230 - ADHD, Depression, CBT, Mindset Shifts, and Productivity

Well I wanted to talk more about productivity but I clearly had some inner need to express my opinion about how crappy CBT is for my depression and getting things done. 

What to do when you don't love your brain, and you don't care about it's opinion of you, and you have stuff to do?! Let's discuss. 

Join ADHDBB and improve your time management, get shit done, and learn YOUR way to become consistent? Get started here: https://adhdbigbrother.circle.so/adhdbb

Interested in the Consistency Crew? Contact me and let me know: https://www.adhdbigbrother.com/contactruss

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Transcript

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Like a phoenix, I'm rising from the ashes of my depressive episode. Behold my glory. Actually, it's a little bit more like a mangy sloth. Climbing up a tree or a or a bear coming out of hibernation. It's just hot mess. But look who showed up. But look who's look who's making an appearance. Oh it's not as pretty or as poetic as a phoenix, though. Am I right? Yeah. All right, guys. Let's talk about some stuff. You are listening to ADHD Brother, the podcast for adults struggling with their ADHD, their comorbid depression, their anxiety. Oh, it's just a new. I'm your host and your ADHD-bit brother, Rush Jones. I've got ADHD too. I've got depression as well. It's crapastic. So let's learn some stuff. Let's laugh at some stuff. Let's make some commitments to do some stuff. Ladies and gentlemen, here's some stuff. Welcome to the podcast. Guys, guys. Welcome, guys. Um yeah, I'm gonna start off with an um. I'm starting off with some bad uming. And I don't have riverside, I don't have like that button that deletes all the ums, I gotta do it manually. Um all right, let's right now let's do business stuff. All right, let's get into it. I have unlimited openings in the community. We're 60 plus people in there right now, but oh man, if you want community support, oh yeah, accountability, body doubling, oh community challenges, weekly support calls, goals calls. If that's your track, oh we are doing it in there. Was that too sexual for you? Oh, we're doing it in there. We're not doing it in there. Stop it. Let's not open up a can of worms on what's going on in the in the body doubling zoom rooms. Ooh, what are you committed to getting done in the body double room? Saucy. That's not what we're doing, okay? We're getting shit done. You know that. Okay. We're done with the reading. We did it already. We're done with the YouTubing and the sciencing, and now we're ready to implement. So that's what's up. How are we implementing? You know, or do we just really want to get really, really great at explaining to people the microscience behind our unique brain and why I didn't do the laundry today? Anybody want to actually do the laundry? That's that's we got a sandbox for that. Additionally, I have three spots open in the consistency crew. Yes, yes, I said consistency. For all those persistency enthusiasts out there, we're gonna fight about this. God, I believe in the power of consistency. Consistency in showing up for ourselves, consistently making efforts. We meet every Monday consistently, unless you can't make it, of course. Um, I I I railed on this in episode 221, if you want to go back and listen to it, but oh my god, persistency. I don't get it. Why did we just fucking bail on a word? Like, I don't want to feel like a failure. Like, what the fuck are we talking about? Persistence only really exists in failure. Why is that a better word? More importantly, why are we quitting on a word? I want to be fucking consistent. I help people become consistent. What are we? So we're not good enough now, we're not talented enough for the word, so we need a fucking chintzy side word? Persistence? Fuck that. Just sounds to me like an annoying guy, like Troy that won't let up. You know, I said no Troy. No means no Troy. Quit calling Troy. I don't want your loan, Troy. God, you're persistent. It's unbelievable. Come on with that. Oh, I am popping out of my depression. I can feel it. I'm starting to get animated again about things. Anyway, whatever. Sometimes we need a little more direct coaching, so that's what the consistency crew is. Um, I max them out at five people because I'm not much of one of those general ADHD education on a on a call. You know, maybe one or two people get hot seated or something like that. Um, doesn't really excite me, you know, doesn't really juice minute, if you know what I mean. My theory, or this is at least the way that I like to do things, I want to get in there every week and I want to do shit together. Tell us what you committed to, tell us what got in the way. Let's troubleshoot, let's refresh the commitment, and then consistently show up every week. And then we use the data community for daily accountability. The work can be a lot easier than we make it, and it really can accelerate full with some direct attention. So uh, but you got to reach out to me though, adhcbitbrother.com. You can click on the contact form uh to get in touch about that, and I will walk you through all the