thinkythink

Getting to the workout tip 2: Sharing what you're about to do

Another way to get out of my own way on the way to exercising -- Sharing what I'm about to do. Tara neatly addresses this in a recent blog post:

I'm not sure why but it still surprises me when I see things work for myself. Yesterday I was talking to my friend and colleague Becca Colao through IM. During our conversation I mentioned that I was procrastinating about exercising and that I wanted to exercise. With in minutes I got my socks and sneakers on and started exercising. So now I know that as both an ADHD Coach and an adult with ADHD that Sharing Your Goals does work.

She was talking about the strategy of "sharing your goals" from Nancy Ratey's new book, "The Disorganized Mind."  I take the notion of what I'm sharing down a level, because I think goals is a big-picture level, and getting my butt out of the house is a pretty detailed-level kind of thing. I try to think small when I want to exercise RIGHT NOW. So I call it not my goal (which works for some) but rather, just what I'm gonna do. Right now.

I use this strategy a lot. The IM with Tara was one example. I do this with my sister a lot. We use IM, e-mail, or phone. We use it to declare a truce in the internal argument about what to do next, and whether or not to exercise. We use it for other irksome tasks as well, like going through that pile of papers on the desk. Here's an example:

C,
I'm going to go through the !@#$%^&*(?! pile of papers on my desk now. Talk to you after.
-Becca

Becca,
Great!  Talk to you soon!
-C

C,
I did it. I gotta eat now.
-Becca

Becca,
EAT! Tuna is nice.
-C

Thrilling, isn't it? It works! Here's another one:

Becca,
I need to go for a swim but I can't figure out whether to go now or to trim the hedge or refile the things my assistant put in the wrong places or to call the 3 clients I should've called or go to the store.
-C

C,
GET YOUR BAG AND GO TO THE POOL. NOW. then call clients right after.
-Becca

Becca,
I have to call the other 6 people too!
-C

C,
CALL ME FROM THE CAR.
-Becca

Yeah, this is (a) sharing and (b) accountability and (c) designating your brain's driver.

Mine wants some tuna. Moral? Use some synergy. Use some help. Tell someone what your goals are, big or little, particularly when you need to get off your butt right now. We have degrees and stuff, but that doesn't make us smarter than all that! So don't feel silly, or do feel silly, just say it and get it done. Get out the door and get moving.

Learning styles aren't just for kids.

I just found this post over at the about.com ADD blog. It gives a good summary of some basics about learning styles from Rory Stern. Here's my gut reaction/rant: why is this information framed as being about kids?

I know kids are the ones in school. But we all have learning styles and it gives a lot of leverage to understand them. Making it just about kids must push some button for me- I do know that a lot of clients learn a lot (as do I) when they think about what worked when they were students. So rather than go off about that- let me just recommend that anyone think about the way they learn. The post in question talks about auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learning styles. Do you learn by hearing, by seeing, or by doing/feeling physically?

But let me ask it a different way:
Which classes worked for you? Which didn't?
What aspects of those classes' material/teaching style worked or didn't?
When you studied, how did you study best?

And at that point I want you to drop the notion of having one style. The post does say these aren't the only learning styles... so let me broaden it for you. To be fair, this isn't just learning style, but also learning environment, but I think that's equally important.

For example, I read theory best while listening to loud music.
I listen best while doodling.

I learn well kinesthetically, like learning a dance step by doing it, but only in conjunction with reading about it or hearing it described several times. Showing me does nothing.

And not learning- but more a concentration style - I cook best while listening to good radio programs (NPR et al)

Now consider this: if you understand that YOU learn best in certain ways, you'll understand this in your kid, too.

 

Necessary Exercise

I've seen more and more talk about exercise and the brain lately, and that's a good thing. I've been to some great lectures by John Ratey on this topic at ADDA conferences and local coaching meetings. Now he's published a book about it, called Spark. I haven't read it yet, sorry John, I'm too busy reading about when to give the baby mushed up banana for the first time. But I would like to reflect on the theme and some of what I've heard from him before.

I think many of his points are well taken; for example, we don't hear as much about exercise as treatment for ADHD, depression, and so forth, because there isn't much financial gain involved in either studying or promoting it. At least not for the folks who look for financial gain here, i.e, the pharmaceutical companies. And yet, exercise can act like medications like Prozac or Ritalin. And, there are a lot of people for whom mental health and/or attention problems seem to appear only when they stop doing a lot of exercise for a long time. I believe John called it "post-marathon onset ADHD." In other words, some people's troubles with the mind only appear following trouble with the knees.

