Positives of ADHD

I am going to suggest that there are some potential benefits to havingADHD. Symptoms that can be impairing in some situations can work for me in other situations. Yet, before we swoop into this…A Caveat.  A Clarification.  A Disclaimer.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is not a gift.

It is non a approval.   I'd never suggest it is wonderful. Nor am I suggesting others be envious if they don't happen to have faced a life-long struggle with focus, attending, restlessness, follow-through, distractions, memory, procrastination, regulating emotions, etc..

ADHD: Is it a Inability?

Again, to be clear, ADHD is considered aDisorder. Not a Quirk, or Annoyance. Undiagnosed and untreated, it tin sabotage every surface area of your life: your career, matrimony,parentingskills, and your dreams. It'due south that bad. And circuitous. Every person with ADHD struggles with a unique combination ofsymptoms and challenges.  Procrastinating, over-committing, impatience, noisy rooms… Those are challenges for me.

Yes, I know, EVERYONE loses things, forget names, or wonders why they went to the kitchen, now so. We are all living a high-stress, overwhelming, distraction-filled world. Just for approximately iv to 5% of adults, the symptoms are at the point where they are severe and impairing.   Bad enough to have usa seeking help from a doctor. Usually, arriving dislocated, and asking, "What's wrong with me?"

Circumstantial With An ADHD Encephalon

However, in one case you've been to the doctor, and hopefully were not misdiagnosed, everything changes.  The relief can exist intense, considering once you know what's going on, it is possible to dramatically reduce the downside of ADHD, and learn to handle the challenges. Then, somewhere along the way, something amazing might happen—you may observe in that location are things about this "mindset" that you can use to youradvantage. At to the lowest degree in certain situations.  (Damn! Some other disclaimer!)

5 ADHD SUPERPOWERS

In no particular society, here are five potential ADHD superpowers.  Use them wisely!

  1. Super In A Crisis

A contempo studyestablish that the ADHD encephalon tends to produce more Theta waves than the brains of average folks. Theta waves are the ones yous produce every bit you're nodding off to sleep.Or listening to your begetter-in-law share stories virtually bass angling.  They point a country of deep relaxation.

So when something goesboom!—a disaster, a crunch, or even something thrilling—and most people's brains overload, ours tin can bound upwardly to… "normal".

As one of the doctors in Add & Loving It?! says, in an emergency situation, nosotros plough to "The ADDer". Several doctors take told us that they see a lot of ADHD among Eastward.R. doctors and nurses, police force officers, burn and rescue personnel, journalists, stock traders,professional athletes,and entertainers.

When others are in crisis, nosotros can be cool, calm, and under control.

The downside? When life is at-home and cool and under control, nosotros're in crisis.  Thestaff coming together drones on into its second hour and we're gear up to explode.

This is likely why adults with ADHD often end up involved in dangerous, loftier-chance activities—it wakes up the encephalon. ADHD motorbusAlan Brown talks about making certain yous make smart choices near how you go your thrills.  He used to feed his need for speed with drugs, now he races. As for me, I'm calmer onstagein front of 1,000 people than I was before I sat down to write this blog.

  1. Super Creative

A report done at the University of Memphis confirmed what many experts accept told united states, and many ADHD booksmerits… People with ADHD tend to be more than creative than their non-ADHD peers.  Onboilerplate.  Non everyone with ADHD is Da Vinci.  Though at that place is some strong testify thatDa Vinci was ADHD .

In the study, 30 ADHD students scored college than their peers on eleven dissimilar tests for creativity.  (Who knew scientists could test inventiveness?!)   However, since so other studies have not plant a link between inventiveness and ADHD. Or at least, productive creativity. As opposed to endless ideation and day-dreaming.

Here'southward a possible explanation. Students with ADHD have a much higher rate of beingness held back a grade, dropping out, and being suspended. The creativity study was done on students who had made information technology into university. So, perhaps the message is that those who made it to college that have ADHD establish creative ways to get by and navigate an educational system that is not designed for this mindset. Even so, to exist fair, schools are making progress in offer accommodations that tin level the playing field.

