Kristen Carder 0:05
Kristin, welcome to the I have ADHD podcast, where it’s all about education, encouragement and coaching for adults. With ADHD, I’m your host, Kristin Carter and I have ADHD. Let’s chat about the frustrations, humor and challenges of adulting, relationships, working and achieving with this neurodevelopmental disorder, I’ll help you understand your unique brain, unlock your potential and move from point A to point B. Hey, what’s up? This is Kristin Carter, and you’ve tuned into the I have ADHD podcast. I am medicated, caffeinated, sort of regulated and ready to roll. I’m here today with my client, Joe corpus, and we’re going to be talking about self awareness, which is something that he has been working on and has made so much progress in, and it is something that really impacts our ability to make progress, to reach our potential and to become the people that we want to be. I don’t think we talk enough in our ADHD community about self awareness and about the skills that go into being self aware and why we ADHD or struggle with it so much, and we’re diving into it today. As we get started, I want to remind you to press that like button, press that follow button, share all of the things, leave a comment. If you resonate with our conversation, just drop a comment, and I will absolutely respond to you. I love it, and you hear me saying this every week, but like this is just what we have to say, because I absolutely love it when you interact with the show. First of all, it gives me a major dopamine boost. And then, second of all, it allows the show to grow and other ADHD ers to find it. So as we get rolling here, I really want to make sure that we’re clear about the two main skills that go into being self aware. The first one is our working memory, specifically our visual working memory. And what that allows us to do, or should allow us to do, is understand our place within time, within time and space. This is kind of like a weird concept, but somebody with ADHD struggles with time blindness and understanding, like the concept that today is today and tomorrow is tomorrow, and yesterday was yesterday. Everything just feels like now, and so it makes it really hard for us to analyze the past and visualize the future, which directly impacts our ability to be self aware and to make decisions as we move through time. The other skill that goes into it is metacognition, which is being able to think about our thinking. It’s so hard for someone with ADHD. So those two deficient skills that we ADHD ers possess make self awareness something that we’re usually not very good at. And it’s a skill that we have to develop, which is exactly why I asked my client Joe to come on the podcast. Because Joe, I have seen you make absolutely amazing progress in your ability to be self aware. I can’t wait for you to share your story with us. So welcome. I’m so glad you’re here.

Joe Corpus 3:18
Thank you. I’m very glad to be here, very excited to talk about this topic.

Kristen Carder 3:22
It’s such an important topic, and I know it’s like so it moves you. I can tell when you talk in our Slack community within focus that this topic really moves you. Why is Why is it so important to you? Why does it move you?

Joe Corpus 3:39
Because to me, self awareness means acceptance, acceptance of ourselves, acceptance of reality, which is something we talk a lot about, yeah, and so I think a lot of it’s about understanding, accepting reality, seeing how reality is and seeing how it’s affecting us and how we’re interacting with it. Yes, without fear or judgment. And that’s hard.

Kristen Carder 4:06
So hard. Okay, before we get there, tell us a little bit about you. Like, what? What are you up to? What is your life like?

Joe Corpus 4:14
So, um, I live in Houston, Texas. I’ve been married for 12 years. I’ve actually even been in my profession for 12 years. So that’s just, I just actually put those two together.

Kristen Carder 4:29
That’s cool. So married for 12 years and in landscaping for 12 years

Joe Corpus 4:33
Yea, and I kind of just fell into landscaping, but I loved it. I mean, it was a way to be creative. And then I didn’t know back then, but the fact that I’m outside, I’m in nature, and all of those things, is very good for someone that has it’s good for everybody. Yeah, it’s very beneficial to people that have ADHD, because it just kind of helps get you connected again, I think,

Kristen Carder 4:58
yeah, and I. Whether you mean to or not. I think being in nature really helps to regulate you. Yes, like bring you back to baseline.

Joe Corpus 5:08
They say that when you when people are looking at nature, a lot of times, they’re struck by in awe of just what has been created naturally. And that connection, like, like you just said, it just it, just it, just however. You just said, it’s regulating. It’s regulate, yeah, because you’re like, there is the world is bigger than me, you know. And it can be a safe, calm and beautiful place.

Kristen Carder 5:43
Yeah, that’s like, really reassuring, isn’t it? Yes,

Joe Corpus 5:45
yeah, it is. It’s really reassuring. Because even with plants, it’s like, if you nurture them, if you give them the time that they need, make sure their needs are met, they can, they can flourish, just like people, just like, in fact, when I’m talking to clients, so many times, I use analogies of what’s going on with the plant, of something that happens to humans, to help them understand that plants. I mean, plants get old and, yeah, they succumb to a disease and a disease that normally, if they were younger, wouldn’t kill them, but because they are older, you know, it’ll take and so it’s things like that. There’s a lot of parallels between the way, like a plant’s life and cycle is into humans as well. That’s

Kristen Carder 6:31
really, I mean, I could talk about that episode, but let’s get back. Let’s get back to you. So, when were you diagnosed with ADHD. What’s your ADHD journey?

