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You are listening to the Navigating Adult ADHD Podcast with your ADHD coach and expert, Xena. Hello, my friend. Welcome back to Navigating Adult ADHD Podcast. I feel like I haven't talked to you in ages. I know you get an episode every week, but sometimes it just feels like it has been ages. And that's probably, to be fair, my time blindness. Because I tell you what, I struggle to estimate and understand how long things will take, including this podcast. So I have been using like a little timer and putting the amount of time I think it's going to take on there, like you can kind of see the time and yeah, it's pretty fascinating. Everything takes longer than I think. So time blindness is a whole other episode. But before we dive into what we're talking about today, I wanted to let you know that we just wrapped up launch week here at navigating adult ADHD HQ and we welcomed so many incredible ADHDers into the membership, the Navigating Adult ADHD membership. So if you missed out this time around, doors will be opening again in June. All right, June of 2025. And we would love to help you thrive with ADHD. In other news, exciting news. I have just signed, signed on to partner with ADHD New Zealand. So I will be hosting some educational webinars. They will be online through Zoom and they'll be happening throughout the year. So the first ones are happening in Neurodiversity Celebration week, which is the 17th to the 23rd of March. So I'm going to do one on understanding your ADHD and how to work with your ADHD brain.
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Okay.
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And that one's totally free. And then there will be another one which is going to be a paid one. I'm not sure how much they charge. I know it's different for members, but you'll have to go to the website and check it out. And the next one, which is the paid one, is around understanding and managing dopamine for motivation. Okay. So if you're interested in those, remember that first one, that understanding and working with your brain is totally free. You can head to adhd.org nz to save your spot. I'd love to have you there. All right, so let's dive in to today's topic, five less well known ADHD traits that we probably share. Right. Kicking off with number one, which I definitely have. And if you've ever done one of those, what is it like the strengths test. I know Martin Seligsman has one. Martin Seligsman. I don't Know if I'm saying that, right? But he's the positive psychology guy. And there's a 24 character strengths test that you can do, and you may have noticed if you've done that, that a love of learning is a strength or a trait that you see. So a love of learning is one that many ADHDers share, right? We love to learn new things, but only things we want to learn about things that interest us.
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Right?
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And it can just be even having a conversation with somebody who's passionate about something that can be like, fascinating to us and we want to learn more about it, more about them.
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Right.
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So maybe you have noticed this, because I definitely have, that you might become a walking encyclopedia about something that you are super passionate about that you have, like, learned all about, whether it's like a new hobby or a new interest. So even ADHD might be one of those things for you.
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Right.
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Learning about adhd. So I get to coach and support and work with so many amazing ADHDers who also love to learn about ADHD.
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Right.
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And that's me too. So often they know like all of these, like, incredible things about adhd. They know a lot of stuff. But sometimes where we can struggle is when it comes to like, applying what we have learned.
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Right?
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Can you relate to that?
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Right.
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I know I sure can. And that's so much of what we do together actually inside the membership is apply what you learn specifically here on this podcast.
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Right?
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So sometimes we can hyper focus on the most random things, right? Maybe one week it's like the history of ancient Egypt, and then the next week it's like DIY woodworking.
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Right?
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We can get like, really interested in things and learn so much about them and literally, like I said, become a walking encyclopedia of that thing. So the upside of this is that we're always growing, adapting, finding new ways.
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Right.
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To improve our lives, for example, new fun things to do.
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Right.
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However, like I said, sometimes the downside is that we can learn a lot of things and not necessarily apply. Apply what we learn, like gather all of the knowledge, but then have difficulty applying it. I wanted to share a bit of a story on this, actually, because just yesterday I was like, oh, I think I did the thing I was trying not to do. And that was. So I hosted a training inside the membership. And the training was a masterclass, a one hour masterclass called Beating Procrastination.
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Right?
