In this episode, Ash and Dusty explore the concept of humility as a vital strength for people with ADHD. They discuss how humility differs from shame and self-deprecation and how it can help individuals manage the real impacts of ADHD symptoms, such as impulsivity and missed commitments, without falling into harsh self-judgment. Dusty shares how humility is an essential coaching tool that fosters cognitive flexibility, accountability, and authentic self-awareness, allowing clients to approach challenges with curiosity rather than ego or shame.
The conversation also delves into how humility can counteract imposter syndrome and rejection sensitivity, common struggles for those with ADHD. By embracing humility, individuals can let go of perfectionistic standards, accept their imperfections alongside others’, and build healthier relationships with themselves and those around them. Ash and Dusty emphasize the importance of modeling humility, owning mistakes honestly without shame, and understanding failure as a natural part of growth on the ADHD journey.
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Episode Transcript:
[00:02:15] Asher: Hi, I’m Ash. [00:03:22] Dusty: And I’m Dusty. [00:04:28] Asher: And this is Translating ADHD. [00:08:20] Dusty: Listeners. I’m doing another coffee chat on December 9th at 8:30 p.m. eastern time or 5:30 p.m. PST. We had a lot of fun the last time, so hopefully you guys come. I learned a lot. I learned some tips about cat care from the folks who were there. We, we discussed gardening techniques. There was, it was pretty good.It was a good time. So come on over. Also, don’t forget, I still have spots for the next round of group coaching. Starting in January. Group coaching is a really affordable and sustainable way to get a sense of what ADHD coaching is like and to get some coaching time with me. It’s a small group between 6 and 9 people.
It costs $200 a month or it can be sliding scale if you are in need of access. But spots are really limited and it’s on Thursdays from 3 to 5 p.m. PST, so just go to ADHD studio.CA or Vancouver ADHD coaching.com and send me a message.
[01:10:23] Asher: So Dusty, I want to tell our listeners what we’re talking about today. [01:14:05] Dusty: Today we’re talking about ADHD and humility. [01:18:21] Asher: Ooh, say more about that. [01:20:25] Dusty: Yeah. So when I was getting trained as a coach at ADCA, we use something called the Via Character Strengths Index. Kind of like this like personality test that helps you figure out your strengths. And there’s lots of different ones. There’s the Gallup Strengthsfinder, blah blah, blah. So this is the one that ADCA uses often because it’s free and one of the things that I struggled with as a coach early on was that one of the strengths was like humility.And I was like, what? How is humility a strength? It’s a characteristic. And people are very humble. But it kind of caught my brain and I was quite curious, about how humility could be a strength, especially when, you know, like, we talked about in previous episodes around self esteem. So many of us already struggle with feeling not good enough when we’re already struggling with self-esteem.
Where’s the line between being humble and having humility and being self-deprecating, or not having good enough self-worth? Right. I think it’s kind of a it’s a bit smashy, but as I’ve coached over the years, I’ve come to see humility as a really important strength, especially in actually like resolving and bypassing shame and helping to work through failures, because we talk so much about how like, we don’t want to focus on failures and how not everything is our fault, and we can advocate for ourselves and and we don’t want to get into shame.
And you know, the thing we’re not necessarily talking about here is that sometimes with ADHD, like we do absolutely mess up and we do let people down, we make promises that we can’t keep. We take impulsive actions like there is real fallout of ADHD symptoms when they’re not, you know, properly managed. And sometimes they’re not properly managed despite your best efforts.
If we could just manage them all the time perfectly, we wouldn’t have ADHD. So the like, the outcome and the goal of good self-management isn’t to never screw up and to not have any ADHD symptoms. That’s not possible. The goal is to, like, have as minimal symptoms and to have those symptoms have as minimal impact as possible. But the whole thing about ATC being a disability is that it does still happen.
And so whether you’re managing your ATC well or whether you’re sort of new to ATC and you haven’t realized that a lot of the the things that you do that might impact other people are attributable to ADHD. You know, sometimes we do have things that we need to kind of like make up for or manage or manage around that have impacts on other people.
