The Optimization Trap

Jaye Lin: 0:00

Hi, this is now presenting ADHD, where we look at common ways ADHD can present in individuals, explain what the root causes can be, and connect the experience to real humans. I'm your host, Jaye Lin. I'm an ADHD coach, instructor, and generally nice person. This is our first episode. I've been intending to start this podcast for over a year, and in true ADHD fashion, I couldn't decide how to start. Every time I came up with a topic, I could think of a million reasons why it shouldn't be the first one. Another subject is more compelling, or an easier introduction. This topic is too meaty, or too sparse. Better keep brainstorming. I kept chasing an ideal, continually realizing it wasn't perfect. After that happened enough times, I would feel overwhelmed and unsure, and would end up shelving the project for another day. It would stay on that proverbial shelf until I got the podcast itch again, but the process would just repeat itself, and I would feel worse throughout each cycle. Is this something you resonate with? Having a project or interest you feel so strongly about, but can't seem to take any real steps towards completion, because you're stuck trying to brainstorm the absolute best approach? Or if you do find the best possible solution, do you find yourself anxious at the idea of executing that perfect solution? If you do, you're not alone. Now presenting ADHD and what I call the optimization trap. Have you ever been really excited about a project or hobby but couldn't seem to move forward beyond thinking of all the possibilities? Has this happened more than once? Does this keep happening? This is a very common frustration point for many people with ADHD, and it's easy to understand why. If I volunteered for this project, and this is something I want to do, why can't I actually do it? This resistance against moving on to the doing phase can be destructive to our work performance and lead us to distrust our passions and interests. A lot of ADHD individuals I talked to feel like this is unavoidable with ADHD, and that they have to just live with their frustration and disappointment with themselves. Well, it's possible to move forward in those scenarios, as supported by this podcast episode that you're listening to. So how do we get ourselves to execute on things? It helps to understand why this is such a common ADHD presentation. Let's talk Brain Stuff. Our ADHD brains tend to operate on a deficiency of dopamine, and one of the effects of this is that when we do get a hit of dopamine, it feels very, very good. Creativity, especially the challenging kind, gets our dopamine levels to surge. Think about how you feel when you're coming up with the optimal solution that solves for many things, even things no one else is asking for. Wow, that feels good, doesn't it? In those creative and challenging optimization moments, higher levels of dopamine get our normally chaotic brain to go in clear directions, and we can come up with complex ideas. The shift from jumbled brain to clear brain adds even more feel-good onto our dopamine high. So what happens when it's time to do the actual planning and take the logistical steps forward? The creativity surge of dopamine is no longer there, and our dopamine returns to normal, lower levels. With lower dopamine levels, our executive dysfunction returns. Those optimum solutions we came up with can require many extra moving parts. With jumbled brain, approaching the planning process can feel really overwhelming. The overwhelm itself doesn't feel good, but our inability to effectively move forward also doesn't make us feel good about ourselves. We felt so good when brainstorming, and now how do we feel? Bad. Stuck. Helpless. Insecure. So what's a person with ADHD to do in this situation? What we commonly do. Bail. Stop working on the project and go do something else. But there's another thing we do, too. We go back to where we felt good, safe, and empowered. Back to optimization. Perfectionism is a term that is often used in ADHD circles. Almost every ADHD individual I know considers themselves to be a perfectionist at some things, if not everything. I however, don't consider perfectionism to be the most accurate term when describing this phenomenon. Instead, I use the word optimization. Perfectionism implies a possibility of a perfect result that can be achieved and defined. Optimization doesn't. Perfectionism is a standard we measure ourselves to. It can be defined by size, angles, color, brilliance, and other metrics. Optimization is undefined and varies greatly depending on the situation and individuals involved. Because of this, optimization is a trap that we can fall into if we're not careful. If we want to get away from feeling overwhelmed and helpless, there is an endless amount of optimization we can do. And there we stay, optimizing, optimizing, and not actually doing. So what results do we get from this? If there's no urgency or deadline, sometimes we just stall and never pick the project back up. If there's a deadline, a common occurrence is to get an adrenaline boost that kicks up our dopamine, and makes it so that we can get things done at the last minute. But it's the last minute. So are we able to fully execute on that lofty optimized solution that we came up with? Most likely not. At that point, we're doing whatever we need to in order to get it complete? And then what happens afterward? Do we feel good about our results? Do we feel victorious that we completed our project? Or do we invalidate the success? Do we compare our results to the optimized solution and feel bad? Do we compare the results to the amount of time we spent working on this including optimization time? If the completion was less dreadful than we anticipated, do we give ourselves a hard time for not doing it sooner, or not doing it with enough time to execute on the optimized result? What happens when we feel crappy after completion? The next time we're ready to transition out of optimization, do we feel better or worse about moving forward with planning, given the negative feelings we've attached to our project execution? Here's a good place for me to get off my monologue and have some friends join me. Please welcome Liz and Ron.