steps uh to get inside. But if that's of interest to you, stop the podcast right now and reach out. Um, or stop the podcast right now and tell your AI bot to remind you to reach out later. And that's how we do it. Um, I created a pretty damn effective platform for getting shit done if you have ADHD. And this week in the community, we had uh a few members reach 30 days in a row of doing whatever they said they were gonna do. That's the brain boiler badge, baby. We had a couple members get 30-day badges for a no-alcohol challenge that we've got going on. Magic is happening inside the community. Transformations, guys. Whole body transformations. People are entering the community chrysalis, and we're just really turning into goop together, and we're emerging glorious butterflies. It's really magical. Butterflies that are getting shit done. Who to funk it? Um, so yeah, consistency crew. Um, we got a few spots for that. That's the next tier up in my tears. Yeah, guys, I got tiers. We have levels. You want a little russ in your face? That's consistency crew. You want me all to yourself? That's the one-on-one tier. My method, here's how I do it. My method is to get you unstuck. I help you become confidently consistent. Yes, that word is very popular in my vernacular. And I leave you with the tools to coach yourself when you absolutely fall off the rails in the future. We will always, always fall off the rails in the future. Falling off the rails happens. Um, we don't become people who never falter. It's the art form of how soon can you catch yourself and then how soon can you non-judgmentally put yourself back on the rails using the various tools you've learned. And the way that the one-on-one coaching works, you just uh go to the website, adhcbaybrother.com, and you click on the book of free chat so that we can talk about it. And that's a free chat for you. You know, so many of us, especially late in life diagnosed, so that we conceptually learned the tools. We read them and we acknowledged that they are a tool, and then that's pretty much where that dies. You know, I learned a tool. I should do that sometime. And then, you know, five minutes later, the microwave dings and we're on to the next thing. Yeah, what were we talking about? Oh, yeah, we should go on a hike sometime. Yeah. Meanwhile, the tool is buried in our subconscious. And it only resurfaces after the shit already hit the fan, right? It's too late, just long enough for us to recognize. Oh, I should have done that fucking thing I learned. And then we just file it back under T for things to beat myself up about later. And that's the that would be the P touch label on that mental file. This to me is the prescription for getting like one-on-one coaching or group coaching or whatever. It's that you need something beyond the conceptual learning. Medicine is great, it works, um, but uh uh, but okay, but are we just now really good at focusing on World of Warcraft? Or, you know, what are we learning? What are we what are we doing? So anyway, those are my three tiers. Uh, three tiers for us. Yay! Uh, I think the cost variance on these really speaks to the speed. It's like how fast do you need or want change? That's how I would determine where I was at, you know, finances aside, that's always a the main indicator, right? Mental health report. Let's get into it. Uh, every episode we talk about our skull spaghetti, the good, the bad, and the weird, because we're not always fine. I want to do my part to normalize the dialogue. I think that me talking about being depressed has had a big impact on me, feeling like I'm popping out of it. Uh, it feels like I see the dark cloud. I see it there, I'm not, but I'm not directly underneath it. Um, not at the moment. It's it's like behind me a bit. I'm telling you, like specific. It's specifically, it's three miles to the southeast. I can see it coming. Uh, there's a northwest front pulling in, but you know, we're making some headway, we're keeping ahead of it. What a dummy. But here's what I'm noticing. I notice I've been tearing up a bit this weekend, which I think is good. It means that I'm caring. I'm having feelings. Oh my god, when I don't care, like when it's like, who gives a shit? Um, that's when I start to red flag it. Um, and I'm doing what I can to be aware of the sunshine. I it's like my givea shits are returning. It's like, hey, give a shit. Welcome back. Where were you? We were looking all over for you. I've just really been mentioning it. Uh, it's like a conversation. It's not to be like, oh, let's talk about me and my poor me and oh, my melancholy. It's really just a matter of fact. I don't have to act depressed to tell someone, you know. It's like, hey Russ, how are you doing? Oh, well, I've I'm in a depressive episode this week. It sucks. It's stupid. How are you doing? And then the conversation continues. Oh, there's something about casually owning it that uh lifts a little bit of it for me. I, you know, and I thought that that was shareworthy. You have been officially shared to with. Shared I've you've I've shared for you, shared to you. Let's talk about doing stuff. I want to talk today about doing stuff. There's