Hey Dan here and in this video I want to share six ways that you can drive if you
have ADHD and just off the bat these are not my inventions I actually got it from
a great book I first found in 2012 I think when I was living in Costa Rica
called delivered from distraction and it's by Edward Hallowell and it is for
adults with ADHD although I'm sure it's helpful for children as well and what I
liked about this book is it's long I listen to it on audiobook like it gave
me a lot of insight into you know ADHD from a very positive perspective the
author himself has ADHD and obviously deals with a lot of patients with it
what was probably the funniest part is in the first chapter he just says like
if you have ADHD you might struggle to finish this book so I'm going to
summarize everything in the first chapter to make it easy for you like
alright this is a great author and so I found these six things are really
helpful and I want to share them with you now the first part of your life is
to have positive human contact now you might not notice this day in and day out
but if you go a couple days without spending a lot of time with other people
without like things like hugs handshakes laughter really good relationships it's
going to seriously impact you in a negative way
and on the other side is people with ADHD you love to be around people
usually at least for most of the time and so the more you can build that into
your day this is something when I was in Costa Rica where I had to really
proactively do it like because I was new there I didn't know that many people so
I was really thinking about this okay make plans go out and see people go to a
co-working space all this sort of thing so hugs and handshakes is the first
thing to make sure you were doing on a daily basis second thing is reduce
electronics especially I would say towards the end or the beginning of your
day now he did say in the book that if you are a fan of Dan's YouTube channel
his podcast or read his emails that kind of electronic stimulation is fine and
actually will cure any disease ever you have
but aside from any of Dan's content try to minimize electronics as much as
possible and that's a big one in these days as much as possible because you
know generally electronics especially things like Facebook and games and all
that they're really wired to pull in our attention and distract us and create
these little dopamine hits that just mess with our ability to have like
proper sustained focus third thing is to get a lot of sleep
seriously this is probably one of the biggest changes that I made after
reading the book I don't use an alarm clock that is how you know if you're
getting enough sleep just when you wake up naturally and yeah it makes a big
difference if you do not get enough sleep it's going to accentuate ADHD
traits where you're going to be more easily distracted have trouble more
trouble focusing and all that whereas if you get great sleep you're more likely
to be able to focus and function well and all this sort of thing so highly
recommend the great sleep also for everyone getting enough sleep it's a
good thing it's important to do it so the fourth thing to be doing I really
underestimated this when I first read the book and it's about diet what you're
eating and primarily sort of minimal carbs getting rid of like sugar simple
starches you know things like potatoes or breads or just sugar I mean if you're
still drinking pop and juice and stuff we need to have talked just stop that I
really underestimated though how powerful this was and I did even at that
time I usually didn't like I wouldn't drink sodas or much juice or anything
like that but recently I've went pretty hardcore on my diet I'll talk about that
in another video but made some really big changes and my brain has been on
fire like I yeah my ability to focus to get things done probably watching these
videos you might be thinking like is this guy I have going due mania like
he's talking faster recently you know blah blah I've noticed some
really big effects and you know one of the really interesting things I read is
the ketogenic diet which is high fat low carbs and essentially how I'm eating now
has been used to treat epilepsy for a hundred years so think about that
epilepsy is a condition in the brain and involves like all kinds of I don't
understand it at all I'm just pretending but like you know your brain wiring and
things misfiring and all that and if your diet can cure that that has to are
not cure but treat it where you don't have the seizures if it can do that it's
gotta be having a pretty interesting effect on your brain and they've done
some very small-scale tests on it with things like I believe bipolar and one
other disorder and it makes total sense that it would affect a DD very
positively as well and so do not underestimate diet by far I have I've
taken medication for ADHD before I may do a video on that at some point but by
far the diet and then the next one who talked about exercise has had a much
bigger impact now than medication has in the past but I ignored it because it's
like yeah diet and exercise you hear that from everyone don't ignore it it's
pretty legit good advice the next area that I underestimated as well is
exercise now I would always be exercising but I don't think I was doing
it right exercise has been shown to massively increase focus it's arguably
releases roughly the same chemicals and has the same effect on your brain as
taking like adderall or Ritalin or something it's releasing dopamine
serotonin norepinephrine it's good for your brain is what I'm saying
and what I was doing wrong in the past is EIN exercise like lifting weights
sometimes or I do like little bits of cardio like where I'm like high
intensity training sprinting walking sprinting walking for the brain if this
is your intent which is what I'm doing with my exercise routine now longer
cardio like 20 to 40 minutes around your 180 - your age is the ideal
heart rate so where you're not like low intensity basically so the type of
cardio where you can still be talking where you can breathe through your nose
that's the kind of cardio to be doing in terms of the brain stimulation now you
should also do like some high intensity stuff some weights like there's all
positive benefits of these different types of workouts but the thing for your
