ADHD Coaching Blog

Monday, February 08, 2010

Identify Your Strengths and Make Them Stronger**

By David Giwerc, MCC, Founder and President, ADD Coach Academy

We live in a performance-oriented world.  It’s also a world where too much emphasis is placed on identifying a person’s weaknesses and then focusing on improving the performance of those weaknesses. This negative focus can take its toll on a person’s innate strengths, which may be downplayed or overlooked in the quest for “improvement.”

For adults, kids and families with ADHD, however, the effort involved in focusing our attention on our weaker areas of performance only exacerbates the challenges of ADHD.  If we’re constantly expected to focus on our performance challenges, we’re setting ourselves up for frustration, anxiety, and even immobilization – all of which inevitably lead to poor self-esteem.

Although this preposterous “weakness” philosophy dominates our world, it does not serve adults with ADHD well.  Based on over a decade of coaching professionals, executives, entrepreneurs, small business owners, filmmakers and parents with ADHD, I have consistently observed just the opposite:

People with ADHD improve their chances for success, as they define it, by focusing on their natural talents – the ones that consistently yield excellent performance – and then by developing a plan to make those talents even stronger.

Our brains work by means of electrical stimulation.  We stimulate our brains by the dominant thoughts we are paying attention to, at any given moment. I don’t know about you, but starting off my day by having to pay attention to what I don’t do well definitely does not stimulate my brain. A project that relates to my areas of weakness will not generate enough interest for me to sustain my attention with projects related to improving my weaknesses

Understanding the power of what we pay attention to and how it impacts ADHD is critical to explaining the negative false perceptions that are created about ADHD.

For example, when I was a child, teachers would wonder, “Why is it that David can do his math assignment so well and so enthusiastically, but when he has to do a simple English reading and writing assignment, he won’t even take the first step toward completing it?  He finds every reason for not doing it and the more we ask him, the more he resists.  He’s just being lazy and does not want to do it.”

Negative labeling, using words ng words such as: “being lazy,” unwilling, spoiled” that accompanies a misperceived lack of performance is simply ignorance of how the ADHD brain works. 

My own personal experience, and that of the hundred’s of clients I’ve coached, has taught me how difficult it is for someone with ADHD to will him- or herself to focus on a boring task, subject or project, especially one that is associated with improving a weakness. 

When I choose to start my day using my strengths to do an interesting task; it has historically resulted in a positive outcome. Strengths-based pursuits energize me and make me feel more fulfilled. They create a powerful feeling of accomplishment and raise my self-esteem. They also empowers me to take on additional assignments, including ones that are less desirable but need to be completed.

In most academic, family and business situations, well-intentioned efforts to improve an ADHD individual’s weakness, may instead lead to unsuccessful experiences that create negative patterns of thinking.  A constant focus on areas of difficulty may actually block a person, with ADHD, from being able to take any action.

When you repeatedly receive the message that your efforts are not “good enough,” to meet the established standards of performance, those bad feelings tend to spill over.  You begin to associate a negative perception of your performance, in one area, with other areas as well.

If you have ADHD and want to maximize your energy and your focus, then it’s essential for you to: 1) Identify both your strengths and your areas of interest and 2) Prioritize and integrate them into your life.

Identifying your areas of interest is the key to being able to successfully pay attention. The greater your ability to pay attention, the greater your chances of creating a foundation of success you can then replicate in other areas of your life. 

To determine your strengths and your interests, first identify the tasks, goals, and/or activities that you consistently enjoy doing and are usually able to complete.

Remember, ADHD is a challenge of boredom and disinterest: The more that either of these elements is, the less likely you are to complete it.

Once you’ve identified the things you do well and enjoy doing, ask yourself:

1. What is it about this topic, goal, or task that’s interesting to me?
2. When I’m focusing on this subject, what are the things I consistently do – the steps I always take – that enable me to complete this task or project?

After answering these questions, jot down a simple bulleted list of the steps. Then take your list and create a reminder, for yourself, by making a colorful visual map; or an audio recording listing the steps.

When you know what it is that enables you to succeed in one area, you can then follow those “steps to success” in areas of challenge as well.  By identifying your strengths and your interests, you’ll uncover the clues to a system for organizing your life.  This system will facilitate both sustained focus and consistent action – the keys to success for people with ADHD.

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Interest, Stimulation and ADHD (V)

ADHD is first and foremost a challenge of brain stimulation.

Boring, mundane tasks are difficult, if not impossible, for a person with ADHD to focus on. On the other hand, areas of interest are a good place to start. If you want to find out what a person with ADHD can pay attention to, and sustain their focus, find their favorite task, subject or topic and watch what happens.



To learn more, please go to http://www.ADDCA.com

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Introduction: ADHD Coaching

Hello my name is David Giwerc. I am the Founder and President of the ADD Coach Academy, http://www.addca.com.  Since becoming a coach in 1994, I have been privileged and honored to witness thousands of adults and families with AD/HD take amazing leaps and bounds to become more fulfilled human beings.

