this episode is sponsored by Sama stick around till the end of the video to learn more about it but for us for some reason it tends to send out these relentlessly negative messages you're stupid you're boring you're ugly nothing's going to work out you're lazy without your attention it can't survive don't let the demon get [Music] you do you ever feel like the amount of work you have to do is not going to fit into the amount of time you have to do it yeah that's cuz it Doesn't at most jobs we really can't do
all the things and still be done with work on time which has been really apparent to me now that I have a new baby and working late is not an option what I use to help me prioritize is Sama Sama is this system that helps people mindfully plan their workday you can open one program and see everything you need to do from your email from your calendar as SAA which is way less overwhelming my sleep-deprived brain deeply appreciates this second time estimates you can set estimates for how long you think each task will take so
you can see what your workload is for that day and and bump back tasks that can wait this allows me to stick to my current part-time schedule and even make sure I have time to pump it also allows me to see when the amount of time I thought I would need to do a task is way off which allows me to adjust my expectations for next time also with Team view my team can see what it is that I'm working on that day and shoot me a message if they need me working on something else
instead they can even add tasks to my day in advance so that I know that I'm working on what they need me working on most sometimes the team even leaves me little reminders or affirmations a that feels good I'm really surprised how effective I've been coming back from maternity leave even part-time Sama is a lot of the reason why task positive Network engage if you want to try it go to s.com ajessica from howto ADHD Sama is so ADHD friendly they have a trial period that doesn't require a credit card up front so you can
decide whether or not you want to recharge for it after you try it out if you try it let me know what you think hello brains this is Dr hell if you haven't seen him already on our Channel Dr hell is the ADHD expert Harvard trained psychiatrist author of like 25 books many of which are about ADHD um and just knows knows so much about ADHD and has been teaching others about it for so so long one of the best things I've personally learned from Dr halwell was from a keynote that he gave at the
international ADHD conference a couple years back about something called the demon so I wanted to have him come on and talk about this Creation in his own words yes it really is um one of the most Val able insights or biological facts that I've learned in the past oh 15 years and it it comes out of fmri where you can see the brain in action and what they found out uh gabrieli at MIT did most of this research that that when you're doing something creative and that's sort of that's our we 0 years I have
it too that's that's our strongest asset is our imagination and when we're doing something using it to bake a cake or write a book or design a building you know when we're involved in the Act of Creation which is you know where we where we are at our best four different regions of the brain light up neural networks and together they're called the task positive Network it's a connectome which uh you know it's not a separ region but it's it it's four different regions each contributing so it's like four different states each contributing something and
the the task positive network is where we do our best work where we're we're in the groove we're we're in the zone and in flow right in Flow In the Zone exactly then you were in the tpn the task positive Network and uh boy you want to stay in the tpn as long as you can but you can't stay in it all day that's the thing about by the way that that's just the thing about Focus anyway you you cannot we're not a machine uh machines can do this they can stay wherever you want them
to indefinitely as long as they've got a source of energy but we our brains cannot do that so we can't stay in the tpn indefinitely so when we're finished whatever we're doing or when we wear out and take have to go for a break you can see on fmri the the tpn shuts down the these regions all go dark and the old thinking was the brain kind of takes a rest because that makes intuitive sense nothing could be further from the truth the brain actually uses you brains you actually use more oxygen and and more
glucose uh when the tpn shuts down than than when it when it's active so what's going on there well for other regions in the brain light up and uh together this connect is called the default mode Network the dmn which I call the demon because dmn sounds like demon also because it acts like a demon in us with ADD you see both the tpn and the and the dmn are are partake of the imagination another another structure if you will that has no localization you you can't say this is the imagination here here there it's
like the hippocampus or the cerebellum or you can't say this is where the imagination is but you can say in these two connectomes that's partaking of the imagination it's interesting that something is critical as the imagination we don't know where it is but so when the when the demon lights up in most people it's it's just fine but for us for some reason it tends to send out these relentlessly negative messages you're stupid you're boring you're ugly nothing's going to work out you're lazy you're everything you've thought of you're arrogant you're narcissist you're full of
yourself you're nasty you're a disappointment to the world you'll never achieve your dreams I mean you know we just lamb based ourselves we just just just fog ourselves and and we stay riveted there we we we we we stay attached we stay pouring over the terrible insults the the dmn is is is is sending us and and and and rubbing our nose in and um you say why don't we detach why don't we look elsewhere well remember we 0 years were always looking for high stimulation contentment is too bland you don't say she was riveted
in contentment but you do say she was riveted in despair in in misery in in thoughts of self attack and and you know life that's captivating that's riveting it's like a horror movie Only the movie is your life so we torture ourselves because it's stimulating yeah exactly exactly so this is like rumination yeah it is rumination uh brooding these dark states that people with ADD report consistently that they're prone to and they don't know what to do about it and it they don't understand that they actually can do something about it what they what they
usually do is just tough it out and and go through these and what's really bad is when they believe what the dmn is saying when they mistake it for reality when they believe their life is going to turn to poop when they when they believe they're a useless piece of blank and when they mistake the the imaginations of the dmn the demon for reality which they're all too ready to do because people with ad their self-esteem tends to be tenuous anyway so if some voice comes along and says yeah you suck you're right you suck