So, the argue over creativity is ongoing, but with the right accommodations, any visitor that wants to exist on the cut edge of innovation would exist wise to hire some ADHD folks to generate quantum ideas. Then hire a bunch of people who are great at follow-through, and details to actually brand it happen. The downside? " Look, I take some other idea nigh hodue west you could do it…  And another.  And iii more… "

Inventiveness needs limits and structure.  AsDr. Ned Hallowellexplains, " Make friends with construction, brand friends with organization.  We tend to see them as the enemy considering, because we think that is going to inhibit our creativity.  And so we resist construction.  Oh no, that's for deadening people that have attention surplus disorder.  I'm free; I have Add together .  Big mistake. Structure, in fact, potentiates inventiveness.  Construction sets you lot gratuitous.

My favourite examples are Shakespeare and Mozart — two of the most creative geniuses who ever lived.  Shakespeare wrote within incredibly tight forms, blank verse, iambic pentameter, de da, de da, de da, de da.  Within that structure he created infinite multifariousness; he created extraordinary variety simply, merely he needed that structure."

  1. Super Intuitive

Some ADHD adults claim they have 'Spidey Senses' or intuition.  Some swear they have ESP. There may be a simpler explanation, and it has to do with filtering.

The boilerplate brain manages to sort and filter down all the incoming sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and bear upon sensations to a manageable 40 bits of data a second.

The ADHD brain has an overload of sensory input, plus bug with what are known every bit Executive Functions.That is, sorting, filtering, deciding, discarding, prioritizing, following through, checking details, tracking progress, post-obit procedures.

I know you've experienced the downside of this… But, but for a moment, consider the upside. When your brain lets in a lot of what some folks might consider irrelevant noise, it can show up in odd ways: Sometimes, we are able to notice things that others naturally filter out. Which is why many ADHD adults will swear they are intuitive, almost psychic, at picking up certain things.

  1. Super Starter

Okay, sure… sometimes a little forethought goes a long style, and saves a lot of fourth dimension.  Sometimes information technology'south amend to have 73 seconds and actually read through the instructions that came with that kit for the garden chair.  Simply we…

  • Are quick starters
  • Leap right in
  • Don't worry, stew, and waste time doing endless research

When folks are resistant to gamble, resistant to modify, hung upwards on process and procedure, information technology tin can haveforever to get annihilation washed.  People will stick with systems that don't work, and go stuck in analysis paralysis.

  1. Laser Vision

It took me a while to starting time this web log.  Stall.  Delay.  Check due east-mail.  Create a funny meme. View a video we're editing.  Coffee.  Cookie.

Then it was either start writing, or re-sharpen the pencils.  So I thought, "I'll write for 3 minutes.  Just iii minutes.  Then at to the lowest degree I have started."  And then?  It spent way more than than 3 minutes, though I couldn't tell y'all how much more.

Welcome to hyper-focus!

In the zone.  Experiencingmenses.  The super-powered reverse of drifting, lost in thought, day-dreaming, butterfly fluttering.

The vague restlessness, and agitation that had me doing everything but what I should be doing, namely writing, was all of a sudden—poof!—gone.

The downside?  Instead of hyper-focused on taking an exam, writing a blog, or finishing a projectwe can be hyper-focused on the incorrect affair, like spending iv hours creating a personalized birthday card… so arriving late for the political party.

THE INJUSTICE LEAGUE

By this point, you may exist wondering…If we have these astonishing powers, these powerful potentials, why don't ADHD folks rule the world?

Well, in some ways we practice.

Talk toADHD expertsand they will tell you they accept clients who are amidst the virtually successful people in the globe.   Laurels-winning athletes.  Vivid entrepreneurs.  Famous entertainers.  Top salespeople.

But well-nigh adults with ADHD are struggling.  Yes, even the successful ones.

While nosotros may take these potential abilities, they are usually not under our control. If they were, I would take started this blog 3 months ago, when I had the initial thought.  And I would be able to sit and carefully proofread it.

But fifty-fifty now, I can feel my burst of hyper-focus starting to slip.

I'g in my own 'Fortress of Solitude', and it's only at present, every bit I come out of the magical spell, that I notice the audio of our editor leaving for the day, the furnace coming on, the smell of java. They are penetrating the hyper-focus, disrupting the invisible free energy field that envelopes me when I'1000 in the zone.

Luckily, like many superheroes, I'm part of a team.  If it were left to me?  This web log would make it to the website three months from now.  Or maybe never.

Best,

Rick

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