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Hacking Your ADHD
Focused and Balanced: ADHD Strategies That Work w/ Skye Waterson (rebroadcast)
00:37:16
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- [00:00]
Mrs. Claus (Younger Sister)
Guys, thanks for helping me carry my Christmas tree.
- [00:03]
Drew Ski (Elf)
Zoey, this thing weighs a ton.
- [00:04]
Sky Waterson
Drew Ski live with your legs man.
- [00:06]
William Curb
Santa.
- [00:06]
Sky Waterson
Santa, did you get my letter?
- [00:07]
Drew Ski (Elf)
He's talking to you britches.
- [00:09]
Sky Waterson
I'm not.
- [00:10]
Mrs. Claus (Younger Sister)
Of course he did.
- [00:11]
Sky Waterson
Right Santa, you know my elf Drew Ski here. He handles the nice list.
- [00:15]
Drew Ski (Elf)
And elf, I'm six' three. What everyone wants is iPhone 17 and at T Mobile. You can get it on them. That center stage front camera is amazing for group selfies, right Mrs. Claus?
- [00:25]
Mrs. Claus (Younger Sister)
I'm Mrs. Claus Claus much younger sister. And AT T Mobile there's no trade in needed when you switch, so you can keep your old phone or give.
- [00:32]
Sky Waterson
It as a gift.
- [00:33]
Mrs. Claus (Younger Sister)
And the best part? You can make the switch to T Mobile from your phone in just 15 minutes.
- [00:37]
Sky Waterson
Nice.
- [00:37]
Drew Ski (Elf)
My side of the tree is slipping.
- [00:38]
T-Mobile Announcer
Kimber the holidays are better. AT T Mobile switch in just 15 minutes and get iPhone 17 on us with no trade in needed. And now T Mobile is available in U.S. cellular stores with sweet monthly bill.
- [00:50]
T-Mobile Legal/Disclaimer Voice
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- [00:59]
Mrs. Claus (Younger Sister)
Visit t mobile.com whether you're into unsolved mysteries, solved mysteries, or creating your own mysteries, Amazon Music's got millions of podcast episodes waiting. Just download the Amazon Music app and start listening to your favorite podcasts ad free included with Prime.
- [01:21]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Welcome to Hacking youg adhd. I'm your host William Curb, and I have adhd. On this podcast, I dig into the tools, tactics and best practices to help you work with your ADHD brain. Hey team. This week we've got Sky Waterson of Unconventional Organization back on the show to talk about the book she's working on, Focused, balanced days with ADHD. Sky is an academic and ADHD coach with over 7 years of experience in adult education. She has studied various fields including psychology, sociology and public health, and is currently a doctoral candidate in Public health. Skye also hosts the ADHD Skill Labs podcast where she discusses research packed tips and advice to help individuals navigate life with adhd. Today, as I mentioned, we're going to be getting into her serialized book that she's releasing chapter by chapter as she works through them on Substack. Our discussion today focuses on what's already been released regarding Skye's ADHD story and executive function, but we also get into a whole host of other Things from systems and calendars to burnout. If you'd like to follow along on the Show Notes page, you can find that@hackingyouradhd.com 206 all right, keep on listening to find out how to get your ADHD life into balance.
- [02:31]
William Curb
We're going to talk about this book that you're working on and I'm blanking on the title.
- [02:34]
Sky Waterson
The working title is Focused Balance Days with adhd. I finally decided to write a book so I was almost like gun shy about that, having written papers before and almost enjoyed the break, honestly, starting a business and not writing. But it's basically the culmination of everything that I have been teaching in a one on one space and now in a group space for the past four years and then just building on that into these sort of areas of like how to go from overwhelmed to focused, how to go from stuck to proactive, and how to go from inconsistent to consistent and bringing in the research behind that because I think it's so important to do that. But that takes a while, which is why this is going on substack, so that people can sort of see the process.
- [03:22]
William Curb
You're going chapter by chapter, releasing it with your. Are you going to go through the.
- [03:26]
Sky Waterson
Entire book that way at the moment? That's what I'm thinking. And it's chapter by chapter. It's more like section by section. So it's a bit of a journey that everyone's going on, including me, the writer. So, you know, currently doing the executive functioning section and you know, I think the release that's coming out this week is like just looking at hot, cold executive functioning and how we have no real definition for that but what it is and how it's important and the connection to Russell Barclay talking about that as well. So it's just a lot of information and I wanted to have one place where I could not only write it but also have some accountability and to share it with everybody as well.