they'll not yeah I do suck you're right and so you know a lot of times I start problem solving I'm like okay yeah this friend must hate me what do I do how do I fix this and I I start problem solving it's The Optimist in you that's good that's good that's the trick is number one recognize it when it's happening you say this is the demon this is not Insight this is not my discovering a Eureka moment that life in fact sucks and I suck too no this is this is imaginary this is a
figment of your imagination and then the way to shut it off you think for a minute what can the brain not live without oxygen and and glucose and how do you shut those off you switch your attention so you you you no longer feed the demon with your attention without your attention it can't survive without your attention it it it it goes dark in a second the minute you look at somewhere else and pay attention to something else it's gone it's a figment of your imagination so how can you tell it because mine's very convincing
it's always convincing that's the thing it's always convincing and don't try to argue it because it'll out argue you every single time it it's like the devil CU it's your creation you have to be able to say to yourself I've done a lot of good things in my life you have to call on on your common sense and your reality you're wrong demon shut up and then redirect your attention as quickly as possible and so you want to have a Rolodex in your mind to use an obsolete term u a Rolodex of other things you
can focus on uh or do a quick burst of exercise works wonders but make it vigorous it's got to take you out of the moment doing something creative U you know bake a cake or or write an email to somebody that you care about um uh loud music can can do it uh call up a friend and have a some something of an in-depth conversation not just chitchat um these are all ways of shutting down the the demon by means of focusing on something else because the minute you shut off it's it's access to your
attention it's gone so you're engaging the task positive Network to shut down exactly exactly you're cutting off the energy supply to the dmn and it it it instantly it's gone and you want to get in the habit of doing doing that to show it who's boss a lot of people are so intimidated by their demon that they give it all the power and it only has the power you give it and you you you labor under this illusion that somehow it is more powerful than it is it's only as powerful as you let it be
and you got to understand that and people say I'm powerless over no you're not it's as simple and as difficult as redirecting your attention sounds easy it's not because the demon is so captivating it's so seductive as you said it it it's almost convincing you almost believe you're as bad as it says you are but you know deep down inside that you're not and so you got to have put that as your default position I'm not as bad as the demon says I am God damn it I'm not and and insist upon it you know
and so and then and then re redirect your attention it's like flipping a light switch once you've done that if you've really redirected it it's gone it's always competing to take over your entire self and you say why in the world would a part of me want to do that why would I use my creativity my imagination to sew the seeds of my own demise why would I do that we don't know but we do it and it's the it's the flip side I mean everything in add has two sides the the most wonderful gift
we have is our imagination the most horrible curse we have is our imagination it's the it's the price we pay for being so imaginative but what you need to do to not suffer unnecessarily is learn that you have control you have the power to flip that light switch but you got to learn how to do it because it will put out Sent send out tentacles and try and hold on to you it'll it'll as you're trying to you know it'll it'll bring you in it'll it'll try to bring you into its layer and so it
can continue to torture you no I'm out of here goodbye boom and you you focus on something else you starty to down so how do you shift your attention to something else oh I I've gotten pretty good at it but you know I I i' can absolutely be seduced by the demon but I um one thing I often do is write another thing I often do is just get on a phone and talk to somebody um uh another thing I I do uh uh is have a big strong cup of coffee um you know so
self-medicate I try not to eat in those moments because that that's you you know feeding the another part of you that you don't want to feed and unfortunately uh sometimes I go on Amazon and buy things when the tough kid you know the going the tough go shopping so that I don't recommend that but um so but what if it doesn't work because I I have noticed sometimes I'm I'm ruminating on something and I go do something but I am still ruminating on the thing the thing you do has got to be stimulating enough has
got to be a strong enough stimulation to shut down the the the demon the demon is powerful and uh you know reading the phone book won't shut it down so you got to find something that's in in itself stimulating enough to out stimulate the demon well this reminds me of another thing that you taught me which is never worry alone oh yes yes absolutely that so so sometimes the demon isn't just attacking your self-esteem sometimes it's worrying about a million things right oh totally absolutely yeah you know absolutely it can you just line up every
bad thing that could happen and infinite web what if what if this what if that what if this what if that and we're very good at producing long long lists of of things to that could go bad and and you're so ripe the if you can talk to someone the act of worrying with someone immediate see the two key variables that create worry are a heightened feeling of vulnerability and a diminished feeling of power and control so anything you can do that can that increases your feeling of power and control and reduces your feeling of
vulnerability will reduce toxic worry well the best thing to do that is is to have be with another person either over the phone or or in person because the minute you connect you immediately immediately with no reason it's preverbal it's pre- rational you feel less vulnerable and you feel more in control just imagine you're in a big Warehouse in the dark alone alone you get paranoid you get scared if you're in that same big dark Warehouse with someone you laugh you crack jokes about horror films and exactly exactly so you know there is Magic in
in connection there is and and it's it's it's it's a great way to uh dispel worry and not to say you go into denial the complete absence of worry that's bad too it's called denial you don't go into a state of denial but but you you you retain your reason you retain rationality so you're not exaggerating the risks and minimizing the the tools you have to protect yourself thank you to my brain Advocates and all my patreon brains for giving us the support that we need to do episodes like this um and have Dr Hall
on not once but many times like subscribe click all the things and I will see you next video want to say bye bye bra oh yeah one two three bye brains don't let the demon get you [Music]
