hey id like to point you guys to a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel that hopefully isnt a train the cloud of adhd has some silver linings i have made a career in it of learning the 1 of the information needed to get many many projects underway that were formerly stalled because of a lack of information or initial direction  i was born with adhd my parents never chose to treat me due to the prevailing advice of experts they consulted back in the 1970s when i was a child i never did well in school despite having a 140 iq and a curious mind i graduated from college with a 20 and an act of 19   i bloomed when i got to college i was able to study what i wanted to when i wanted to and i could avoid the idiot professors generally and choose the really brilliant ones to learn from they loved that i was obsessed with everything from philosophy to history to statistics i was also a computer nerd from way back i programmed in things like assembly and pascal for fun i got bored with computer science and put it on the back burner  my original background was in english literature i earned an ma in medieval english literature because i was just fascinated by it while i dont work daily with old english or middle english my education did teach me how to research information and find the minimal amount of needed information to proceed   due to economic reasons i went into it as opposed to academia it paid well and you could go in with industry certifications rather than formal education eventually i found a more open enrollment masters program in electrical engineering and got an msee in software engineering  im above 50 now and i found a way to make my adhd work for me i worry constantly about the things ive forgotten to do where did the time go etc but i made one determination that made me able to perform i was honest with myself and my teams about where my talents were i am a good programmer i loved the theory and practice of software engineering and i was the guy who could get your team going but i was not the guy to deliver it i was tapped with going into management and found out quickly i was not suited nor did i desire to be the guy to manage people and hit a deadline   ive stopped trying to be a cheetah and embraced my nature of being a squirrel what most of you probably are suffering from is the voices of years and years of disapproval and disappointment every damn teacher i ever had talked about how i couldnt sit still how i was wasting my potential and then i had a crash when potential and reality switched   here is the secret it is your damn life your damn mind do with it what you will and enjoy it yes try to develop better executive function it can happen meditate as best you can each day learn to know what a quiet mind is like and try to return there daily if even for a few minutes  be honest with people say i am all over the place and doing rote stuff isnt what i like to do switch up jobs as best you can i became a consultant because of this i found a great company that loans me out and then finds new projects every so often see if that doesnt work for you  the world wants you to be a neat little cog in the clockworks you will never be that-- be the grease between the cogs if you want to participate if you dont adjust your desires and do something else if you dont desire much you can tell the world to fuck off  finally the most important thing you can do is to silence those inner voices of anger and disapproval they have been installed in you by people with a completely different mind than what you have god bless them but they can fuck off be your damn self try to be mindful but be yourself try to slow down your thoughts but be yourself   in an age where every condition is given a group name and protection we are not that should stop but we are not the types to complain if someone told a gay person to stop thinking like a gay or told a transgendered person stop thinking like you are another gender and it will go away people would be up in arms we have a condition much like color blindness where our perception of things will never ever be like the rest of the world telling us to focus or whatever is akin to telling a color-blind person to see green or see red it isnt going to happen  accept and love yourselves as i tell my kids there is only one u in the universe