- [04:05]
William Curb
And I think that idea about executive function is a great place to start here because one of the things I like always, I'm like, okay, I have this idea of I know what executive function is. And then I'm like, okay, I'm going to write this thing on executive function. Let me just pull up the definition again so I can be very crystal clear. And then I sit there and I'm like, oh, that's why I don't have a crystal clear definition in my head. There isn't one.
- [04:23]
Sky Waterson
No. And this is something that I also, you know, I Was like, okay, I'm going to deep dive this. And what we do, a lot of it has to do with executive functioning, because impulsivity is not necessarily what we're focusing on. It's more like working memory struggles and things like that. But, yeah, to find out, not only that we don't have a working definition for it, there's a bunch of different optional definitions. And also the idea that, like, it's not just the ADHD community that's in this big debate about what executive functioning is. It's the mental health community in general. It's also the sort of head trauma community. Like, all of these different communities are having this debate.
- [05:04]
William Curb
Yeah. And I think that's an important thing to be really cognizant of going in this conversation. It's like, oh, yeah, we don't own this definition, and that's why it's not agreed upon.
- [05:13]
Sky Waterson
If we just look at one piece of executive functioning, which is the working memory piece, there's a very seminal book published by an author on working memory, and he said at the end of it that he would never write another book like this again because it was so stressful and took so long. And he said, like, it was really hard to even imagine writing it because the stuff he did before that got so much controversy, so much pushback. And here's the guy who really spent a lot of time thinking about this topic.
- [05:44]
Libsyn Ads Voice
Yeah.
- [05:44]
William Curb
And it's funny to think about, like, oh, yeah, you're talking about research and then getting pushback on, and you're like, oh, no, why?
- [05:51]
Sky Waterson
And that's just working memory. That's just an aspect of the idea of consciousness, executive functioning, and how our brain works. But because it's the brain, you know, I mean, when I was studying neuroscience, they talked about this idea that, like, neuroscience is kind of one of those final frontier spaces which we ADHD people love to go into, where everything is new and we are learning so much. Which is one of the reasons why it's so hard to measure and really have a definition of these things now.
- [06:19]
William Curb
Just for the listener's sake. Often what I do, when I do it, I. I go with the Russell Barclay model, where, if I'm recalling correctly, it's just pretty much substituting the word executive function for impulse control.
- [06:31]
Sky Waterson
Yes. Which, to be fair, it makes sense because if you look at the dsm, impulse control is like a big factor when it comes to these kinds of things. Yeah.
- [06:39]
William Curb
Because that's also one of the things where you're like, oh, there's no Executive function in the definition of adhd, which seems wild.
- [06:47]
Sky Waterson
It's so wild. It's so wild for that person who always leaves their house and forgets something and forgets that they forgot something. It's wild.
- [06:57]
William Curb
Yeah. And I was like, oh, is talking about executive function and ADHD technically misinformation? Since they're not. I mean, we know that they're connected, but within the definition it doesn't exist. I'm like, that's a hard question.
- [07:10]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. But the good news is that one of the things, and the reason I'm writing this book is that even though we don't have a working definition like one that everyone agrees on of executive functioning, ADHD is still very much something that you can build strategies for around different executive functioning aspects and test them and try them. And so the only thing that the piece that I want people to remember when we talk about this definition is not there's no definition, therefore it doesn't exist. Or I shouldn't, but more almost like a bit of a trusting themselves. If something is going on in your brain and it doesn't feel like it's working the way other people are working, but maybe it's working better for you to do it slightly differently and you're happy and healthy and everyone else is and all that kind of stuff, then go for it. You know, like, there's probably just something in your brain that we haven't figured out yet. Because everyone's still figuring it out.
- [08:05]
William Curb
Yeah. Because one of the things that I come up against with, like the ideas of self diagnosis and stuff, and I'm like, oh, there's good parts and bad parts, but what's most important is, are you doing things that work for yourself? Like, don't.
- [08:15]
Sky Waterson
Yes. Yeah.
- [08:16]
William Curb
Try and push yourself.
- [08:17]
Sky Waterson
That's the biggest problem. A lot of what we talk about is this idea that having the right ADHD strategies feels like wearing the right prescription for your glasses. You can see properly, and if you don't have the right prescription, you. Everything's a bit fuzzy and people are saying, oh, well, that's just what it always looks like. And you're sort of looking at this blob that's a beautiful tree that they just described. And being like, are you sure? Because you just described this in glowing detail. And I'm looking at a green blob. So I'm wondering if maybe we're not quite lining up here. And. And so it's. Yeah, it's about out what works for you. It's been tricky writing this book holding the nuance and the support, because I sort of want to do both. I want to provide the practical support that works for you now without feeling like I have to. Or I want to hide the complexity of the research that goes behind it as well.