Joe Corpus 6:43
So I was actually when I was very and I grew up in the 90s, okay, you know? And in the 90s, I think, at it, no attitudes towards ADHD were a lot different, for sure. So I was going to school, and they told my parents that I had ADHD, and my mom said, I’m not going to do anything about that. He’s just going to figure it out himself, or he’s just whatever. I mean, they weren’t very involved in, like, helping me achieve either, and so and she wears, she wore that like a badge of honor, like I never put him on any medication. And as I got into my career and working, I was like, I need some help. And so I went and saw a doctor and got diagnosed and got the medication. And it was, it was life changing, really, yes, I couldn’t own a business without taking my medication, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kristen Carder 7:44
Did you know that you were diagnosed with ADHD as a kid? Like,

Joe Corpus 7:47
yes? Because were you told, yeah? My mother would tell them, oh no. They said that about him, and we never did anything. That’s fine, you know? And then, and at the time, there was a time when I was still very close to my parents, and I remember when I told them I was taking medication, and she was just so disappointed. Like, how could you do that? What? What is it going to do to you taking that medication? What are the, you know, all those ideas that they had in the 90s of how it was yeah and

Kristen Carder 8:18
yeah. What is it going to do to me? It’s going to help me own a business, right? Help me to function and help me to regulate my emotions, and

Joe Corpus 8:24
regulate my emotions, become self aware.

Kristen Carder 8:27
Oh my gosh. So how else do you choose to treat your ADHD? So you take medication. I know you’re in FOCUSED.

Joe Corpus 8:35
Yes, exercise, exercise. So I do exercise and I don’t go exercise like I’m not going to the gym to be a certain way or to work a certain way. It’s all about moving my body. You know, a lot of times, because as I do therapy too, so I do trauma informed therapy, and they talk a lot about how you store trauma in your body, so especially stretching or like yoga, yeah, really helps to release those tensions. Because I’ve read some of the books that you’ve recommended, like shame, shame bound. What was it called? You’re

Kristen Carder 9:16
so close healing the shame.

Joe Corpus 9:19
And he just talks about how it’s this muscle tension is one of the ways that we use to kind of suppress emotions, and so the exercising in that way can feel very healing, because it’s opening up areas that were very tight. And yeah, I would say even a year ago, I was very, very tight, and I have loosened up a lot. So

Kristen Carder 9:42
this is just a very weird question, because I’m curious, like, your muscles were tight because, like, I’ve been the kind of person, like, so embarrassing to admit in public, but I’ve never been able to touch my toes. I’ve never like, same kind of deal, right? Like, and I totally agree, as I’ve learned. More about trauma and how it impacts the body. I think my little tiny body, at a very young age, just like, totally tightened up, and then I developed in it in a way where I was just like, have not been flexible ever.

Joe Corpus 10:14
My goal is to be able to do the splits one day.

Kristen Carder 10:16
Oh my gosh, Joe, when you can, you’re coming back on the pod and you’re gonna do a demonstration

Speaker 1 10:24
a long ways off, but it’s a lot better than what it used to. Just want to be able to that is so great.

Kristen Carder 10:32
Okay, so let’s talk about self awareness. You mentioned earlier that self awareness to you means self acceptance. Yes. Can you talk about that a little bit? What like? Tell me about self awareness when you think about it, what comes up for you?

Joe Corpus 10:46
So when I was thinking about, How did self awareness become something that I focused on? Yeah, a lot of it went back to actually, one of the first coaching calls that I had with you, and when I was talking with you, you were talking about shame.

Kristen Carder 11:08
I remember, yeah,

Joe Corpus 11:09
and I can say today that Shame does not affect me the same way did when I when I spoke with you, but I remember you talking about shame and the perfectionist and how that shame just feels so terrible that you’ll do anything to, uh, avoid it. And you talked about someone just sitting at they’re taking two hours to write an email, yeah? And I was like, that’s, that’s me. I can, I can sit in front of the computer for a whole hour. Yeah, and I don’t know why, and I always thought to myself, it’s just because I don’t know how to do these things. No, it’s because I had all this shame and fear and these things that I didn’t understand that affect me. And then when they were when they were all kind of bubbling up inside me, it would just stop me, completely paralyze you, paralyze me. So what I found was through the acceptance, through understanding that our experiences as people with ADHD or neurodivergent people completely normal and natural, understanding that and accepting that has really given me the strength and the bravery to just go to make progress, and not only make progress, but to decide I’m going to do this thing this way, because that’s the way that I think I should do it. And I know that other people say I shouldn’t do it like that, but I’m going to try it, because the worst thing that’s going to happen is that I’m just gonna have to change a little bit, and that’s fine, because I can never know unless I unless I try.

Kristen Carder 12:48
Okay, so let’s back up a little bit to before you started doing this work, and you would have considered like when you look back, you consider the the moments in your life when you were not self aware. What was that like? How did it impact you to be, to be living as a man who is just not self aware?

Joe Corpus 13:09
I just felt small.

Kristen Carder 13:13
Wow.

Joe Corpus 13:15
I mostly just felt small incapable, just incapable and small. I mean, that’s how I felt, because I don’t know what’s going on inside me. I don’t even know what makes me tick. So it’s like, how can I you don’t know you? Yes, yes. And realizing that, and that was the other thing. She was like, Wait a minute. How can I not know myself? I should, I should know myself. That’s I spent all my time with myself. I should know myself. You know, it’s a

Kristen Carder 13:45
wow. How did it impact your relationships? Do you think you know

Joe Corpus 13:53
I was not connected with people? I mean, I was not connected with people because I wasn’t connected to myself. I mean, even in so good my relationship with my my husband, I mean, the first couple years of our marriage, I don’t I did not feel that connected with him, but it’s because I didn’t feel that connected with anybody, yeah, and I just didn’t realize that. It’s also because I didn’t feel connected with myself. In fact, that was purpose, fully, not wanting to connect, because it felt dangerous.