brain if you want to use exercise as essentially a medication alternative is
every day or at least six days a week cardio sort of twenty to forty minutes I
mean I'm doing more like twenty because I don't know I guess so bored on the
treadmill but twenty to forty minutes kind of that low intensity level you
should be sweating but not like panting or that after for your brain and
actually for fat loss that is by far the best and that's something I may be new
but never really understood and applied in the past and over the last month I
have and it's made a really big difference both in terms of not having
to hold my gut in anymore because it's disappearing and also in terms of my
focus and just mental energy as well and the last thing to add to your life to
thrive with ADHD is some kind of a altima t spiritual practice that can
actually be prayer if you follow a religion that has praying good it can be
meditation like a mindfulness practice that sort of thing
it makes sense right meditation is about calming the brain I'm guessing praying
also has that sort of a positive effect where you're focusing on what you want
you're being thankful for things you're calm you're sort of you know focusing
inwards or outwards or whatever so that has a big impact as well that isn't
something that I've had a lot of experience myself with I've done some
meditation on and off I've never been able to have a consistent practice but
the science showing how good it is for you and also the evidence like if you
read biographies of people who are doing great things or listening to
meditations are really common babe so it's something I'd like to add soon to
my own daily routines as well I just haven't but you don't need me to do it
for you to do it to you know the science and everything else verifies it here two
less things at the end of the video here that I think are really important
the first critically important if you have a TD is to get distracted right now
and buy one of these shirts made by an awesome local Czech designer here in
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sign on the back organic cotton oh my god these shirts are epic there's a link
in the description to that website and the other thing I wanted to touch on is
medication because you know the aspect of medicating a DD is a hot topic people
a lot of people don't think a DD is a real condition they're wrong but they
get into like just naturally treat it you know naturally treat everything like
you have cancer treat it with you know drinking lemon juice I know that's
stupid and I'm sorry if I'm offending anyone but that's stupid
medication serves a really good role in ADHD treatment as well and I would
encourage you if you do suffer from ADHD where it has a big negative impact on
your life follow the advice in this video
pick up the book I mentioned but also look into the medication options it's
discussed in detail in the book I had a doctor say to me in Vancouver and we
could talk about like Big Pharma and evil drug companies and all that sure
but we talked about the risk of medication and most ATD medications the
risk is very low stimulant medication it's been used for like 67 years if you
actually have a TD and you take it responsibly it there's very low risk a
lot of the horror stories you hear are people like students who are using it to
cram was studying with Red Bull and just terrible lifestyles in general what he
said to me is what is the risk of not treating the ADHD it's an interesting
thing to think about right is like stress is one of the biggest killers we
have in terms a blood pressure heart disease stroke
and just general happiness and if not treating a DD leads to a business
failing or not having a good exercise routine because you can't you know you
don't have the control to do it and I'm not saying that ad DS should prevent you
from doing any of this but just hypothetically right if ADHD is getting
in the way of you having a good routine maintaining good relationships maybe
keeping a job or having your business succeed that is going to have like if
you want to do the math your odds of having a serious medical condition or a
lot higher from going through big life stresses from not exercising and all
this stuff then it is from taking like stimulant medications or other kinds of
medications for that matter as well so that was a really interesting point this
doctor brought up and it's something to think about again I know it's
controversial blah blah blah but think about that is you know I would start
with what I've talked about here one other thing I didn't mention is
supplements like fish oil is huge and there's some other ones for should be a
longer video really there's some other ones for ADHD like I think B vitamin
zinc magnesium but fish oils sort of the biggest that's been shown like if you're
not taking fish oil definitely take it make sure that it's high in EPA so look
for sort of extra strength or whatever you want to aim for a thousand
milligrams so one gram of EPA a day is ideal so my point is start with the fish
oil get into the exercise routine maybe try emetic meditation before medication
oh that sounds good should be a sure try these things like spending more time
with people doing all these things but medication can be a good way to give you
the foundation to put these structures in your life is right now you're not in
the best place to actually you know build a proper social schedule and
exercise every day and eat really well maybe start with medication something
like medication you don't have to take
long-term take it for three months get your life in order create these
structures of social support and exercise and eating and then you know
see what you feel about the medication if you want to continue that is my
honest you know heartfelt advice on it that's it as you can probably guess I
could talk about this topic for literally hours if not days and lots of
different parts about it maybe I'll make some more videos on it if you have any
questions leave them below in the comments and I'll do my best to get back
to you and do subscribe to the channel if you've enjoyed this we talk talks
about business psychology you know ADHD personality types personal development
lots of stuff thanks for watching catch in the next
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