Liz Welshman: 7:28

I'm Liz Welshman. I'm an ADHD coach and consultant, and I'm also a parent of a kid with ADHD, and I have ADHD myself. I am not a niche coach. I'm pretty much the town bike when it comes to coaching. My favorite client is always the last person I coached. Very happy to be here.

Ron Capalbo: 7:50

Hi, I'm Ron Capalbo, otherwise known as ADHD Coach Ron. I'm a coach, advocate and instructor living in the LA area. I love making ADHD content on Instagram and Tiktok. And along with individual coaching, I run a few group coaching classes that have been a great way for clients to get coaching at a fraction of the cost, while also meeting other ADHDers in the community that help validate those struggles.

Jaye Lin: 8:16

Okay, welcome to both of you! I'm so excited that you're here in the first episode. So do either of you resonate with the optimizationtrap?

Liz Welshman: 8:27

I do big time. And I really love the way you've explained this. I've actually never thought of myself as a perfectionist, because the output is so far away from perfect most of the time. But I'm definitely someone who optimizes on the back end. So rather than trying to get it right on the front, I just have a lot of trouble completing the things that I get started on. And I think for me, it comes down to this really big fear of mediocrity. I don't need what I create to be amazing or mind blowing. I'm just terrified of it being mediocre. It's like the worst thing that could happen to me.

Jaye Lin: 9:13

So it's okay if it like totally sucks. And it's okay if it's really good. But anything in between, oh gosh?

Liz Welshman: 9:21

Ugh, yeah. Being average. Gross.

Jaye Lin: 9:27

Okay, Ron, what about you?

Ron Capalbo: 9:28

Yeah, I love the optimization term, because perfectionism never, like really sat well with me. I realized that it was closer to perfectionism than laziness, which, which was a really interesting kind of thing that I figured out. But yeah, the thing is, there's so many different reasons why I struggle. It's not just because of the perfectionism. You know, it's because of the motivation. It's because of the fear. It's because of the uncertainty and all of that kind of wraps up in optimization really well for me, so I love that.

Jaye Lin: 10:05

Yeah. And I like to use optimization also, because it's not a bad thing to strive for perfection, right? Like, if we say we're perfectionists, that just means that we are striving for perfection. And that is a quality that most societies really encourage. Like, we don't want to be complacent. We want to always be like, better and better and better. But optimization. It can never be perfect, right? Like, what are we striving toward? We're striving toward a lot of different things. And it can go in a lot of different directions. And oftentimes, I feel like I have an idea of what the optimal result is, and then I start doing it, and it changes. And the more I spend optimizing, the less I spend actually seeing what works, that makes sense.

Ron Capalbo: 10:58

I've always had this thought of like, looking for what the right answer is for something. And I wonder if it is a societal thing, where it's, you know, sure, no one's gonna be perfect. But if you strive for perfect, and you come up short, you're gonna be better off than somebody that just settles, like, that's always the fear that someone's gonna settle for something. And, and I think, us not getting that recognition, too, right? If you settle for something, someone might not give you the the validation that if you just get something done, it's acceptable, and you move on. But if you do something extraordinary, that's when people are oppressed. That's when you get that kind of dopamine, maybe from other people, that validation that you're looking for it. So we start striving for excellence for it, because that's what gives us the the dopamine we're looking for.