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And the goal was to help people with overcoming Procrastination, to know, you know, identify when it's happening and then have tools to Overcome it, right? To work through it to. So basically you procrastinate less, right? And I have been working on procrastination for a number of years in my own life and with the people I have been supporting. And so I have some incredible tools when it comes to this. However, I've got, like, multiple tools, not just one, right? And this one hour training yesterday, because I love learning about, like, ADHD brain and procrastination and all these things, right? Like, I love this shit, right? So because I love it so much, kind of went in and I gave them the fire hydrant. So what I mean by that is, you know, if somebody's thirsty, it's more beneficial to give them a glass of water, right? Than it is to, you know, give them a fire hydrant and, you know, point that at their face. Whereas yesterday, like, I went in with, like, here are like, what I would recommend. Like, there's multiple tools here, right? Like, I'm giving you a few just to choose from. But I think that sometimes that can be very overwhelming when we do that. Instead of saying, here's one, start with this, right? And then building upon that. Yeah. And that comes back to this, like, love of learning and also, like, wanting, like, I love giving to people and being, you know, generous and all of this sort of stuff. So, yeah, little sneaky thing, just to be mindful of that I noticed yesterday. All right, so number two on our ADHD traits is justice sensitivity. So us ADHDers, we have a strong sense of fairness, okay? And we cannot stand when things feel unjust. You feel me, right? This one can really rile me up, right? So a couple of rather silly but funny stories, right? Just yesterday, right? We have got the three boys here and we're doing lunch boxes for the next day. And Mr. 13 now does his lunchbox. And that's a whole nother story for another day how that came about, right? But anyway, like, he's old enough to do it, but I used to, like, love doing lunchboxes. Used to really enjoy them. And so I was happy to do them. And anyway, he's making his lunch and he grabs a packet of two Minute Noodles out the cupboard and he's like, hey, dad, can I take these in my lunchbox? And he knows to ask his dad and not me because I would be like, no. So he asked his dad. His dad's like, yeah, sure. And then I look at his dad and I go, okay, so if he can take two minute noodles, that means that his brothers can also have two minute noodles. And his dad's like, oh, no, no, no, that's not going to happen. And I was like, okay, but if you give him two minute noodles today, you've also like, are you going to give him two minute noodles again next time? And how is it fair that if he can have them and his brother's can't, how does that work, right? Like a silly example, but like the justice in me was like, that ain't fair. Like no way, right? And okay, here's another story. We have got two cats who are like my whole world, I'm friggin obsessed with cats, right? Crazy cat lady. I love my cats and they love temptations, right? The little cat treats, they're obsessed with them, right? Like all cats are obsessed with temptations. And one of my cats knows where they live, above the fridge. And he will hang around in the morning, like, trying to get his treats. Trying to get his treats. And sometimes he'll even like attack my feet when I go to like leave the kitchen. Because he's like, look, you haven't given me my treats yet, right? And so I very rarely give them to him because it makes him attack me more, right? And other than that, he's pretty loving. But when he wants his treats, like, he ain't. He is not nice. So there were two days in a row where I just gave him his treats. I was like, you know what, it's just easier. I need to get upstairs. He looks like he's going to attack me. Here's your treats, right? Here's your little four temptations. I literally rationed them out, four temptations for you, right? But because I gave them to him, the next time I saw his brother by himself, I gave his brother his four temptation treats, making it fair and equal, right? Like that is the links that I will go to when it comes to things being just right? So you probably relate to the justice sensitivity and how that can rile you up. But I want to also highlight that this makes us great advocates and leaders, right? As well as change makers, right? Now the challenge with this, of course, is that because we feel things so deeply, right? People with adhd, we feel things more deeply than the average person, right? That injustice can really affect us and it can kind of consume us, right? Like, I know that I can have it on my mind for a long time when something's like really rubbed me the wrong way and felt like really unjust, I can have that on my mind, right? Yeah. So number two, justice, sensitivity. All right, let's go to three. Number Three. And this kind of follows on from justice sensitivity, and that is not having the patience for people who don't take responsibility for their own mistakes.
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Mm.
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So if you think about it, those of us with adhd, right, we have been told constantly to own up to our mistakes, right? Whether we just forgot something or, you know, we were running late or we acted impulsively, many of us grew up hearing things like, you just need to try harder or you're making excuses again.
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Right.
