The WORST Writing Advice For ADHD/Autistic People (And What To Do Instead!)

Devlin Blake Author

If you're ADHD or Autistic, some advice isn't going to work for you and in fact can leave you worse off. Find out some of the worst advice for the ND

Transcript 

So I’ve read a lot of self help books over the years, taken a lot of courses, but when I couldn't do the things, even the so-called simple things, I felt like a failure. It wasn’t until I was in my mid forties when I found out I was ADHD and Autistic, and got diagnosed, and I’d like to thank Tick Tock for putting that idea in my head.

Because until that point, I thought I was broken.

I mean what else can you think when you can’t do something everyone says is simple like build a habit?

But trying to build a habit isn’t the only bad advice I’ve received in my life. So here’s the worst productivity advice for neurodiverse.

Hi novelteers, I’m Devlin Blake, Novel Writing & self publishing Expert, Coach, published author, and former ghostwriter of over 200 books. If you’re writing a book, be sure to check out my Novel Writer’s Club, featuring self directed courses, weekly crits, ask me anything, group coaching and more. You can find out more about it at the link below.

So building a habit. That’s the worst advice ever. I have very few things I consider habits. Even brushing my teeth is something I do, but it’s not really a habit, because a habit implies you don’t have to remember to do it. I always have to remember to do it. So instead of building a habit, focus on building an obsession. I have another video on that.

Another bit of horrible advice is keep your butt in the seat until you can write. Nope. Horrible advice, really. Because here’s what happens when you do that, especially as a new writer. You just sit there, doing nothing, stressing, or possibly researching, until the timer dings and you can escape this drudgery.

Soon, your brain sees writing itself as drudgery and once that happens, there’s no coming back from that. Well, you can come back, but it’s so hard, it’s not really worth it. Again, creating a writing obsession is your best way to handle that. Once your brain sees it as a fun thing to do, then you’ll genuinely want to do it. Butt in the seat, will never accomplish that.

Reward yourself for a job well done. For finishing that chapter, that book, that one hour of writing time. Again, this is horrible advice, especially for the neurodiverse. It comes from training animals, where this actually works. A dog will sit for you if you train them by using treats. And any trainer will tell you each time your dog sits on your command, a treat should be offered.

But that’s a dog, not a person. Don’t get me wrong, I like dogs. But they don’t have the higher functions of a human, and that’s where the problem comes in.

Writing is a lot more complicated than sitting for a treat. So if you treat yourself for writing, your brain will associate writing with treat. But that also means once you stop treating yourself, your brain will go where's my treat? I’m not doing this without a treat.

And that makes it impossible to become a better writer. Here’s why. When you’re new at writing, writing a paragraph seems like a big deal. As you write more, writing a chapter becomes a big deal, then writing several chapters, then a whole book.

An external treat gives your brain no room to grow since it’s still looking for the same treat you gave it after writing a paragraph, but now the treat is at the end of a whole chapter.

Eventually, that treat is going to be so far away that your brain will no longer make the connection between writing and treat and will just go forget this, I’m out of here.

And you’ll never be able to finish your book.

The solution is to make the writing itself the treat. Once you stop thinking of it as something you have to do and start seeing it as something you want to do, or get to do, you won’t need external motivation draining treats to get it done.

And the last bit of bad productivity advice I’m going to cover is eating a frog. You might have heard of this. It’s from a book called Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy. It’s also from a Mark Twain quote that says something about how when he has something unpleasant to do, he eats a frog first so anything else is better than that.

I’m pretty sure he meant a metaphorical frog, but hey, it’s Mark Twain, you never know. I wouldn’t put it past him to eat a real one.

Anyway, the metaphorical frog in question is your biggest hardest most unpleasant task. If you do that first, then everything else should be easy, right?

Wrong.

Back when I tried to use this advice, I would literally stay in bed for hours unable to face that task frog. I went whole days like that, and no, I was not depressed, though that task frog was seriously stressing me out. It’s an executive function thing.

If you’re neurodiverse you’ll understand.

So what is the solution then?

Because that frog isn’t going away. At some point you do have to eat it.

Well, the solution is a technique I just learned has a name recently called the dopamine ladder. It’s where you stack small fun tasks on top of each other so you get a hit of dopamine. After several hits by stacking several small tasks together, you’ll have enough of it floating around to eat that frog.

So instead of starting with your largest task, start with your smallest or most fun one. One that can give you a quick win and hit of dopamine.

That will make eating whatever frog you have easier.

So that’s some of the worst productivity advice for neurodiverse writers. Once you understand more about your own productivity style, brain and how you work, writing a book becomes not such a scary task.

You’ll be able to tap into that power productivity and get more done than you’ve ever dreamed possible.

I offer more productivity tips inside my membership, the Novel Writer’s Club.

You can find it at the link below.

Also remember to like and subscribe to see more videos on writing and publishing your novel.

Until Next time, this is Devlin Blake, saying Write On.

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Categories: : ADHD/ Autistic writing advice