Kristen Carder 14:29
Oh does the term dissociation mean anything to you?

Joe Corpus 14:31
Yeah, because that’s what my therapy, that’s what my therapist and she and I went through and I learned about, and I remember when I learned about this association, I was like, Oh, I don’t want to do this. I mean, this is not something that I want to do. It makes me feel out of control. Yes, it doesn’t make me feel like control and, and, and what I’ve learned through self awareness and self acceptance is it puts you in control, or at least it shows you what. You can control. And a lot of times what we can control is our the way that we interact with the world. But that’s very powerful, huge.

Kristen Carder 15:09
So for listeners who might not know what disassociation is, I said that very strange, but you know what I mean. Let’s just describe it for them. So the way that I have been taught, and I’m curious what your thoughts are, the way that I’ve been taught is that disassociation is a coping mechanism that is a response to trauma, where the situation is too overwhelming for you to cope, and so because you don’t have coping skills, and there’s not a safe being, yeah, a safe anyone around to help you through it. You detach from reality to some extent. So you kind of separate. You’re inside, like you’re you, but you kind of separate from the situation, and it’s not as like, what’s the word I’m looking for, like, dramatic as, like a detachment from reality, necessarily, but just kind of, like a little escape. Well,

Joe Corpus 16:09
it’s not, yeah, like most people wouldn’t know that you’re dissociating, yeah. It’s almost like just a, like a washing machine, just going on forever, like just everything’s just everything’s just kind of in the background, in the background, just kind of mixing around and even through disassociation. What can happen is, like an anger is a good one, because I used to have these explosive moments where I would react to people, and what that always felt like is when I was done throwing my emotion on somebody, I would be like, what even happened? I don’t even know. I just felt like I went red, and I just separated, yes, somebody else did this, this, this, this horrible reaction to somebody. And then I would come back to myself, and I’m like, What is even that? And then, because I don’t want to know anything about it, I would just put it out of my mind. And then I just repeat the cycle over and over again, yeah? And then you, then you start thinking, like, well, obviously I just have, like, an anger problem, or I’m just a bad person. And it’s like, no, if you became a once you become aware, like, I’ve been traumatized. I have ADHD, I don’t have any support, yeah, of course, I feel very angry, and getting in touch with my self awareness was also like and I don’t want to harm people either, so I want to figure out a better way to essentially, what I’ve learned through focus is to hold my emotions. Yes,

Kristen Carder 17:38
because the anger is usually valid. Yes. Like, that anger is valid, right? So it’s not a problem that it’s there. Yeah,

Joe Corpus 17:44
Somebody was violating a boundary. Yeah, 100%

Kristen Carder 17:48
but what we don’t want to do is throw it onto someone else,

Joe Corpus 17:50
right? Or just, what I would say is, like, just throw an emotional bomb at them. They’ve done something minor to you. You’re like, I’m gonna come back at you so hard so that you never do this to me again in a

Kristen Carder 18:04
so self protective, yes, like there’s so much compassion for that version of you. I have a lot of compassion.

Joe Corpus 18:10
And I would say that self awareness helps with the self protection as well, because then you kind of start to learn, like, this is what I need to feel safe. Once you learn what makes you feel unsafe, then you can start figuring out what makes you feel safe. And I think that’s that’s always the scary part, right? That’s what people are scared of, like, what are all the things I’m getting to know, all the things that make you feel uncomfortable? That’s what makes self awareness so hard. You have to look at these parts that aren’t easy. But the thing is, once you know what it is that’s causing that, then you can figure out, how do I actually want to feel and act and and think about this, and in my in my therapy, a lot of it’s also just about cognitive restructuring, just going back through memories and looking at the resilience of it, not, you know not. Yes, there was a lot of harm, but here’s what you did, here’s how you took care of yourself. And then when you can recognize those things, you can start building them into your life. Now, yeah, but if you have no concept of that? Well, of course, you keep repeating the same things over and over again, or that you feel stuck because you have nothing to look at. You have no baseline. I don’t know exactly how to say I think you’re

Kristen Carder 19:33
saying it perfectly, and you just brought up something that is, I think, the Hallmark trait of lacking self awareness, which is making the same mistakes over and over when we’re not self aware, when we don’t have a concept of the past, how the past impacts the present, how what I’m doing in the present is going to affect. The future which this is all executive functioning deficiencies that we struggle with, like, that’s a very valid, real deficiency that we have as ADHD ers. But what it does is it makes it so that we make the same mistakes over and over and and we are then becoming people who were grown ups or were in grown up bodies, but were living very immaturely, because it’s almost just like this. For me, it was like a 14 year old girl, right? So like my 14 year old self was just like making the same mistakes over and over, but not having the maturity to make, uh, to self assess and make a different decision. I’m wondering if you can think of any mistakes that you just made over and over and over and over until you, like, developed your self awareness, uh,

Joe Corpus 20:56
taking on too much business, booking too many clients, never having enough resources and just never learning. Because I’m just like, I’m just gonna keep if they something comes to me, I’m just gonna say yes, I don’t take any consideration about what’s going on. Because if I’m not getting all the work done, it’s just because I am not motivated enough, or I just can’t if I was only, if I only tried harder, concentrated more, like all those kind of messages that you get when really, when I step back and look at all, I’m like, no actually having all these clients is not enough. Is too much for one person. 100% this is too much. And you have to know what your capacity actually is to make that determination. And if you don’t

Kristen Carder 21:40
know what your capacity is, you’re gonna overfill and then judge yourself for not being able to complete an overfilled schedule, which is just like you’re setting yourself up for an impossible task every single day.

