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Before we start, a quick note. If you've been listening to this podcast and thinking, I need more than insight, I need support. This is for you. Your ADHD brain is not broken. It just never came with a map. That is why I created your ADHD Brain is a okay Academy. It's my patented step by step framework to help you build a life. And that finally fits how your brain works. Ready to get started? Click the link in the show notes to sign up or book a free discovery call with me now. On with the show. 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 adhd, 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 are doing? 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 aok, 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. Hi, I'm Tracy Atsuka. Welcome to ADHD for Smartass Women. This is where we challenge the old narratives about ADHD and replace them with something more accurate and a lot more inspiring. Today's episode is a solo, one that I've wanted to do for a while, and it's all about identity. I love talking about identity, about starting, and about the decisions that you might not realize that you actually get to make. So today's big idea is this. You get to decide who you are. Easier said than done, right? So why can figuring out what matters to us be so confusing? Probably because most of us never actually choose our values. We inherit them, right? We absorb them from our parents, our culture, our community. And often that can work for a while until it no longer does. And when it doesn't, work. That's exactly when you start feeling lost. Do you know that feeling when nothing is actually wrong? When but you just know that something's off? You have the sense that you're living a life and something is not quite fitting? I don't know, is it? Not your life? But you're not sure. And you don't know what the right fit actually is. For some of us, looking at where our values come from is eye opening. Maybe you realized your parents weren't even happy with their own values, but you still look to them because you never knew that there was actually a choice. Or. Or maybe your parents said one thing and then did the actual opposite, so you were left wondering, what am I even supposed to believe? What is it that I actually believe? First off, there's no supposed to. Okay, you get to choose. This is your permission slip to drop the values that feel like, I don't know, an uncomfortable scratchy sweater and replace them with ones that actually fit you and feel good to you. And if the word values feels big and overwhelming, just change it. Ask yourself, what do I actually care about? What lights me up? What makes me feel alive? What feels like home? What generates positive emotion in my body? Because that is the real test. Values aren't feelings, but they drive the feelings we seek. Feelings are the emotional states you experience as a result of living or not living in alignment with those values. So let me give you an example. If you value freedom, you'll probably feel trapped in a rigid nine to five kind of job. If you value connection, you'll feel lonely. If you're isolated. If you value excellence, you'll feel frustrated if you're forced to half ass something. Right? That is something that is really frustrating for me. I always feel like I need to do my very best. And if I know I haven't been able to do my very best, it is really disconcerting to me. I'm wondering if you can relate to that. So now that we know that our values shape our emotions, let's flip the script. Instead of starting with things we think we want, what if we started instead with the feelings we want to experience? Here's an easy way to figure out what you really value. Focus on how you want to feel. Because most of the time we don't actually want things. We want the feeling that we think those things will give us. So you probably don't really care about the prestigious career. What you want is to feel significant, respected, or appreciated. Ask yourself, is it really that you want a perfect house? Or is it that you want to feel safe and stable or at peace. Maybe you don't care about winning at tennis or winning at pickleball. What you want is to feel excellent, competitive, or part of a community. So instead of chasing things, let's instead chase feelings. Because when you figure out what feelings actually matter to you, your decisions, they just become a whole lot easier. I always say that it's really helpful to give your life a North Star or a theme, something that captures what matters to you, how you want to feel and where you're going. And here's the best part. That North Star doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to feel right at the time. So let me give you some examples of what your life theme can be. It can be a value, like for me, challenging the status quo. When I have to make a decision and I have two options, I always opt for the option that allows me to challenge the status quo because I know that I'll stay in the game longer. So I consider my number one value to be challenging the status quo. That is also my North Star. It's my driving value. So you can have a value. It can be a general idea, something as simple as trusting my intuition. So whenever you're struggling to make a decision, you ask, okay, what does my intuition. You're really tapping into that intuition, feeling it in your body. What is it