- [09:10]
William Curb
Yeah, absolutely. Because that's always like the problem with like TikTok where it's like this one minute video and it's like, yes, that's true, but. But also you need to understand all these other things to really apply that idea.
- [09:21]
Sky Waterson
Exactly. It's about bringing it all together into a space where I'm mostly speaking to people who are adults who've had ADHD for maybe they were late diagnosed and they've had it for a couple of years and so kind of trying to take them along. And that's what the podcast. We're trying to bring people along for the ride so that they can become empowered with their own understanding of how their ADHD works.
- [09:44]
William Curb
The great thing with books too, is you can have that section that tucks in, then you have the little blocked off section on the side that's like, here's the nuance to this idea.
- [09:51]
Sky Waterson
Exactly. We call them little research recaps. We have workbooks where we talk about that stuff as well. And yeah, it's definitely super fun.
- [10:00]
William Curb
I love the meme of people with ADHD always write with parentheses or em dashes. And it's because every thought comes with bonus thoughts.
- [10:08]
Sky Waterson
Yeah, 100%. Everything should have footnotes. I'm pretty sure footnotes were invented by someone with adhd.
- [10:14]
William Curb
So an interesting thing with the chapter stuff you sent me was the coming into your ADHD diagnosis and how it wasn't something that you kind of saw. And how for a lot of people I think that is, they just like don't realize that, how their thinking is so vastly different than other people. They just go, oh, I'm broken somehow, but it's okay. I'll just work harder.
- [10:35]
Sky Waterson
Pretty much. I mean, that's what I did. I was chronic, like, burnout between every kind of bit of university and then go back and do it again. Before I was diagnosed, that was kind of my cycle. It was really hard to string a CV together and make it look coherent. I was like, taking things out, you know, like putting it all together as a result. And I'm happy to say now that's not the case. Once I got my diagnosis, I figured out these strategies. I haven't burned out ever, which is huge because I've had babies and all kinds of things, but it is this thing of going, I remember distinctly just thinking I hadn't found the right career yet because I was attaching it to something. I was like, okay, well, maybe it's like, I haven't figured out what my purpose in life is, and I haven't found the right career. And I see a lot of people with ADHD doing that. They'll, you know, come in and say, like, I'm doing this, but I'm also doing that. And, like, maybe, you know, I'll. I'll get back to you basically, once I have started this new job, because it's going to be amazing, and then I won't need it. And then, like, so, you know, comes back. But I've been there. I've done the same thing.
- [11:35]
William Curb
Yeah. I mean, and I think that's a interesting problem that we have with ADHD is I've been listening to a lot of stuff about rejecting the passion hypothesis of finding the work that works best for you. And I'm like, I think this is a huge problem with people with ADHD and especially with undiagnosed adhd, because we're like, oh, we have to find this thing that we're passionate about, but we get bored so easily. We think that we've never found our passion 100%.
- [11:57]
Sky Waterson
And actually, one of the first things I tell people to do is use. I think we've talked about the Step into Focus routine before, but for those of you who are listening, you can always just message me on Instagram, and I'm more than happy to just send you the workbook. But it's this idea of, like, okay, the first thing we want to do is, like, we want to figure out, can I do this job well? And once they've gotten to the place where the job they're doing now is at a level where they're like, well, I don't enjoy it, but I've got the dopamine starter and I'm stepping into focus and I'm taking the breaks, and I'm doing all these kinds of things. I've gotten it to, like, as far as I think it's going to go, then you can make an intentional move into another role if you want to, or a different space. And that, I think, is the biggest problem. And this is something I did so much before I was diagnosed was like, I would do this big leap. I remember, like, I was studying media design, and then I was like, oh, no, I really want to do sociology. And, you know, because I was undiagnosed at the time, I was like, who needs to finish the last few weeks of your design diploma? No one. Like, let's just jump. Let's just go to the next one. And. And so those kinds of decisions, those very ADHD decisions, that is what made it harder to. Not even to show that on the CV or anything like that, but just for myself, it affected confidence at that time.
- [13:21]
William Curb
Yeah, this is something I love with Brendan Hand's wall of Awful model is that you have all these bricks in this wall of being like, failure, failure, failure. And then you're like, this is my identity now. I'm not someone that finishes something that's really, really tough.