Jaye Lin: 11:48

Yeah, but then also, my optimum is not the same as someone else's optimum, right. So I mean, we're searching for this validation that like, Wow, you did such a great job. And sometimes we don't even get that. Because they're like, Yeah, you know, this isn't, this isn't the optimal solution. And they don't give us the proportionate praise that we were striving for. And it just is frustrating. It makes us distrust ourselves, it makes, you know, it makes us doubt this, even the skills and the knowledge of the people giving us this feedback, because it's just like, "Ughh, are you stupid?", you know, like, or, or like, "are you not paying attention? This was the optimal result. Why are you saying it's not?" And optimum for each person varies, so it becomes really difficult to figure out what exactly we want out of this. Right? It just becomes a way for us to grade ourselves and realize that we didn't measure up to what we wanted to be.

Liz Welshman: 12:55

Jaye, another thing that I notice in my clients, and in myself is that because we are such, so many of us are such top down thinkers, so we need to sort of have a real idea of the end product. And before we can get started, but like you said, so much of the creation of anything good is in this messy, in the middle engagement bit. But the dopamine in the beginning of the big idea, the big exciting idea, and maybe hopefully, in the end at the end where people say, yeah, great job amazing. But where the actual creation comes is that engagement, and that's the messy yucky bit that optimization keeps us from.

Ron Capalbo: 13:42

There's so many different reasons, right? It could be a fear of getting it wrong, the fear of disappointing others disappointing yourself. It could be just lack of motivation or uncertainty. But I want to kind of speak to the fear thing a little bit, because of how we try to avoid uncomfortable feelings so much. So if we ever had a point in our lives where we felt like we disappointed someone, or we were disappointed in ourselves, and just how, especially for people that are highly emotional and can feel things more than say, the average person, that disappointment becomes such a roadblock for us that we have to, especially if it's something that we're trying for the first time, we don't want to fail, because of that fear, that becomes this huge barrier in front of us that, we're not looking at getting better at something and seeing where we are. We're saying if I fail at this, it's going to feel terrible. It's going to feel awful. I'm going to hate every moment of it. And so going with what Liz was saying as being conceptual, you know, top down thinkers, we are thinking about every possible scenario, every feeling that might come along the way and if disappointment is on the horizon, there's a very good chance that's going to shut us down.

Jaye Lin: 15:05

Yeah. And it also becomes somewhat of a self fulfilling prophecy, when we are so scared of what's going to happen, and what if I'm not good enough that that's all we pay attention to, you know, like, where we fell short. And we're, we're not always seeing what we're doing right, or how this experience will contribute to future instances of doing this. And it's the fear kind of just compounds over time until it becomes unbearable. And yeah, we bail. Yeah, totally. What examples from your experience can you share with our listeners?

