Wired for Connection: Turning ADHD from a disorder into a superpower (and why it can be a blessing, not a curse)

~ Jill Brown ~ Leave a comment

I’ve never been diagnosed with ADHD, and I haven’t sought a diagnosis, but at 67 I’ve no doubt in my mind that I have it. I tick nearly every box going.

Perhaps you can relate? Have you ever been midway through mowing the lawn, only to abandon the mower to wash your crystals in the bath, while your bedroom sits upside down from a half-finished de-cluttering mission you started earlier, and the hoover has been plugged in, unused, in the middle of the lounge, for two days? Then you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

It was a lifelong pattern: misplaced keys, text messages half-written and never sent, shopping lists devotedly written out and then left forgotten on the dining room table. You get the picture.

But, on the other hand, when my brain found something it loved, it went to the opposite extreme. I could become so hyper-focused that I’d be fixated on a project for hours, even days or weeks, completely absorbed and happy, and at times, oblivious to everything else. I’ll never forget sitting with a client many years ago, so deeply focused that I was oblivious to the numbness creeping into my leg. As I stood up and realised my leg felt dead, I took a few steps anyway, trying to stay professional, and crashed to the floor. My leg had gone so numb it had buckled beneath me. My poor client was deeply concerned, and I was mortified.

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It’s good to talk right? Or is it?

~ Jill Brown ~ Leave a comment

It’s kind of become a cliché that it’s good to talk. And in many ways it really is. Being able to share our thoughts and feelings with a trusted other can lighten the load and provide the benefit of a perspective that’s different from our own. And positive human connection in itself, is of course, a wonderful thing. We’re social animals and we’re not meant to be isolated.

And this is why talking therapies can be so helpful. A therapeutic relationship built on trust can be the perfect place to open up, receive support, feedback, and maybe even for some people, and for the first time in their lives, the experience of unconditional positive regard.

So it would be reasonable to assume that when someone is living with the effects of trauma, such as PTSD or C-PTSD, talking about it matters even more. And yet it’s more complicated than that. Understanding how past events have shaped us really does help, but it’s increasingly recognised that trauma can’t be resolved by cognitive methods alone.

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What’s your Metaphor?

~ Jill Brown ~ 1 Comment

If you don’t know where you’re going any road will take you there… Lewis Carroll

wooden signpost in forest

Traditionally, metaphor has been thought of as a poetic way of speaking, a way to make language more colourful and interesting. Well of course it is that, but it’s also much more. Far from being just a fancy way of speaking, some researchers of the human mind go so far as to say that metaphor plays a major part in defining our very sense of reality.

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Back to the beginning with DMT

~ Jill Brown ~ 9 Comments

My relationship with ayahuasca and the other sacred medicines really began several years ago when I watched a 2010 documentary called DMT The Spirit Molecule – or at least that’s when the seed was planted in my mind. I’d never heard of DMT before this documentary but I was intrigued by the title and the description of the subject matter.

DMT, or Dimethyltriptamine to give it its full name, is a compound that’s found all throughout nature and is naturally present in the human body. It’s also one of the most powerful psychedelics that we know of.

In 1990 a professor of psychiatry called Rick Strassman had finally managed to get the necessary authorisation to conduct research into the effects of DMT. Prior to that no scientific research on psychedelics had taken place for nearly twenty years.

Within the first five minutes of the film I was fascinated by the recounting of an experience of one of the study volunteers:

‘I saw this city, in the distance; it was dark green with lights flickering and before that tremendous geometric patterns that are incredibly rapid. I cannot describe it to anyone. They’re so fast. I was watching that and a ball of light went right past me. And you’re in this place. Why am I in this place?

Then I noticed there was this woman off to my right. She had green skin and she had a dial and I realised that she was turning the volume of the lights up and down on the city in the distance. And as soon as I looked at her she noticed I was watching her and she said “So what else do you want?”‘

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Life begins at sixty? An adventure into the world of shamanism, ayahuasca and other marvellous things.

~ Jill Brown ~ Leave a comment

rainforest

My son said to me the other day ‘Mum, how d’you feel about being nearly sixty?’ It’s a fair enough question I suppose and one that had fleetingly crossed my own mind a few times lately, what with the impending birthday looming ever closer.

I have to agree that sixty does sound very old, at least it does when you’re thinking about it in relation to yourself. After all, for much of my earlier working life it was the age that female colleagues had taken their retirement and so for me back then (in my blissfully naive twenties and thirties), it was a kind of abstract landmark where a woman would leave the world of useful work and start a graceful and accepting decline into her dotage. It never seemed like something that could possibly happen to me.

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Transcending Tarot Workshop

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tarot1

Tarot Workshop in Lound Village Hall, Lound, Suffolk, NR32 5LL

Thursday July 12th 7-9pm

This is a workshop for those who wish to discover more about the part of themselves that normally remains hidden within the unconscious mind. Using the tarot cards to connect with your inner self, you can gain a deeper understanding of yourself and teach your unconscious mind how to guide you towards becoming the person you know you could be.

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Freedom

~ Jill Brown ~ 1 Comment

Key to success concept

I’ve been thinking about options this week and trying to reach a decision. Then I heard  this little story …

The little bird had been in the cage for a very long time. It would sit on it’s perch and look through the window to the great outside world beyond.

It would gaze in awe at the birds flying free outside and wonder how it felt to spread your wings and soar.
 Sometimes another bird would rest on the sill outside and their eyes would meet. Then the outside bird would fly away and the little caged bird would feel more trapped than ever.
 But early one morning an opportunity came – the cage door was left ajar and the little bird could see that the window was open too.

His little heart pounded – this was his chance.
 He thought about how wonderful it would be to fly freely and as high as he wanted to go. He thought about resting on a branch and singing to his hearts content. He wondered what the earth would look like from high above and what it would feel like to soar.
He thought about all these things for a very long time and his excitement grew. He thought about these things until the sun set and the moon came up. He could see her outside the window. Oh how she beckoned him.
 And just as he thought about answering her call the cage door was closed again. The owner had returned.

What’s your story?

~ Jill Brown ~ Leave a comment

The girls are reading a book.We all know that stories are entertaining.

If a story interests us enough we’re hooked.

I’m guessing we can all remember that lovely feeling we had as a child whenever we found ourselves transported to another world – the world of story.

And as adults it’s the same thing. If we love to read it’s a wonderful thing to get lost in our imagination and forget the world around us for a while. And movies too take us on a journey into another reality, another life, another point of view.

But stories are so much more than that too. They hold immense power. They can change reality and they can win wars. Juries base their decisions on them, corporations increase their profit through them and we live our lives by them.

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Working with Dragons

~ Jill Brown ~ 1 Comment

Working with Dragons

herebedragons3

Close your eyes for a second and think of the word dragon.
What kind of image do you conjure up in your minds eye? What kind of feeling do you get? Do you think of a huge and terrifying creature? Is it evil and destructive? 

Or maybe your dragon is magical, magnificent and benign.

But whatever kind of dragon springs to mind, the chances are on some level you’re being influenced by every image you’ve ever seen and every experience you’ve had relating to that one word dragon.

Because for most of us, dragons are a part of our psyche …

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