Faster Than Normal

peter shankman, faster than normal.

turbocharge your focus, productivity and success with the secrets of the adhd brain.

imagine using your adhd to write an entire book during a 30-hour flight to tokyo.

yeah, you heard that right.

not read an entire book, write one.

well, that's exactly what author peter shankman did.

shankman has harnessed the power of his adhd brain to such great effect that he can accomplish incredible feats, like writing a book in 30 hours, creating and selling multiple businesses, or finishing ironman triathlons.

most importantly, shankman believes you can do the same.

well, maybe not exactly the same thing.

your adhd might backfire on planes, or your body might not like extreme endurance events.

but what shankman does believe is that you can harness the power of your adhd to unlock your potential.

you'll need to find tools of your own.

who knows, maybe a plane works for you too.

establish personalized rituals and avoid the specific triggers that lead to your self-destructive behavior, but shankman's experience can point you in the right direction.

if you don't have adhd, this chapter can still help increase your productivity and decrease your distractions.

and who couldn't use some of that?

we'll start at the beginning of shankman's story and then look at adhd in a new light.

a blessing, not a curse.

growing up in new york city in the 1980s, peter shankman knew he was different.

he was always blurting things out without thinking, which got him beaten up or sent to the principal's office on countless occasions.

he couldn't remember to tidy his room, but every once in a while he would clean the entire home to perfection and do all of the family's laundry on top of that.

he could focus for hours on a complex project, but in the middle of a basic task, he'd get distracted.

the issues followed shankman to adulthood, especially in his personal life, where he had a string of failed relationships.

he was bemoaning yet another breakup during a therapy session when his therapist threw a book at him.

literally.

hit him right in the gut with a copy of delivered from distraction by edward m. halliwell and john j. rady.

figuratively, it hit him in the heart.

shankman cried as he read their description of adhd, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

he finally felt seen as the book explained how the condition makes life a paradox, makes you feel laser-focused one minute but spacey the next, makes you ultra-confident one day but insecure the other.

most importantly, the book helped shankman understand his adhd was a blessing, not a curse.

for now, remember the book delivered from distraction as we'll come back to it at the end of this chapter.

and remember the key lesson it taught shankman, which is the foundational premise for his book and this chapter.

adhd is not a disease.

it's a power.

and if harnessed correctly, it can be a superpower that leads to an amazing life.

in general, people with adhd are creative, eager, spontaneous, daring, inventive, and compassionate.

their brains work faster than normal.

sound familiar?

some of history's most famous thinkers exhibited traits that could have easily led to an adhd diagnosis if such a thing had existed in their day.

you may know some of the names like galileo, leonardo da vinci, ben franklin, louis pasteur, henry ford, and albert einstein.

many of them struggled with everyday tasks and in school.

they were all considered different, they all had failures, and yet they all changed the world.

without getting too scientific, people with adhd don't produce enough of the chemicals that help us focus and feel happy.

dopamine, serotonin, and adrenaline.

our modern understanding of adhd has only started to gain traction in the last 25 years or so.

but doctors have been observing and noting adhd behaviors such as wild swings in attention span and lack of a verbal filter since the mid-1800s.

if left unchecked, adhd can be disastrous for people who have it.

they can be forgetful, distracted, and unreliable.

their overactive brains make it hard for them to relax or sleep.

they're prone to addiction, anxiety, and depression.

that's why adhd must be monitored and rules must be put in place to harness its power.

and that's exactly what we'll cover in the next section.

rituals schenckman speaks at events all over the world.

for most of these engagements, his contract is basic.

he speaks and you pay for him and his travel.

but there's one important exception.

las vegas.

for sin city events, schenckman's contract stipulates that he only speaks at lunch and he'll only be in las vegas for 8 hours maximum.

from wheels down on arrival to wheels up on takeoff.

why?

because schenckman is eliminating his choice about what to do in las vegas with a free night or even a free hour.

he knows himself well enough to know nothing good will come of that freedom, so he doesn't give himself the choice to even have it.

sure, most of us don't have global speaking engagements.

but there are smaller ways to eliminate choices in your daily life that can help you avoid your personal distractions and adhd triggers.

there are also ways to eat, exercise, and sleep that'll help control your adhd and maximize its gifts.

but to do any of these things, you must make rituals, not resolutions.

that's the only way these changes will stick.

resolutions are just words.

they're like a flimsy shack built on air.

rituals are built on action and routine, and they're as solid as a brick house.

to build a ritual, build it backward and focus on the reason you want to do it in the first place.

for instance, if you want to get up early so you can do more with your day, focus on that great feeling you will have at the end of a productive day, not on waking up at 5am.

you can create rituals to help eliminate choices.

what are your daily distractions?

how does it make you feel when you avoid them?

focus on that feeling and eliminate the choices that sidetrack you.

schenkman, for example, eliminates wardrobe choices and getting distracted in a messy closet by having two uniforms.

jeans, t-shirt, and sneakers for office days, button-down shirt, jacket, and shoes for speaking engagements.

same goes for his meal choices.

identical meals week after week.

he also only eats between 1pm and 8pm, which eliminates more choice.

should i eat this second dessert at 9pm?

no, because it's after 8pm.

as well as eating, schenkman also creates rituals around exercise and sleep, because all three help regulate the body's production of dopamine, serotonin, and adrenaline.

remember, those are the focus and happy chemicals that can harness adhd.

the exact details of schenkman's rituals aren't important.