Ron Capalbo: 15:46

So I make Tiktok videos and instagram videos online. And I remember, not only the first time but so many times during the past couple of years that I've done this, where I've had an idea for a video and started it, and something got in the way, or there was a worry that came up, and insecurity, so to speak, where I'm like, "I don't know if people are gonna like this", or "I don't know if what I'm trying to communicate is gonna get across". And there's been times where those just stay in drafts. There's some that I love so much to and still haven't posted, because it's not exactly what I'm looking for. And I'm starting to worry that people might take this the wrong way, or they aren't going to get this and this, all this work is going to be for nothing, and it's going to be a disappointment. And you know, there might be some backlash for the way I'm saying something and all these thoughts go through my head. So So yeah, I remember going back to the first time I posted something took me like a month before I posted any video online. But just, I don't even know if this was part of the question you asked, but like what I've done about it, and what's like changed about it? I would say, you know that first time, when I posted I go back to that video all the time. And as the kids say, I look at it as super cringe. It's a video that I'm just like, you know, this is this is cheesy. This is cheesy and a little bit embarrassing, but that's okay. But I show that, actually, to a lot of clients when they talk to me about any of the videos I make, because I say that that video is the reason that, I mean, honestly the reason I decided to become an ADHD coach started with that video. Like I didn't start taking classes ADDCA until after that video. I didn't start making other videos until that video happened. That was step one. If we were to look back at the ups and downs and the excitements and the fears that have happened over the past two years, that video was step one for me. And I, there was a time I thought about deleting it, but I leave it there, and I show people that, as a reminder that my recent videos that I love that I'm so proud of I've helped so many people would never have happened if it wasn't for that one. And something that really resonated with me at that time was I started to think of things in a growth mindset, instead of a fixed mindset. The idea of like, I'm not going to get better unless I see where I'm at, unless I look back at it and self reflect. And then see from that finished product, what it is that I want to get better at. And each time that I've done that I've gotten better. What do you know? So I'm very proud of that. And it's something I still remind myself, it's not fixed, right? Like, I made a video the other day that I deleted I was like, "This is crap. I'm not gonna gonna ever post this". And, and so it's, it's, I have to constantly remind myself and constantly check in to make sure that I'm growing. And I'm not just stopped with, you know, my insecurities or my fixed mindset that I think always creeps in. And it's never gonna go away. But it is figuring out how to be okay with it, and learn from it.

Jaye Lin: 19:08

Yeah, I'm so glad that you brought up the growth mindset because I feel like that is so huge when it comes to the optimization trap, right? Because we we want to get everything perfect on the first time.

Liz Welshman: 19:20

By the way, it doesn't make me cringe looking at your first TikTok.

Ron Capalbo: 19:25

Have you seen my first TikTok? Did I show you my first TikTok? Man. Yeah! And I love it! Because it's so fucking ballsy to just do something for the first time. And what you said about the growth mindset, or the fact that we have fixed mindsets is so important, because I think a lot of us would like to think about ourselves that well, we're making mistakes all the time. And actually we live in a way that is kind of aligned with a growth mindset because we fall, we get back up again, we keep going we're all pretty resilient. But because of this temporal discounting that happens, it's really hard to imagine the work that we're putting in now as being part of a really long continuum of progress, rather than just something that we're doing to create this amazing product. And yeah, speaking of cringe, that once there's really cheesy saying around, it's something like, you know, don't compare your day one to somebody's day 1000, or whatever it is. And I know that, especially when it comes to things like speaking, I'm really comparing myself as a little rookie, baby novice speaker, with someone who's super polished and amazing, and who's been doing it professionally for years. And that, really, you know, that's a real barrier for me to getting started.

Jaye Lin: 20:56

Yeah, and a lot of it is, we wouldn't know, kind of like, the optimal way to go forward without even experiencing it. Right? Like, we have all these ideas of how it's going to go, and sometimes, it doesn't even go that way. But when we spend so much time optimizing for it, it's almost like sunk cost fallacy, where it's like, no, like, this has to be it because I spent so much time making sure this is perfect. This has to be the perfect way, and it can kind of get in the way of the product being better. And a great example is just this podcast episode. At first, you know, it's number one, I optimized it a whole lot. And even when you two were like, "Yeah, you know, what do we need to prepare?" I was just like, "well, I want this to be like real fresh, I want to get your fresh reaction. So I'm going to read it to you in, you know, our interview, and then I'll, I'll give you separate questions for you to prepare". And then in my head, I couldn't figure out what those questions would be without just completely giving everything away. And then I was just like,"why do they need to be surprised? They got to know about this anyway, they know about all this stuff. They don't need to be surprised. I can tell them what I'm going to say". And it worked out great. So I mean, without me kind of saying like,"Dude, it's go time, you spent several days thinking about it couldn't think of any questions that wouldn't, that would give a, that wouldn't give away the surprise. It's just time to give it to them. Let's let's move forward." So having the space to be like, "I'm over optimizing. It's, it's time to go". I feel like that's super helpful.

