This episode is sponsored by Cure Hydration. All right, I’m going to be real with you. Drinking water is boring. My ADHD brain is like, wait, we have to do this again? Like every day, multiple times. What in the world? And because I’m running from meetings to coaching calls to kid chaos, staying hydrated is not something I’m naturally good at. It’s not something I naturally think about. That’s why I’ve been obsessed with Cure hydration packs lately. Cure is a plant based hydrating electrolyte mix with no added sugar, only 25 calories, and it actually tastes good. The watermelon and berry pomegranate have been on repeat for me. I’m actually like really running low on those flavors, which is so sad. They’re refreshing without being too sweet or artificial. It feels like my water finally has a little bit of personality, which I enjoy. I really do. What I love most is that CURE uses a science backed formula that hydrates as effectively as an IV drip. So when I’m scrambling through my day forgetting my water again, CURE helps me to catch up fast. I throw a few packs in my bag and it makes drinking enough water simple. Which for my ADHD brain is basically a miracle. So staying hydrated isn’t just about water. You also need electrolytes. And that’s why I love cure. It’s clean, tastes great, and it actually works. And bonus, CURE is FSA HSA approved so you can use those funds to stay hydrated. The smart way for I have ADHD Podcast listeners. You can get 20% off your first order@curehydration.com ihaveadhd with the code ihaveadhd and if you get a post purchase survey make sure to tell them that you heard about Cure right here on the podcast. It really does help to support the show. Don’t just drink more water, Upgrade it with Cure. Save over $200 when you book weekly stays with Vrbo this winter. If you need to work, why not work from a chalet? If you haven’t seen your college besties since, well, college, you need a week to fully catch up in a snowy cabin. And if you have to stay in a remote place with your in laws, you should save over $200 a week. That’s the least we can do. So you might as well start digging out the long johns because saving over $200 on a week long snowcation rental is in the cards book now@vrbo.com. Welcome to the I have ADHD podcast where it’s all about education, encouragement and coaching for adults with adhd. I’m your host, Kristen 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 Kristen Carter and you are listening to The I have ADHD podcast, episode number 138. I am medicated, I am caffeinated with coffee and diet Coke and I am ready to roll. Hello, how are you? How are you? How are you? I hope that life is treating you well. I hope you’re great. Welcome to the show. If you are a brand new listener, I just want to say you’re in the right place. I’m so glad you’re here and if you are an og, a long time listener. Welcome back. So good to have you. So good to have so many listeners around the world. Who would have ever thought. So fun. There’s not much to report over here from the Carter home. I am just in the business. I am just in the business of like doing my thing during the day and then being a mama Uber in the evenings. So all day long I work in my ADHD coaching business. I write podcasts, I hang out on Instagram, I write emails, I create content list. The most fun thing I do is coach clients in varying capacities. And that is like my dream job. I love it so much. And then I spend my evenings as a mama Uber. That’s what I call myself. Essentially I am just the Uber of the family, running the children around. My husband is co Uber and we just take the kids to drum and to swimming. We have two kids in swimming lessons. No, not swimming lessons, swim team. They’ve practiced like four nights a week and we are running back and forth like crazy people to the school. But you know what? It’s winter in Pennsylvania. It gets dark at 5pm My kids like they need to get energy out. They have no idea what to do with their lives when they can’t go outside and play or be on an Xbox, which we don’t allow until later in the evening. And so with swim team, it is drumming, it is all of the things. So yeah, that’s it. And then I usually crawl into bed with a glass of wine and my phone or a good book and. Or a good book, like 9pm and I am just done. I don’t know if you are in the same boat as me, but like in the winter time, my brain just shuts down at like 8:30 or 9 and my body’s like, listen, the only thing we need right now is our bed. And so I comply and just go to bed. Oh my gosh. Last night though. Okay, so this is a major Survivor spoiler alert. It’s a week after the episode came out, so hopefully you’ve all seen it. If not, fast forward this part. But Greg and I watched the Survivor finale last night. Oh my goodness. I’m so glad that Erica won. She was the one that I wanted to win for quite some time. Her gameplay was fantastic. She was the dark horse. Nobody