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Even when our struggles were due to executive function challenges, due to having a brain that's wired differently, we're not doing these things because we're lazy or we have negative intentions. No.
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Right.
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But because we have had to take so much responsibility for our own actions, our own behaviors throughout our lives, it can be kind of infuriating when other people refuse to do the same. You feel me? Like, have you ever worked with someone who has made a mistake, right. Like, knowingly it's their mistake, but they refused to acknowledge it, to take responsibility and own it.
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Right.
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Meanwhile, there's us ADHDers who have a tendency to over apologize, right. Even when things are not our fault.
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Right?
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So this isn't just about, like, frustration, right. But also, again, like, that fairness comes into it, that whole justice sensitivity, right? Because we hold ourselves accountable and we often hold ourselves to quite a high standard, right? Sometimes too much of a high standard. So it can be really difficult to watch other people dodge that responsibility. Like, I. I gotta admit, I struggle with this one, right? Co parenting, three boys. Because I don't know if it's just a kid thing, but taking responsibility is not a thing they want to do, right? It is always everyone else's fault, right? All right, I've got an example for you. And if you don't want to hear a poster, right? Like just like fast forward like maybe a minute and a half. Okay. Yeah. Now's the time. So one time, this just came to me. One of the boys had a. Let's call it a poo sident, a shitcident, right? Where he somehow missed the toilet bowl with his number two. And he got it on the floor. And I'm talking a log, thankfully. Like, it was a log, right? But he missed the toilet bowl, managed to get his log on the floor, right? And this is in a morning, and I think it was like a Sunday morning or something, and I was in bed, and all of the boys were up, My partner's up. So their dad's up, and their dad discovers it, and he's like, come here. Boys, like gets them all up to this bathroom and he's like, who did this?
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Right?
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And we established pretty quick that it's not Mr. 9 and it's not Mr. 13, right? So somebody's had an accident, which is okay, right? And I'm in bed listening to this and the kid who's obviously had the accident is like, well, maybe it was Rocky or Sugar. These are our cats, right? So maybe it was the cats. Like that is the length that he was going to. To not take responsibility for what was obviously not a cat accident. And honestly, it was just kind of so humorous. Nobody got in trouble. It was just very humorous. But that's the kind of lengths that kids will go to to get out of taking responsibility. Like they will literally blame a cat for something, right? But when we're talking about things, like more serious things, right, where they're not taking responsibility, I can get really like about this and like sometimes I just have to take myself away, right? Like your dad's gonna deal with this one or me and your dad are gonna go for a walk and we're gonna talk about it, right? Which is always a really good thing to do. And then we will talk about, you know, consequences of your actions or what have you, or taking responsibility, right? And I gotta admit, like, as a co parent, trying to teach kids to take responsibility is a difficult thing to do, especially when it's something that like, fires me up, right? So that one, I'm navigating that. But on the positive side of this, right, when we don't necessarily have the patience of people who won't take responsibility for their own actions and mistakes, the positive side of that is if this is you, right? Like if you're like nodding along right now, you are likely quite self aware, right. And willing to reflect and grow, right? So I think that that's a really good thing and that's for sure. Me, I'm like, oh, shit, yeah, that was me. My bad.
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Right?
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Interesting one to think about. All right, number four, over committing to stuff and saying yes before thinking it through. Can you relate to that? Do you over commit to things? Do you say yes before you've really thought it through? Because I for sure do, right? And here's the thing. So often when somebody says, oh my gosh, do you want to come along to this, like weekend way? And it's going to be so fun, it's like, oh my God, dopamine enthusiasm, like exciting. Yes, right? Like our ADHD enthusiasm can kind of go next level and we just say yes. Before we consider things like do I necessarily have the time, Am I going to have the energy for that? You know, is it a realistic thing for me to commit to that or will I be over committing myself?
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Right.
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We just get excited and we commit to things that we genuinely want to do and. And then we often realize, you know what, I probably overbooked myself.
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Right.
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And it might not even be time wise. Like I might have the time for it. But mentally, do I have the capacity for that? Emotionally, do I have the capacity for that? Physically, am I going to have like the energy for that?