Liz Welshman: 22:45

Totally, totally. I will just say one thing about optimizing and how it's shown up in my life. And I think that it's sometimes I have underoptimized. For example, I've often had these, you know,"oh, that's an amazing idea". And I've started going on it, and realize, "Oh, I did not do any of the checks and balances in the early stage to actually validate this idea". Like, for example, I've had all these amazing book ideas. One of them was, Oh, my God, I'm gonna write this book called, "All Dogs have ADHD". And it's gonna be amazing. Like, because I'm looking at my dog. I'm like,"Whoa, you are everything that is amazing about ADHD, you're just so loving, you're so intuitive. And you just keep coming back for more, and you just get back up again. And I basically started writing this book. And then I did a little Google search, and I was like,"Oh, shit, somebody's already written the best selling book. All dogs have ADHD".

Ron Capalbo: 23:55

You have like, the website and everything. She's got marketing material.

Liz Welshman: 24:01

I printed off 1000 copies of it. Sometimes a little bit of optimization on the front end, or a little bit of, you know, critical thinking, holding it up to the light a little bit can be protective. So I guess it's kind of knowing the difference, and not getting too carried away on the excitement

Ron Capalbo: 24:23

I think with ADHDers, we find ourselves on train. each side of that to where it's an all or nothing thing, right. Like I like to say how we have our mouse sensitivity just all the way up high. If you've got it on one side of the computer screen, you're trying to get to the middle but it's just shooting across to the other side. Like that's who we are. Because, like, yeah, it's either the over planning or it's the"fuck it let's go, I'm ready like now". And I wonder what part of that ends up being our coping mechanism because of how much planning stresses us out that we become impulsive. But then we get worried that we're impulsive, so then we over plan. And it's trying to find that middle ground of, okay, I've planned enough, I have all the information I need to make this happen. And how do you find that? That's the trick. But it's first, it's being aware that there is an enough, right, and then it's figuring out how to stick that landing.

Jaye Lin: 25:26

Have you ever tried getting out of the optimization trap even before you knew about it? And what did you do? And what were the results? Because that happens to me a lot. And this is something that in my learning program, I always ask because every everyone says, like, "Oh, I've been working on it for too long, I've been optimizing for too long." And I always say like, "how do you know it's too long? What amount of time is not too long?" And that is not something that a lot of people think about, right? Like we have been optimizing and optimizing. We haven't started another project yet, and now we feel bad, because we haven't started on the project yet, and we've been optimizing for, I don't know, four days. And then the overcorrection, like what you were talking about, Ron, is that the next project, we don't let ourselves do any optimization. We just like, do do do do do, which isn't fulfilling, because optimization feels good. And so we just keep swinging back and forth. But really, one of the key ways I think, to get out of the optimization trap is to determinehow long is acceptable for me to optimize. You know, like, if I, if I mark that ahead of time, like I'm going to start doing on Thursday. So between now and Thursday, I can just go like balls to the walls on optimizing, and not even feel bad about it. This is part of the process. But come Thursday. That's it, I'm gonna start doing it. What do you think?

Liz Welshman: 26:57

Yeah, that's a really cool way of looking at it. My initial response to your question was pluh balance, as if I'm ever going to find that. As if I'm ever going to find a middle ground. But I don't, I don't want to overplug coaching, but the real key to me in this is to be coached, right? That's the only way I can get started. And Jaye, you coached me on this last week when I was really stuck in that, well, in that optimization part of preparing something for CHADD, which is next week, and I, Oh, this week, by the time we go to air. And I, I need that external, I need that someone to bounce it off to say, "Okay, where are you at? What are you doing? What is going to be good enough?" Because it's really hard for me to trust any sort of internal reflection or measurement of what would be good enough, especially when accepting that moving from the planning stage to the creation phase means I might have to let go of this idea of this amazing final product. When is it ever going to be okay for me to let go and move forward? And I really need someone external to bounce that off. Definitely.