And I’ve come to realize that, like, humility can be a really powerful ally that runs parallel to shame and is like a better conduit for making amends, making repairs, and fixing issues than shame does.
[03:59:08] Asher: See, I’m finding this really fascinating, and I’m curious how this might show up in your coaching. [04:04:21] Dusty: Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, for me, it’s huge. I think it’s one of the most important parts of being a coach. Right? When I wanted to get into ADHD coaching, I had no idea what it was. And I thought I was going to get to tell everybody what to do and like, give them all my great ADHD tips.And I, you know, I love to tell people what to do. So I would say it’s still quite a daily struggle for me to be a really good coach and, and allow clients the space to find their own meaning and their own, you know, outcomes. And I primarily do that through humility, like, like reminding myself that I’m not the expert and I’m not better than them.
And I don’t know everything. Right. So it certainly is one of the most important things that I can do as a coach for my clients. But I think that it actually also is a really important coaching tool for clients in two ways. One, because we get into black and white thinking and we have that oppositional. I think we are sometimes too rigid in our thinking.
As people with ADHD, we are. We can sometimes be closed minded to potential solutions and like kind of reminding ourselves that we like, don’t know everything or that like sometimes something you thought wouldn’t work has worked. If we can sort of like, tap into humility, we can almost like introduce a little bit of, like cognitive flexibility and willingness to try things.
And so I think it actually is an important tool in getting clients to open up and, and consider other possibilities. Right. So that’s that’s one way that we use humility in coaching, but another way that humility has been really important for me and for some of my clients is in, managing follow. Right. So I think when something bad happens as a result of sort of an ADHD symptom, whether it’s like if you take impulsive action or you’re reactive or you, you know, you overpromise and you underdelivered, you know, you can I think people tendencies to go one of two ways, either to like make excuses and say like, well, it’s not my fault I
have ADHD or like, you can’t expect me to blah blah blah, right? And they and well, ATC is a real reason. I have seen it be the case that people sidestep accountability or say, well, I can’t do that. I can’t do that because of ADHD or like, you can’t have these expectations because of ADHD, or it’s not my fault because of ADHD or the other direction that people go is like, well, I guess I’m just a piece of crap, I suck, I’m terrible, I’m a bad person.
I’m so sorry. They go to shame, right? And I think humility is the third option, right? So when we’re being humble, we can basically, you know, it’s not sort of not seeing yourself as more special than, than than you are, but also recognizing that you don’t know everything, but also that it’s okay not to know everything. Right? I think it in a way, practicing humility.
It makes it not personal in a way. So if you have made a mistake, if you’ve caused harm to someone else unintentionally, I think being humble and just saying, wow, that wasn’t my intention. And I’ve really got something to think about here. Like, I didn’t I didn’t anticipate this outcome. I’ve got a lot to think about. And like, I, I, you know, certainly don’t want to cause this harm to you in the future.
And so I’m gonna I’m going to really do what I can to improve in the future is a way to make people feel heard and cared about, but it’s also a way to stay out of like, well, I guess I’m a piece of crap, right? Because when you go to the well, I guess I’m a piece of crap, you’re sort of you’re making the mistake, mean something about you.
Whereas if you’re being sort of humble, you’re acknowledging that everybody makes mistakes and that you’ve now you’ve made some mistake, you’ve, you know, caused some harm, and that you can play a role in correcting it. And so there’s a kind of agency and there’s a kind of power fulness in humility, I think. Does does this make sense? What I’m saying?
[07:47:10] Asher: Absolutely it does. And as you were talking, I was thinking about how humility has played a role in my own coaching, even though it’s not a concept that I’ve thought about in the way that you’ve thought about it. And something that I think is really important as a coach is what we model for our clients, and humility is something that I model.Meaning if I make a mistake, if I drop a ball, if I miss an appointment, or I’m not as communicative as I like to be or whatever, if it’s something that is my stuff, I. I own that and I own it with honesty, but I don’t own it from a place of shame because I want to model that for my clients.
I want a model that there is room for mistakes here. We all have ADHD. There is going to be a time where there is a schedule snafu, or where something doesn’t go exactly the way we intended it to go, or one of us screws up in some way. And I’ve noticed with new clients that first time that they miss a session, they they come really shameful, really guilty, really apologetic.
