When Losing Interest Isn't Failure: ADHD and Creativity

0:00 Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the ADHD Skills Lab. Today I actually want to share an episode of another show with you. It is called the ADHD Channel for Women. It's from our friends at understood.org, a nonprofit helping millions of people navigate neurodivergence. The ADHD Channel for Women features three shows that each unpack different aspects of life with ADHD.

0:25 They cover sex, dating, and relationships, deeper dives into where neurodivergence and the biggest news stories meet, like a newly discovered gene variant and how it could help how we treat ADHD. And then there's an ADHD coach who answers questions. The episode that I'm about to play for you is about how the Emmy winning writer, producer, and director, Adam Reid, handles idea overload with ADHD.

0:48 I really liked the way he talked about getting to 70 or 80% on something that he was so hyper fixated on, and then dropping it and initially feeling pretty bad about that decision, but later on realizing that he was really just putting it away and that he was going to come back to it later. It reminded me of finishing my master's and just dropping academia for an entire year, going away, making art, working in a bakery, and then coming back a year later to do my PhD and not actually dropping it the way that I initially thought I had.

1:23 So I definitely related to it and I did appreciate that he kept bringing and then thinking maybe I shouldn't be using the metaphor of a cheese cave. It might be a little bit niche. Check it out, see what you think.

1:34 I've learned to give myself permission to suck at something, permission to fail, permission to get excited by it. I have no shortage of ideas. It's putting them into motion, is the scary part. And also which ones, but there's a different way of looking at it, maybe, which is oh my god, I'm really excited about this right now.

1:49 And it may become nothing. And that's okay because it's like nothing is lost.

1:57 Hi, everybody, and welcome to Sorry I Miss This, the show where we talk about all things ADHD and its relationship to relationship, sex, intimacy, communication, and more. As always, I am your host, Kate Osborne, and welcome to the first ever live studio audience spectacular. Woo! What's a lot of applause?

2:21 It went on for so long. Thank you all so much for being here. I am so, so grateful. And for all of you who are joining us here online in the live stream, thank you so much for being part of this as well. We are so excited to be doing this. This is the first time that we have ever done this. Understood has been making podcasts for a few years now with the Misunderstood Network and all of that great stuff.

2:41 We have a number of different shows that we do, and this is the first time that we've ever been in the studio live with all of you and with all of you. So we're so grateful. So for those of you who don't know the work that Understood does, um, Understood is an incredible not-for-profit that is dedicated to raising awareness and education around ADHD and learning differences and keeping that education free and accessible to everybody of all ages.

3:05 The work is amazing and incredible. And I am obviously am a huge fan. If you are interested in donating, there is a QR code on your screen, or you can go to you.org slash giving G-I-V-I-N-G. That's really risky to have to spell in front of a live audience, but we did it. I'm super excited. But yeah, so thank you all so much for being here.

3:27 I really, really appreciate it. Um, and so without further ado, I'm so excited to welcome you to this episode about ADHD and creativity. When we first decided to do this episode, I was so excited and I was like, immediately we have to get my friend Adam. For those of you who don't know, Adam Reed is an Emmy award-winning writer.

3:52 He is a director, he is a filmmaker, he is a producer, he is one of the most brilliant and creative people that I've ever met in my entire life. Adam Reed, welcome to the show. Okay, this is so stupid, but I wanted no cards that said understood on the back more than anything in the entire world. And I have them, and I feel so powerful right now.

4:15 This is my caller daddy.

4:17 I don't know, I don't know what's on them either. Yes. You were like, Do you want the cards? I'm like, don't give me the cards.

4:22 Yeah. Okay. So keep it fresh. First question of my powerful cards. Adam, how do you define creativity?

4:31 Oh God. See, I should have gotten all the cards in advance. I think there's like the way that we do things and there's what one might normally do. And for me and my brain, for since I was like a little boy, it was like, oh, what's the other way? Yeah. And I think that's really appropriate to be here because I think I don't know.

4:50 I didn't know for a long time, but I think differently.

4:52 Well, if you were gonna action verb creativity, is creativity a choice? Is it a practice? Is it inherently existing? That's not an action verb, but you know what I mean?

5:04 Like what I think we're all creative and it's a human thing. I think it's a muscle. And like if you don't use it, you might lose it. But it's really a part of us. So it's like when we're kids and we play, we're inherently creative or we're we're excited about, you know, play. It's like, well, you lose that too.

5:21 You got to use it. And the more you use it, the more it comes naturally. Uh, the other thing I'll say, just from a writing point of view, is the hardest part isn't writing, it's showing up. And that gets so much easier the more you trust that that'll come.