telling me to do? It can also be a specific mission. So my mission is always to be the best parent I can be. And so if again I have to make a decision, I look for the option that allows me to live that mission. Because again, it's about intention, right? It's about what I want for myself. There's no wrong answer. You just need someone to guide you. So that North Star. So when life gets messy, because it always does, you know where you're headed, you've got some direction. So what this is doing is it's about simplifying what matters to you so you can actually use it. It's helpful, right? Look, I'm not asking you to change your whole life overnight. I'm just asking you to keep going, to keep questioning, to keep exploring, to keep showing up, to keep being curious. Because here's what I know for sure. Once you understand who you are, once you know what matters to you, what drives you, what lights you up, you, you will start to make decisions with so much more confidence because you'll be factoring you into the decision. Life will stop feeling like a constant game of I don't know what I want. So I'm just going to go let everyone else make decisions for me, which is a horrible way to live. You'll stop second guessing yourself. You will stop feeling stuck. And most importantly, you'll stop beating yourself up for past decisions. Once you know what matters to you, you stop outsourcing your decisions. You stop waiting for someone else to define your life. Because you are the one who chooses. But choosing isn't the hard part. The hard part is then getting into action around the choice and the decision you've made. So we've talked about how understanding your values gives you a sense of direction. How making decisions get easier when you know what actually matters to you. But what if you know exactly what you want, You've made a decision and you still can't start? That's where procrastination comes in. Because here's the thing. Procrastination is not a flaw. It's not a moral failing. It's not a character flaw. It's not a sign that you're lazy or unmotivated. In fact, it's just your brain trying to solve a problem. It's just not solving it in a way that actually works for you, in a way that actually helps you. Your brain is not procrastinating for no reason. So now I want to talk about why procrastination isn't a discipline issue. It's actually an emotion issue. Number two, how to make starting so stupidly simple that your brain can't resist it. And and number three, how to hack dopamine so motivation comes to you instead of you chasing it. So let's start with the biggest misconception about procrastination. That procrastination is a discipline problem or a character flaw or a moral failing. Most of us assume that when we are procrastinating, it's because we are not disciplined enough. That if we just had more willpower, we would not put things off and we would get stuff done. But that's not true at all. You're not putting off tasks because you're lazy or bad at time management. You're putting them off because your brain is trying to avoid a feeling. Think about the last time you procrastinated on something. It probably was not impossible to do, and it was probably something that other people do all the time. But when you sat down to start, your brain just hit a wall. The wall was not the task itself. It was how the task made you feel. Maybe it felt overwhelming, maybe it felt boring, Maybe it felt confusing. And so you didn't know where to start. Your brain. It's not avoiding the work. It's avoiding that feeling of being uncomfortable. So what do we do instead? We find something that feels better. Right? We start scrolling Instagram. We go in if we're lucky, and clean the kitchen, or organize our closet, or binge watch the newest Netflix series. So let's go one layer deeper than that. If your brain is avoiding a feeling, the real question is what feeling? Boredom is uncomfortable. We know confusion is uncomfortable. We know overwhelm is uncomfortable. But underneath most of those is really just fear. Fear that you'll do it wrong. Fear that it'll take too long. Fear that you'll look stupid. Fear that you'll try and it won't be good enough. Fear that you'll start and you won't be able to finish. Fear of making the wrong choice. Fear of realizing you don't actually want the life you've built. That's a big one. Fear of learning who you really are. Fear does not show up announcing itself. It shows up as, I'm going to do this thing later. It shows up as over researching or. Or reorganizing your desk or convincing yourself, I can't do it until I have more clarity. And that fear actually makes sense. It's easier to stay where you are, even if it's not great, because it's familiar, it feels safe. At least you know what that feels like. The unknown, however, can feel destabilizing. Your brain reads uncertainty as risk, but fear is just an emotion. Just like excitement, just like frustration. It's not a prophecy. It's certainly not a stop sign. It is just information. And then there's perfectionism. Perfectionism, however, it's just fear. But it's in a tailored blazer. It says, if I can't do it perfectly, I won't do it at all. But that's not high standards. That's actually self protection. You are trying to keep yourself safe from all of those fears that we just talked about. Perfectionism isn't about doing great work. It's about avoiding criticism. It's about avoiding feeling