235 The ADHDers Guide to Being Proactive (Even With a Reactive Brain)

I Have ADHD Podcast

Kristen Carder

Self-improvement, Health & Fitness, Education, Mental Health

4.8 • 2.8K Ratings

🗓️ 31 October 2023

⏱️ 42 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Fair warning: this episode brings the heat. This is a topic I’ve felt compelled to discuss a lot lately, and I’m not holding back.

As adults with ADHD, our brains are reactive. This means that when there’s a stimulus (aka phone notification, a child calling for you, etc.), our brains are naturally triggered to react. We lack impulse control, so our instinct is to respond immediately.

Someone who's proactive, on the other hand, will slow down first. They’ll take a breath and decide when it’s in their best interest to react. They don’t act out of impulse, and they aren’t constantly putting out fires or managing other people’s issues at their own expense.

So, how do you morph into someone proactive as an ADHDer? First, you have to take care of your most basic needs. Be sure you’re medicating, staying hydrating, getting into nature, and moving your body in a way that feels good to you.

Secondly, you MUST decide what you want and be willing to fight for it. You cannot create or control a situation if you don’t know what you want. Give yourself the space and time to find out what you want. And remember: to live the life you want, you can’t keep pleasing other people.

In this episode, I’m breaking down everything I wish I’d known years ago about being a proactive human, including why it’s important to stop saying yes to everyone else’s request so I can start living in reactive mode.

If you want a safe space together where you can feel seen and heard as you go through this work, I invite you to check out FOCUSED, my group coaching program for adults with ADHD. Inside FOCUSED, I can take care of you and support you as we work through this together.

Come hand out with me on Instagram HERE.

AG1 by Athletic Greens

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the I Have ADHD podcast, where it's all about education, encouragement, and coaching for adults with ADHD.
0:14.0	I'm your host, Kristen Carter, and I have ADHD.
0:18.0	Let's chat about the frustrations, humor, and challenges of adulting relationships working and achieving with this neurodevelopmental disorder.
0:27.0	I'll help you understand your unique brain, unlock your potential, and move from point A to point B.
0:37.0	Hey, what's up? This is Kristen Carter, and you're listening to the I Have ADHD podcast.
0:43.0	I am medicated. I am caffeinated. I am regulated, and I am so ready to roll.
0:50.0	Glad to be here with you today. Welcome. Welcome to the show. Thanks for tuning in. This episode is going to be a goodie.
0:58.0	I say that every week, and I do mean it every single week. I am standing at my desk today, because I'm going to bring the fire.
1:08.0	And I need that extra support. I need to be standing, because I'm going to bring it today.
1:14.0	I am so looking forward to talking to you about how to be proactive, rather than being reactive, which is, I mean, this is like our life's work as someone with ADHD.
1:27.0	And it's so, so, so important. Yeah, I've got to have fired my belly today and we're going to bring it.
1:34.0	It is just like the most gorgeous weather in Pennsylvania-ish area right now. It is fall, autumn, whatever you want to call it.
1:46.0	I want to hike this morning. I have started carrying a stick with me when I go on hikes, because some of y'all don't lease your dogs.
1:55.0	And not everyone in the world is comfortable with dogs that they don't know. And so I have started.
2:04.0	I've started to empower myself to just protect myself when I need to. And I don't know how you feel about unleashed dogs.
2:13.0	I like dogs. I like dogs. Please let the record show. Love me. I love me a dog.
2:20.0	But when I don't know the dog and it's just off of a leash on a trail, that is very concerning to me.
2:28.0	I grew up on an island where stray dogs roamed free and they just bit children at will. And so I've got a little trauma there and whatever.
2:39.0	Sometimes we just bring our childhood self onto our hikes in Pennsylvania. And I guess that's what I do.
2:45.0	And so as the adult 42-year-old version of myself, I have just started when I hike to carry a little stick with me.
2:54.0	And it's not to do any harm. It is just to have a barrier between an unleashed dog that I don't know and myself.
3:03.0	And I have got to tell you, it has calmed my anxiety so, so, so much. And it has allowed me to just kind of like create a little space between myself and an unleashed dog.
	...

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