- [13:34]
Sky Waterson
And that's one of the. When I work with people, we use the step into focus routine to kind of like, I guess you'd say, build steps into the wall. A lot of times it's just about focusing on the very next step. And sometimes when you're struggling with things, it's about just being like, can you get to your desk and do something fun for a little while at your desk? And then maybe we'll, like, turn off some of the distractions, but switch to a podcast. We're not turning off all of the fun stuff. And then can we write on a piece of a post it note what you need to do during this period. Exactly. And so you're kind of like taking those little steps one at a time because, yeah, otherwise the wall is just too big and the research backs it up again. You know, this is what I'm trying to do with the book is like, bring the research in. There's research to show that. And again, this is a theory, but it's based on kind of the research that we've got that there seems to be some kind of spike of reward center pleasure that you get if you're neurotypical when you start a task because of the connection to that reward at the end. With adhd, we don't get that. And so we just are like, what is this? Why are you making me do it?
- [14:42]
William Curb
Yeah, it's one of those things where it's like, so easy to be like, I don't see the point of doing this, and so I'm not going to do it.
- [14:49]
Sky Waterson
And eventually you're like, well, clearly these other people have something I don't because they're doing those tasks. What they must have is that they have a passion for this work that I don't have. So I have to go find the thing that is the passion. And we can really chase our own.
- [15:03]
William Curb
Tails with that because it seems like Just talking to this term with my children the other day, trying to explain to them what it means that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.
- [15:12]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. And I think it's important to say that it's not a judgment at all. Like I said, I was like, give me the crown. I was the winner of this. I did it so often before I was diagnosed and figured out these strategies, but it is a thing. If you're contemplating a job change, you should probably just listen to the end of this podcast.
- [15:35]
William Curb
Well, and it's also great to think about how you're building your skill set when you're going through these things, because it often is like, oh, I failed at doing this, but what did I learn from that Failure, even just not even really a failure, just that phase. Like, what did I learn doing that and how can I apply that going forward? Or, you know. Yeah, some combination of things. Because I'm like, I would never be doing this podcast had I not had a podcast beforehand that went terribly.
- [16:00]
Sky Waterson
Yes, yes. I remember you telling me that story. It's good. I think I like to, you know, when we're talking with the community or even with my internal team, we try and talk about, like, wins or lessons. That idea of, like, what's a win that we've had recently or what have we learned from the thing we tried and it didn't work because both are equally useful. If you don't have a listen, it's hard to be able to adjust and figure out what strategy aspects are actually going to work for you.
- [16:29]
William Curb
And I should also emphasize that, yes, things suck in the moment. Try and stay away from the toxic positivity movement. But it's like, yeah, oh, yeah, in the moment, it's gonna suck. But, you know, a couple months later, you can go, oh, yeah, I did learn how to do that kind of stuff. And that's. Maybe I can use that.
- [16:45]
Sky Waterson
Totally. I was recently talking to Russ from ADHD Big Brother, and he was talking about that idea of, like, neutral language is like, instead of being like, it's amazing, I'm doing amazing, or like, oh, it's terr. I'm doing the words. You're like, it is okay. And I am doing it.
- [17:02]
William Curb
Yeah. I'll get a text from my friend. He's like, how's it going? I'm like, it's going.
- [17:07]
Sky Waterson
And that's okay. Especially with adhd, you know, we talk about this idea of sensory stacking as part of focus balance days. In fact, that inconsistent to consistent phase. A lot of that has to do with dopamine, because once you're not overwhelmed anymore and you're not stuck. Stuck anymore, then you're like, okay, but now I'm not doing it consistently. And so a lot of that has to do with the dopamine. A lot of it has to do with, like, can you add dopamine to such an extent that you're able to kind of, like, just turn the dial up a little bit on how interesting your day is? So it's going, But I'm also like, you know, I'm sitting in a comfy chair having a cup of tea while it's going. So that's pretty nice, you know.
- [17:48]
William Curb
So one of the things I've noticed recently is I've. When making dinner, I used to, like, always listen to podcasts and stuff, and I just, for some reason, turned on some music sometime, and I'm like, oh, this makes this ten times better.
- [17:58]
Sky Waterson
Good. Yeah.
- [17:59]
William Curb
For one, I don't care if I get interrupted by my kids while I'm listening to music. Whereas, like, if I'm listening to a podcast, I need to stop and, like.
- [18:05]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
What was going on?
- [18:05]
Sky Waterson
Yeah, you have to stop. Stop when two people are talking at once and you immediately get overstimulated. Yeah, yeah.
- [18:11]
William Curb
And I'm like, oh, this is much better. I'm more energized by this. And I'm like, and this feels silly, too, because this is like a recommendation I've made people before.
- [18:20]
Sky Waterson
And I'm like, oh, it's always the way.
- [18:22]
Libsyn Ads Voice
Yeah.
- [18:23]
Beacon College Announcer
Yeah.
- [18:23]
William Curb
I think the idea of just upping that baseline dopamine for things is such a great thing to. Especially, like, getting back into something. Often I find when I know what I'm supposed to be doing and I've done it before and I come back to it, and I'm like, it's not the same and I hate it.
