Coping is the Key
“It’s not about the cards you’re dealt, but how you play the hand.”(1)
My father joined the Navy at age 18. He always spoke appreciatively of the Navy for whipping him into shape. Obviously never knowing what my father was like as a kid, all I could witness was the after-Navy man. What I saw was a man with a strong work ethic who had a lot of healthy self-discipline routines and had a very hard time sitting still for any prolonged period of time. A perfect example of how this manifested itself: whenever my parents came out to visit me in Seattle, I needed to have a long enough list of projects so that my dad could have some productive time while he was out.
When it came to behavior, my dad used general, non-scientific terms such as “whipping into shape” and “control yourself.” And those worked fine for me growing up. I didn’t spend all that much time pondering over what came easy for me vs. what was a challenge for me. My peers also talked about my behavior non-scientifically, using words like “spaz” and “random”. I always credited my six brothers and sisters for being harder on me than any of my peers (I say this in the most loving and appreciative way), such that by the time I reached the point of hearing words like this directed at me, I had a pretty thick skin and rarely thought much of it. I knew my family loved me and I was as encouraged to give them a hard time as they were to give me a hard time.
By copying my dad’s behavior, things seemed to work pretty well for me. It wasn’t until well into my Microsoft career that I started to look at my behavior more objectively and scientifically. Why was I so routine-oriented? Why would I have unpredictable surges and lulls in my execution? Around this time, I read Scott Peck’s “The Road Less Traveled.”2 Among the many takeaways I got from this book, one that was especially important was how he presented therapy. At that time, there was a huge stigma associated with seeing a therapist. If you were seeing a therapist, it meant you were crazy. Scott countered that, saying that the healthiest individuals are the ones that seek therapy, because they are prioritizing their health, and taking specific steps to understand more about themselves.
Scott’s perspective resonated with me. As a computer geek, I saw therapy as debugging my brain. And given how much I had learned about software through my debugging experiences, I actually became excited about going to therapy. From my earliest therapy, we replaced those general terms from my childhood with more scientific terms: “ADHD” and “addictive behavior.” There was no judgment or labeling associated with the use of these terms. It was all about understanding. As we talked about this science, I could replay my experiences and see how these behaviors were exhibited in my dad and in myself. The genetics behind this made that none too surprising.
Coping skills
After understanding these disorders as being part of my wiring, we started talking about how to handle it. I was clearly not debilitated by these, having a very successful schooling experience and having a strong start professionally. But there were times when I did feel very stalled or stuck. As I replayed my childhood experiences with my therapist, he introduced me to the term “coping skills.” Whether you build these skills with full awareness of what behavior you’re trying to counteract, or you build these skills as part of learning an overall routine, coping skills are the habits that you build that offset the disorders that you have. In my dad’s case, from a time when there was no talk of therapy and disorders, it was as simple as the Navy giving him a rigid routine that he found comfort, ease, and quiet in. He came to value routines to help with his self-control, and modeled that constantly for me to follow.
There was one point during this first therapy series when I attempted medication for my ADHD. For me, it was part of debugging and objectivity. I wanted to compare my natural normal with this modified normal. Was it night and day for me, or just a slight change in focus? Did it subdue creativity, or did I still feel inspired? I took the medication for two weeks. My original plan was to take it for a full month, but I had physiological reactions that made for a pretty unpleasant experience after two weeks, so I stopped early. What I did get a glimpse of during those two weeks was a quieter mind. And while there was less chaotic thought which I had often leveraged for my creativity, I could see the value of this quietness during times when I needed less creativity and more raw execution.
From this more informed vantage point, thanks to the reflection and experimentation of my therapy, I turned my attention to intentionally developing my coping skills. It was a very empowering feeling, and was a key pivot point in my personal and professional growth. I knew what my own mental impediments were, and I knew how to avoid them. My dad had given me a solid set of skills to work with the genes I had been dealt, and now it was up to me to take them further.
I’ve shared many of my best coping skills in earlier posts. Let me summarize my top three here. For more detail on any of these, follow the footnotes.
Timebox everything3 - When I introduced timebox everything, I called it my #1 coping skill. In its fully developed state, it’s now as simple as telling my brain, “You just need to give me 30 minutes of relative peace and quiet and then you can go back to free firing.” This skill was built over time, with each successful iteration convincing me that it would save me. I measured success for how long of a timebox I could maintain my focus in. I started with 5 minutes. I declared success when I achieved 90 minutes, repeatedly. It has given me on-demand focus.
Read with a pen4 - Reading was always a struggle for me, because I couldn’t get my brain to focus on the words over the constant distractions in my head. When I found myself re-reading the same paragraph for the third time, I would typically give up. The original motivation behind my “read with a pen” habit was to force my brain to pay more attention to what I was reading.
Reflexive capture5 - I describe my ADHD brain as a dripping faucet that I can never turn off. The ideas just keep dripping. With each drip, I had a choice: ignore the drip and stay focused on what I was doing, or turn my attention to the drip and derail my focus. Neither option was that ideal, so eventually my level of frustration drove me to discover a third option: capture the idea in real-time so that I don’t lose it, and then get back to what I was doing.
Passing it on
We pass on our genes to our kids. This is a mixed blessing. And after being diagnosed with ADHD, I was focused on the bad I had given my kids. I remembered what was hard for me because of my unfocused energy. And I was watching it play out with my boys. Perhaps Pop felt the same way, but I never heard him apologizing or acting down about it. What I remember from my dad was him modeling the better alternatives, through his own routines. So that’s the approach I took.
I remember when my youngest was in college and he was talking about, “Being behind on some easy things.” I had that same feeling in college, where I was knocking out the hardest problems thrown at me, but couldn’t seem to finish the simple stuff. I pointed him to the post-it note system he had already been using, with notes stuck to his computer to track his work. I suggested he color code the post-its to indicate how long each task would take. Then, when he found himself with a short window of time to get something done, he could grab one of the appropriate colored post-its and knock it out. A week later, Drew sent me a text message with a picture of his updated system, and a “Thanks.”
He and I can talk about genetics, therapy, disorders, and coping skills later. For now, I’m just focused on building up his base, as Pop had done with me.
In Control Your Phone, Or Your Phone Will Control You6, I said that the smartphone has created an “attention deficit norm.” So my 10 pro-tips that I shared there are not only to help the genetic-ADHD population, but the naturalized-ADHD population alike.
The upside of ADHD
When you build a strong set of coping skills to offset the negative effects of your disorder, what you’re left with are the positive effects. That turns your disorder into an extraorder … contributing to your extraordinariness. Here are my top three celebrations of ADHD.
ADHD turns your brain into a relentless idea factory. Need to come up with a creative idea? Just plant a seed and give it time … and then be ready to capture the ideas when they come. Creativity unlocked.
You can handle more simultaneous distractions. Your brain has been building your context switch7 muscle from a very early age. I found this to be especially helpful in my management role, where you are more bombarded by the disparate needs of your entire team.
You have creative syntheses. While you don’t experience a linear path to the idea, often times you are able to draw from several seemingly unrelated sources to arrive at a unique synthesis. This expands the possibility spectrum of any brainstorming session.
Don’t let the disorder define you. By developing the right coping skills, the disorder can propel you.
Footnotes
The Road Less Traveled, M. Scott Peck (Goodreads), also referenced in the “Love is a verb” section of Love It Or Leave It
The “Read with a pen” section of Mining for Gems
The “Reflexive capture” section of Harness the Power of “Idea Bombs”