5:36 Like now I just want to throw out the fancy, powerful questions because I just want well, I want to talk about that, right? Because I feel like one of the big challenges when it comes to ADHD is the start, the moment of beginning. Because we see when you talk about executive functioning, when you talk about all of the different places where the starting happens, sometimes that starting is the most difficult part.

5:58 So, how do you navigate the starting of the thing with ADHD?

6:05 I've learned to give myself permission. And that means permission to suck at something, permission to fail, permission to get excited by it. I have no shortage of ideas. And I think a lot of us are like that. We're like, I have a lot of ideas. It's putting them into motion, is the scary part. And also which ones?

6:22 Because I'm only made a finite time. But there's a different way of looking at it, maybe, which is oh my God, I'm really excited about this right now. And that's okay. And it may become nothing because it's like nothing is lost. We're often looking for permission from the outside. Oh, that's a good idea.

6:41 Oh, you should go do the thing. We need to do that for ourselves creatively. And that's a muscle too. And I, again, easier to talk about it than always do it. But that's the trick is to say yes and say no. That may run out of steam in 10 minutes or 10 years, and nothing is lost.

6:56 When you talk about permission, permission is, I think, for me at least, there is there's a loadedness to that, right? Because as somebody with ADHD, I've I've been told a lot in my life that I'm doing it bad or I'm doing it wrong, or I need to do it differently, or be different, or be something else than I am.

7:18 I can't relate at all. I know can you imagine you're crazy? I'm the only one ever. So that that permission often gets really dicey really quickly. And then you kind of add on the fact that sometimes there is a guilt and and shame around creativity, like the hyper focuses and the hyper fixations that we have left behind.

7:40 I gave myself permission to do the thing and I failed. I gave this myself permission to try, or or I took the big risk and it didn't work out. And now I feel even worse about myself. And that's a question that I I hear a lot from people.

7:54 I think the last thing you said is maybe the most important, which is um we feel like we might fail or that we're being selfish somehow to the either the responsibilities, the people, or even ourselves, right? Our future self, where we're going, like, I can't spend all this time and and have it feel wasted.

8:10 And I just want to put everyone to nest in their heart deep down because I don't think it takes easy, which is to say there is no such thing. There is a reality to your responsibilities. But take all that aside for a second. There is no growth without failure, and every great thing that's happened to me in my career is the direct result of eating shit so completely and really getting hurt.

8:42 It hurts that's life, and it's easier to talk about than it is to live through, and sometimes it hurts a lot. But here's the cool secret sauce, because once you know, so you get kicked in the teeth or like Rocky, you get knocked out, and it was like it's the getting back up and take and what you take from it.

8:59 There is no story if it's just like this happens, then this happens, and then this happens, right? It's because of this, this happened. And I think that is where we can find our best selves of going, no, go after the thing, fail, do it again, or adjust your approach, decide it's not for you. That's growth.

9:22 Oh, this is not what I thought it would be. I threw myself into this situation. So we started at a place and now we ended at a place, and I have no idea where we started, but I believe wholeheartedly in what I said.

9:33 That's I mean, I'm not gonna lie to you. You said that sometimes you fail and then you get back up again, and I just started hearing chumbawamba in my head. So, like that was that was where I was at for a lot of that was that. So, a very famous piece of advice around creativity, specifically writing, but I think it applies to a lot of things, is kill your darlings.

9:55 How do you feel about that advice, especially when it comes to ADHD and being curious about a lot of things all the time?

10:03 I think when inspiration strikes, those are the darlings I think you speak of, or it's like the first thing you write. And then ironically, by the end of the whole process, because you've shaped an entire thing around that, often you don't need that. And that's where that comes from, like kill your darlings.

10:16 So that's one side. And then at the intersection of all your really different ideas, say, Oh, I'm into, you know, this knitting, and but I'm also into, you know, stop motion and miniatures. And then the weirdest ones, the things that don't belong together, is a shortcut to your voice. So I say, like, your real job.

10:38 And it's hard because, right? We have a lot of things that we're interested in. We have a lot of things that we're interested in. You just talked about this. You're an amazing show. Everybody, please go see it. And this is like a whole core thing to it, which is like, how do I choose? Right. Don't, is my answer.

10:54 And you might think, well, this is so singular. There's not going to be another rural farm knitting, bondage, space exploring, Lego master. I don't know. I'm trying really hard to come up with different things. Hi, that's a show. We'll talk about it later.

11:08 I'd watch it. I'd watch it.