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Right.
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And this often happens because of time blindness.
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Right.
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Like our time blindness is definitely comes into this. Also rejection sensitivity.
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Right?
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We don't want to miss out on things or, you know, be criticized for not necessarily doing things, but also impulsivity. Hello, Impulsivity definitely comes into this. And then also dopamine, like we can get dopamine when someone else is excited about something, right? So just last week actually I found myself excitedly replying to an email offering to help with this local event that is coming up. So we've got a local event here and I think it's called Startup Weekend, where there's. The whole weekend is about like startup businesses coming together and like creating their ideas and then pitching it sort of a thing, right? So it's like a mini shark tank. I've never watched Shark Tank. I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. Anyway, they wanted some volunteers to help with them, you know, putting their pictures together and doing it. And I've done it before and it was like a great event, like really fun, awesome, well run all of this sort of thing. Great to be in the community and helping. So somebody had asked me if I was able to help again in a similar sort of a capacity, and I excitedly replied and I was like, yes, I would love to help. Da, da, da. And then I started realizing, you know, you know, what with the amount I have on my plate right now, my current plate is quite full.
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Right.
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And although it would be a great thing to support and you know, I know I will enjoy it, I think it's gonna come back and bite me in the ass quite literally.
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Right?
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Like physically, mentally, emotionally, I don't think it would be a good thing to commit to on my Sunday, which is really my day of rest. And I've been very good at like using that day to deliber rest, which is a whole other episode coming.
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Right.
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So again, like at the time I was like, yeah, I've done that before. It was A great event. I'd love to do it again. I don't have anything on that weekend. Yes, I'll just do it, right? And then I started on reflection, like, oh, I think I might have over committed and said yes a little too quickly here. So when we start kind of working with our capacity, which is something I'm really big on, like, do we have the capacity for this? Like being, being aware of, like how much do I have in the tank today, right? Like I had a hundred percent yesterday and I gave a hundred percent, right? Like I had this cracker of a day where I got so much done I was like on effing fire. But I don't have that every day, right? So today for example, if I've got 30% and I give 30%, then I gave 100. Okay? But the thing is on a Sunday I'm often kind of like resting, depleted, like I've had a full on week, right. And I want to sort of set myself up for the next week. So I know on a Sunday, often my energy is lower, like the capacity in my tank is less. I'm probably going to wake up in the morning and feel like I've got 30% to give, right? Do I want to spend it at this thing, doing this, you know, event coming and going, Like I've got to drive back and forth and all of this, right? So I've got a whole episode actually on capacity, which I definitely recommend you listen to because you know, when we sort of listen to how much physical, mental and emotional energy we have, we start to plan things differently. We start to say yes to things differently. This is one of the reasons why I almost always say no to anything in the evening. You want me to give a webinar in the evening? I'm sorry, I'm out. I know myself well enough to know that I'm not going to be mentally and emotionally switched on for that. It's a no, right? So again back to like number four, over committing, saying yes to things before we think it through. The good side of this is like it's because we're passionate, like we're often fearless. Like we want to try new things, do new things, right? We have this kind of drive in us. However, we can get ourselves into a little bit of trouble with this, right? Like that's the downside. We've got to be mindful of that. One of the things that I have learned and although I did not practice this last week with that email, right. But one of the things I've learned In person, when somebody offers something is, I'll often say, oh, my God, that sounds amazing. Pencil me in and I'll come back to you to confirm.
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Right.
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So it sounds like I'm all in.
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Right.
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Which, you know, I want to be all in. But I also know that I need time to think about it and check. Even if my calendar is free, that doesn't mean I'm a. Yes.
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Right?
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Oh, my God, that sounds amazing. Pencil me in and I'm gonna come back to you and confirm.
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Right.
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That kind of creates the balance for me to, like, demonstrate my excitement and get excited about it without being 100% all in yet.
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Right.
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So again, this helps to kind of, you know, pause, check in, give it some time before going all in. All right, number five, the fifth ADHD trait that is probably a little less well known and common for those of us with adhd. Am I, like, dragging it out? I so am.
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Right.