- [18:38]
Sky Waterson
Yeah, 100%. It's like this thing of, you know, we talk about it in terms of, like, a dopamine dial. Because I actually have another art article. You can just message me on Instagram dopamine, and I'll send you that link. But it's basically, I was learning about this idea of the dopamine detox. There's a lot of articles coming up on my feed about this idea of dopamine being bad and we're overstimulated and we need to detox. And people were doing it. People were neurotypical and claiming it changed their lives and all that kind of stuff. And it really was a Complicated one for me because I understood what they were saying. Like, I turned off. I'd recently gotten rid of like Instagram reels and I found it was really helpful. But the idea of removing dopamine when you're already struggling with it as a person with ADHD didn't feel accessible. So I ended up doing a bit of a deep dive into the research on it and talking about this idea instead of a dopamine dial, which is this idea that you can kind of go up and down levels. So if the podcast is too much, you know, it's like kids talking and now it's over stimulating. It's like going down to the music and then maybe down to white noise and then off, rather than having to just be like an on off switch for dopamine.
- [19:52]
William Curb
The dopamine detox stuff is kind of interesting. I did an episode on it a while back and I was like, oh, this is not as well supported by research as I thought it would be.
- [20:00]
Sky Waterson
It was tricky one, you know, like I said, I'm not saying. And again, this is all very complicated. But the reason it kind of came up was I have a lot of clients who. Some of them would come to me and they'd be like, I read this article so I know what I need to do, but I failed at it. And I knew I just needed to turn every everything off and just focus. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, where is this coming from? Where in the focus bound stays is this information? And it was like there was a lot of judgment on people who weren't doing this idea. There was this idea of, I think you're a better human if you can ABC thing, which always happens, I think, on the Internet.
- [20:36]
William Curb
Yeah, I think the funniest thing too is I don't disagree with all the things they're saying to stop doing. I'm generally like, that's great. There are more extreme ends that are like, don't get any dopamine throughout the day. I'm like, that's terrible. That's not going to help anyone. No, but the like, oh yeah, you know, cut back on social media, try and like, you know, the basically do the major sins less. I'm like, yeah, that's probably good advice.
- [21:01]
Sky Waterson
Exactly. But then the thing becomes what are we doing instead? And that's where it becomes interesting because what I really realized in doing that kind of research was that, that like, we're actually kind of under stimulated sometimes. Like we think of ourselves as being overstimulated. But really, if you're sitting in a room on an uncomfy chair with no cups of tea. It smells bad or doesn't smell like anything or whatever. You know, it's. You're not. You're looking at nothing because your windows are shut, but you're on your phone. That's only one of the five senses that you're stimulating. So really thinking about it from a less of a perspective of kind of like all or nothing in that way, but sort of thinking, okay, what other senses can we bring in to make your whole experience better?
- [21:46]
William Curb
I've been thinking about that understimulation aspect too recently in terms of I cannot take naps. And I think it's because I lie down and I try and not stimulate myself. And then my brain goes, time to go bonkers.
- [22:01]
Sky Waterson
Yeah, you've given me free rein. Do you know what you've done?
- [22:05]
William Curb
I'm thinking about everything, like, okay, I gotta hop out of bed now. And I'm like, I'm still tired. Tired. That didn't work at all. And so I'm like, okay, if I, like, listen to like, you know, sleep podcasts or something and have a weighted blanket, you know, or, you know, just a number of things to be like, okay, this is going to like, get me to that level where I'm stimulated enough that I can actually relax. Which seems.
- [22:25]
Sky Waterson
Yeah.
- [22:25]
William Curb
Counterintuitive.
- [22:26]
Sky Waterson
No, that makes a lot of sense, actually. You just triggered something. So I, I can only take naps, like in the lounge in the afternoon. This is very specific. But, like, I think, yeah, you're right. It's because it's like, it's. There's still like some sunlight and some background noise and things happening. And I put a podcast on. Whereas if I go to the bedroom and it's dark and quiet, it's just. It's not enough during the day. Can't get there.
- [22:52]
William Curb
And I'm like, oh, applying this too to like, when I'm trying to take a break, do a little bit more than I think is having heard about neurotypical stuff is. And be like, okay, what does my ADHD brain need?
- [23:03]
Sky Waterson
Yes, exactly. And I think that's it. That's exactly what it is. It's like, what does my ADHD brain need? And kind of letting that be the focus, because the neuroscientists and the researchers are going to argue and they're going to critique and they're going to figure things out. Trust me. We literally talk about it every week on the podcast. That's what we do. But your job is to take care of yourself and your family and your friends and, you know, that kind of thing. So it's like what is good for my brain and really letting that be the focus, obviously with, you know, talk to doctors and things like that. But, like, that's the touchstone of what you want to do.