expected it. It’s so hilarious that what’s his name? Not even get one vote. I can’t remember his name. You know, the white dude, very athletic. What was his name? Oh, Xander. No offense to any of you named Xander, but he was like the most Xander Xander. You know what I’m saying? Like he was the Xander est of all the Xanders. And anyway, he didn’t even get one vote. I can’t believe it. It was so good. So good. I did share on last week’s episode that we are moving. And not just moving, but building a house, which I can’t believe I’m saying out loud. Like, this is actually happening. This life that I am creating is unrecognizable to the person that I was 10 years ago and even five years ago. Like, it is absolutely wild. I just want to go back to 10 years ago. Me, who was non functional, filled with anxiety and frustration, overwhelmed constantly was like watching daytime TV because she didn’t know what else to do with her life and really hating being a mom but feeling like that was the only option for her. I just want to go back and be like, it gets so much better. Hang in there. You’re going to be okay. I don’t know if you guys relate to that, but the person that I was 10 years ago would not believe what’s happening right now. She couldn’t pay her bills. She was borrowing money to heat her house. She was not surrounded by relationships. That felt really connected and empowering. She didn’t feel like she could show up and be herself in the world. And yeah, a lot can happen in 10 years. So if that is you right now, where you’re just feeling like I’m non functional, I don’t even know, like, where to start, what to do. I just want you to know that I know that everybody’s journey is different, but things can change, things really can improve and that’s important for me to communicate to you because, yeah, I really would not believe it. If I went back and told 10 years ago me, she would be like, what are you talking about? That’s not even possible. So anyway, we’re building a house, which is such a privilege. I can’t believe I get to do it. People keep asking me if it’s stressful, and I’m like, no, it’s not stressful. It’s a privilege. Like, this is the ultimate privilege. I guess some people get stressed out, like, with all the decisions or whatever, but, like, I get to decide. I get to make these decisions. Like, what a huge privilege. So I’m just choosing not to be stressed. I’m just choosing to recognize my privilege in all of this. Because like I said, 10 years ago, me would have. Would have been. She would. There’s no way she would have been able to do this 20 years ago me. God bless her. O gosh, I just have so much compassion for past me. So anyway, I’m realizing that moving means that sometime in the next couple weeks or months, I’m gonna have to start packing up my house, my current house. Like, I’m gonna actually have to move, which I’ve just been blocking out. Like, I have been blocking out the fact that I’m going to have to, like, empty out closets and put things into boxes and, like, label things and organize them. I don’t even know. I just am completely detaching and avoiding that section. And I’m just waiting for Greg to be like, it’s time. And he can kind of head that part up. Because I don’t. Oh, I don’t really even know. I don’t even want. I don’t want to do it. But what we’re doing is we are trying to get the house ready. Greg is home right now changing out closet doors or something crazy like that. Because that ought to do it. That ought to make our current house, like, really sellable. I don’t know. Apparently that’s a thing. Anyway, so I’ve been spending so much of my mental energy on the new house so amazing that I’ve been avoiding the fact that we are gonna have to pack, which is fine. I’m just gonna avoid it until I guess I can’t anymore. You know, ADHD is annoying, but one of the ways that I navigate ADHD is that I really do wait for an urgent deadline. And once that urgent deadline is there, like, I’m going to snap into gear. I trust myself to get it done once there’s urgency. But right now there’s not urgency. So I’m just not going to do it. All right. Anyway, if your life is kind of like a grind, you know, where you’re just like working all day, running kids around all night, have some things that you’re also doing on the side, like, I’m with you. I get you. I’m in the same boat. It’s a privilege to be a human in the world. But like, also, wow. I’m tired. Okay, guys, I’m tired. Okay. Last week’s episode, it was a really beautiful time of reflecting on 2021 and coming to terms with what worked, what didn’t work, and what you might want to do differently. And this week’s episode, we are going to dive in to dreaming and planning for 2022. Now, I want to remind you that ADHDers are not great with self reflection. This has to do with a couple deficient executive functioning skills that are working against us. So we struggle to perceive and understand the passage