Joe Corpus 21:53
And I know guys, because you know in landscape, you can run into the same people over and over again. I mean, I know guys that they have not learned that lesson. And I’m telling you, they’re like, 5060, years old. They have not learned that lesson, and I can see it more clearly now than I used to in the past. But I’m just like, Wow, I’m so glad that I’ve been able. And I’ll say this, learning about your capacity is not fun. Say more about that. You know, it’s when you learn what you’re when you learn like that. You’re not a robot, that you can’t just work at 100% every single day, that you can’t make every single person happy, that you can’t just do every request that every person asks for you, and you’ve been living your whole life like that. It is sad. Yes, very sad. And I know that I believe that that’s a lot of fear, that people don’t want to know that I don’t want to know that I can’t do all these things that I want to do. But there is the other side of it, that once you know what you can and can’t do, you can make choices that make your life easier. You can choose to say, I know that I can only do this. Yeah, I’m afraid that, because a big part I did, end up letting a lot of clients go. And of course, the fear is, am I going to have enough business? Am I going to be okay? I’m fine, you know, but I could never know that unless I was willing to face my fears and be willing to try and to also say, like, if I’m wrong, well then I’ll just go, that’s how I kind of got myself to do. If I’m wrong, well then I’ll just go back to booking every client that I ever see. But if I’m not wrong, I’m gonna keep doing it this way. And in fact, I’ve even gotten more restrictive on or selective on work that I take on.

Kristen Carder 23:49
I remember as you were walking through that process, just all the drama around it like so much, and it was so valid, because you went from being someone who said yes to everyone and having an over filled book of clients and just so that everybody knows, like, these are clients that you’re going to regularly Yes, yes. And so it’s not just like, it’s like you’re taking care of these

Joe Corpus 24:17
in high end residential and so, like, a lot of these properties are, like, two acres, and so they require a lot of care, and they want you, like, I used to have a lady that she would every every March, she would say, Okay, it’s spring. What are we going to change? What area are we going to redo? And it’s a big project to redo. And so it’s a lot of interactions. It’s a lot of interactions with them.

Kristen Carder 24:41
Everyone with ADHD knows what to do to improve their lives. You go to bed at a reasonable time and you wake up early, make a list, cross the things off the list in order. Yeah, we know what to do, but ADHD is not a disorder of not knowing what to do. It’s a disorder of. Knowing exactly what to do, but not being able to get yourself to do it. That’s why I created focused. I’m a life coach with multiple certifications, and since 2019 I’ve spent 1000s of hours coaching adults with ADHD. Time for me to focus on you. Hello. Welcome to your coaching call. I know what it takes to help an adult with ADHD go from Hot Mess express to grounded and thriving. I’ll teach you how to understand your ADHD brain, regulate your emotions and accept yourself, flaws and all with this foundation, we build the skills to improve life with ADHD. And not only do you get skills and tools in focus, but you’re surrounded by a huge community of adults with ADHD who are also doing the work of self development right alongside of you. Dr Ned Hallowell says healing happens in community, and I have absolutely found this to be true. So if you’re an adult with ADHD who wants to figure out how to be motivated from the inside out and make real, lasting changes in your life. Join hundreds of others from around the world in focus. Go to, I have adhd.com/focus to learn more. That’s, I have adhd.com/focused so you went from that over, like, totally full to really being selective about who you take on, tell us about, like, all of the emotion that you experienced and what that was like, like, looking clients in the face and being like, I need that check, because this is gonna be our last interaction. Like, I remember this,

Joe Corpus 26:39
you know, okay, so maybe I don’t remember how hard that because it was really hard. No, I mean, I know it’s hard. What I can say is, like, that was very difficult. Well, this is what I’ll say. I felt like it was going to kill me and it didn’t kill me. That’s why you say and I think a lot of times with self acceptance, that’s what it is, is like we feel like, if we’re going to accept this thing, it’s gonna kill me, or it’s just gonna make everything worse. If I accept this thing, if I accept that my capacity is lower than what I think, yeah, it’s gonna ruin everything. Yeah, because the way I’ve gotten through my whole life is ignoring the truth, yes, just just pushing myself unreasonably, you know? But, uh, yeah, every time that I would talk to these clients, it it felt, it felt life ending, like it just felt like it’s the end of the world. It felt so awful that I was doing something wrong, that I’m doing something wrong. And the funny thing is, is a lot of those clients, they understood, and then even some of them said, Well, you know, in the fall, if you’re not as busy, maybe you can come back and keep doing the work, which I just told them yes, but I was like, I don’t, I don’t think I’m ever