They feel horrible. Right. And that’s not what I want to model for them. And so when it’s when it’s my error or my mistake, I model from a place of I’m owning and acknowledging it in an honest way. But I’m not I’m not going to fall all over myself to apologize. I’m not going to come from guilt or shame.
I’m just going to put it out there and then let’s have a conversation about it from here.
[09:13:28] Dusty: Yeah, exactly. It’s it’s I think it comes into it’s a, it’s a real coaching skill as a coach. And there’s two other really specific ways that I think humility can be helpful with like very particularly ADHD issues. One is imposter syndrome and one is rejection sensitivity. So can I explain. [09:35:05] Asher: Yes please. [09:36:12] Dusty: Okay. So imposter syndrome if you’ve ever looked at my like Twitter bio, I call myself the Henry Rollins of ADHD coaching. So if you don’t know who Henry Rollins is, he was the singer of a band called Black Flag, which was a really influential DC punk band, and Henry Rollins is really quite a character. He’s, first of all, a super, super neurodivergent guy, goes to the gym like three hours a day and is obsessed with music.If you’ve ever read any of his books, he has an endless appetite for like, new records, listening to new music. He listens to the same album every Friday, so like a lot of a lot of neurodivergent vibes going on here now, but he actually does have ADHD anyway. So one of the things I love about Henry Rollins is like, he’s so wise, he’s so smart, he’s got such a great view on things, and he’s like this big beefy like he do like he’s really tough and kind of scary.
And if you ever heard him on a podcast and he’s even had his own podcast, he’s like the sweetest guy and he’s so humble, he’s so humble. So he’s like a world famous musician. But he always talks about himself as a musician, like he’s just happy. He’s just lucky to be in the room like he’s the biggest music fan boy.
So he is such a fan of other musicians and even now, as sort of a world renowned musician, he has this radio show and he just loves to show new music to listeners. And like, if he, like, he’ll geek out about some music that he’s found. And to him, if the musician is good and he likes that music like they’re, they’re like above him, he’s like, oh my God, you know, like he’ll fanboy over anyone, even though he himself is Henry Rollins.
He’s so humble. He’s just happy to be in the room. And I genuinely believe that for him, that’s like a very authentic way. And so he’s got no ego. He’s got no ego as a musician and being a musician myself, it’s really hard to be a musician. It’s basically a dick measuring contest. Pardon my French. Right? Like musicians, especially in sort of punk rock, like it’s all about ego and you have a big, you know, sort of like always sort of repping how awesome you are.
And that was always really hard for me as a person with EDC, because like many people with EDC, I’m the jack of all trades, master of none. I never felt like my skill level was up to other people’s. I never felt like my knowledge level was up to other people, so I always felt less than as a musician in any room that I was in.
And so I always felt like I had something to prove. I had this big imposter syndrome. And I realized like, oh, there’s another option here, right? I don’t have to be walking around super insecure and like, feeling like I have something to prove. I can just be happy to be in the room. I can be curious about others.
I can be humble. I can just be a I can just cheerlead everyone else. And that has also really served me as a coach. Like the very first time I went to the EDC conference. It was so intimidating, right? I was like a new coach. There were like thousands of coaches there. There were thousands of content creators there.
I was like, what’s my role? Like, who? Who am I? And actually, after after that first conference, I actually emailed Henry Rollins because that’s a thing you can do. People can like email him. And he like actually emailed me back, which like meant so much to me. And he had something really nice to say and it was very encouraging.
And so that’s why I’ve always aspired to be the Henry Rollins of ADHD coaching. And in that, I mean, I want to be like, I want to be fearless. I want to be like wise. I want to be upfront about my politics and my opinions. But at the same time, I want to be humble f I, I never want to bring my ego to the room.
I just want to be like the biggest fanboy of every client that I have. And I think that through humility, we can rid ourselves of imposter syndrome no matter what we’re feeling. Imposter syndrome about when we come from that place of enthusiasm, of humility, of curiosity about others, and we take the need for ego out of it, and we go like, I don’t have anything.