vulnerable. And perfectionism. All it does is it keeps you stuck. Because if you wait until everything is perfect, guess what? You are never going to move. You are never going to take an action. So instead of asking, how do I force myself to do this? Ask yourself, what emotion am I trying not to feel again? Is it boredom? Is it confusion? Is it fear? Is it discomfort? Fear is the emotion. Perfectionism is just a strategy that you're employing so you don't have to feel that emotion. The second you name the feeling, it loses its power, it stops feeling permanent and it starts feeling more manageable. Now the question is, okay, but how do I actually start? I've named the feeling, now I need to start. I need to get this thing done. Because the hardest part of any task, especially for our ADHD brains, is starting, and that's biology. That whole Nike just do it thing, it works for some people. It does not work for our brains. So what works instead? Number one, intention. You need to know first and foremost why this thing matters to you, that you want to get done. Why are you doing this thing? Or your brain is just not going to care. So you have to connect it to something that you actually want for you to move your life forward, to be proud of yourself, to feel better. Right? Number two, what else works? Inspiration. Your brain needs to feel pulled towards something not pushed. And number three, identity. You need to see yourself as the kind of person who follows through. I am the kind of person who starts every morning with a workout, or I am the kind of person who never leaves dishes overnight in the sink, or I am the kind of person who wakes up every morning and drinks a glass of water. The identity can be very, very simple. And when you're starting to create that identity, I always recommend do something really, really simple so you can prove to yourself, like drinking a glass of water every morning, that you are trustworthy. And when you have an intention and create an identity around it, that you will follow through and can be trusted to do so. So if you're struggling to start, ask yourself this. What do I actually want? Not what would look impressive, not what would make someone else happy, not what should I want, but instead, why does getting this thing done actually matter to me? What do I hope that it will give me? Is it a feeling of relief? Is it a feeling of freedom? Is it a feeling of pride in myself? Is it a feeling of growth or income or proof that I can do this thing? And here's the real one. If I decided this mattered, how would I show up? Because the problem usually is not capability. You can usually do these things no problem. It's disconnection. When you reconnect to what you want, that intention piece and why it matters to you, you don't need to force yourself. You just move differently, with so much more ease. Again, your brain needs to be pulled towards something not pushed to it. Because this isn't about forcing yourself. It's about becoming the kind of person who, who does the thing. Whether that's making a career change or cleaning out your closet or getting a project done, or frankly opening an email, whatever that thing is that you want to do for you. So what else can we do to get these things done? We can start so small that it feels truly effortless. And here's how we do it. First of all, we shrink the decision. Instead of telling yourself, I need to write this report, tell yourself, I just need to open the document. Put that on your to do list. That's it. No pressure. Just open the document, Write one shitty sentence, right? That is it. What else can you do? You can limit your choices. Instead of asking, how should I do this? You give yourself two options and five minutes and pick one that is less mental load, which is naturally going to equate to less resistance. So instead of how should I start writing this report? You could ask, should I outline or just start writing? You're giving yourself two choices. Last one, use the five minute rule. Tell yourself you only have to work for five minutes. For me, it's 25 minutes. You probably know if you've been listening to this podcast long enough that my starting point is always 25 minutes. Because I know over seven years I have never not done it. When I have turned over, my timer started 25 minutes. I know I'm always good for it. There's something about my brain will do it and so my body will follow. And then once I'm in there for 25 minutes, we struggle to start, but we also struggle to stop. And so I use that to my advantage so there's no commitment beyond that. Just give yourself five minutes when you're starting. Because once you start, like I just said, your brain will likely keep going. I have an example. So I am also a real estate broker, and every four years, I don't practice real estate anymore, but every four years, we have to renew our license, which I don't know why, but I just feel an obligation to keep. It's ridiculous. I just hired a real estate broker in San Francisco to help us find a home. So I am not using my real estate license, but I want to keep that license because I've had it for so long. So in order to keep the license, you have to do these continuing education credits, and they are so boring and so performative and exactly the kind of things our brains struggle with. So you have to do 40 hours. And so many of these courses require you to literally sit in front of