11:09 You're going that would clearly be just for me. In my opinion, it just became truly universal. And I think the things that we really respond to in art or even food or music, it is people who found themselves through these expressions and your commitment and love of the thing.

11:28 I want to talk a little bit about what you said in in terms of of choosing and and doing it all. Because one of the things that I I experience real grief, real gut-wrenching grief about is that I you only get one life, right?

11:50 And you so you say.

11:52 So you say. And so I get really excited and and really passionate about whatever. And for this particular example, I'm gonna talk about the time that I became a magician. I'm very fun at parties. Um, but so I got really into magic, right? And I I loved it and I was curious about it, and it was exciting to me.

12:11 But that whole time that I was I was learning magic, I wasn't learning about pasta making or or cooking or or oil painting or whatever. And so when it comes to that sort of like that curiosity and that and that constant, almost nagging curiosity of like everything is interesting and everything is fascinating and and and creativity is is just knowing that all of that exists all the time.

12:40 How do you handle that that kind of I could be doing something else? Maybe I could be doing something else that's that's better or different or or whatever.

12:50 I think a lot of people feel this put a lot of additional unneeded, it's not unneeded, it's very real, but pressure to land on something because they need to commit and they feel like they want to, like in a gamer sense, they need to level up there, which is I think what you're talking about. And if I'm leveling up here, all my other stats are gonna be kind of garbage.

13:06 My pasta stat is garbage.

13:07 Your pasta stat is r really low. As long as you're genuinely like responding to the thing, it's actually working. And it was like as long as you don't necessarily need anything more from it, and it has a job to do, a role to play in the Lord of the Rings sense, where everything has a part. It's a little bit of a mystery, right?

13:25 So there are times when you feel spread thin or you're moving in too many directions at once where you may need to just make a list and go, what's exciting me most right now? But again, nothing is lost. So sometimes starting is hard in the week because I'm like, what am I supposed to focus on? The best work is gonna come from where my inspiration is the most rich.

13:45 And here's what's interesting is when it fades, it isn't a failure. And I often take scripts I've written and I'm hyper-focused on something. It is my entire life. I'm so certain it is my entire future and that this is gonna happen. It's inevitable. And I whether I finish the thing, or usually it's like when I'm like 5% away from actually finally finishing a thing, and it's not even the whole thing, it's the first draft of a thing.

14:10 Forget the 20 more drafts or 100 more drafts that it's gonna take. I lose all will to even look at it again. Okay.

14:17 Yes.

14:18 And there's a shame monster that pops up, and it's a shame monster is very real because that can really get in your way and and and mess your life up. But the reality is um it is okay to put it in the cheesecave. It needs to age. You did everything you could do with magic in that moment, and it's gonna come back.

14:38 And then what's so amazing, and you have to live long enough to have this experience and have this magic work on you, which is when you least suspect expect it, or when, and in those free associating moments or in the shower on long walks, you make a connection to something you learned or something you wrote.

14:56 It may be the only thing that survives from that draft, but you're like, oh my God, I know what I can do with that. And if it took five more years, it would be okay. Permission. The cheese actually needs to age, it goes in the caves. They have to pat it. It's a real thing, and it's not ready. And we have to say to ourselves, that's okay too.

15:18 Now, if you haven't finished anything and that's been your goal, that can really hurt. You know, you can sit here and feel like you've let yourself down, or the people who came on that journey with you gave you all that time, and we're like, I'm gonna handle things so you can work on this book that you've been talking about.

15:36 And it was like, but I have enough confidence to know that it's not over. It's hard to connect that moment to the future moment where you're like, oh my God, magic. Like now I get to use that amazing, all those years I spent, you know, with Shakespeare. You know, it's like it comes back. This is your story, and it's what makes you really unique.

15:59 So we can't turn our back on these things either. It's like we can put them away, we can put them out of sight and out of mind, and that's okay, but they're gonna come back.

16:06 I love that you talked about finishing stuff because they did this really interesting research study on ADHD and creative thinking. And one of the things that they found over and over and over again was that we are really good at that differential pattern matching, right? That sort of like galaxy brain, whatever.

16:28 Beautiful mind shape. There is there is a very big difference between potential, right? Being able to think the thoughts and make the weird connections, and then the output and or or the achievement, right? Of like finishing the actual thing. And so, like, how do you decide what goes into the cheesecave?

16:50 That's a great question. And it leads right to one of my favorite things, which is it tells us. So, um, for a long time, my ideas, I thought of ideas like, oh, they're like children. You want to protect your idea, you want to like really be appreciated and celebrated and all these things. But I don't think our ideas are children.