so much information out there on stuff, ADHD stuff. You know, what's happening inside my school spaghetti? And let me just tell you, there's reasons for this. And it's not you're broken, and it's not do more, and it's not just do it, and it's not drink more water, and it's not get a new planner, and it's I don't know. It's just don't do anything, don't feel anything. Maybe I'm jaded. Can you guys smell my jade? The jade on my breath. I'm very jaded. Maybe I'm just naturally oppositional. I don't know. Um, I don't know what's going on in my neurozipshiticals, okay? Anyway, I'm sorry about shit talking. I do believe in psychoeducation, even though the word is dumb. Psychoeducation. It's like educate those fucking crazies, man. The psych Come on, people. Words. Words. I do believe in the word consistency, and I I do believe in the word psychoeducation, but you have to say it like you're a psycho. Psychoeducation. Okay, let's say you're at a point where something needs to change in your world. Like you know what needs to be done, whether it's to have more control over your day, you got better time management skills, how can you let the things that you need to do stop piling up? Like, what does it take for someone in chaos to get their head above water, breathe a little, have a little more time for the relaxing stuff? That's when I enter your picture. That's where I can help. I think that's that's my general stance on when you hire an ADHD coach. It's not not when things are going okay. Like, you know, if I just had a morning routine, it's typically when you need help getting your head above water. And it's tough because when we're in that spot, we're like, I don't have time to learn time management. That is the reddest of the red flags right there. So that's how like we do that together. I like without I don't need a mindset shift. Like I'm more of a person that's like, how does a person with your current mindset do a thing with all the shame, all the guilt, the yada yada yada? You know, how does that person improve their time management so that they can get their head above water? If you're late diagnosed, ADHD or God, that journey to a new mindset. I mean, we're talking you legitimately believe differently about things in your core, your autopilot. That is not something that changes this week. Like I'm talking autopilot. You know what I mean? I'm not talking like you met with someone that spun your brain and you're like, yeah, yeah, that's how I'm gonna look at the world now. This is the new me starting now. That's a journey. It's a worthwhile journey, but that's like we're talking years of therapy, right? I think it's more beneficial around things like shame and guilt, like relieving some of the emotional pressure that comes along with having a history of ADHD. But like therapy, that takes years. But what are we gonna do? Just like punt all the crappy tasks forward and uh keep drowning with bad time management until what? Until the universe stops shitting on us? I'm not sure that's happening. Kind of feels like the universe has volcanic diarrhea right now. So I don't. Have you been following the Earth news lately? Yikes. So I'm sort of more in the in the line of like, while that's going on, uh, what are we doing, right? You know, most of you know what I think. I mean I'm in the camp DBT or ACT, like dialectical behavior therapy or uh acceptance and commitment therapy, those uh modalities, what do you call them, methodologies of therapy? Like I don't have time or the want really to reframe my thinking. I used to think I was a piece of shit. Now I know it's my brain. Okay, great. My brain is a piece of shit. Okay, you know, we don't have to love everything about us all the time, right? I love my, I don't know, ears. My ears are cool. I love I love my arms, I love my mustache right now. Do not love my brain. So it's like, so ultimately, like I'm a I'm a coach, a productivity coach. So for me, I'm coming from the lens of like, but I want to do stuff. I think it's about meeting people where they're at. And that sounds very cliche. That's kind of like how people how you're supposed to work, I guess. But uh, I'm not talking you out of your overwhelm. You're overwhelmed. And you either need a break, so take a break. Or if you don't need a break, how does an overwhelmed person do a thing? What does that take? And that's how I am with depression as well. Like it's like I can't undepress myself to do the fucking laundry. We gotta do this stuff anyway, right? So, how do we make it easy? Um, I can absolutely drag my laundry on forever. I can absolutely push my bills, bills to the last minute, but I would like to pay them before I get a late fee. Can't undepress myself to get up and pay the bills. I gotta figure out what's my way to do this, even though. How do we make it easy or easier? Let's say. How does a person who thinks they are lazy and nothing works for me? I've tried everything. How does that person do a thing? That's literally my I just that's my jam. I love this shit, you guys. It's not about thinking you can first, and not in my world, you don't. You're convicted in your I can't stance. So how does that person do a thing? So