I don’t have to prove anything to anyone. I don’t have to, like, think about my own insecurity. If I’m really focused on, like, how cool everyone around me is and how much I have to learn from other people. And I think it’s just it feels like a soothing balm on my soul, because I’m incredibly insecure about everything all the time, and I’m super socially anxious.
And when I remember to go outwards and be like, wow, everyone around me is so cool, I wonder what they have to teach me. I wonder what they know that I don’t, and I just lean into curiosity and humility at the same time. It completely rids me of like ego insecurity, imposter syndrome, and I’m just happy to be in the room.
And I have a great experience. And ironically, like, paradoxically, that’s how I improve in every aspect of my life. So as far as imposter syndrome, that’s why I think humility can really help us.
[14:11:19] Asher: Just be really appreciating what you had to say there. And as you were talking again, I was sort of reflecting on how humility has served me. And what I was thinking of is several years ago, this was right before the pandemic, actually. I was invited to speak at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and I’m speaking to a room of posts doctorate fellows with ADHD.Now, y’all, I have a bachelor’s degree and that is it as far as my education journey goes. And so coming into this, I was feeling really intimidated. What do I have to tell these highly educated future, not just future doctors, but future like groundbreaking doctors, you know, highly, highly intelligent folks. And a couple of things happened that help my perspective there.
For one, that the head of the department that invited me out, we had lunch the day before my talk, and he was really wonderful, obviously really educated, really, really intelligent. But not somebody who speaks down to other people was really interested in telling me about his work and was really interested in my work, and really enthusiastic about this presentation that I was going to give.
And then number two, during the Q&A, there were a couple of questions where I had to say, hang on a second, let me, let me, let me pause on that for a second. I’m not sure how to answer that. And in one case, I didn’t have a great answer. And in the other case, I actually gave a great answer.
The question was, what if I’m just lazy? And I was like, ooh! And I thought about it for a second and said, I don’t. I don’t believe in lazy. I think lazy is a symptom and not a cause. Meaning if you’re struggling to to activate for what’s what matters to you, then there’s something else going on there. I don’t think lazy is something inherent to any of us.
I think it’s a symptom of something else going on, and that sparked a really, really robust conversation with the participants in the room. So all of this to just kind of double down on what you just said, that if I would have gone to ego and imposter syndrome, I have to prove to this room of people that I’m smart enough to be up on this stage.
I would have frozen in those moments, but kind of embodying that coach mindset, coming with curiosity first and recognizing I have been asked, and this is an enthusiastically wanted topic here, those two things kind of allowed me to just lean into what I know, and also what I don’t know to comfortably say, I don’t know. I don’t have a great answer for you, and here’s why I don’t have a great answer for you.
[16:46:13] Dusty: Yeah, like saying I don’t know is leadership, right? Like it’s we it’s good to model that. You don’t need to know everything and that you don’t need to be like Mr. Ego puffed out chest like I’m the smartest guy in the room. I know everything like, you know, and I’m not talking about, like, in coaching, but just like in any circumstance, right.You know, I was kind of talking about coming from the music industry. We’re certainly like a lot of people are like that. Right. It’s it’s so I think refreshing to see someone be okay with not knowing something in any circumstance. And I think that that is like leadership that’s modeling. And like true leaders are humble I think. Right.
So there’s also like a connection here between humility and leadership.
[17:27:13] Asher: Does see, this is something that’s actually come up in my coaching multiple times. Clients who we have ADHD. So we struggle with recall and or we recall or understand things differently than other folks. And so I’ve more than once had a client come to me with their goal being, I want to remember, right, I have to I have to know the answer on the spot.And coming from that place of imposter syndrome, coming from that place of I see others have better or different recall that me, one client in particular looking towards his boss who always knows the answer right? If you have a question, he knows the answer off of the top of his head and was really kind of driving himself into the ground trying to be that person when in reality his brain just didn’t work that way.
And so a lot of our work ended up being around sort of acknowledging that his strengths are different than his boss’s strengths. But he does have strengths that he brings to the table, which then allowed him to approach moments like that from that humility place rather than from that imposter syndrome place, from that place of this is this is just what is true for me.
