we excessively focus on our future, it can lead to anxiety. So let's do what we can to stay in the present as much as we possibly can. So now that we understand how our thoughts create our reality and the life that we live, let's talk about how to turn our thoughts into what we want. And a lot of people may think, oh my gosh, this is woo woo. That's what I thought, but I promise you it's not. It's all based in science and frankly, a lot of common sense. So let me explain. The first thing that you're going to need to do to turn your thoughts into what you want is you're going to have to set clear intentions. You have to identify what you want. And, and that means you need very specific goals. Think about it. You don't get into a car and just start driving, usually, right? You have a destination in mind, you have a destination in your thoughts. You set your gps, you've got a map, you've named a location. Turning your thoughts into what you want is no different. And why is this? Because of the reticular activating system, or ras. So the RAS is a network of neurons located in the brainstem and that focuses on what you decide is important by aligning your thoughts with your goals. Ras, what it does is it puts a spotlight on all the opportunities that are now going to support these goals. So it filters everything that comes into your world and it decides what gets passed on. Unconscious mind. So let me give you an example. You decide to buy a car, and all of a sudden you. A car that you never noticed before is suddenly parked on every street corner. You see it everywhere. You literally have friends who you've never noticed that they drive that car, but now they drive that car. You see reviews on this car in your emails. You pull into a parking lot and everyone parked around you seems to be getting out of the same car. That is your reticular activating system, your ras. But to really get it to work, you have to be really specific so it can spotlight exactly what you want. So if it's a car, you want to know the make, you want to know the model, you want to know the year. If you're looking for a home, get really specific on neighborhood, type of home, number of bedrooms, square footage, what kind of architecture. The more specific you get, the more likely that your ras is going to get to work. If you're researching something, oh, I don't know, for a school project or a work project, you need to get specific on the exact topic, the exact keywords. And your RAS is going to make sure that you start noticing articles and news stories and conversations related to that topic. How else do you turn your thoughts into what you want? Number two, it is all about positive emotion. Universal law. Number one, we've already talked about it. Whatever we focus on just gets bigger. So let's focus on what we want and not what we don't want. We all know people who complain about everything and it's hard to be around them, right? Partly out of fear that the bad stuff that they see right and left because that's all they're focused on is going to rub off on us. But the negative emotion is also crushing. So positive emotion for the Win Universal law number two. Like attracts like. It's all energy. And like a magnet, we attract positive emotions, people and circumstances to us. Think about it. If you're kind to others, they're going to be kind back to you. If you're optimistic, other optimistic people are going to be drawn to you. They're going to want to be around you. If you're moody and pessimistic, the optimistic people are going to run and the pessimists are going to follow flock to you because your negativity makes them feel, well, I don't know, less bad about themselves, right? They're thinking, well, at least it's not just me. Research from the HeartMath Institute has shown that positive emotions create coherent heart rhythms where the heart, mind and emotions are in sync. And this is associated with overall health and well being and optimal functioning. Positive emotion will always get you farther. Not just because that's the way our ADHD brains work best, but also because people want to help and they want to be around those that generate positive emotion for them. Okay, how else do we turn our thoughts into what we want? Number three, we feel the feelings of having it. Now we start visualizing what we want and it's not enough to just picture the end result. You need to combine this mental image with strong positive emotions. You want to feel the excitement, you want to feel the pride and the joy that you will feel once you've achieved this goal. This emotional connection is what makes visualization so powerful. And it literally helps to rewire your brain for success. So what's the science behind visualization? It gets you motivated to keep going. When you feel good about reaching your goal, your brain releases dopamine. This is the chemical, you know, the neurotransmitter that our brain doesn't make enough of. So when there's more dopamine, we feel happier, we feel more inspired. So we keep working towards our goal. What else does it do? It strengthens neural pathways. When you combine visualization with emotion, you activate the same neural pathways in the brain that are activated when you you actually experience the event. Crazy, isn't it? Your brain doesn't distinguish much between real and vividly imagined experiences. By vividly imagining the experience, your brain gets used to the experience and it becomes less intimidating. This mental rehearsal helps you feel like you've already done it, which makes actually doing it seem easier and less scary. How else does visualization help you? Well, it builds confidence. When you imagine yourself achieving your goal and you feel positive emotion around it, you practice being successful in your mind. And this is exactly what makes you feel more confident and less scared when you try to do it for real. Visualization with positive emotions also creates a positive feedback loop. The more you visualize and feel good about achieving your goal, the more motivated and confident you become. This makes you want to keep working towards the goal, since every step you take makes you feel even better. Let me give you an example. If my goal is to run a marathon, I don't just imagine myself crossing the finish line. I feel the exhilaration, the sense of accomplishment, and the physical sensations of completing the race. I visualize every detail vividly, and I really sit in the positive emotions, in the pride I feel for myself. One more thing. It's not enough to just see the race from your own eyes. You want to picture yourself from an outside perspective, like you're watching a movie of your success. And this is what helps you make the experience feel even more real and even more powerful. This is what athletes do all the time. It helps them dissipate the fear and the anxiety of the situation. So achieving their goal, it