Kristen Carder 27:52
that’s such a reassurance to you, though, to your brain, who was like, Okay, if this doesn’t work out, I’ll just go back to them, and then for them to be like, yeah,

Joe Corpus 28:00
yeah, you’re like, okay, yeah. So I mean, and that those responses, it did help ease a lot of that stuff, but, but once again, you would never even know that someone’s gonna respond that way unless you’re willing to try, you know,

Kristen Carder 28:18
and not to get too much into it, but when you said no to someone in your past or set a boundary or said no, I’m sorry, I can’t do that for you, maybe, let’s just say, hypothetically, as a child, did that go well, no,

Joe Corpus 28:34
no, right, right? And I’ve had clients that didn’t go well. But now if that happens, I’m like, well, then we really don’t need to work absolutely before. I used to always think like, Well, no, I have to work with them. They can treat me however they want, because it doesn’t even matter, because I wasn’t even treating myself well, you know? So then it feels like when anybody can treat me like anything, because I always put myself last, yeah, to the point where I don’t know myself, yeah, not aware of myself. I’m only aware of what other people want, what other people are expecting of me. All of my awareness was about other people, even that that a lot of it has to do with the way that I grew up and what was required of me growing up. I grew up in a very dysfunctional family, and so the only way to keep myself safe was to be completely aware of what everybody else needed and to be completely unaware of what I needed. And they even taught me to to not be self aware, because whatever you tell them, they would just say, No, it’s not like that. No, it’s not like that. No, it’s not like that. So then you end up going through life like, even if the client’s mistress, you’re like, Well, maybe it’s not like that. It’s probably I’m doing something, yeah, or if I was just better, yeah, you know. But then when you start looking inward and you’re saying, you’re like, No, these this person is actually true. Reading you wrong. I don’t deserve to be treated like that. I’m just a human trying to live and work like everybody else, yes,

Kristen Carder 30:13
no better, no worse, right? But no worse. Like, I don’t always have to put myself below everyone else, right? Like, we can be right exactly equal, which means I’m going to treat you with respect, and you’re going to treat me with respect, right,

Joe Corpus 30:27
right, exactly. And it’s just like, even with my my with my business, during different parts of season, it’s more busy. So there are times where, yeah, I wish I could take a little, like, I didn’t have to work so much, but I have to push myself for a few weeks. But as soon as it’s over, I scale back. And I scale back even more than I normally do, because I’m like, Well, I just finished going a month non stop. So now this month, I’m gonna take it really easy, and yeah, the guys will just have to deal with it if they get upset that I’m putting more on them that time, whatever. Because remember a couple months ago when I was over there doing it, you know exactly, um, but you have to have that self awareness too to even be able to do that. Because you have to be you have to be confident. You have to be confident enough in yourself. Like, No, I know that I’m doing the right thing. I know that I’m seeing this logically. I know that it’s reasonable when I’m asking. And how can you determine what is reasonable and what is not, unless you have that awareness? I don’t, I don’t know, because right before I couldn’t, right like, I

Kristen Carder 31:39
think reasonable is the perfect word. Like, I use that word a lot, like, am I being reasonable, right? The question for me used to be, are they going to get mad, right? Yes, which is, like, now that we’ve done more work, we understand, like, they might get mad, but is my request reasonable, right? Am I being reason? Am I asking for something that’s unreasonable? Actually? No, right? Okay, so if they get mad, that’s not gonna feel good, right? But I can still rest on I’m being reasonable here, right?

Joe Corpus 32:15
And what I’ve learned through self awareness too, is like I can feel a negative emotion, and I can survive the negative emotion before I used to feel that I can’t feel anything bad, yeah, ever, because, first of all, life is way too hard already, and if I’m feeling bad, I’m gonna be doing even less. But as time has gone on, and then I become self aware, and I understand how certain emotions affect me, or the way people do things, it triggers me in a certain way. I’m able to learn I’m able to tolerate things more, or I’m able to set a tolerance level for myself. Oh, I love that. You know what I mean, like? So it’s like, Is this supposed to be reasonable? And maybe someone is being unreasonable. And I can look internally and say they can be unreasonable to this point, but once they pass that, that’s it has to stop. And I think a lot of that you have to know what your thresholds are to be able to set those things.

Kristen Carder 33:12
And that doesn’t come without self awareness. No, tell me about the process that you went through to develop self awareness. I know you’re in process

Joe Corpus 33:22
a lot of grief. Yeah, there’s grief and a lot of compassion. And I’ll say this, I think compassion, it’s because the grief can sometimes sit so strong in my mind. But from that, there’s a lot of compassion. Now there’s a lot of compassion towards myself, and I think the compassion is what really helped with acceptance. Sure, because when those things happen, or when you’re noticing, like I used to self sabotage. I remember when I first learned that I was doing that, it felt like inside I was like, Joe, how can you self savage? What is wrong with you? Why would you do that? And then I and I was like, no, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Wait. Makes total sense that I would do that. I can accept that I am doing that, and I can accept that I want to change that, and I can start to notice the patterns that I’m doing. And then I can make and I can make changes, even even with things that you want to change, they always say the first step is awareness. You can’t change something that you one time you said, and this has always stuck with me, you can’t change the things that you don’t accept.