of time. So in short, we are time blind. So this makes it hard to even pinpoint ourselves within the construct of time. I don’t know if this is making sense to you, but when I’m like, think back on the last year, what are you even talking about? It’s like this meta ethereal thing that we just do not feel grounded within the construct of time. And so even in this episode, as we are looking to 2022, as we’re looking a year out, that might also feel very, very uncomfortable and weird for you. And likely some of that has to do with our perception of time. Additionally, one of the reasons why we struggle to reflect is another executive functioning skill is metacognition, which is the ability to stand back and take essentially a bird’s eye view of oneself in a situation. It’s the ability to observe how you problem solve. And it also includes like self evaluation skills and listen. That is an executive functioning skill which is housed in the frontal lobe which is underdeveloped in our brain. So it makes sense that we are not great with self reflection and self evaluating. And additionally, we really struggle with our working memory. So we struggle to remember the things that we’ve done. We struggle with that memory man. So we struggle to notice patterns within our own lives and to notice the things that are working or not working. So that’s why last week’s episode is so important, because these three underdeveloped skills can make it so that we’re extremely deficient or just like not so good at evaluating ourselves and knowing what to change about what we’re doing so that we can make the progress we want to make. Right, Right. So it can. Then. I mean, it’s definitely connected to, like, can we step into the future with any kind of clarity? So, anyway, if you haven’t listened to last week’s episode, I’m gonna highly recommend that you do that, because it is really important. And even if you’re not listening to this in real time, which I know a lot of, you kind of find the podcast and then you binge all the episodes, which is so fun, I want you to know that these skills, you know, it doesn’t matter if it’s not the end of the year or the beginning of a new year, it’s still really great to take so stock of where you are in life, what’s working, what’s not working, what you want to do differently, and then imagine the future that you want to step into. And so today, we’ll be building on last week’s episode by imagining what might be possible for us in 2022 as we look at the coming year, what might be possible. But before we get started, it’s time to hear from our sponsors. This such a dork. You know, I listen to other podcasts, and I listen to how they do their ads, and I just. I don’t know, like, we’re all just out here trying to make a way for ourselves. And some people are doing their ads with funny accents because it’s just, like, more engaging for the listener. Some people are playing music behind it because that feels more engaging. I just. I think it’s really funny to think about, like, how all of us in this new space of podcasting, it’s only been around for a couple years, how we’re all just trying to, like, figure it out. It’s just amazing. So, anyway, this podcast is sponsored by Focused. Listen. If this podcast is changing your life, you’ve got to check out Focused. Focused is my ADHD coaching program, where we take the concepts that I dabble in on the podcast, and we go deep, deep, deep, deep, deep. We study them and apply them to our lives, and we make huge, sustainable, lasting changes. I am a qualified, certified, experienced life coach. I mean, I say that with a weird tone of voice, but, like, it’s actually true. I’ve coached hundreds of clients, and I have thousands of coaching hours under my belt. I have a lot of experience. Focused is the perfect complement to an ADHD treatment protocol. So if you’re being treated for your adhd, but you Feel like there’s some something holding you back. First of all, I get it. I’ve been there. Second of all, I want you to know that it is possible for you to take control of your Life. Go to ihaveadhd.com focused to learn more. Learn all the things. Oh boy, do I have big plans for focused in 2022. I cannot wait. I’ve been planning with my team I and we’re pumped. It’s going to be a really amazing year. But that’s not what this episode is about. This episode is about you and your plans and your year. So as I mentioned, not only is self reflection difficult, but so is future casting. So we’ve all, as adhders, got some deficient skills that make it difficult to not only reflect on and change our behavior like we talked about last week, but also look to the future, make a plan, prioritize, and then follow through on making our dreams come true. The executive functioning skills that go into this are like visualization, organization, prioritizing, planning. So, yeah, organizing our behavior across time to reach a goal, it’s not so great. We’re