- [23:42]
William Curb
And I think this is also really relevant to another point you were making in the book, that ADHD research is very recent. It's only gotten to the DSM was 68.
- [23:52]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. And the combination of ADHD and autism is only in 2013, which is even crazier.
- [23:57]
William Curb
One of the things that blew my mind is that the first person diagnosed with autism died last year.
- [24:03]
Sky Waterson
Really? Oh my gosh.
- [24:05]
William Curb
And I was just like, oh, that person perspective how recent that diagnosis is.
- [24:10]
Sky Waterson
Yes, exactly, exactly. And I mean, yeah, it is crazy looking back at it. And also just in general, like, I, I did a lot of, I did a deep dive into the DSM for this book. Like, how does the diagnosis look? Like, what does it include? And yeah, it's two pages, you know, it's just two pages to cover everything. And most of those pages are questions that they ask you about, like, do you stand up more than, you know, the normal person would? Or things like that. So it's very brief, I would say, obviously there's more context behind it, but this is the thing that's like the be all and end all, if you will.
- [24:49]
William Curb
Yeah. Although it is interesting to think, realize that, like, the DSM is a tool designed for insurance.
- [24:57]
Sky Waterson
Yes. Well, I think that's, that's very, very true. It's a tool designed for insurance. This conversation gets me thinking because we do a lot of talking about, like, what it would be like if neuroscience, like, if, if the brain was scanned for a diagnosis. I know you talked about that. Like, what's a really, you know, if we talk about ADHD research, like, what's a gold standard of research? Well, it's like, are we doing actual experiments? Are they randomly tested? Are they double blind and like, what's a not amazing type of research? Surveys. So then it becomes its own conversation. Right. And I think that's, that's the thing. I think it's, it's the complexity of this topic that is both so frustrating and so endlessly fascinating. It's the reason that I've been just completely focused on this for four years and feel like I'm only still scratching the surface.
- [25:50]
William Curb
Yeah. Because there's so much that we don't know. And I mean, while a proper, like, ADHD Diagnosis is like, repeatable and verifiable. Like, that's great. It would be nice to have a very quantifiable brain scan method.
- [26:03]
Sky Waterson
That would be great. Yeah. Or AI voice, apparently. That's the thing. Now I was learning. Yeah. Like, we were recently reading a piece of research that said that the AI deep learning models are starting to be able to pick up how ADHD people speak.
- [26:20]
William Curb
That is definitely something where AI can be much better at picking up patterns that we just kind of ignore normally.
- [26:25]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. The footnotes to go back to our earlier conversation, the AI notices them. A deep learning model can notice them. And so there is some conversation about whether that could be a tool for diagnosis in the future, at least for a referral. So, yeah, there's lots of new things happening, but I guess at the end of the day, for the person who's listening to this and is like, that's cool, but I have work tomorrow and I'm trying to stay in my job and get a raise and get my boss to be happy with me because I can't have what happened last time happened this time, that kind of situation. There are practical strategies for that, and we do have those practical strategies. We just have to tailor them to everyone's specific environment and their specific struggles because we don't have this easy, one size fits all solution for adhd.
- [27:15]
William Curb
And there's also just the aspect of, like, we have all these strategies that we've learned to use too. And some of them are not great strategies. You know, we have a lot of these maladaptive things. Like, I'm like, oh, I'm never late. It's because of anxiety. Probably not the best way to make sure I'm not late.
- [27:30]
Sky Waterson
Yes, actually, that's so true. When we work on this idea of going from stuck to proactive. So once somebody's no longer overwhelmed, the second thing that we do after the step into focus routine is help them with their calendar. And this is a complicated one because like 70 to 80% of what we do is take things out of there, like, okay, you don't need that extra notebook. You don't need that app. I know that app was exciting, but maybe just try this. And so we really, it's really about streamlining and helping people simplify because the amount of, like, the amount of complexity that will add to our organizational system is so fair because every time we say we have a problem, someone says, well, have you tried a planner? And so we just keep adding them.
- [28:16]
William Curb
Funny. When I first envisioned this podcast, it was not discussing all these strategies and stuff. I was like, I want to focus on these tools that people can use. And I was like, as I was doing that well, I'm like, this doesn't won't work without this strategy behind it. And then I'm like, as I'm doing, I'm like. And also the tool is kind of a problem in itself because we all want a new shiny tool.
- [28:36]
Sky Waterson
That's the thing. Yeah, we don't do that either. We don't teach like people always ask me like which app, which one? And I'm like, nope, I'm going to teach you principles that will work regardless of what kind of person you are. Are you an online or a paper person? Yeah.