I will have to get back to you on that. I don’t have an answer for you immediately. Rather than that panic place of oh no, I don’t have an answer and I should have one right now.
[18:51:24] Dusty: Exactly. Yeah, there’s another not to change topics necessarily, but there is another way that I find that humility has helped me and has been helpful to some of my clients, and is really specific in it’s around rejection, sensitivity. So I mentioned this to you a little bit when we were doing the self-esteem episode, but something that I think gets in the way of our relationships unintentional is that when we’re feeling rejection sensitive, we have this way of like making everything about us.And whether we bring that to whether we bring that insecurity to the relationship or not, it’s like they’re with us, right? So, you know, if you ever do anything to screw up or you think you have, you think someone’s mad at you. There’s like sort of this cycle that happens and people might recognize this. So you think someone’s mad at you, you have unintentionally done something, or maybe you’ve actually done something and you know someone’s mad at you.
And so you go into your own head and you’re like, oh my God, I’m the worst. I’m a terrible friend. They hate me. Everyone would be better off without me. I should just go live in Iraq, blah blah, blah, blah blah blah blah blah blah, right? And pretty soon you are making it all about you, and you’re convinced that because you’ve made one mistake that people don’t like you.
So there’s a really there’s some really interesting like assumptions in that, that I like to question for myself and with clients. And one of them is like this, I say, okay, do you have any people in your life that you love who aren’t perfect? And they go, yeah. And I go, well, who? Tell me about, you know, is it your brother?
Is it your cousin? Is it your best friend? Is it your colleague? Tell me about people that you love. Tell me about their flaws. What don’t you love about them? Like, what’s kind of annoying about them? What’s like, what’s a bit problematic about them? And usually people can say, well, you know, so and such, you know, has this issue and this other person is a bit like this.
And I go, okay, but you don’t hate them. Well, no, you don’t wish that they weren’t part of your life. Well, no, of course I. You mean you still love them even though they have some shortcoming? Well yeah. And I go, oh, interesting. Okay. So you have the capacity to love people when they’re not perfect. Why is it that you assume that your friends don’t?
What are you really saying? What are you implying about your friends here? That you have to show up to the relationship? Perfect. And then if you make one little mistake that they’re going to reject you and just, like, kick you to the curb like your friends kind of sound like terrible people. Are your friends terrible? Are you are you friends with the most judgmental jerks on earth?
And they go, well, no. And I go, well, so why do you think you’re why do you think you’re better than them? Right? Like, what do you say? You’re the kind of person who can be, like, loving and flexible. And you can love people even though they have flaws. But your friends are like, not like that. Is that what you think?
And I go, no. And I go, okay, all right. So is it possible that if you have the capacity to love someone who’s not perfect, that maybe your friends are like that to you? And then I say, like, what if you had a friend who was worried that you were mad at them? And instead of coming to you and telling you and trying to resolve it, or trying to get some love and like some assurance from you, what if that friend just like, ghosted your relationship because they were sure that you hated them?
How would you feel? And the client or whoever I’m talking to goes like, oh my God. Like I, you know, oh, I would want them to tell me, I would, I would hate that. I would want them to, you know, give me an opportunity to let them know how much I care about them. And I go, okay, so why aren’t you doing that for your friend?
Right. Let’s like, turn the tables here. Let’s like, let’s turn this into a like bit of a thing around humility, right? If you have the capacity to love imperfect people, let’s assume that so do your friends. And let’s assume that you don’t have to be perfect and that your friends are like, let’s assume the best of your friends or the people that you love, okay?
And sometimes, sometimes we do love jerks, right? That’s the case. Unfortunately, sometimes we have toxic people in our life, but I find that it kind of gets people out of it. Kind of shakes up the way that they’re thinking about things, and it gets them realizing, oh, okay. Like I’m actually kind of making very unfavorable assumptions about this person that I care about.
Yeah. You’re focused on yourself. Yeah. You’re saying, well, I’m a piece of crap. But the implication here is that one tiny little mistake is going to cause somebody to kick you to the curb. And what does that really say about them? Right. And so bringing in humility kind of at all levels on this allows people, I think, to like get out of the need to focus on themselves.
And then it’s like, okay, if you weren’t making this all about yourself, if you weren’t just so sure that like, oh, I’m a piece of crap and everyone hates me, or if we have actually caused harm to another person through some unintentional means, let’s make it about them. Let’s put ourselves aside. Let’s put our ego aside. Let’s put our own hurt feelings aside, and let’s actually listen to the impact that we had on this other person, acknowledging that we don’t have to be perfect people to be worthy of love.
So I find it also like bringing in humility actually makes it because there’s I think there’s a thing we do. And I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced this ash, and it’s totally intentional, but I do think that sometimes with ADHD, because of rejection sensitivity, we have the tendency to make everything about ourselves when we’ve caused harm because like now we need validation and we need like connection.
We need to know that person is not going to, you know, get rid of us. But sometimes we forget to like, make it look like make space for the like the actual the impact that we’ve had on the person. And so I like to use humility to actually give space to the person and be able to hear the impact that I’ve had on them without, like, internalizing it, without making it mean, oh, I’m a piece of crap.
But when I can actually hear like, oh yeah, like I let you down or like I made us late for that event and that was really frustrating to you. I’m really sorry. And I’m going to think about and kind of coming full circle back to the thing I was saying at the beginning. Let me think about, like how that happened, how my ADC played into that, what I can actually do about it.
And yeah, you know, I care about you and I’d like to do better. So I’m going to I’m going to try to do that. I almost feel like humility becomes this shield for that part of my heart that wants to indulge in self-hate. It becomes a shield where I go, like I’m caring about the other person right now and like, I’m being a good friend and like through being humble and acknowledging that, like, I’m it’s not all or nothing.
I don’t have to be perfect or I’m a piece of crap. I can actually find a way to make space for, listening to and caring about the other person in a way that that actually really makes up for the like, whatever the ADHD symptom was that caused the harm in the first place. It’s kind of a weird is this is this making sense? What I’m saying?
[24:54:10] Asher: Absolutely. It is Dusty. And you asked if this is something that I’ve run into and it is. We’ve talked about it on this podcast before. I call that place we can go to the defensive crouch, right? We we immediately jump into a place where we we want to defend ourselves or protect ourselves or protect our feelings. So defense can look like arguing with or coming from that kind of place.But defense can also look like that cut and run behavior, that ghosting that. I feel bad about this. So I just don’t I don’t want to face it. I don’t want to deal with it. So I’m just I’m just I’m just going to protect my own feelings here. And so I think the interesting place that we’ve kind of come to today with humility as a concept is humility is about perspective.
Humility is about getting out of the all or nothing thinking, the catastrophizing, the internalizing. And that’s really hard to do with ADHD because we have lived this life where we are often made to be at fault, even when it’s not our fault because of our ADHD. Dusty, you were telling me offline a couple of weeks ago about something between you and a partner where you had to kind of set a boundary where this is what I can do, but this is what I can’t do because of my own ADHD.
And when we don’t know what we don’t know, it’s very easy to a assume that it’s all our fault at the start. But then b we go into that catastrophe rising place where we’re overblowing it and we just get really defensive. It becomes about just not wanting to feel those bad feelings, which can lead to particularly when it is our fault, when we do need to step up and make amends or have a conversation can lead to some really bad behavior on our part.
And actually, probably even worse behavior when it’s not our fault. When there’s when there’s a story that we’re creating that has nothing to do with us, because that’s the mystery situation where a friend just vanishes and you don’t know why that’s happened, and certainly not something that I’ve done in in my recent history. But, you know, you go back to my teens, in my early 20s, that was absolutely a behavior of mine where I would I would just cut and run relationships because I, I didn’t know what else to do with that.
And so humility is a concept. It’s an opportunity to examine. How else could you show up here. It’s an opportunity to kind of step back, step out of it and distinguish. Bringing back a concept that we talked about a few weeks ago, distinguish what’s your stuff here and what’s not your stuff here, and act from that place rather than reacting to the negative emotion?