becomes less intimidating and more manageable. By watching yourself succeed in your mind, you strengthen your confidence and determination to complete that goal, to achieve that goal, to finish whatever it is that you're looking to finish. So how else do we use our thoughts to get us what we want? Number four, we take action. We combine positive emotion with action. We get comfortable with being uncomfortable, whether. Whatever it is, we get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Whatever it is that you need to get into action around in order to achieve your goal, start doing it. And you can start practicing this in little ways that don't have much to do with reaching your exact goal. But you're working that discomfort muscle, which gets stronger over time. So, for example, leave your phone at home when you're going for a walk. You'll survive. Nothing's going to happen. You used to do it all the time. Don't take your phone with you into the bedroom. Strike up a conversation with a stranger. Turn off the television and sit in silence. Do something that scares you, if even just a little bit. Sit quietly for five minutes and practice mindfulness. Practice breathing. Declutter. Get rid of the things that you don't need, that you feel uncomfortable letting go. Start getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. Then take the next smallest step. Focus on the immediate action that's needed, rather than looking out into the horizon and saying, oh my God, I've got to get all the way over there. No, you just need to get right here. One step closer is all you need to do. One small step at a time leads to a big giant leap right into the future. And then engage in acts of kindness to attract positive reciprocity. I'm telling you, it works. When we are kind to other people, the universe is kind back to us, right? And it starts with them typically being kind back to us. Finally, the last thing to turn your thoughts into what you want is Practice gratitude and celebrate Practicing gratitude shifts your focus from what's wrong to what's right in your life. We talked earlier about what you focus on just gets bigger. So if you're paying attention to what's working in your life, you're going to see more of what's working, which generates positive emotion and helps to reduce anxiety and stress. When you regularly feel thankful, you also start to think more positively and you attract more of what you want because you're appreciating what you already have. Remember, like attracts like. This happy mindset gives you the energy and determination to work towards your goals. Plus, when you show gratitude, you build stronger relationships with others who in turn can support you in achieving your goals. By practicing gratitude, you also align your thoughts and your actions with what you want to achieve, and so it becomes easier to reach your goals. Finally, celebrate your small wins. When you're proud of yourself, when you feel positive emotion, when you feel inspired. Guess what? You keep going. So celebrate your successes. I can't even tell you how many times I meet these incredibly accomplished women and they don't realize how accomplished they are. And I believe that the big problem is they've never learned to celebrate their successes. So if you don't celebrate your successes, you're never going to feel successful. Remember how I mentioned those nasty Reddit comments and Goodreads reviews? I'll be honest with you, they kind of got to me and I started doubting myself, questioning if I was too optimistic or frankly, just plain delusional. And I asked myself, should I tone down my focus on ADHD strengths and fit in with the mainstream narrative? There's a woman, Barbara Luther, who is one of the teaching coaches at adca, the ADD Coaching Academy, and she taught one of my coaching classes. And I remember she had a acronym called BMW and it stands for Bitch, Moan and Whine. And so the deal is you get five minutes of BMW and then it's off to the races. So I gave myself five minutes before I decided, hell no. Why should I do anything other than double, triple, or quadruple down on what I know works? The key to Loving your ADHD brain, it's not trying harder or fixing yourself. It's understanding who you are and learning how to work from that place instead of against it. And this is the part that doesn't get talked about enough. Adhd, it is not a productivity problem. It's an identity problem. When you believe you're broken, lazy, too much, or unreliable, everything you do comes from that belief. Your thoughts, your emotions, your decisions, your confidence. But when your identity changes, everything downstream changes too. You know, when I learned that 43% of people with ADHD are in excellent mental health? Not surviving, not coping? No, they're excellent. That meant for me even more that ADHD was not the problem. The way we've been taught to think about ourselves is. Most ADHD women, they don't need more strategies. They need a new story about who they are. One that replaces shame with clarity. One that explains why things have felt so hard and why so many traditional systems never worked. Because when you finally understand your brain, you stop fighting it. When you stop fighting it, your nervous system settles. And. And when your nervous system settles, you start making better decisions. Not forced decisions, aligned ones. And that's what our your ADHD brain is a okay academy is built for. The AOK Academy is where ADHD women learn how their brains actually work. How to trust themselves again, and how to build a life that fits them. Not by pushing harder, not by fixing flaws, but by shifting identity first and letting everything else follow. This work, it doesn't just make you more productive. It makes you calmer, more confident, more decisive, more at home in yourself. Enrollment for the AOK Academy is open for the next five days, and we begin together on January 14th. If today's episode gave you that quiet wait, this actually makes sense. Feeling, don't ignore it. That is clarity knocking. And you can learn more by going to tracyoutsuka.com so that's it for today. As always, thank you for listening to the ADHD for Smartass Women podcast, and I will see you here same time, same place, next week. Until then, be brilliant. You've been listening to the ADHD for Smartass Women podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Otsuka. Join us at adhd for smart women.com where you can find more information on my new book, ADHD for Smartass Women. And my patented you'd ADHD brain is a okay system to help you get unstuck and fall in love with your brilliant brain. One last thought. Understanding ADHD really helps. But trusting your ADHD brain, well, that changes everything. And that's exactly what three days to fall in love with your ADHD brain is all about. It's free and you can sign up@traceyautsuka.com ilovemybrain we start on January 6th.