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All right, number five. Making unexpected connections.
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Right?
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Connecting dots that other people just can't connect, and then often being like, how can you not say that? How did you not come up with that? Like, this seems so obvious.
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Right?
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So our ADHD brains see patterns and connections that other people miss.
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Right?
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And I love this for us. I really do. Just yesterday, I was coaching a client, and she was actually telling me about this conversation she'd had with somebody who was talking about, like, an issue and a problem that they had in their life and how in her brain, she could just so quickly and easily see the path to having solved it and achieving what this person wanted to get to. Like, her brain just, like, lit up the connections at rapid speed. And I was like, yes, that's something our brains do. How cool is that?
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Right?
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And maybe you have noticed this with your intuition. You know, you've had that experience where you, like, walk into a room and you can just tell that, like, they've had an argument and things are frosty or something's not right in that room.
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Right?
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And you can't necessarily explain it, but you just know something is off.
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Right?
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That's because we see things, we observe things in the world through our five senses, right? Taste, touch, smell. See, I don't know. I can't remember the five of them. You know what they are, Right? But we take on more through our five senses, which means that we can observe things more than other people, than our neurotypical friends, which is quite a cool skill to be able to have, Right? And then we can kind of piece things together without necessarily being able to explain It. But we can, right? And sometimes we might struggle with some traditional, boring, step by step logic maybe, but we can often excel at the creative problem solving and making those connections that other people can't. And this again, it comes back to our nervous system is wired differently and therefore it works differently. Our nervous system is hypersensitive in many ways and it works at lightning speed. Speed. Now this is going to be like a silly example, but I'm going to give it anyway. But just the other day my partner and I, we left home to go for a walk. It was about 6am in the morning and it was blackout, like dark outside, right? And so we're walking under the street lights and my partner had something in his eye and he's like, oh my God, my eye is so itchy. And like we stopped at one point under a street lamp and he's like trying to like get this thing out of his eye. He's like, oh my God, it's not nice. It's really not good at all. He's like, I need some water to get it out. And as soon as he said that, I was like, okay, well we're about to walk past the college. Why don't we just walk in and find one of their water fountains? And he's like, oh my God, that's genius. So we didn't have to turn around and go all the way home. And I was like, to me, I was like, that just feels super obvious. Like we've taken the kids in there as we've been biking past, we've gone in there for water before. I'm like, doesn't that just seem super obvious? But for his brain, right? His probably neurotypical brain, he was like, I would never have even thought of that. And I was like, really? But that's often what it's like is it seems really obvious to us, but not necessarily to the people around us, right? When we're able to make those connections and come up with those solutions, right? Kind of cool, really. Like that ability to jump from A to Z so quickly and come up with creative solutions. I like that one. All right, my friends, so as we wrap up, right, us adhders, we share so many traits, right? Core traits, right? And while we know that there are lots of very well known things that we do and experience, there are also some things like this that are less well known, right? That do come with, you know, some of them come with some kind of benefits, some cool things that we can do. And for that I am grateful. Although I do want to acknowledge that some of them definitely do come with challenges.
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Right.
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We don't want to. We don't want to scratch over that, too.
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Okay.
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So you are not alone, right, in the core elements that you have, but also in the challenges that you experience as a result of having a brain wired differently in a world that just wasn't really made for us. Okay. But at the same time, all of these traits are what make you you.
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Right.
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And you are a unique and awesome human. Okay, so which one of these do you resonate with the most? I would love to hear. Come and hang out. You can hang out in our Facebook group, right? You head over to the website navigating adultadhd.com and you can join that for free. Or come and hang out on Instagram. Tell me, right? DM me. I respond to every single DM that I get. Sometimes the odd one will go into, like, the spam folder, and I just forget to check it, but when I find it, I do reply. All right, but I'd love to hear which one of these traits do you resonate with? And do you have a story, a story about that trait you can share? All right. Huge love, my friend. Take care. Have a beautiful week. I will speak to you soon. Hey, friend, if you want some more help navigating and thriving with ADHD and some help applying everything that you're learning here on the podcast, then head over to our website, navigating adultadhd.com.