17:06 I think they're seeds. And they take some of the pressure and the self out of it because it's almost more like a discovery. And it was like, and the only place they don't grow is sort of in your pocket, is what I say. And you got to get them out, and some some some of them won't grow. And I think that's a really powerful thing for me because I'm like, oh, my job isn't to protect it till it's nature is going to take its course with even our ideas.

17:30 They don't really even belong to us. We become the steward of these ideas. So putting something in the cheesecave is as simple, just answering one question and then the other is as simple as I'm not feeling it anymore. It's heartbreaking, but only if we let it. And also, I'd keep a rotisserie, rotisserie.

17:48 I keep a lazy Susan. Um, I'm gonna try and find a better metaphor for this. It's more like chess, where it's like, I'll do five games, like like Bobby Fisher. I can say, I like to have a lot of things. If I'm just working on one thing, honestly, I just probably will get really bored with it. And what I usually do now is I'll be like, I'll go over to the other thing that was so exciting.

18:06 And it's almost like a lot of little cheesecaves. We're gonna kill that. We're gonna stop talking about cheese.

18:10 A lot of cheesecaves.

18:10 That's a way to sort of keep it fresh. It's like, oh, I'm ignoring my work by doing this other thing. Now this is getting built up. And it was like, and this thing is aging. And then you can go right back to it.

18:22 Your relationship to creativity, I think, is very singular in in terms of just how much ownership you have over the creativity in your life. And I know that a lot of people with ADHD often feel like the executive functioning parts of it, the overcommitting, the task prioritization, those can sometimes get in the way.

18:44 So I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about how you work with your ADHD to develop a healthy relationship around creativity and and how it shows up in your life.

18:55 I mean, it's first of all, there's no point where I've ever felt like I haven't figured out or I'm not at the very beginning, which is I think hard to hear because I think little me would be so impressed by some of the things that I've done. But I gotta say, every day, even now in my new old age, I'm I feel like a baby.

19:12 I feel like it's all still out in front of me. I kind of think even really successful people in every area, I think also have that inside of them. We're pushing ourselves to keep it novel so we stay excited. But I think forgiving ourselves for that, giving ourselves permission to lose steam, reboot, get it excited about something else, this takes a lot of the friction.

19:37 And then we're generally, and I'm speaking for myself, obviously, but I think this works. Creating more. Now, we may not be finishing all the things we want. And this is I maybe a good bridge into like just because we can see it on our head doesn't mean that it's entirely up to us. And I think we often feel that way.

19:54 So I think the other huge thing that we haven't talked about is like where do you feel supported? Who do you feel supported with? Forget wanting to do everything. What are your strengths, like your actual strengths? Get into those things. What are your actual weaknesses? And we don't necessarily have to be better at the things we're not good at.

20:14 We might just want to be like, I'm really good at this and this, I'm not so good at this and this. And you go and you find your people and you're like, oh, I have a band, I have a tribe. And it was like, and those people change too. Every idea, every project, even if it's just little life stuff, is like, oh, who's my best accountability partner in this?

20:34 Who's my buddy who's gonna love this the way I do, but add value and do the thing I can't or keep me online? And I think that's the secret to that.

20:42 I want to talk more about strengths because I I feel like so often ADHD gets this like just constant negativity around like we can't do it and we can't do it and we can't do it. But I I also feel like there are a lot of places in my life where because of the way that my brain is built and because of the way that I think, I excel and I do really, really well in some of those places.

21:06 Can you speak a little bit to that and and how your strengths have really allowed you to create this relationship and build this life that you are currently?

21:16 There are very few environments where the way I think and work work. And I had to learn the hard way that certain structures, certain jobs, even certain relationships best of intentions can completely fall apart. I'm on an insufferable show off. So it's true. So if I see an opportunity within one of my strengths, I can't do anything, but the things that I know how to do, I go, I can do that.

21:44 So we obviously get a lot out of the the curtain call, so to speak. It was like you've presented whatever thing, and everyone's like, Holy crap, that was amazing. I can't believe you did that. Well, that's motivation for me for next time. That's the fuel in the tank. And I think the more we do that, the more we can.

22:00 Trick ourselves. I have a very quick draining social battery in almost any scenario, except on set when I'm really where I belong. And that's because I can control all these different elements. Knowing how I operate best is the only way I've been able to have any amount of victories. And again, in between, if not long runs of failure.

22:26 No one else can take responsibility for that. Like I've had to learn in just the last few years how to take a lot more accountability for my own frustration, especially when it's projected outward. You know, it's like that's no one else's job. And I have to still daily remind myself, and maybe not well, but like, oh, I have to take responsibility.

