I spent most of my life believing I was lazy. Teachers and bosses often told me I wasn’t “living up to my potential” or that I needed to “apply myself” or “try harder”. I didn’t really know how to do any of that. I just knew something was wrong. Wrong with me. No matter what I tried, I always seemed to be falling short of everyone else’s expectations. I needed to somehow be more than I was. Since there was no other explanation, when people accused me of being lazy, I just assumed that must be the right name for whatever I was. And then, in my mid-30s, I found that I had ADHD. I finally learned the difference: Lazy = I don’t want to do the thing. ADHD = I desperately WANT to do the thing, but I just can’t seem to START doing the thing. Those are not the same. At all. Laziness is choosing comfort over effort, and feeling totally fine about it! My version was full of guilt and self-loathing. I’d sit frozen on the couch and think about the task, stress out about the task, yell at my brain to get up and just do the task. And that’s the difference. Lazy doesn’t do shame spirals. Lazy is too busy relaxing! With ADHD, your motivation runs on a different type of fuel. Most brains are motivated by importance: when something is important, you do it because it’s important. ADHD brains need interest, novelty, challenge, or urgency. Otherwise, it ain’t getting done. No matter how important the task is. This doesn’t mean it’s a character flaw, it’s just a different type of operating system. Once you know how your brain works, everything else about motivation starts to make a lot more sense. Here’s my advice: the next time you find yourself reaching for that word “lazy”, swap it out: Don’t think “I’m just lazy”, think “I’m having trouble starting”. “I’m lazy” is a verdict, it’s final. But the other is a problem you can actually do something about. This week’s worksheet: You’re Not Lazy. Five minutes with a pen to take the word apart. What’s one thing you’ve been calling yourself lazy about? Leave it in the comments, and try reframing it not with a permanent “lazy” label, but a temporary “sometimes I have difficult with this” that you can strategize around.
P.S. I just moved ADHD Motivation Mastery to a new home! The new course site is much prettier, faster, and easier to actually finish. To celebrate, it’s just $99 (normally $150) for the rest of the month. Check it out here.
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