the key is to create and maintain rituals that will work for you and your adhd.

if you need a place to start, here are some general guidelines.

for exercise, begin with 20 minutes a day, 6 days a week, of any activity that's beyond normal for you, and that includes walking.

do that activity outside and in nature as often as possible, and go from there.

for sleep, try cutting out late-night television to gain an extra hour or three.

for eating, load up on veggies and avoid any food that's advertised on tv.

schenkman also religiously tracks his exercise, sleep, and eating habits.

tracking will help you figure out what works for you, and once that happens, a super-powered brain and fulfilling life will naturally follow.

we'll get into that more later, but first, let's talk about triggers.

avoiding triggers we just learned that rituals can help you harness the power of your adhd as long as those rituals are personalized.

the same goes for avoiding adhd triggers.

the hot buttons that affect schenkman might not be the same ones that affect you, but you need to understand your personal hot buttons and how to avoid them.

and yes, everyone has triggers that cause them to act in self-destructive ways, whether they're fueled by adhd or not.

we've already heard about one of schenkman's triggers, las vegas.

he knows he can't be there because he has an addictive personality.

he learned that the hard way when, after a nerdy and alcohol-free childhood and adolescence, he discovered drinking as an adult.

in typical adhd fashion, schenkman went too far with alcohol, so now he avoids it like he'd avoid any other trigger.

has he ever gambled away his life savings at a poker table?

no.

but he knows even a little gambling could trigger a spree for someone like him, so he simply avoids it.

schenkman has other hot buttons that are probably relatable for many people, like being late.

it stresses him out, and then he's focused on the stress instead of the event he's late for.

his solution is to live life 30 minutes early, and he thinks it's one of his best defenses against the pitfalls of adhd.

when you're late, you feel anxious and incomplete, like something needs to be done that you can't get to.

and that's an awful feeling, especially when you have adhd.

along those same lines, if you have the choice between doing something now or later, always choose now.

deadlines are another time-related trigger for schenkman.

when he doesn't have deadlines, professionally or personally, things don't get done.

if your assignment for schenkman has a due date of soon, that gives him and his super-powered brain the chance to do a thousand other things in the meantime, which means your thing won't get done.

so he always insists on hard deadlines, and you should too.

to help him avoid triggers, maintain rituals, and make the most of his adhd, schenkman uses a host of tools.

in the next section, we'll take a look at some.

we also have some advice if none of these tools work for you.

tools and inboxes before we get to the digital apps that can increase productivity and minimize diversions, know this.

you should put them all on one screen.

scrolling through screens is a minefield of distractions for anyone, but in particular for someone with adhd.

so files and groups are your friends as you move everything to your home screen.

as we mentioned earlier, schenkman is committed to tracking his data when it comes to eating, sleeping, and exercising.

he does this using withings, which tracks weight, sleep, blood pressure, and air quality, runkeeper, to track steps and exercise, and myfitnesspal, which tracks caloric intake and nutritional numbers.

tracking is critical because it can help you reach goals and move forward.

it gives you a sense of crossing things off the list, which is bliss for anyone with adhd.

schenkman is also a huge fan of google apps, especially the calendar, to help organize his 1000-mph thoughts.

accessing all those google files anywhere and anytime through the cloud is also a gift for adhd brains.

they usually want information right now so they can complete this incredible idea for a new business they're having while touring an american civil war historical site and birdwatching and going over tuesday's presentation, and you get the idea.

the theory about keeping all of your apps on one screen also applies to your home and workspace.

those spaces need to be kept clean.

people with adhd have a tendency to collect things, so clutter is often an issue.

some people can live and work in clutter, but it's distracting and depressing for most.

if you spend hours looking for things, need to walk over piles to get across the room, or have to shove aside a mess to put your plate on the table, it's not a good idea.

if you put your plate on the table, it's probably time to clean up and declutter.

now let's go back.

remember when the therapist threw the book at schenkman?

it hit him in the gut and opened his mind to the idea that adhd was a power to be harnessed.

the book, delivered from distraction, was written by edward m. halliwell and john j. rady.

schenkman, in a wonderfully adhd gesture, emailed halliwell out of the blue just to say, hi.

he responded, and now he and schenkman are friends.

halliwell even wrote the foreword to faster than normal.

now schenkman has turned the tables.

he wants anyone with questions or comments about his work or adhd or just about anything else to contact him.

maybe you want to tell him about a great app that helps with your adhd, or get some advice on triggers, or describe that shiny necklace you saw in the window, or, oh look, a squirrel!

in this chapter to faster than normal by peter schenkman, the key takeaways are that adhd is a blessing, not a curse.

it can be used like a superpower, as long as it's understood and managed.

people with adhd don't produce enough of three key chemicals, serotonin, dopamine, and adrenaline.

that deficiency can lead to a lack of focus, verbal outbursts, and destructive decision-making.

but exercise, good sleep, and healthy eating habits can boost the production of those chemicals and help adhd brains operate at their maximum output.

when that happens, creativity and productivity usually follow.

people with adhd should avoid triggers that might set off their self-destructive behaviors.

these triggers might be a thing, such as alcohol, or a place, perhaps las vegas, or any person or situation that causes stress.

there are some apps which can help you track the three key activities of eating, sleeping, and exercise.

and finally, it's important to keep your digital and analog environments clean and clutter-free.

thank you so much for listening, and if you'd like, please leave us a rating or a comment.

we always appreciate your feedback.

see you in the next chapter.

bye.