the computer for 40 hours. My brain just cannot do that. And so I knew I needed to find something different. But I leave this until a couple of months before it's due. And I just keep moving from one list to another. Find a real estate course, right? So finally, all I write down is open your computer and Google California license renewal, continuing education courses. This has been going on my list, on and off my list now for probably six months. I literally sat down, went into Google, and in 15 minutes I found a program. $65 I paid for it, and I'm on my way. I was so in my head about this, it was ridiculous. I've literally done this particular broker's license renewal probably five times before, and still, what do I do? I hate doing it so much that I blow it up and make it a much bigger deal than it ever was. Because in 15 minutes, I now had found a program, I started working on it, and, you know, within a month I was done. Let's pause here. Have you spent your whole life being told your way is the wrong way? If you try to use systems designed for a neurotypical brain, of course you'll feel like you're failing. But here's the truth. You were never the problem. You just have a different brain, which means you need different systems. That is exactly why I created the AOK Academy. It's my six step patented framework designed to help you reconnect with your intuition and build systems based on your unique strengths. Let me help you reconnect with your intuition, trust yourself again, and build a life that actually works for you. You've had the answers all along. I'll help you see them. Look, it's time to stop second guessing and start trusting yourself again. Find the link in the show notes to sign up or book a free discovery call. Now let's get back to it. So understand that normally when we put these big tasks on our list and we just look at them month after month, week after week, hopefully not year after year, we make them so much bigger than they really need to be. And that is even when, you know, like my example, I've done this five times before and I always think it's a hassle, but it never fails. When I'm done, I'm like, that really was not that big of a deal. So you know what I did this time? I actually made a note to myself. You know, I use the Bear app so I can never lose anything, so I never will lose anything again. And in the Bear app, I put the link to the course, the name of the course, the link to the course. And then I described how I was Feeling and how it all, you know, when I started and when I was looking for a course and, you know, thinking about, oh, my gosh, this is so much work. And then what my experience was, going through the program, I gave myself advice, what was difficult, what was easy. And so next time when I go through the same angst around, you know, my broker's license renewal, I'm going to go right to that there app. I'm going to search for California license renewal, and there is a description of what happened last time. So I won't have to go through it again. I'll know. Okay, click that link. This is the program. Cause I couldn't even remember the program I'd taken four years before. But now I'll know exactly the program. I'll know exactly how the program works and what really helped me, how I got through it. And so right away, the angst is gone. Right. So this works because your brain isn't actually resisting the task, it's resisting the transition. Right. So if I can make that transition so tiny that it doesn't feel like effort, my brain will stop fighting me and it'll just go with it. And this is the deal. Once we start, that's when we can actually. Motivation can take over. You find the course you need, you start it, and the relief and positive emotion is huge. So what else can we talk about? This is a big one. And I've talked about it before. Motivation does not come before action. It follows action. You will never feel like doing it ever. Next time, in four years, when I have to do my license renewal, do you think I'm going to be like, oh, yay, I get to do it? No, I don't want to do it. But that means I can't wait until I feel motivated to start because I am never going to feel motivated to start this. Right? So what that means is you start and then motivation kicks in. And that's because dopamine is the fuel that we need for motivation. Dopamine is the neurotransmitter that makes things feel fun, engaging, or even just doable. If a task doesn't naturally trigger dopamine for our brain, our brain is not going to see a reason to start. And that's why opening an email can feel like wading through cement. But scrolling Instagram, instant dopamine, Right? But then we don't feel good after, right? That's fast dopamine instead of slow dopamine, which is the kind of dopamine that we get when we're doing something where there's intention behind it and we really want to do it for ourselves instead of scrolling through Instagram. So how do you hack dopamine to make starting easier? Well, you create an instant win again. Make the first step so ridiculously easy that it's guaranteed success. Right? Write one sentence, answer one email, put your workout clothes on at night. And yes, I've done that before. The faster your brain gets a dopamine hit, the easier it is to keep going. Then pair the task with a reward. Light a candle before you start. Make a cappuccino in advance or coffee in advance of getting into the task. Play music