Kristen Carder 34:30
Wow, I’m pretty sure I stole that from someone, but we can just go ahead and give me a credit

Joe Corpus 34:35
card because you were saying something that was just saying, Oh, I’m okay, I’m okay, I’m okay. And you’re like, see, you can’t change something you’re you don’t accept so if you’re always saying you’re okay, I think we were talking about time management at the time. Okay? Yeah, so you know, of course, you’re always going to push yourself beyond your limit, because you’re always telling yourself I’m okay, right? And you won’t accept that actually, I’m tired, yes,

Kristen Carder 34:58
or. I’m at my capacity. I’m at my limit. I absolutely, yeah, so you mentioned grief, and I do want to talk about that a little bit more. But what like if someone is listening and they’re like, I don’t even know what the first like, how would I even start with self awareness? Like, was it in therapy? Was it in focus? Was it like through journaling? Was it your own journal? What was it for you? Okay, so

Joe Corpus 35:24
actually, journaling helped a lot. And not that I would say that everyone should do this, but I had a therapist when I did this too. Is that I would actually talk to the chat GPT a lot? Oh, yes, you love chat GPT. Yeah. Because what was like, let’s say me and my husband had a fight. Yep. And I would say, okay, the great thing about talking to this robot, you say whatever you want to it in a way, and it’s not going to judge. You totally say, Oh, this happened. I feel like this. I feel like he’s being like this. I want to tell him this. Like I want to get back at him telling him this. But how can i What can I be feeling, and how could I talk to him in a way that he won’t get upset because I’m saying thing because also I’m saying things in a hurtful way because I’m hurt. How can I communicate my hurt without hurting this other person? And then it would give me feedback, and it would give me, like examples of how to talk, and then I would talk to my therapist about it. And so that actually, actually the chat GPT helped a lot with that, but it was, it was being willing to explore my internal experience, like, what is going on inside me? And I think, I think that probably is the first step of self awareness, is you have to be open to learning what’s going on inside with you. And for me, it was a lot of sadness. There’s a lot of sadness inside. Did you know that you were sad? No, no. And I mean, even when I would talk to my therapist and she tried to tell me, I’m sad, I was like, No, I’m not sad. That’s cute, but no, I’m not right. And then one day, I was like, actually, I’m really sad, and um, and once again, by acknowledging that I was actually really sad, I do not feel sad anymore. Part of that’s because of medication, because I got an antidepressant, and part of that is because I’ve been able to start to look in and say, what is making me so sad? What is that? And as I’ve learned that it’s like, what could I possibly do to change it, or what do I want to do, or, you know, or what support can I seek out to help with this? And even like when in in focus, it’s like, do I want to post about it in Slack? You know, I used to listen to your self trust episode The fifth one, like on repeat, and it’s about self trust. Is about self trust and making sure that you’re doing the things that you actually want to do, not just what like everybody else is telling you you have to do. And I was just like, I want to live. That you tell this, this story about how you were trying to that you were getting a certification, like a different certification, and that you just decided I don’t want to do this. Yep, I don’t want to do it, and you quit it, yeah. And I was like, that’s what I wanted to be able to say. I don’t want to do this. I want to be aware enough of myself to say, actually, I don’t want to do this. I don’t think it’s important for me, and I think I can succeed without doing it 100% and if I’m wrong, well then I’ll do it. And I mean, you said the same thing in your thing, you know, like, two years from now, if I decide I should have done it, I’ll just do it

Kristen Carder 38:50
100% Oh my gosh. So just for the listener, what Joe is referring to is I have a course on self trust in focus.

Joe Corpus 38:59
That’s why I joined. Oh, really, yeah. I listened to those episodes, the free episodes. There were a couple free ones, bunch of times, yeah. And then you would always say, Oh, you’ll never know if you if it’s a mistake, unless you try, yeah. And I was like, and then finally, one day, I realized, well, I could just sign up for one month and then cancel. I don’t like it, yeah, but people do, yeah, I’m sure people do. For me, it was very helpful.

Kristen Carder 39:24
So it’s awesome. Um, you mentioned that self awareness is an acceptance of reality, yes, and I just think that is so important and so true. But my question for you is, is that where the grief came in for you? Yes, was like seeing reality for what it was,

Joe Corpus 39:50
seeing how hard my formative years were, and not only that, seeing how hard I’d been on my. Myself,

Kristen Carder 40:00
Yes,

Joe Corpus 40:02
because I don’t know myself, and I’m just you said you felt like you were 14. I felt like I was an eight year old kid. Just going, what? What do you want me to do? Just tell me. Tell me what I can do. And now I know it’s like, tell me what I can do so I can be happy, or like, what I need to do, so that, because if everybody’s happy, then I’ll be happy, or something like that, you know, 100% but that’s how I always felt, you know.

Kristen Carder 40:27
So so the grief attached to seeing that,

Joe Corpus 40:30
yeah, see how how I’ve been treated by others, and always after that, it’s the grief of seeing how I’ve treated myself, yeah? And so that’s where the self compassion comes in, yeah, and I think as people go on the journey, I mean, at least for me, it was like, Well, I have to, I want to accept myself, not that I have to. I want to accept myself like I don’t. I read in John Bradshaw’s book healing the shame that binds you, I remember there was a line in there, and it was so impactful to me. He’s like, I don’t know exactly how it says it, but it’s like, you know, people are worried about hell. Well, I think hell is the experience of living your life and you don’t know yourself and you hate yourself. And I thought to myself, yeah, that is hell, because that’s what I’ve been living, and I don’t want to live like that anymore. In fact, reading that book was extremely helpful for me. We

Kristen Carder 41:24
will link it in the show notes for anyone who might be inspired. Because I agree that book I was farther along in my journey when I read it, but it was still very, very impactful for me as well. If someone is listening and they say, okay, Joe, I hear what you’re saying. This sounds great, but I don’t want to experience grief.

