Susan McGinnis, ADHD Impact Coaching

This comic illustrates how we need to learn the skill of conversation, so we can live with others, and we learn this at home, from infancy. As we grow and our social needs change, we still need to learn skills to negotiate life, and we learn it first at home, from interacting with our families and watching others. This is from NPR's "Life Kit" series, link in comments.

This report that 1/2 of teens are awake between 12 and 4 a.m. on their phones is a "wake up call."

(link in comments to full article)

I see in my coaching practice that most adults also have a phone use problem that is interfering in their life.

The smartphone is an inherently addictive device. I can offer some advice, but only you can implement changes.
My advice is to establish rules and support them with protocols:

First, just get everyone a clock-radio to use as a wake-up alarm.
Yes, they still make them!

The phone can be charging in the kitchen overnight - for adults, too. Or adults may need to take custody of kids' phones at bedtime.

Figure out the nature of your habits. If reading on a different type of reader like a Kindle is your difficulty, switch mediums. If reading itself is your difficulty, try listening (on a different audio device). If it is about content, switch the type of content you consume at bedtime. Try just turning off the light!

If you do this and you still have trouble sleeping, you will have the opportunity to explore what to do about that.

How much is enough?

"I'll know it when I feel it"
(I don't know - I haven't thought about it)

Maybe sounds like: "When time runs out." "When I feel too tired to do any more." "When I burn out." "When I am too frustrated and stop - I give up." Ouch!

Versus something like:
"When I have gotten clarity on the specifics of the assignment, on my objectives regarding it, done what I could think of to do, gotten the results I got, considered them, considered what I could try differently, done that, and taken a step back to evaluate my results. Am I done?

(Some may notice that sounds like using "executive functions"!)

Evaluate means that I revisit my objective (the assignment?) ("what was it I wanted, anyway? Is that still what I want?") and my results:

Now that I've had all this experience, seen what it really takes, has my objective changed? If so, maybe this experience was enough - a "success," even. I will use what I learned going forward!

And from this new vantage point: What's my next objective?
That's what an upward spiral of experience looks like — it's not the depressive spiral that feels like failure, that stops you.

Point: You can help yourself have the experience of life that you want to have by getting clarity. Don't let vague language beat you down

Background:
I was reading that AI use is actually increasing the time people are spending working. Work expands to fill the time.

If you don't have a specification for your efforts, you will never be done; it will never be enough. You can see how far you can go, but you'll only know when you can't go any further. And that can be okay, if you are clear that that's how it works.

👉 Start with: “I hear you. You don’t want to do this.”

👉 Then follow with: “Here’s what still needs to happen.”

This does two things:
- It shows respect (which [teens] are highly sensitive to)
- It keeps you grounded and in control of the situation

This tip from Big Life Journal for parents is also useful for our own internal conflicts. Why are we not doing the thing, we ask? Because we are conflicted. Part of us doesn't want to / doesn't feel ready!

Learning to dialogue within ourselves in the same way a parent, teacher, or supervisor might communicate can allow us to feel affirmed, which then might allow us to open up to change.

"A simple mental trick for decluttering is to “zoom out” and see your belongings as categories (“shoes,” “jackets”) instead of unique personal items (t-shirt from Hawaiian vacation)."

How you think about possessions affects patterns like holding on to things or letting them go.

"Research suggests other strategies that are effective, such as taking a photo of a sentimental item before letting it go, setting an item aside in a temporary “purgatory” box before making a final decision, and thinking about whether the item could be meaningfully used by someone else. More broadly, it also helps to start with possessions that are lower in identity or emotional meaning and save the hardest items for later."

"Trash" is the easiest category, so get rid of trash first — it makes it easier to see what remains!

link to article in comments

Being able to "regulate" yourself means that you recognize what is happening right now and can support yourself back to a calmer -or more engaged - state. It is a developmental skill, meaning it is a sign of growth; so it can be supported (or hindered) by environment, other people, etc.

"Regulation is not the absence of activation. It's the ability to bounce back from it. If you're in a busy or overwhelming season right now, here's a gentle reminder: You don't have to be perfectly calm to be regulated. You just have to keep returning to yourself. Maybe that looks like: one slow breath between tasks, a quick step outside, a moment of acknowledgment that "this is a lot right now,” or simply letting your emotions be there without judging them.

Small moments count. They add up. They teach your nervous system that even when things feel like a lot, you can find your way back to yourself. And THAT is regulation.”

This message is from Lauren McCoy's newletter, found at letitgowithlo.com.

Does fear of not being able to fall asleep get in between you and adequate sleep?
Here's something to try - calling to mind a series of images,mimicking how your brain works when you are asleep.

"Beaudoin developed a technique to mimic this kind of “dreamlike” thinking — with the hope that he could trick his brain into falling asleep faster. He calls it a serial diverse imagining task or cognitive shuffling, because it’s almost like shuffling a mental deck of cards, each one with a different image or thought."

Free acces to article in link in Comments -

Could social media use, or "scrolling," be a kind of dissasociation? Would it be more helpful to think of it that way, rather than as an addiction?

“I think people experience a lot of shame around social media use,” says lead author Amanda Baughan, a UW doctoral student in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, in a university release. “One of the things I like about this framing of ‘dissociation’ rather than ‘addiction’ is that it changes the narrative. Instead of: ‘I should be able to have more self-control,’ it’s more like: ‘We all naturally dissociate in many ways throughout our day – whether it’s daydreaming or scrolling through Instagram, we stop paying attention to what’s happening around us.'”

Link to article in comments

What's the difference between 'evaluating your actions toward better meeting your needs' and the 'name-calling, blaming, and shaming' yourself that leads to hopelessness and depression?

Marshall Goldsmith's message is that we are trained to the negative in our culture, but by learning, we can find our way out — for our mental health, for our success, for our relationships. This (link in comments) is a short video from the Non-Violent Communication website, and I'll also post a link to the excellent book, "Non-violent Communication."

I've been looking through bins of old art and schoolwork saved long ago from my kids' childhood (it was easier to save everything, it appears!), and I've noticed how memories and emotions have come up for me. This part of organizing is often an obstacle to sorting and clearing our spaces, and I decided to set myself up to work in controlled bursts, and to allow and appreciate the memories and emotions as they arose.

Having an intentional approach has helped me as I make decisions about what to keep - what I value v. what they might someday appreciate (if only for a moment). I have had to consider how much space I am willing to devote to what I save, and how much they might be willing to take away or look through. I notice and adjust to these elements of process as I go.

A bigger takeaway has been, in revisiting them as children through their expressive arts, how much their art and writing gave them a way to process who they are, their world, and what they cared about. Art gave them a means to reflect and express on their experiences, to feel important, and to give meaning to ordinary daily life.

As adults, let's remember artistic expression as an important part of being human. Name the parts of your world, of your daily life. Call to mind the beings you love, and what brings you joy, and bring these joyful aspects into your life as much as you can.

This is all to build a healthy identity, a sense of who you are; and it is foundational to your well-being. Before judging, before outcomes, is the strange and wonderful fact of be-ing.

How do you help your child learn life skills?

By letting them do things with you, and by doing things with them; letting them hear how you are thinking about the task, and how you are making decisions and then evaluating the results.

Great essay on this by Laura McMaster, PhD in CHADD's Attention Magazine for December. "Helping Build Executive Functioning Skills and Independence at Home."

I'm going to post a link to a .pdf of the article in the comments, and I believe you will be able to access it without a paywall. You might want to join CHADD for $75 and get a free subscription to the magazine as well as their online resources.