not so good at it. So some or all of these skills are likely deficient for you like they are for me. So that makes it hard to dream up and essentially manifest a vision, a future, exactly what you want out of your life. Okay? But I want you to know that even though ADHD does affect our frontal lobe and all of our executive functioning skills, it is possible to develop and improve these skills. Now, it’s not going to be perfect and it’s not going to be linear. It’s going to be a little clunky. But if you know that these are weaknesses and you purpose yourself to develop them, you can, it does work. You might not be able to do it alone. You might want to elicit the help of a best friend or a partner or a therapist or a cognitive behavioral therapist or a life coach. But I am telling you that these skills, skills of visualizing what you want, organizing it in your brain, prioritizing what’s most important and following through, they can be improved little by little. So that’s what we’re going to do today. Okay? Now, as we have this discussion, some of you might know right away exactly what you want out of 2022. You might know exactly what you want it to look like. You might already have a picture of it in your mind, and that’s fantastic. But I’m going to guess that most of you are like, wait, what? It’s 2022. It’s coming. I have no idea. I haven’t thought about it. I have no. My chair keeps squeaking. Okay. Distracted, Moving. Okay. Most of you, I’m guessing, are just like, I have no idea. So I want to just encourage you. Don’t freak out. It’s okay. You don’t have to worry. Do not fret. We’re going to just have fun on this episode. We’re going to play. There’s no pressure. This is just fantasy. This is play. This is fun. We’re just going to have a good time today. Okay, here’s what I want to say. If you have no idea what you want 2022 to look like, which you know is the next year coming, it might actually be easier for you to start with a vision of what you want your life to look like in five years. Okay. Because for those of you who are beginning to develop a vision, a picture of what you want your life to look like, there’s probably a lot of changes that you want to make. I know there was. For me, when I started doing this work, I was like, holy bleep. There’s a lot that I want to change. And then I started to feel the urgency of, like, I need to do it all now, and all of this is important, and I have to get it done now. And then I just really paralyzed myself. And that wasn’t great. It wasn’t effective, and I don’t want you to do that. So if you can think about your life in five years, that can relieve some of the pressure. It can relieve some of the urgency, which is really important, because remember, your emotion is what is going to fuel your action. And so if you’re feeling pressure and urgency, that’s actually going to cause your body to likely go into, like, a flight or fight state or maybe a freeze state, and you’re probably just going to avoid it. Okay? So again, if you’re like, I have no idea what I want next year to look like, I want to encourage you to look out five years, okay? Five years is a long way away. And so that relieves a lot of the tension. It creates a lot more space. Because making big changes within one year can seem daunting and overwhelming. But five years is doable, right? So a lot of times I do find that it’s easier to dream about five years out and then work your way backwards to determine, okay, if I want that vision of my life in five years, if I want to make that happen, what’s the first step? And then the first step can Be what your vision is for this coming year. Are you with me? Do you get it? Okay, so we’re going to go there for a minute. Remember our hiking analogy from last week? I want you to imagine you’re now standing at a peak. It’s a mile marker for 2020. Remember, the end of the year is not a finish line. It’s just a mile marker. And we’re looking at the view of what’s ahead for us. What do you see? What direction do you want your life to go? What do you see way off in the distance? It’s a little fuzzy, but you know it’s out there for you. Something that’s like welling up within you. It’s burning in your belly. Maybe it’s a new job or a new relationship or maybe it’s financial freedom, like student loans being paid off. Maybe you’d like to move or start a company or change your relationship with your family of origin. What is it that you really can picture being down the road for you? What is it now? I work with all types and levels of ADHDers in my coaching program focus and I also have a very small handful of one on one, like high profile, public figure type clients. I was just doing this exercise with a one on one client in our session today when we were doing this exercise. Here are the things that she wanted to tackle. She wants to write a book and then go on a publicity tour for the book, start a podcast, clean up the