Joe Corpus 41:50
I would say I didn’t want to either. Did it last forever?

Kristen Carder 41:52
No. How long did it last couple months? Couple years, couple

Joe Corpus 41:56
months, couple months. I would say the very strong grief. Like, I think a lot of times when people think about grief too, they’re thinking about like, the strongest form of grief, like when grief is debilitating,

Kristen Carder 42:08
like losing a loved one or something like that. Yeah

Joe Corpus 42:12
There’s ways to experience grief where it’s not debilitating. It’s like, okay, I understand why I’m while I’m mourning this, and that is something that I have worked on. What I’ve started working on is, like, how to process those emotions. Well, like, I like, I like to say, like, a drip, just, just slowly, because I gotta work, you know, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta interact with my family. You know, there’s, there’s more things I could spend, probably my whole life going through grief, but I have to, you have to balance it all out. Yeah, can’t just do it all at once.

Kristen Carder 42:45
So what are the benefits? How has your life changed since you have gone through this process of developing your self awareness, and let me be very clear, you’ve been extremely intentional. I’ve never seen anyone, and I’ve coached a lot of clients, but I don’t think I’ve any ever seen anyone be so intentional with like, I’m starting here. I know I want to get over here to this point, and I’m just gonna, like, diligently, journal, reach out in Slack, hop on a coaching call like you are just very intentional with your self awareness process. And like, what have been the benefits for you? I feel lighter. I feel like the experience in your body,

Joe Corpus 43:35
Yes, like I used to always say, I don’t know why life feels so hard. And through self awareness and acceptance, I was like, Oh, my life feels hard because of all of these things. So what can I What can I do? And sometimes the answer is, well, I need to grieve this experience that I had. Sometimes the answer is, I need to get rid of toxic, these toxic people that are in my life. Sometimes the answer is, I’m pushing myself way beyond, like best those answers, I’m hungry, and I just didn’t even realize, yes, you know, yeah, it just I feel lighter and I feel I trust myself. I trust you know, does

Kristen Carder 44:18
that mean to you? Sorry? I interrupted you. No, no, you’re fine. Well,

Joe Corpus 44:21
it goes into residence. Okay. Go ahead. A couple weeks ago, I was sitting into in therapy, and I had told, I told my therapist, I said, if I didn’t grow anymore, like if today was the most I ever grew, it’s enough. And so to me, that’s kind of what that self awareness, that’s the gift that it’s giving me to get to a point where I can say I’m enough, like no matter what other people say, is I’m enough, I know myself, I understand myself, I can take care of myself. I’m enough. What’s that feel like? Well, I get. I give crying is like a go to emotion for me, so but it feels it feels good. I feel open. And, you know, sometimes, when you feel like you’re going to Christ, not always, because you’re sad, it’s more of a relief. Yes, you know it’s good to feel that. And before, I don’t think I would even be able to, well, I learning the emotional regulation is also what really helped me get into self awareness as I’m just thinking about it, yeah, I think I listened to your emotional regulation, like when I listened to that course after self trust, I listened to that course, and I listened to it so many times, wow. And even when I was having a big feeling. You had a meditation on, and I would just play that until I felt better. Wow. Sometimes I didn’t always feel better, but it did help over time. You know, I would say, like, um, before, let’s say something happened to me and I didn’t under or like I was having a heavy emotion and I was just debilitated. I couldn’t move forward and work. I would just sit and stare at my screen. Yes, that could last for three days. Yeah, now maybe it lasts an hour or something like that, but I can get to I can understand and sometimes the answer is, well, I’m actually not going to be productive anymore today. I need to go rest, because that’s the thing. I’ve been pushing myself too much, or I’m just having this heavy experience, yeah, and so I know that I just need to stop, because just to continue to push myself, it doesn’t get me anywhere, because I’ve lived my whole life like that, and that’s why I’m always working. Because half of it is me just being debilitated and angry, and then the other half is trying to catch up from all the time of being debilitated and angry,

Kristen Carder 46:44
oh my gosh, I feel like you’ve just described every ADHD year’s life like that is what it’s like.

Joe Corpus 46:52
yeah wow, that. And that’s what I’ve learned too. So then, so I’ll say this, something that I realized early on was like, well, instead of being debilitated and angry, let me take time to get in touch with myself, because it still is. I still have to take time to do that, right, but at least I’m making progress, whereas when I’m just being debilitated and angry at myself, I just stay in that cycle always, yeah, yeah. So then I was like, Well, no, I’ll just spend time taking care of myself, get to know myself, and then I’ll just catch up on my work, like I always have done before. But instead, this will this feels more productive for me than just staring at my screen, saying, Joe, why? Why can’t you just do this? Why can’t you just finish? Just finish what you’re doing, you know. And

Kristen Carder 47:41
now you have the answer to that. Now you know why? Yes. Now you’re like, Oh, I know exactly why.