- [28:51]
William Curb
In the end it usually doesn't really matter. And it's going to be totally individual. What works best for each person.
- [28:57]
Sky Waterson
I've seen million dollar deals get organized and set up on a Google Doc that, you know, just a Google Doc, plain and simple. Most people have access to them.
- [29:07]
William Curb
I mean I know for years the best to do calendaring method I had was just like a stack of seven index cards that I had for each day of the week. And I just kept it in my pocket and then would add stuff as I go. I don't remember why I moved away from it probably. Oh, I remember having a child that was added complexity.
- [29:25]
Sky Waterson
Yeah.
- [29:26]
William Curb
And to get, yeah, you use these things that you don't get back to them.
- [29:29]
Sky Waterson
And I'm like, oh yeah. Well that's kind of why when we talking about those systems, I'm just giving you like little things everywhere. But you know, we talk about this idea of like, okay, does your organizational system have a capture space to support you and your working memory? So you know where you're like, I need to do that. Like a space where you can write that down. Walking down a road with people coming at you on one hand like something like that. And then does it have a space for prioritizing? And then does it have a space for like scheduling? And it's usually at that point that people realize it's three different things probably connected to each other. And then what I realized was actually I wasn't the first person who figured this out at all because Google and Apple and even Outlook have already figured this out because they have like things like do you want to use my Notes app? And then my reminders and then you can click and drag the reminders into the Google Calendar, the ical for example. So that kind of thing is what we tend to do. The system is simple but getting it to make sense and getting people to use it consistently, that's where the complexity often comes in.
- [30:37]
William Curb
Yeah, it's that consistency piece, but also the resiliency of like, okay, I didn't use it today, but I can use it tomorrow.
- [30:43]
Sky Waterson
Exactly. You want everything to have that bounce back. You don't want to live in a world where the systems that you use punish you if you don't use them every day. Because that's gonna happen.
- [30:57]
William Curb
Yeah. I mean, I think that's one of the most important things to, like, remember is like, yeah, I'm not going to be 100% consistent. How can I. 80% consistent.
- [31:07]
Sky Waterson
When I was not diagnosed with ADHD back in the day, I was absolutely the person who would spend all weekend making the perfect calendar system for the next week. Fully scheduled, color coded, most beautiful thing. And it was useless. By the end of Monday.
- [31:24]
William Curb
I had so many times where I'm like, I'm going to come up with the system that's going to fix the adhd. And I'm like, I'm at least now at a point where when I have that thought, I go, nope, that's not going to happen.
- [31:35]
Sky Waterson
Exactly. Yeah. 100. It was either, honestly, my, my things was either I would completely abandon the system or I would stick to the system at the sort of sacrifice of my health and my ability to hang out with family and friends and, you know, that kind of thing.
- [31:52]
William Curb
Yeah. It's so easy to be like, I'm doing the system, so it must be working. And it's like, no, it's really not.
- [31:59]
Sky Waterson
And also, I can almost guarantee, because I've looked at hundreds of calendars right now that you do not have enough dopamine in your day. Whoever you are listening to this.
- [32:09]
William Curb
Oh, yeah. It's one of the things that I've been really trying to figure out too is like, how do I make sure that I'm scheduling time for myself that is not work. Because I'll like fill out my calendar and be like, man, that sucks. That's all I'm doing.
- [32:24]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. So often. Yeah. You look at your calendar and you're like, man, who made this thing?
- [32:30]
William Curb
Clearly someone that does not like me.
- [32:32]
Sky Waterson
Yeah. And that's the problem. And that's why, you know, when we get to that inconsistent to consistent piece of focus, balance day, the program and the book, you know, one of the things that people think is like, oh, I have to become consistent. This is where it's going to get so boring. But it's actually where it gets Fun, because that's the thing that makes us consistent is adding dopamine in the right places in the right ways.
- [32:56]
William Curb
Yeah. Because often when we're procrastinating it is because we are not taking the time to do things that are going to make us feel better. And so our body's just like making us.
- [33:05]
Sky Waterson
Exactly, exactly. That's it. And it's. You know, I talked a lot about this actually recently, but. But it's this idea that if you imagine your brain with adhd, a bit like a teenager, if you give them two strict rules, they will climb out a window. Like you're not going to just get your ADHD into line. You'll find yourself at 3am scrolling something inane that you didn't really care about when it was the middle of the day but now is super important to you. And that revenge bedtime procrastination is the thing that's going to make it harder to sleep, make it harder to get through the week. We don't really have a, well, we'll just have to white knuckle it version of this.