Jaye Lin: 28:27

Yeah, and I think it's part of the process, because initially, I did too. And eventually, I got so used to having those conversations that I would just have those conversations with myself. You know, I think they call it rubber ducking, where we're just talking to ourselves, like we we're talking to someone else. And I just started doing that. And that's actually the reason why this podcast episode is going to go get released. Because I said, "Hey, Jaye, you're in this pit of despair on how, you know, you suck, and you can't follow through on anything." And then in my head, I'm just like, "can you really not follow through with everything? What isthe evidence for that? And what do you actually need to do to feel like you are doing something?" And what I needed to do to feel like I was doing something really wasn't that much. Which was ask Ron and Liz, if they want to be on this podcast episode.

Ron Capalbo: 29:33

Like now I'm committed.

Jaye Lin: 29:34

Take the first step. Like, I already did it, they're expecting me to do it. I'm gonna go forward. So, a part of it is just, you know, how often are we having those conversations? If it's, you know, once every several months, it might not stick as much as, like a regular conversation with someone about this.

Ron Capalbo: 29:55

I've seen online so many people post like, Oh, here's an ADHD hack. and some people will say like, "Oh, that's great". And other people we like, "tried, it doesn't work". And I think it's why, and again, not to plug coaching, like Liz was doing. But I think it's why coaching is so beneficial, because it's not just us sitting here telling you what you're supposed to do. It's you telling us what you think you should do. And that's kind of empowering to explore that and see what what comes with that. Because I, I resonate so much too, when, I mean, I don't know if anybody else does this. But when I have an idea, I say it out loud. And I'm just looking for someone to grab onto it. Right? Like, that's what I need is like, the motivator, because I'm someone that wants to do things with people like teamwork is a huge strength of mine, that when when I get in on some, with someone, but then similar to you, Jaye, when I have someone that I'm I'm doing it for, so there's an accountability, where you told us like, "Hey, we're doing this on this day". Now you got to make it happen. But there's, there's so many different ways to go about it. Right? It could be the accountability partner, it could be, you know, what did you call it rubber ducking that's amazing. Rubber Ducking, right? It could be, you know, doing something musically related. It could be doing something for someone else, like there's so many different paths, but it's really finding what your hack is for you. And, but realizing, and I think this all comes down to, that it is a thing that needs to happen, you need to find what that optimal thing is, but how you do it, there's, I think there's a lot of different ways to go about it.

Liz Welshman: 31:42

What a shame it would be if you didn't feel safe to put your crazy wild ideas out into the world with the knowledge that you're gonna have some of you sort of more planny friends around you to go, "uh, hang on, that's an awesome idea, but here's why it might not work". And you, Yeah, you could really easily go back into your shell and go, I'm gonna stop sharing my ideas, because they all think they're dumb and crazy, but I'm gonna keep doing it anyway.

Ron Capalbo: 32:12

I think though, there's, there's definitely been times where I've had that stigma that I think a lot of ADHDers who are labeled as ideas people have, where it's so easy to say,"Wow, you have great ideas. There's a lot of them. Some of them are crazy, but every once in a while, like oh my gosh, that's perfect. That's exactly what we need", right? Compared to someone going, "Wow, you just come up with these, like batshit crazy ideas, and you'd never do anything". Like those are two different perspectives on the same thing. And I've had that before. I've had people say that, you know, it isn't what you think it's what you do. And there's, there's shame involved in that. And that can cause my ideas to be like, "Well, I don't want to say anything right now. Like, I feel like my ideas are dumb". And that kind of speaks to how our self talk can be completely influenced by one or two, just negative perspectives that people have about us. So yeah, anytime that we're like,"I never do this", it comes from somebody else, not you. And then it, it starts to become who, you know, your self fulfilling prophecy.