This only can begin to happen when you become educated about your own ADHD. I don’t mean a general, textbook education of ADHD with medical language about the brain and the corresponding imbalance of neurochemicals. Unfortunately, that is how most health care professionals may have explained ADHD to you.

The kind of education that will empower people with ADHD to move forward is the kind of customized, individualized education that encourages you to explore and discover the specific situations where your own impairing challenges (inattention, impulsivity and hyper activity) of ADHD have impeded your ability to move forward.

To find out how you can get educated about your own ADHD in powerful proven ways, please go to Simply ADHD Program

Monday, December 14, 2009

Awaken Your Buried Treasure

Successful, fulfilling events in your life have brought you great joy and strengthened your self confidence. Although you know these experiences exist, you have not been able to conjure them for a long time. You have the ability to bring back these events, about yourself at any time, but the knowledge of how to do so is buried in the depths of your subconscious; you have been totally unaware of its existence.

This knowledge is your personal buried treasure. It can provide you with powerful wisdom and experience you can create again and again. Knowing that there is an available, internal source of success will provide you with a stronger sense of confidence and encourage you to take action when you are entering unknown territory. After you discover your inner knowing and learn how to use it, you will find you have an empowering resource, of knowledge, that reminds you of your strengths, personal triumphs and successful strategies you can incorporate into your life. This knowledge also includes hidden values that once motivated you to pursue important goals. How many experiences do you know of that can give you the confidence to take action and ignite those special sparks inside you?

Discovering and revisiting your buried treasure can be the impetus that will empower you to act on important goals. Your inner knowing reminds you of past successes that can be recreated, possibly with better results. What good will personal strength and knowledge do for you if they remain buried and concealed from your world? The following questions can be very helpful in beginning the process of discovering your buried knowledge: What experiences in your personal, academic, family, professional, or business life have consistently: Made you feel good about yourself? Given you a strong sense of accomplishment? Been fulfilling? Brought you instant joy? What is the first step you can to take to look for your buried treasure? When you do find your buried treasure of “knowledge,” what elements do you need to identify and integrate into your life?

When you discover your inner knowing, you can identify specific reminders that you can use, i.e. imagery, a quotation, a word, a song, anything that will stand out in your mind and remind you to focus on your knowledge. If you don’t pay attention to your buried treasure, it will stay concealed. It will remain your biggest barrier to opportunities for success. Don’t deny what you have already successfully created and know. You have the antidote to stagnation and procrastination, inside you, waiting to be rediscovered so that you can become your true self!

 

Saturday, November 21, 2009

David Giwerc Speaks at Muskingum College

David Giwerc, MCC, Founder & President of the ADD Coach Academy speaks at Muskingum College. 

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Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Michael Phelps and the Power of a Mom’s Love

Michael Phelps recently was in the news again breaking another world record, swimming the butterfly stroke. Michael Phelps also has a mom who always believed in his ability to do something well. Not everything, but at least one thing. She never let up letting him know that you don’t get satisfaction from working on making your weaknesses stronger. She never let him use his ADHD to keep him down.

I believe his story has a powerful message that all parents who have children with ADHD need to take note of and integrate into their families. It is the power of love and belief in others. It is the power of one person, his mom, to see only the good in her son. When everyone else saw problems, it was the power of one mother to see possibilities. This was a result of a parent’s belief, love and confidence her son could do something well, even when other people in the academic world were pointing out to him the things that he didn’t do well. You make the most out of your life by doing what you love, especially when you already do it well. Think of all the swimmers, musicians, artists, writers and web designers who may have ADHD and do something well but are directed to spend their time, focus and energy on tasks that play to their weaknesses. Their brains are not getting the nourishment they need. When you have ADHD, you don’t gain any kind of momentum, or positive self-esteem, by focusing on what you don’t do well. You get ahead in life by focusing on what you already do well and by doing it better and better. I believe it was the power of one mom persevering relentlessly and always saying to her child, even as an adult: “You can and you will if you want to. Don’t let what you can’t do get in the way of what you already, brilliantly can. Just because you struggled in school you are not a loser. Just because the teachers didn’t understand how you are wired does not make you bad. I know how you are wired and your brain has trillions of different ways of processing the world. If you can find what you love then I will love it also. I will always remind you of your love for swimming if it ignites both your head and your heart.” Through the power of his Mom's love and Michael’s unrelenting determination and hyper focus on swimming, he transformed his natural talents into superhuman strength, and for his efforts we all got to witness the greatest swimmer in Olympic history. Thanks, Mom!!!!!

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

ADHD is a Unique Brain Wiring (V)

ADHD is a Unique Brain Wiring

This video supports our foundational principle that ADHD is a unique brain wiring. It is your special way of understanding the world around you.

Having ADHD does not mean you are broken, it means you have a unique brain wiring.

You are endowed with trillions of different ways to learn and live in the world. Not just one or two ways that are mandated at school and work. You have to discover how your unique brain wiring shows up in strengths and accentuate them.

If you want to learn a proven program that will empower you to access your strengths for more success then go to: http://www.addca.com/simply-adhd.html.