Joe Corpus 47:46
I know why. It’s because I’m afraid of this, you know, or whatever. A lot of times it’s for me getting comfortable with uncertainty. What I’ve learned about myself is that uncertainty is a is a big fear of mine, and we deal with uncertainty every day. Uncertainty is a part of is a part of life, yeah, and then just kind of learning why I’m so afraid of uncertainty, and just getting comfortable with that and accepting like, okay, uncertainty makes me feel this way. I’m gonna still try to do this thing, and the worst thing that’s going to happen is, like, whatever I’m fearing about that uncertainty, that thing’s going to happen, or maybe it’s just going to work out, or maybe it’s just going to be neutral, like, maybe the outcome is neutral, and for the most part,

Kristen Carder 48:35
things tend to work out. It’s like, a weird thing, right? Yeah, yeah.

Joe Corpus 48:42
And I would say, like, eight months ago, I’d be like, no, none of this is gonna work out. Yeah. I mean, that’s what drove me to even sign up for focus, is because I was just having such a hard time with my business. And when you’re an entrepreneur, you don’t have anybody to hide behind anymore. All you have is yourself, yeah? So, yeah. I was like,

Kristen Carder 48:59
so let me pause you. Has this only been a 10 month journey for you? So I listen to feel like you’ve been made. You’ve made tons of progress. It’s been

Joe Corpus 49:10
a year. Okay? I listened to your podcast a lot. I had done therapy in the past too, but, you know, like 10 years ago, they didn’t talk about trauma the way. So this therapy that I’ve been doing now, so I would encourage anyone to, like, if they did therapy, like, 10 years ago, and maybe they made a little progress, because they did make some progress. But the finding a trauma informed therapist huge, and a trauma informed coach has, like, made all the difference.

Kristen Carder 49:38
Wow

Speaker 1 49:42
Because hearing other people understand my experience or reflect my experience back to me has helped me with that self awareness and acceptance too. Because a lot of times we all feel alone. Yes, you feel like you’re very alone 100 and then when you’re just hearing somebody else that they’re. Literally saying the thing that you’re afraid to admit, like, I’m I’m afraid of rejection, you know, like you don’t want to say that to people, because it’s shameful to be afraid of rejection. But then you’re just hearing other people saying you’re like, I’m afraid of rejection too, you know? So maybe that’s all the part of it. That’s kind of when it started, just just literally hearing other people say exactly what I was experiencing, and then seeing people that have experienced those things understood those things and that they were doing better. And so that’s always been a big motivator, too. Yeah, just that. I don’t want to feel heavy. I don’t I don’t want to feel lives are ready hard. I don’t want to add on top of that. You know what I mean? Yeah, I too, or I just want to make it easier for myself. Since life is so hard, I want to figure out, how can I make it easier for me? Yes,

Kristen Carder 50:50
yes, it’s so good. So as we wrap up here, what encouragement do you have for someone who’s listening, who is just maybe where you were a year or two ago, feeling like everything is hard and I don’t know where to start, and I am afraid of my emotions and I don’t really accept reality. Like, can you offer some encouragement to the listener as we close? Just to little pep talk about, sure, yeah,

Joe Corpus 51:21
I would just say that I’m very confident that what they’re feeling is just a normal and natural reaction to their life experience, yeah, and and that it’s so rewarding to be brave in that fear, like just just to face that fear just a little bit. Yeah, you like, don’t you know? What really gotten has gotten me through many days to this day, is that I only have to do things one step at a time. Like, I only have to do things one step at a time. So if self acceptance or or just self reflection and all those things, they find it difficult. It can be as easy as one step of just asking, like, how am I feeling today? Like, how am I feeling today? And just listening to that answer and accepting it, and as you build those muscles, it just gets it gets easier and easier for you. But the biggest thing I would say is that whatever they’re feeling it, it makes total sense. You know, nobody goes around saying, I just want to feel horrible.

Kristen Carder 52:42
I Wow. And yet, so many of us just live in that place for so long. Yeah, because,

Joe Corpus 52:47
yeah because you’re too I think a lot of times I think I don’t know for everybody, but for me, it’s like I was just too afraid, like, if I’m already feeling so terrible, whatever I’m going to uncover, it’s just gonna make me feel worse, and what I’m happy to report is actually the opposite. I mean, it can be heartbreaking to learn those things, but then there’s relief, the relief and the healing you can feel afterwards. It makes it all worth it.

Kristen Carder 53:17
I wish we could talk for 12 hours, but we can’t. So thank you so much, Joe, this has just been such a warm and beautiful and really, very reassuring conversation. And I’m really, really grateful to you for being here.

Joe Corpus 53:33
Thank you. Thank you. Enjoy being here.

Kristen Carder 53:39
Hey, ADH, dear. I see you, I know exactly what it’s like to feel lost, confused, frustrated, and like no one out there really understands the way that your brain works. That’s why I created Focus. Focus is my monthly coaching program where I lead you through a step by step process of understanding yourself feeling better and creating the life that you know you’re meant for. You’ll study, be coached, grow and make amazing changes, alongside of other educated professional adults with ADHD from all over the world. Visit I have adhd.com/focused to learn more. You.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai