Holy Fuckballs, I Guess I'm Writing A Book

Howdy chicas y chicos! I’ve been working on my profanity bible life guide to help you get your SHEET together for a few weeks now. Since it’s eating up my time and I want to hold myself accountable, I’ve decided to change my publishing schedule around a bit.

So far I’ve been doing one week of freestyle writing, one week of Mindfoulness, one week of freestyle writing and one week of podcast. Right now I just don’t have the time to do it all AND my guide, so I’ll be doing one week of life guide, one week of freestyle writing, one week of life guide and one week of podcast.

Yep, this little fucksmurf has fully committed to writing a sarcasm & silliness-filled guide both Ryan Reynolds and Brené Brown would be proud of. At least I fucking hope so, because I’m seriously busting my ass over here. I’m still figuring out what the structure will look like but it will probably look somewhat like this:

• My usual swearing and joke-filled rambling, this time enhanced with a sprinkling of theory and science,

• (Usually embarrassing) anecdotes,

• Tips, tools and useful exercises.

Anywho, all of that to say that I will be posting modified excerpts from my life guide every two weeks, starting this week. And of course if you guys have any requests, please let me know in the comments!

Now without further ado, this is my excerpt for this week, under the chapter ‘Environmental Health’.

Chores

Ahh chores, the Bane of my existence. Tom Hardy’s version to be exact: strangely terrifying and a great back-breaker. Too dark? I guess that’s DC for you! Oops.

Chores terrify me, and you probably too, because for us ADHDers they are often synonymous with shame*. And shame is such a deliciously shitty feeling to have, isn’t it? People go to great lengths to avoid it by blaming, cheating, ghosting and of course… procrastinating.

Now why are chores so finger-lickin’ shameful? In short: because we often suck at doing them. You see, when presented with the opportunity to do chores, our brain usually reacts in a ‘I’ll see your good intentions and raise you a middle finger’ kind of way.

That’s thanks to the fact that an ADHD brain operates under an interest-based nervous system as opposed to an importance- or priority-based nervous system. In other words: it only wants to get shit done when said shit is interesting to us in some kind of way.

So, guess what the dullest tasks ever experienced by mankind are? Yep, chores. And the worst part is that you have to do them over and over again! If you had to do a chore once every year, it wouldn’t be so bad. Hell, it might even be fun. Bring on the foam and tie some shoe brushes to our feet, let’s have a goddamn party!

Here’s the problem with that. How the fuck do you explain to your neuro-somewhat-typical loved ones that you can successfully lead an international team in a high-pressure environment but you can’t get the fucking trash can out? Hello, Trash Can Shame!

Luckily a fellow named William Dodson came up with the ICNU framework, to give us an overview of what does motivate the ADHD brain. According to him, our brain switches on when a task gives us a sense of:

• Interest

• Competition/challenge

• Novelty/creativity

• Urgency

Then Elaine Taylor-Klaus, a fellow coach, came along and changed it a little. She uses the acronym PINCH:

• Play, which includes creativity, fun and humor

• Interest

• Novelty

• Competition, collaboration and connection

• Hurry-Up a.k.a. urgency, the late-diagnosed’s bestest friend

Who knew that pinching (in this context!) would light up our brain like a Christmas tree? Being a passionate lover of acronyms and word play (get your mind out of the gutter, Jesus!), I made my own based on my experience as a coach.

[to be continued]

Accurate representation of the effect my profanity bible will have on people.

PS: I can’t get paid via Substack for the work that I do because of where I live, so you can become a paid subscriber or… buy me a coffee via my Buy Me A Coffee profile. Thank you for your support!