inner workings of her business and do a bunch of corporate speaking engagements. That’s a tall order, right? And it all feels important to her. And let me tell you, she’s brilliant. She can do it like she is the person that can get all of this done. But this is actually like a five year transformation. This is not a one year thing. And sometimes realizing that all of the things that you want to do is actually a five year thing at first it can be annoying and you can feel this impatience like, no, I want it to all be done now. But the truth is that if this client of mine were to focus on cleaning up the back end of her business, writing a book, going under, publicity tour, starting a podcast, doing all of these corporate speaking engagements, if that was her focus for 2022, she would be paralyzed and she would get nothing done. Okay, that is just the truth. So what we did together and what I want to encourage you to do is put all of those things in order of importance, like domino effect importance. And what I mean by that is like what needs to happen first in order to allow the other things to happen. What is that first domino that sets off the trajectory of all the other dominoes? Okay, so you’re looking at your life. You’re imagining in five years. These are the things that I want to see come to life. These are the things that I want to make happen. And then you ask yourself, what is the first domino? This is so interesting because this is like happening in real time as I’m imagining this. But I do want you to think about, like, setting up dominoes and you just like tip one over, which tips the other one over, which tips the other one over. And a lot of times our goals are like that. What we don’t want to do is stack a whole bunch of dominoes in a way that’s not affecting the other ones. And so we’re just trying to like click over, tip over random dominoes. And it’s just not like this successive pattern. It doesn’t make sense. And I think a lot of us are approaching our goals in that way. We’re approaching it like, okay, I’m going to tip over this one, but that has no effect over here. I’m going to tip over this one. And we’re just running around like, pretty ineffectively, if that’s making sense. So I want you to put your goals in order of domino effect. Important, okay. What needs to happen first in order to allow the other things to happen? So as I was speaking with this client, the most important thing for today, which I know is earlier than what you’re listening to, but today, December 16, 2021, the most important thing that she do today is clean up the back end of her business. That is priority number one because she makes great multiple six figure revenue. But she doesn’t have good boundaries, she doesn’t have a good system. She’s bogged down with work that she shouldn’t be doing. So really nothing else on the list matters right now. It’s just cleaning up the back end of her business so that she has really good boundaries, a really good team to rely on, and lots more time in her day. Okay, so this is the one domino, the first domino that’s going to tip over the other dominoes. So the next domino is once she has more time in her day, she knows that the best way to grow her audience with all of the connections and expertise that she has, the best way for her personally is to start a podcast. And so she knows that the next domino is the podcast. Yes, she wants to write a book. 100% yes, she wants to do these speaking engagements and tours. But that is not going to happen effectively until she cleans up the back end of her business so that she has a lot more time time in her days and then starts the podcast and begins to grow her audience. Because selling a book to a large podcast audience is a lot more effective than selling a book to a small, like Instagram audience or a small email list. Right? So once she has a business that functions well on its own and she’s mastered the art of podcasting, then she’s going to have space in her brain to write a book. Do you see how, like, even though all of these things are things she wants to do, there is a specific order that she can follow that makes sense. And this is true for you too. Okay, so she was explaining me the book writing process, because I actually don’t know the book writing process and she has experience in this area already. So she said, you know, once I’ve actually done the work of writing the book, it takes a year for the editors and the publishers to actually finish up and like have it complete. So she can do the work of writing the book and then there’s nothing for her to do while the publisher is publishing it. Right? So while the book is in publishing, she can continue to podcast. She can continue to oversee her business, which is now functioning really well while she’s traveling for corporate speaking engagements. Right? So finally we’re able to add in that next thing that she wants to do. All right? And