- [33:48]
William Curb
Even when we do try, it just doesn't work. You know, I'm like, oh, I'm just gonna like, I'll be like, I'm just gonna work through this, you know, cycle. And I'm like, I got five minutes of work and it done in an hour. And it's the worst quality stuff. If I had just taken a real break and really just like let go of the expectation I was gonna do work, then I could have come back and just, you know, do half an hour break week. Half an hour work. Wow, that works way better.
- [34:13]
Sky Waterson
Yes, yes, exactly. And, and that's kind of the thing we want to, we want to sequence for you, especially when it comes to the consistency is like, how do we sequence your week In a way that feels fun because I will say, because this book is the culmination of everything that I have been teaching. So we have a program where we teach these principles to people and it gets fun. Like it's mostly fun. And I think that's the thing people don't understand is they're like, right, I've done it, I've done the thing. I'm in a terr. Horrible space. You know, take me away and make me land systems. As if this is going to be a horrible experience. But it's not, it's not a horrible experience. The horrible experience is not having them.
- [34:51]
William Curb
Yeah, I mean, I'm just thinking about like when I started scheduling these board game Nights with some of the dads in my neighborhood. I get less sleep on those nights, but I'm more productive on the next day anyways because I am doing the things I want to do and I'm having enjoying it. And then I'm like, shouldn't be ignoring sleep every night, but you know, once a week, that's fine. And I'm like, this is great. Great.
- [35:11]
Sky Waterson
Exactly.
- [35:12]
William Curb
Is there any thoughts that you wanted to leave the audience with?
- [35:15]
Sky Waterson
I think that's the number one thing, though, is the last thing I said, which is that it can sound unrealistic because you've been living your life not in a way where you can have fun, but like, we called the book Focused Balance Days because it's supposed to be helping you build strategies to feel focused and balanced. You know, having fun, doing a bit of this, doing a bit of that, getting things done, but not having it be super stressful. You know, that kind of day where you sort of wake up, you feel in control, you know, you get to work pretty much on time, you do most of your things, you have some fun, and then you go home and you get enough sleep. Like, that is what I want every day to be for you. And that is the goal that I have. And that's. That's always been my goal, but now I get to write it into a book, which is really exciting.
- [36:06]
William Curb
My brain's like, tangent back to dopamine detox, because that totally fits in there that people are all those things that people shouldn't be doing.
- [36:13]
Sky Waterson
This is the problem of writing book that brings everything together.
- [36:17]
William Curb
I was like, oh, yeah. This is like, totally why people like. The reason I didn't like the dopamine detox is I'm like, it doesn't address the issues, which is that you don't have these Focus Balance days where if you are doing the things that make you happy and do things, you're going to be less likely to do these other things that you need for.
- [36:33]
Sky Waterson
Exactly.
- [36:33]
William Curb
Now that I had my little aside there, that where my brain was going. If people want to find more about you and the book and all that.
- [36:42]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Where should they go?
- [36:43]
Sky Waterson
You can go to unconventionalorganization.com you can also find me on Instagram and I will send you links. If you just message me book, I will send you a link to the latest chapter of the book. That's Instagram. On Instagram. Unconventional organization with an S. We'll get you there.
- [37:01]
William Curb
Perfect. All right. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show. I had a great time talking.
- [37:05]
Sky Waterson
Yeah, it's always fun. Thanks for having me.
- [37:12]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Thanks again to sky for coming on the show, and thank you for sticking with us all the way to the end. If you'd like to check out Unconventional Organization or sign up for that newsletter, you can find that@unconventional organization.com before you go though, let's do a quick rundown of today's top tips. 1. Avoid over complicating your organizational tools and try to rely more on basic principles such as having a capture space, a prioritization system, and scheduling system.
- [37:37]
William Curb
2.
- [37:38]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Aim for 80% consistency with your systems and give yourself grace to bounce back after setbacks. No one will ever follow any system perfectly, so work on choosing tools and systems that can adapt to you missing days without completely derailing your progress.
- [37:52]
William Curb
3.
- [37:52]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Don't forget to prioritize. At least a little fun in your planning. Building dopamine into your day through enjoyable activities can help you stay consistent and avoid burnout. Alright, that's it. Thanks for listening. I'd love to hear what you thought of this episode. Feel free to connect with me over@hackingyouradhd.com contact if you'd like links or to read this episode's transcript, you can go to the show notes page@hackingyouradhd.com 206.
- [38:18]
William Curb
And.
- [38:18]
Podcast Host (William Curb)
Now for your moment of dad do you think it would kill avocado makers to put in a different toy? Sometimes I've got like 50 wooden balls now.
- [38:33]
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