while you're working. If I can do something, you know, if I have something on my list that I have to do that I really don't want to do, and it doesn't involve me really doing, you know, deep thinking, you know what I'll do? I'll put the murder shows on the 48 hours, the date line, the 2020. I don't know what it is about those shows, but they motivate me or inspire me to sit down and start working on that thing that I need to get done. So pair the tasks that you need to get done with something enjoyable that'll trick your brain into associating that task with pleasure. And then use micro rewards to stay in motion. You know, cross things off your to do list. Look, if you take one big thing that you would normally put on your to do list, find a real estate program, which for me was a big thing, and you change that to do list. And on that to do list, you have things as simple as open your computer, Google real estate schools for license renewal research. Three of these schools. Choose a school, pay for the program, right? All of those things are tiny little things on your to do list that are so micro it's easy to get them done. So you're going to be crossing all these things off your to do list. How do you think you're going to be feeling? You're going to be feeling really good, right? Your dopamine is spiking. How else can you do it? Track progress visually. I'm like that. You know, I like post it notes. And so one of my little post it notes hacks is I write all the different things on a post it note. I don't always do this. I do because I use my planner card. My planner card most of the time. But there are times when there's a big project and I just cannot start. So what I'll do is I'll get post it notes and I'll write every little, tiniest little steps of the project and they'll start out on the left hand side of my desk and I will slowly do whatever the post it note is telling me to do. And then it moves to the right hand side of my desk. So you know what happens at the end. I have this big stick stack of post it notes and that is how I can track my progress visually. And it just keeps me going. And then again, you know, this one acknowledge every tiny win. That would be my post it note pile strategy, right? Once I get the big win, then, okay, I'm going to celebrate the fact that I'm so proud of myself for getting that thing done. And I get the visual, I get to look at that post it note pile and then what I'm teaching myself is when I'm stuck, that works for me. So then I start trusting that I know that it doesn't matter what I have to get done. If it's difficult, I have a strategy that works. I have a strategy that works. Your brain is wired to chase small, frequent dopamine boosts. The more you give it, the easier it is to stay in motion. And here's the magic. Once dopamine fires, chances are again you won't want to stop. Right? So if you've ever been trapped in procrastination mode, I want you to remember this. You get to decide who you are. Not once, not in theory, in action. So every time you open the document, every time you send the email, every time you take the five minute step, instead of waiting to feel ready, you are basically teaching yourself that you are trustworthy and you have skills that will allow you to get whatever it is that you need done. Done. Values give you direction. Action is what gives you identity. You've got that big pile of post it notes on the right side of your desk. What does it tell you? I am the kind of person who trusts that when I need to get something done, I have a strategy that will get it done. And starting, even imperfectly, is how you become the person you've already decided you want to be. You don't become confident and then start. That's not how it works. You start and that's how confidence is built. You don't become disciplined and then act. No, you act. And that's how your identity is formed, that you can actually get things done. I hate the word discipline, so I don't even use that word. And you prove it to yourself in small and glamorous moments. It's the little things, right? All right, that's what I've got for you for this week. If this episode resonated, do me a favor and leave a review. Not for my ego, for the woman who hasn't found us yet. We are changing the conversation around ADHD one smartass woman at a time. Thank you so much for being here and I'll see you next week. You've been listening to the ADHD for Smartass Women podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Otsuka. Join us at adhdforsmartwomen.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. Let's pause here. Have you spent your whole life being told your way is the wrong way? If you try to use systems designed for a neurotypical brain, of course you'll feel like you're failing. But here's the truth. You were never the problem. You just have a different brain. Which means you need different systems. That is exactly why I created the A OK Academy. It's my six step patented framework designed to help you reconnect with your intuition and build systems based on your unique strengths. Let me help you reconnect with your intuition, trust yourself again, and build a life that actually works for you. You've had the answers all along. I'll help you see them. Look, it's time to stop second guessing and start trusting yourself again. Find the link in the show notes to sign up or book a free discovery call. Now let's get back to it.