then once the book comes out and is published, she can continue to oversee her well oiled machine of a business podcast weekly, go on a press tour for her book. And when the press tour is complete, she’ll have so many opportunities. So even though this client wants to. She had five things that she wanted to do in 2022. Clean up her business, start a podcast, write a book, go on the publicity tour, do corporate speaking engagements. We determined that, like, this is actually a five year plan. This is not a one year plan. This is. These are things. And most people don’t even get any of this done in one lifetime. Right? And so to think, okay, in five years, if all of this can be done, I’m not going to be disappointed that it took five years. I’m going to be so pumped that I got it done. And then we ask ourselves, what is the one thing, the starter domino, that’s going to tip over all of the other dominoes? Right. I love it. So in five years, So I have a business that’s essentially running itself A thriving podcast, a best selling book, and regular corporate engagements like Totally doable for her in five years. And I want you to think about your dreams and your goals. Is five years too long to wait to get all of those things right? Is five years too long to do all of the things that you want to do? Probably not. It’s relieving to see that far down the road because a lot of you have several big things that you want to accomplish. But transfer transformation takes time. Huge changes are going to take years. And that’s okay. Start by envisioning five years out and then work your way backwards to what big goals you want to set for yourself this year. And let that big goal for this year be that most important domino that will affect everything else. It’s the one thing that would set you on the path to achieve your long term five year plan. It’s the one thing that would give you the opportunity to accomplish all the other things, right? So cleaning up the back end of her business, setting better boundaries, like having a team that she can rely on, that is the one thing that will give her about 20 hours of her week back, right? It’s the most important step for her right now in 2022, even though it’s not as exciting as like, I’m going to write a book. But cleaning that up is the most important thing because it’s going to give her so much time. If she tried to add in podcasting and writing a book, speaking engagements now when her business is chaotic and all consuming, she would not have the space or the bandwidth to do it. She would burn out. She wouldn’t accomplish it right? But cleaning up that business means she’s actually creating time and space to be able to pump out the content that she wants to create. It’s the one thing that would change everything. And so it is the number one goal for 2022. And so I’m using this as an example and I want to ask you, what is that one thing for you? What is that first domino that needs to tip over so that all of the other dominoes can follow? Maybe for you it’s being diagnosed and treated for your adhd. Maybe it’s getting a second job so that you can afford to pay a personal assistant to help you with all of the logistical things in your life that you suck at. Maybe it’s changing careers so that you are being compensated fairly for the work that you’re doing. Maybe it’s leaving your emotionally abusive relationship so that you can have the mental and emotional capacity to Move forward with your own goals. Maybe it’s being willing to dive into therapy to heal up the traumas from your past. Maybe it’s doubling your business revenue so that you can retire your husband so that he can stay home with the kids and be the house manager. What do you dream about? What do you dream about becoming? What makes your soul come alive? What gives you all those butterflies in your tummy? Start to envision yourself as that person doing that thing that you dream about doing all the things that you’re dreaming about. But I want to encourage you to make sure that for 2022, you’re setting one big goal. There’s one thing that you’re working toward. Even though the ADHD brain likes to hop around all the different ideas, having one steady goal that you’re focused on will significantly increase the likelihood of that you’ll accomplish it. And this is where we’re going to bring in the visualization skills and developing the skills to see the goal, to see the thing that you want to do. And if you have two goals, it’s fine, but have the second one as a subsequent goal, the second domino, right? Meaning the first one has to be accomplished first, and then once it’s done, then the second one starts. Much like my client who’s going to clean up the back end of her business first, and then once that done, she’ll have time and space to start a podcast, right? So she essentially does have two goals for 2022, but she’s focusing on them one at a time. She won’t even think about podcasting