here's my coachy thing on that. This is what I do for me. And it's really brain tricks. It's mind fuck yourself. To me, the task is what gets done, but the effort that I put in is about something else. So that's the general zoomed out view of the thing. I personally create games and challenges for myself. I created a card game, actual playing cards. I had it made to help me do life's basic things when I quote unquote can't. I turned it into a game because I enjoy games. Six things that I have to do, cool. I'll roll a six-sided dice and whatever it lands on, set a 10-minute timer and I work on it for 10 minutes. People are like, but what if it's not done? That's the fucking brain talking. I wasn't gonna do anything anyway. So who gives a shit if it's done or not? It's done 10 minutes more than it would have been. What it takes to get me started is knowing that I get to quit in 10 minutes. Zero thoughts past getting started. You know, like the what, well, what if this and what if that, and what if I want to keep going, and what if I get done early? That is just the brain braining out. That's not part of the game, and it's not worth talking about. It's just play the game, see what happens. We can be such multiversers, like we'll let our brain take us down every single avenue, every world in which we oh, if I try it this way and if I tried it that way, and we keep going with it mentally until we hit the dead end where the thing doesn't work. And so we just keep ruling things out. And oh man, like have you ever read a book that tries to give you all of it? And oh man, like we want all of it, don't we? Like, give me everything, just tell me everything and give me everything. I just want to know all of it. And when this happens, you can do that. And when you if or if that happens, you could try this other thing and then that. And like, how many of us have actually printed out some sort of a logic map that takes you through every possible avenue and moment? Okay, this happened, so I'm gonna do this. 0.0 of us have done that. Okay, maybe, maybe there's one person. Sorry, Clark, didn't realize that don't mean to exclude you. But the problem here is that we're all so unique and different. So, what it takes you to do a thing in the moment, and with your brain and your life and your backstory, it's gonna be unique. Here, here, here's my here. I'm gonna give you my I'm 50. Here's how your old ADHD big brother does it. I'll give you a data point here for your world. I do have depression. Okay, we know that about me. I am riddled with ADHD. You can see it everywhere. The metaphorical rash, it's up and down my neck. I can't even go outside without a turtleneck. But man, the cognitive work. The talking to myself about the moment, the absolving of the shame in the moment or the guilt, that takes effort. Effort I don't have in those moments. Like I don't have the energy for everything. So if like if you're a person that is struggling with overwhelm and too much going on, isn't that a deal breaker for you? When someone's like, well, if you're having a tough time with the kids and the stress and the bills and your job and you're feeling like you're drowning, okay, take time and talk to your brain about it. Spend all the remaining negative five spoons that you have to lovingly argue with yourself about yourself and why your thinking was wrong and what your new thing's gonna be, and try to convince yourself of a cognitive reframe. Oh my god, that energy? Do you have that? I don't. These are just my strong, unwavering opinions. Welcome to the show. Um, I believe other people who aren't like the people who we feel that are we're letting down or you know, maybe that are judging us. Other people who get it, like the very act of purging in a community, it helps. Right? Doesn't it? Doesn't it help you? If we have too much to do, we purge it onto a list, get it out of our head where we can see it and deal with it. We're overwhelmed with life, we're drowning. How do you get it out? Who's your purge person? That it would be so much more helpful to me than my mirror. Oh, how's that for marketing material? Come on down to ADHD Big Brother and purge with us. Vomit your woes at ADHD Big Brother, starting at $49 a month. We've got your puke bucket. Anyway, alrighty. I I hope you got something out of this. I I do recommend across the board, if you are overwhelmed, you got too much going on, you can't get your head above water. That is the time to join us. Uh, don't worry about I won't use it. Don't worry about like I don't know where to start. I join. Make the commitment to join, and I'll personally be in contact with you, and I will hold your hand through the next steps. If you want it, you know, I'm here to help if I can. I mean, that's the whole problem, I think, with having this purpose of being of service is you have to be of service to service it. And turns out that's what kindles my light. So come and get some if you like. Um, alrighty. That will do it for ADHD Big Brother episode, uh, whatever episode this is. Have a great week. Y'all come back now, you heal? Uh wait, I should say it how I normally say it. And with that, I shall talk to you later.