Hello friends 👋
As many of you know I am not big on labels.
I recently discovered further why and I would like to share with you.
When I was a wee lad in primary school I was regularly sent to the office for punishment because of my cutting up.
This eventually led to having special classes for me with dedicated teachers. Including a psychiatrist who labeled me with ADD (as it was called back then) and summarily prescribed me Ritalin which made me a drooling heap of non-responsive-comatose-walking dead-child. My mother put an end to the medication and chose to keep me awake but annoying to the teachers! 😛
Anyway, I noticed that others attempted to treat me differently after the ADD diagnosis. Especially other kids. My peers saw it as something to tease and ridicule and customarily bullied me in many diverse ways.
What this did for me was help me to see I did not want to be treated differently simply because of a label. I truly saw myself no different. Someone else's estimation of me, true or not in a medical sense, was not going to determine the way I chose to live.
Fast forward over 40 years.......
I have lived with ADHD the entirety of my life. I know no different.
In my career I manage multi-million dollar home renovations. From inception through estimation. From scheduling to bidding. From installation to inspection. With usually at least 3 jobs going at the same time.
If you do not know what living with ADHD can feel like.....imagine incredibly fast moving water in a river sweeping falling leaves from trees out to the ocean. Your brain produces thought after thought (leaves) while simultaneously falling into the water only to be plummeted away from you on the shoreline as you desperately try to track the leaf you were just focusing on!!! 😛
And then there is my career which requires an immense amount of focus, clarity, planning, consistency, patience, memory, intelligence.
Had I allowed my 'label' to dictate to me who I am I would more than likely not pursued the career I have! It certainly would be easier!!!!
I express all of this to point to something I have witnessed and experienced personally.
Many of us, if labeled with something allow that something to limit us. It becomes a reason why we cannot achieve or overcome in some fashion in our life.
I am NOT advocating against the reality of our labels.
I accept I have ADHD.
I simply do not define that as something that limits me.
In fact, I see it as a gift. My brain can see so many possibilities in such an abstract way that I always catch challenges before they happen because I can foresee them coming. I have learned to trust myself in what I know is honest about how things will work together. And I am never wrong here. My overactive brain has taught me how to recognize an almost immediate distinction between what is my head and my body. What I think versus what I intuit. When I cannot lose sight of the fallen leaf in the river it is because I am seeing that thing with my intuition. There is something there for me to look at and discover. So, I do.
I do not understand how to be anything other than myself. I acknowledge that my hyperactive brain exists. But I don't know how to live without it. So, I make it work for me. It is not something that limits me or causes consternation. I know I need tools and support in my world to help me focus and have clarity. But, I just consider it normal! I know no different.
I will not allow something to control me in such a way that it does not bring to me that which I desire, need, want, deserve or serves me. I choose to utilize that thing which seems to limit me and turn it into something that feeds me and makes me dangerously adept. Because I cannot see the point in allowing things to define me as weak.
Those things may be more challenging than others may have to navigate.
I accept that.
That also makes me stronger than others. I also get the opportunity to overcome and adapt more which makes me more capable than those who do not need to navigate such things (around these areas at least).
This shows up in a myriad of practical ways for me.
This writing, and all my other writings, point evidence to it. The way my abstract brain construes thoughts in such a way that applies honest, radical sense to oft times confusing ideas. I can see things others cannot. I can add things up that seem to make the most fundamental sense to my brain but are actually quite uncommon for many others.
This aids me in my interactions with others. I am able to support them in very real and practical ways.
But I have had to work at this. I have had to work to find tools that serve the way my brain works in real time. I have had to overcome a LOT of external noise to find peace with my incessant mind.
I wanted to write this all down as an example to others that whatever label, definition, challenge others may place in front of you that may somehow seem to put you at a disadvantage or limitation can actually become a very real super-power in your world. Bringing you, and others, a gifting that only you uniquely have to offer.
Are you too sensitive??? Empathic??? What ways can that be your greatest strength??? How powerful a heart and gift it can be to feel so deeply!!!!!!
Are you neurodivergent??? How does that serve you and the collective???
Even the label submissive or dominant!!! It is not something that makes you less-than or incapable in some way. In fact, it is a huge gifting that supports not only you but all of those around you!!! While you may not consider so at this moment, after a few seasons in the community you may discover that your station brings with it some aid/support to those around you.
In what ways are you gifted with your uniqueness???
It needs not be a reason to believe you are encumbered. Rather, it can be the thing that you have learned to build as your greatest strength and gift.
In what ways can you support yourself to discover how to use your gifts to work for strengthening you and your collective???
I hope you find focus, clarity, and purpose today.
Namaste
Drago and Amethyst