22:49 I have to over unfortunately overcommunication. When it's applied correctly, it can be annoying. But for my work, it's definitely a gift because now everyone's charging up the same mountain. And I might end up in situations where try hard as I might and wanting to impress people is great and goes a long way, but it is no substitute for telling people how I work best and then showing them.

23:17 This is gonna sound like a digression, but it's not. Um, so Understood did this really interesting study about uh people in creative fields. And one of the things that they found was like one out of two people, which I think scientifically is half, but don't quote me on 50%. I feel like like identify as neurodivergent, but 90% of those people find that a lot of times the field is inaccessible because of exactly what you're talking about, right?

23:41 And so I also get itchy sometimes because we also sit here kind of from a position of privilege, right? Like you happen to be like an Emmy Award-winning writer and director. I'm a full-time content creator, podcaster, writer, also. And so, like we have the kind of luxury of fitting creativity into a lot of our lives.

24:05 So, for our our dear listeners who who maybe don't feel like they have that much room, can you talk briefly uh about fitting creativity into your life no matter what?

24:18 The creative has become work, but the greater joy for me, and I think maybe everybody can take this with them, is in finding little ways to see ourselves and to bring ourselves joy. I think every area of our lives is a chance to do that. And I think it takes a little bit of time in the gym of your soul to get to the point where you feel comfortable enough to do that on the regular.

24:45 And I don't think you have to be talented, I don't think you have to be a particularly artistic person to find the joy in the little things and to say yes to yourself. And you can model that in your own life on a daily being like, I have this stupid idea for how we might reorganize the bookshelf. And it was like, you may regret it, but starting is actually the harder part.

25:06 The doing it is actually fun. And who cares if it worked? And I think that's the sort of pattern you want to follow again and again to feel like, wait, I'm closer to living the life that I wanted to live in the best of scenarios. And I don't think it ever gets easy. I say all this from that privilege, but I it's just one more overshare to say, like, it's so much easier to talk about these things and to see it clearly, but I really believe in it and I've seen it.

25:33 I feel it. So when I'm when all that's working, I'm like, holy shit, I'm doing it.

25:38 What is one piece of advice that you wish that you had when you were starting your journey in terms of building your relationship to creativity with ADHD?

25:48 I didn't know I had ADHD until I was like 45, thanks to you. We won't go into that right now. It's your fault. Sorry. I could cry. There's so much that I didn't know. And I was really, really, really hard on myself. So if you take one thing away from all of this is that you just don't need to be. I'm still growing through that and processing what little Adam didn't know.

26:16 We don't have time for that. But if we just went into the kernel of it, it would actually be like you don't have to be anything. I learned early on that performing, not just like acting, but like performatively living, masking. I didn't know what that was until recently. That was the way I could accept love, that's the way I could succeed, that's the way I was safe and I was okay.

26:43 Oh, I'm being appreciated. But that's not really seeing ourselves clearly, and I'm now working against that. But I had all the success because of that. So I have to both say thank you to my little self for not knowing and chasing that so hard because it delivered me to this moment, and I have to also be okay with some of that urgency and that performativeness leaving and being okay with what if I don't, I am not what I create.

27:11 I'm not worthy because of what I make. I'm worthy because of who I am and how I see the world. And I don't even have to share that. If I share it, that's a gift, maybe to other people, but to myself. And I think that's the that's a big growth moment. And I'm still, I think, trying to live that.

27:32 That's a that's a crush of an ending question. That was you nailed that. Oh, good. Thank you.

27:38 Let's do it again.

27:43 Thank you for listening. Anything mentioned in the episode will be linked in the show notes with more resources. Have a question, comment, burning story you'd like to share, email us at sorry I missed this at understood.org. This show is brought to you by understood.org. Understood.org is a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering people with learning and thinking differences like ADHD and dyslexia.

28:05 If you want to help us continue this work, donate at understood.org slash gift. Sorry I missed this is produced by Justamine Molly and edited by Jesse DeMartino. Video is produced by Calvin Kennee. Our theme music was written by Justin D. Wright. Production support provided by Andrew Rector. Brianna Berry is our production director.

28:22 Neil Drumming is our editorial director. From understood.org, our executive directors are Laura Key, Scott Koshir, and Jordan Davidson. And I'm your host, Kate Osborne. Thank you so much for listening, and I'll see you again soon.

28:37 That was an episode of the ADHD Channel for Women from understood.org. To listen, search for the ADHD Channel for Women in your podcast app. That's the ADHD Channel for Women.