One conclusion: this dovetails with the concept of ADHD as a set of character traits (versus a pathology). Some people simply need a WHOLE LOT of movement on a daily basis, or perhaps a continual basis. The problems arise when they start moving. So the "symptoms" are circumstantial, and not a manifestation of a disorder.

Another conclusion: we need to take exercise more seriously. For me what automatically follows is that we need to put more attention on how we manage to get that exercise. We don't need to spend more energy thinking we ought to exercise more.

And yet another conclusion: Exercise can help. Some of us need a lot of movement and sweat and so forth, but that doesn't leave us happy as clams. Including enough exercise is, for some of us, like eating properly; if we don't eat properly, we don't feel good; but eating well is not sufficient to make everything great. It is necessary, but not sufficient.

Stay tuned for: how we actually get the exercise, exercise for us inattentive folk, and other subtleties.

Posted over at www.addcoachesblog.com

I just wanted to give you a heads up that I've been posting on Fridays over at www.addcoachesblog.com,
a fun cooperative blog project with a group of ADD coaches (duh). My post last Friday was about Mediation, and if anyone yells for it, I'll repost it here, if not, check it out over there! Here's a link.

Meditation

People talk a lot about meditation is useful for ADD, and when a group of colleagues recently had an online discussion about it, I thought it was time to say something about it....

And my book recommendation from there:

Moon Over Water: Meditation Made Clear  With Techniques for Beginners and Initiates

Check it out...

Tips for Too Much Thinking

One of the challenges I've always had is thinking too much. It's gotten a lot better over the years, with all kinds of help and strategies, and being nice to myself. I think I'll be addressing this more in my blog, but I did want to get started with a few things that help.

I'm not talking about ruminating or obsessively worrying. The same things might sometimes help, but that's not what I'm focusing on here.
This is about volume and speed of thought.
The part that's hard isn't what you're thinking about, but rather that you're thinking so fast that it's tiring. You may forget what you were thinking about just now, and that can be troubling, because it seemed like a good idea, or just because it's disconcerting not to know what you were just thinking, but meanwhile you're about 100 topics further. That leads me to tip #1:

#1.  There's no need to think about what you're thinking about.
You're just thinking. Your brain is on auto-pilot with no functioning brakes. It is happening to you.
I'm not saying you ought to get mad at yourself for thinking about your thoughts (aka metathinking). That won't really help much. And I'm all about whatever helps.

This immediately leads to tip #2:

#2. Don't fight your thinking. I love this book Taming your Gremlin by Rick Carson. It's funny and sweet, and it's all about not fighting the gremlins/committee/editor doing all the criticizing up there in your peanut head. Perhaps you're doing no criticizing whatsoever, just thinking about baseball statistics and how the people who analyze them are odd and cute furry animals and how nice the birdie is that just flew by plus the article you read this morning about the local police department and also your idea for starting a business to sell more blue clothing wait what was I thinking about chocolate?

Guess what? The same not fighting it helps a lot. Let's back up a minute, though. Strategies to get along with your chatterbox neurons may be further than you are right now, or you might be just so tired from the chatter and the automatic fighting.

#3. If you fight it, let that be. Sometimes that's just what you're doing. Remember- it's just happening to you...so,

#4. Notice it- let's talk first step here. Say 'hey look at my brain go- it's doing all that thinking!'
This is NOT trying to quiet it. It is NOT suppressing it. It is NOT major meditation (not to discount the value of different kinds of meditation to some people). You may forget you noticed a moment later. If it's really bad, you might just keep naming the phenomenon every minute or ten or ten seconds- hey look! I'm thinking! Or, oh crap! Stupid thinking! There it goes again!

#5. Give yourself a break. Do whatever it is that lets your brain be still(er). For me it's watching idiot TV. Also helps me when I can't decide what to do to help my hyperthinking state. You know how we fear the mind-numbing effects of TV? Well, that's exactly what we're looking for. For me, when the brain is explosively chattering, TV = Zen. Zen does not = Zen for me, it equals think-bomb proliferation. Other people I know and have worked with do things like nap; listen to unnamed radio programming their rational selves find offensive; play solitaire; play sudoku; run really fast.

What works for you?

My brain is a lot quieter than it used to be, now that I'm less of a fighter about it, and it rarely gets truly exhausting. And I know way better than to say to myself, "don't think so much." Yeah, right.