Jaye Lin: 33:27

Yeah. And I also want to bring up the other side of that, right. And when I was listening to you talk, I noted that it was "wow, you have really good ideas". And then the second piece was "you have ideas and you don't do anything". And, and I think the key between those is the doing things part, right? Because I come from the corporate world, you know, I worked for Google and Yahoo, and all these other companies before. And a big piece was, I was constantly having these ideas. And everyone was just like, I don't have time to spend more time doing your idea. I'm super busy, and I just need to get my work done. And for me, the way that I took that was they think my ideas are bad. And it's really something else entirely, which was, hey, if you want to go ahead and do this, go ahead and do it, but you are not. You're expecting other people to execute on your ideas, and that's not okay. You need to, you need to pull your weight around here. And when I figured that out, where it's just like, okay, everyone will be on board with me if I do it. If they don't need to do a lot of extra work in order for my ideas to go forward, it's much more likely that they'll be on board with me. And that's exactly what happened. Like I did the logistical work and I did all the other stuff that kind of, you know, kind of sucks. But it's part of the optimization to kind of be like, "Hey, how do I convince them that this is a good idea".

Liz Welshman: 34:59

Totally, totally. And nobody's ever gonna care about your idea as much as you do, right? Like nobody. And that's, that's why collaboration is so powerful. And it is for me too, I get so much out of that. Nobody's ever going to want to execute and see this happen as much as I'm going to want to say it happen.

Jaye Lin: 35:24

Yeah, but that's just another example of how it's a distortion. Our reaction to something is a distortion in that that isn't what they were even saying to us. But what we took away from a lot of it was they're not into my ideas, or they think my ideas are not good, or they don't think that I can follow through on stuff. And that's actually not what they're trying to say, at all. Most of the time, I would say, it's, it's really something else that is less... shitty? Yeah,less shitty. That's the best word that I can think of.

Liz Welshman: 36:07

Yeah, it's more like, I just don't have time for that. Don't put more stuff on my plate. Go, yeah, cool. Go do go do it yourself.

Jaye Lin: 36:15

Are there any other ways that you think you can ease the overwhelm of planning and executing?

Ron Capalbo: 36:21

Yeah, I think when it comes to over optimizing and over planning, there's so many different reasons that we do it. And so I really think step one is figuring out what the reason is that it's happening. And it can be different for the same person for different situations, like I think I was talking about before, it could be just fear of not being good enough, right? It could be that you don't know what to do next. It can be the uncertainty of. It could be your negative self talk, you know, having a fixed mindset of, I never finished things, I'm not going to do this. It could be the overwhelm of us being conceptual, top down thinkers, that we are kind of aware of everything that's going to go into what we have to do. And so all of those things require different ways to handle that, you know, there's different strategies to fix all of those situations. And so, the first is kind of sitting down and seeing, I like calling it like the invisible monster, it's like, throw a sheet on top of this invisible monster and see what it looks like and the best way to defeat it, right? You know, I love the the movie term, "the jaws effect", when they say the reason that Jaws was so scary is because they didn't see the monster until the end of the film. And so often, we don't see what the monster is that we're facing. And so being able to pinpoint what it is specifically that we're dealing with, is always going to be step one, and from there being like, oh, okay, I'm overwhelmed with everything that's going to have to... and from there, I can figure out what steps I need to take. Or I don't know what to do. That might be where you bring a friend up, and you you ask someone's opinion, or writing out a list of ideas of what to do next. But it's, there's there's different reasons for the optimization trap each time. And so figuring out what it is you're up against, I think is, is the key.

Jaye Lin: 38:20

What deliberate thoughts or actions can we take to make optimization a slingshot instead of a trap?

Liz Welshman: 38:25

I think the most important thing for clients and for myself is a mix of self awareness with self compassion. So knowing what your strengths and weaknesses are. Knowing what gets you going. If you are someone who is really needing to ride the wave of that initial dopamine surge that gets you going, use it. Don't try and make it perfect. Just go for it. If that's what does it for you, do it. I also, I love your idea of, if you know that you're someone who spends ages in that beginning bit of planning, let yourself sit in it. Let yourself enjoy it and roll around in the shit of it for a set number of days, but then, okay, I have to get started. I think also, it's really common for people with ADHD to be stuck in this magical thinking. And we really believe that there'll be some point in the future where doing the thing won't feel shitty. Doing the boring stuff to get us at this amazing endpoint won't feel like hard work. Accepting at the outset, okay, the actual doing the actual creation is often gonna feel, yuck, it's gonna suck, but that we were gonna have to do it anyway. And it's in that engagement and in that doing that we get the result that we're hopefully after.