[27:38:27] Dusty: Yeah, I once heard it said, somebody once said to me, everybody with ADHD thinks that they’re the exception to the rule. And it’s so interesting because that’s totally the way it is, right? Like, I see this happening with my clients all the time. They’ll be the best friend to their friends and go, oh yeah, no, it’s okay that you didn’t get everything done.You should rest. You deserve rest. You deserve whatever. But then secretly, they’re holding themselves to this like higher standard. Like everybody else is allowed to make mistakes except for me. Everyone else is allowed to have rest except for me. Everyone else doesn’t have to be perfect except for me. And so I think there’s an interesting thing here where if we can actually turn that into a bit of an ego thing and go like, why do you think you’re so much better than everyone else, right?
Like, what are you really saying when you’re holding yourself to this perfectionistic standard? But everyone else doesn’t have to be? Do you think that you are somehow you’re not special like. And I mean that in the nicest way possible. You’re not special. You’re just like everyone else. You are also worthy of love. If you’re not perfect, you also need rest.
You know, like if you can acknowledge that your friends deserve it and are worthy of it and don’t have to be perfect. Like, what are you really saying when you’re saying, okay, but I do have to be right. And so if we call into humility that way, we can kind of get out of, like you said, that black and white thinking and that need to be perfectionistic because there’s this weird, there’s this weird thing that happens when we look at ourselves as people where we’re just so hard on ourselves.
Right. And that might be coming from a place of a lack of self-worth. But in another way, it is almost kind of like this ego thing where it’s like, well, why do you think that you have to be perfect and that you can be perfect and you should be perfect, right? Maybe you’re no better, but also no worse than everybody else.
And that’s like, okay, you know.
[29:17:07] Asher: Absolutely. And say one more place that I absolutely think that comes from is just, again, living life as an ADHD person. Our our imperfect is different than other people’s imperfect. It’s and it’s when we don’t know what we don’t know about our own ADHD, we don’t have great answers for that. So when that’s been your lifelong experience, I think that’s where that expectation comes from.Is the number of times where you you failed and it did blow up in your face despite your best intentions or you have something blow up in your face that you didn’t even see coming, except for in hindsight, and you can’t understand how you got there. That’s a repeat experience that most of us with ADHD have gone through throughout our lives, particularly those of us who are a little older, who didn’t have the supports or the understanding that exist in schools.
Now, you know, for me, it was you’re so smart. My parents would look at me and go, you’re so smart, but you’re so lazy, right? And so I embodied lazy as something that I just was. And when those moments would happen that I did not match action with intention, all I knew was to berate myself for being lazy.
So I think alongside humility, there’s an element here of getting under the hood and getting to know your own ADHD, getting to know what your strengths and challenges are in a way that is helpful, in a way that you can have constructive conversations with others about what isn’t is impossible for you, or or where you can advocate for yourself from that place of strength.
[30:54:26] Dusty: Yeah. And I think as we’re talking about this, what I’m realizing is that I think for me, the way that I make sense of humility is it’s it’s this other way of making sense of failure. Right? Because like failure, if failure is bad and it’s shameful and it’s painful and it’s something to be avoided, we don’t learn from it.And it’s something that is supposed to not happen. But with humility, we can make failure our friend, right? We can be like, yeah, failure is part of it. Everybody fails. Like failure doesn’t mean anything about me. Failure is just one possible outcome. And because I’m like, not more special and not more perfect than everyone else, I’m going to have it.
And it doesn’t mean anything about me. And then when we can do that, lo and behold, we can actually learn from failure.
[31:35:05] Asher: And so that right there is bringing journey thinking into the picture to detaching from outcome, and instead just being where you are, being where you are and not not getting so attached to what happens or doesn’t happen from this place. Dusty, I think that’s a great place for us to wrap for today. But before we do, listeners, as a quick reminder, we would love for you if you find this show helpful to leave a review wherever you listen to the podcast, please and thank you.So until next week, I’m Ash.
[32:07:01] Dusty: And I’m Dusty. [32:08:08] Asher: And this was the Translating ADHD podcast. Thanks for listening.