until she’s got a clean and tidy and tight business and therefore many, many more hours in her day. Much more brain space to accomplish her podcasting goal. So do you have your goal in mind or goals? Can you see yourself in five years with a bunch of things accomplished? And have you figured out, like, what’s the most important thing to focus on this year? This is that deficient prioritization skill, that executive functioning skill. So I want you to know that you may experience this in a way that’s like, I don’t know, I don’t know what’s most important. I don’t know what to say. And I just want you to think about it as, what is that first domino that will knock over the next domino? Like, what’s the most important thing? It would be great if you wanted to sit down with a pen and paper and do some journaling. It would be great if you wanted to talk to your therapist or your coach about this. That would be great. We want to join focused and go through my Living with vision course. And all of this would be great. But you don’t need to rush on creating the goal. You have time. But once you have it in mind, I want you to think about three important things. The first thing, how am I going to remember this goal? Remember, your working memory sucks. Okay? That is because of your underdeveloped frontal lobe, your deficient cognitive skills. It’s not a problem because you’re going to figure out a way to remember it. But that’s the first thing. How are you going to remember it? Second, who do I need to become in order to accomplish this goal? We’ll talk more about that. Third, who and what? Oh, this is big. This is big. Get ready. Who and what do I need to say no to in order to accomplish this goal? So let’s talk about the first one. How am I going to remember this goal? I want to encourage you to make the goal visible. Put it everywhere. It’s one big goal. It’s not that other things aren’t happening. It’s not that you drop everything else, but it’s the one thing that you are visualizing in your life. You are setting your brain to kind of solve the problem of how are we going to accomplish it? So put sticky notes in your car, on the bathroom mirror, in the fridge. Dream about it, spend time imagining it, journal about it. This is your goal for the year. It’s the one thing that you’ve decided will change everything. It’s worth thinking about, it’s worth fantasizing about. It’s worth spending your mental energy on. So I want you to really. Excuse me. I want you to really think about this goal, like, imagining it, working on your skill of visualizing it, making sure that you can see it, that you can taste it. Okay? And listen, your brain is designed to solve problems, and your brain is designed to create. And so if you are continually focusing on this goal, continually focusing on this goal, your brain. Now, you might not accomplish it in 2022, but you’ll get a lot closer because your brain is designed to do that. But it won’t do it if it doesn’t remember. That’s like a key. That’s a key. It won’t do it if you don’t remember. So it’s really important that you externalize this goal. Put it up somewhere, make it so that you remember it. I want you to ask yourself, who do I need to become in order to accomplish this goal? This is big. What kind of A person accomplishes this goal. So I don’t want you to just make a plan for, like, here are the things that I need to do in order to accomplish it. It’s more of who do I need to become in order to accomplish it. This is a very life coach y topic, okay? But I’m telling you, totally changed my life, and I think it will totally change your life. What kind of a person actually accomplishes this goal? What do they think about? What are they feeling during the day? What are their relationships like? What does their life look like? Your job this year is to evolve into that person. Because the person you are today can’t accomplish the goal, right? If you could, you just go do it today, right? But you can’t. So you’re going to need to make some changes in your life. You’re going to need to evolve a little bit. You’re going to have to think about changing your identity into the person who can and does does accomplish this goal. Your job is to begin to identify as someone who has done it. Imagine yourself having completed it. What do you feel like? What are you thinking? And I encourage you. This is, you know, tied to remembering. And as you’re fantasizing and visualizing, I want you to live into that identity every day. Live into that identity every day. What would I be thinking if I’ve already accomplished this goal? What would I be thinking if I knew how to do it? How would I feel if it’s already done? What would my life look like? Okay. And live into that identity every day. And let me tell you, when you do accomplish the goal, it’s kind of a letdown. I’m not lying. It’s kind of a letdown because you’ve already changed your identity along the