Jaye Lin: 39:58

Yeah, I also like to to include other people, and I brought this up earlier. But having a place where I'm, I'm checking for feedback, right? If, if what I'm wanting is other people excited about this project with me, and that is the outcome that I would like, "oh, when people will be excited about my podcast". If I'm just like, "Yeah, I'm starting a podcast!" And everyone else is like, "Oh, why?" Then I'd be like, "Hmmm, I don't know if this is something that I want to keep going on". Right? But usually, the other thing happens, where I'm just like,"yeah, Ron, Liz, I think I'm gonna go forward with my podcast. I was wondering if you'd be my guests for the first episode". And for you to be like, "yeah, fuck yeah! We're stoked!" And that just really reinvigorated everything for me. And so having moments where it's just like, "Yeah, I'm working on my podcast, I finished editing my initial like, Intro today", or "I finished my logo. I did all this stuff" and having everyone be like, "yeah, yeah, yeah!" That really just pushed me forward. And even if I was in the optimization part, I would be so eager to show everyone what the result is that it will push me forward, instead of me just saying, like, "oh, well, it has to be better. It has to be better". It's like, No, I'm showing people what I have now. And they're like, "this is great. This is great". When I showed you my logo, and you're just like, "Oh, I love it". That was really the point in time where I'm just like, "I'm not going to touch it anymore. This is it. I'm going to upload it. It's gonna go". Right? So what will give us that feeling of like, "Hey, this is good. I'm gonna move on"? And a lot of it is the feedback. Like if I'm already getting the excitement from everyone, and I feel good about it what reasons do I have to mess around with it more? Right? let's let's move on. If I didn't show anyone my logo, I'd be like, "well, you know, could be better. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know". And I really wouldn't know. Because when I showed you my initial logo, and you're just like,"Yeah, you know, I kind of like this idea. But this idea" and then I played around with it more. I was just like, "oh, this is the one", right? But if I didn't show you I would have just been spinning! I would have made, like a million logos! I would have just kept going forever and ever. Where can our listeners go if they want to connect or learn more about you?

Ron Capalbo: 42:23

You can follow me on Instagram and Tiktok. On Instagram, I'm @adhd_ron, on Tiktok, @adhdcoachron or you can just go to my website, adhdcoachron.com. Right there, you can sign up for a free consultation, check out my group classes, my individual coaching, and then also, there's a huge breakdown of my origin story, my whole ADHD journey, and all about me.

Liz Welshman: 42:52

You can find me on my website, which is narcissistically named lizwelshman.com. My Instagram is@bouncy_ADHD. So bouncy, B-O-U-N-C-Y underscore ADHD.

Jaye Lin: 43:13

You've made it to the end of our very first episode. To recap, it can be easy to get trapped in the optimization phase of any project or venture because our ADHD can make optimizing feel a whole lot better than getting started. If you find yourself in the optimization trap, Liz, Ron, and I have a few suggestions. Pause to figure out what factors are keeping us in the optimization trap, a place where ADHD coaching can help Bringing other humans into the process for a boost of dopamine to start producing results. Keeping the growth perspective in mind when we start to doubt our abilities to fulfill our lofty goals. Determine what amount of time is acceptable for optimizing, so we can get our creative juices flowing and make sure we feel good about it. And keep in mind that once we're in the muck of things, we can sometimes have a better idea of what works and what doesn't. So save some of that optimizing for when we have better clarity of the parameters and limitations. If you found this episode enjoyable or informative, please tell your friends and family members with ADHD, and/or give us a review wherever you get your podcasts. If you want to read transcripts or show notes, find out more about me, Jaye Lin, or give suggestions on future episodes. Please go to our website, npadhd.com. That's the acronym for now presenting ADHD, npadhd.com. Or you can follow us on Instagram @npadhd. Thank you for listening, and we hope to see you again soon.