way. And so when the goal happens, it’s just kind of like, oh, yeah, of course. It’s shocking. It is shocking. Shocking, Shocking. For those of you who haven’t listened to my episode on self sabotage and why you’re stuck, I think that relates to this very, very, very much. Because one of the reasons why we stay stuck is because we don’t actually change our identity into the person who can accomplish the goal. So I think that that episode is. I highly recommend you listen to it as you are shifting your identity into the person who can and does accomplish the goal. Okay? The last thing is I really want you to consider who you need to say no to in order to accomplish the goal. What kind of boundaries do you need to set for your life so you can accomplish this goal? The more that I work with ADHD is, the more that I realize how few boundaries many of us have. Boundaries are a whole thing for us seems to be a pervasive deficiency within our community. And I think it’s, I don’t know, maybe trauma related or I just, I don’t know. We struggle with boundaries, but there’s no way that you’re going to be able to shift your identity and become the person who accomplishes this big goal if you’re not willing to figure out how to create boundaries. So say no to people, Say no to jobs or tasks or even things, you know, other things that you want to do and stop carrying what’s not yours to carry. And this is a whole episode that I actually hope to have a psychotherapist on to chat about. But suffice it to say that I set a huge, impossible goal for 2021 and promptly went to work figuring out how to do it. And one of the main things that I learned is that I needed to set better boundaries. And the way that I did this personally, not everybody is going to be the same, but the way that I did this was I went to weekly therapy sessions with my therapist. I had weekly coaching sessions with my coach. I read three books on boundaries this year. Highly recommend Nedra Tawab’s book Set Boundaries, Find Peace. She’s amazing and you can follow her on Instagram as well. I think it’s just Edrathawab. It’s Tawwab, so just remember two W’s and her last name. Set Boundaries, Find Peace. So good. The book Boundaries by Townsend and Cloud is very good. It’s from like an old school, fundamental Christian perspective. So if that’s not your jam, I totally understand. But there are really good nuggets in there and I actually prefer their definition of boundaries to anyone else’s that I’ve read. And then another one called Necessary Endings, which is, it talks about boundaries within the context of business, which I think, you know, a lot of you are entrepreneurs or successful in business, and I want to offer that to you as a resource as well. That one is called. What did I say it’s called? Oh my goodness, it left my brain. Necessary Endings. Yeah, that one is really good. But implementing boundaries and tolerating the discomfort that comes with setting boundaries is a really important skill that will allow you to accomplish your goal. Because here’s what’s true. Doing the right thing often feels uncomfortable. Making the right decision for me, for my family, for my business, for my goal. It often feels really uncomfortable and it’s inconvenient for other people. Hear me. It can be inconvenient for other people. But the discomfort is the price that we pay to see our dreams come true. I really believe that. Listen. Discomfort is the price that we pay. It’s the price. Discomfort’s the price that we pay in order to see our dreams come true. So I want you to know that your life is yours to design. Your life is yours to create. So I know that some of you are listening with more freedom than others. Some of you are listening with more opportunity than others. Some of you are listening with more money than others. I understand that. I do. But I want to encourage you that even small changes, little by little, small shifts, can lead to big, huge goals being accomplished. So I encourage you, my listener, my dear, dear friend, to begin to imagine what’s possible for you. Determine one thing that will change everything. That first domino and set that as your goal for 2022. And then ask yourself, how am I going to remember this? Who do I need to become in order to accomplish this? And who or what do I need to say no to in order to make this happen? Have an amazing time designing the life of your dreams. I will talk to you next week. I cannot wait. If you’re being treated for your ADHD but you still don’t feel like you’re reaching your potential, you’ve got to join Focused. It’s my monthly coaching membership where I teach you how to tame your wild thoughts and create the life that you’ve always wanted. No matter what season of life you’re in or where you are in the world, Focused is for you. All materials and call recordings are stored in the site for you to access at your convenience. Go to ihaveadhd.com focused for all the info.
