Hello, brains!
I say that to you because, if you think about it, it wasn't really you that decided to come here today.
It was your brain.
And whether you decided to walk, or drive, take a taxi, or ride a bike, that decision was made by your brain.
Behavior, all behavior, is affected by the brain.
This is a story about my brain.
So, I was a smart kid.
By 18 months, I was speaking in full sentences.
By third grade, I was scoring post-high school on standardized tests.
I had, as all my teachers agreed, so much potential.
I was also struggling.
I didn't have many, any, friends outside of books.
I was easily overwhelmed.
I spaced out in class.
I lost things constantly.
And trying to get my brain to focus on anything I wasn't excited about was like trying to nail jello to the wall.
But I was smart, so nobody was worried.
It wasn't until middle school, when I was responsible for getting myself to classes on time and remembering to bring my own homework, that being smart wasn't enough anymore, and my grades started to suffer.
My mom took me to the doctor and, after a comprehensive evaluation, I was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD.
If you're not familiar with ADHD, it has three primary characteristics: inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity.
Some people with ADHD have more of the inattentive presentation.
Those are the daydreamers, the space cadets.
Some have more of the hyperactive-impulsive presentation.
Those are the kids that usually get diagnosed early.
(Laughter) But the most common presentation is a combination of both.
(Laughter) My doctor and my parents decided that, given my shiny, new diagnosis, maybe stimulant medication would succeed where spankings and lectures had failed.
So I tried it, and it worked.
The first time I took my medication, it was like putting on glasses and realizing I could see without squinting.
I could focus.
And without changing anything, my GPA went up a full point.
Honestly, it was kind of miraculous.
By 14, I had friends that liked me.
By 15, I had published my first poem.
I got a boyfriend.
By 17, I knew I wanted to be a journalist.
My local college had a program that would guarantee admission to USC.
They had a really great journalism program.
So, I signed up at my local college and I started taking classes.
I moved in with my boyfriend.
Things were going great, until they weren't.
I started having trouble making it to class on time.
I aced a statistics course, but I forgot to sign up in time, so I never got the credit.
I took classes so I could help my boyfriend with his career, but I completely lost sight of mine.
I never made it to USC.
By 21, I dropped out of college and moved back home.
Over the next ten years, I started and quit, or was fired from, 15 jobs.
I ruined my credit.
I got married, and was divorced within a year.
At this point, I was 32, and I had no idea what I was doing with my life, besides reading self-help books that didn't seem to be helping.
What happened to all that potential?
Was I not trying?
No!
I worked harder than anyone I knew.
I didn't even have time for friends.
I was that busy.
I had potential, though.
So, my failure was clearly my fault.
I just hadn't done what I need to do to reach it, and, honestly, I was tired of trying, putting more effort into life than everyone else and falling farther and farther behind.
At this point, I could have given up on myself, I could have decided that everyone who'd thought I had potential was wrong.
But I didn't, because I knew that it was my behavior that had gotten me here, and behavior is affected by the brain, and my brain has ADHD.
Looking at my behavior, I knew: even with medication, even as an adult, my ADHD was still interfering with my life, and what I needed to know was how and why, and, more importantly, what could I do about it.
I started to do some research, and I found a lot of great information.
I found a lot of bad information too, but that's another talk.
But there's good information out there.
Websites, podcasts, talks, by researchers and medical professionals; books that would have been way more helpful than the self-help books I'd been using that were clearly written for normal - well, there's no normal - neurotypical brains.
A lot of what I found, though, was either super technical or seemed like it was written for parents and teachers trying to deal with ADHD kids.
There wasn't a lot that seemed intended for us, the people who have ADHD.
So, I started a YouTube channel.
I had no idea how to start a YouTube channel, but I started a YouTube channel.
I almost called it "How Not To ADHD," because that was about all I knew at the time.
But my boyfriend, Edward, talked me out of it.
It turns out lots of people need help understanding ADHD, including, maybe especially, those who actually have it.
I was no exception.
I thought ADHD was kind of the same for everybody.
I thought it was mostly about getting distracted.
I thought having ADHD was maybe the reason that I was scott66@example.net.
And I thought I was what needed to change, in order to be successful.
I couldn't be successful and still be me.
Spoilers: I was wrong.
So, let's go back for a second, let's go back to what brought us here today: the brain.
Understanding the brain you're working with, it turns out, is kind of important, and that's true whether that brain is your employee's, your student's, your kid's, your significant other's, or your own.
ADHD affects between 5 and 8% of the global population, which means, statistically speaking, there's between 37 and 60 of us just in this room.
You can't tell who we are just by looking, but it's fun to watch you try.
(Laughter) So, at some point, you're going to meet someone with ADHD, work with them, give birth to them, or fall in love with them.
Chances are you already have.
And, at some point, you're going to ask yourself, "What is going on in their brain?!"
So, after two years of learning about ADHD and a lifetime of experience with it, after having the honor of connecting with researchers, and doctors, and ADHD experts, and tens of thousands of ADHD brains all over the world, what can I tell you to help you understand ADHD?
By the way, many of them helped with this talk.
First of all, it's real.
It's not bad parenting or lack of discipline.
ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder.
It's currently the most well-researched mental condition, and there are actually measurable differences in the brain.
These differences are larger in children, but, for most people, they never go away.
In other words, adults have ADHD too.
While rates of ADHD diagnosis are increasing, it's not because of an increase in sugar or technology, or lack of spanking; it's not, any more than people drowning in swimming pools is because of Nicolas Cage.
Correlation does not equal causation.
Those are real numbers.
(Laughter) It's from both an increase in understanding that ADHD exists, that girls, adults, and gifted students can have it too, and ironically a lack of understanding that being hyper, misbehaving, or struggling in school does not mean you have ADHD.
ADHD is more serious than I realized.
The primary characteristics - inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity - don't sound all that serious, and I didn't think that they were, but, in real life, they translate to people getting into more accidents, being more likely to get fired, get divorced, significantly more likely to struggle with addiction.
I learned that ADHD is on a spectrum.
Raise your hand if you've ever lost your keys, or spaced out in the middle of a lecture.
If you're not raising your hand, I'm going to assume you spaced out in the middle of this one.
(Laughter) The thing is, while everyone experiences ADHD symptoms sometimes, an actual diagnosis is based on how many of those symptoms significantly and chronically impair multiple aspects of your life.
Just like you can get sad and not have depression, you can get distracted and not have ADHD.
And just like you can have mild depression or severe depression, ADHD can range from mild to severe.
I also learned ADHD is a terrible name for ADHD.
It creates a lot of confusion.
We don't have a deficit of attention!
What we have trouble with is regulating our attention.
As ADHD coach Brett Thornhill puts it, it's like your brain keeps switching between 30 different channels and somebody else has the remote.
Sometimes we have trouble focusing at all, and other times we get stuck on a channel and can't pull ourselves away, which in real life might seem we don't want to do homework because we'd rather play video games, and short, sometimes that's the case.
But the truth is there are plenty of times we want to able to focus, we try, and we just can't.
Current understanding is that this difficulty has to do with the way our brains produce and metabolize neurotransmitters, like dopamine and norepinephrine.
I learned ADHD is highly treatable.
Stimulant medication boosts these neurotransmitters, which is why it helps us focus.
It's very effective for around 80% of people with ADHD.
And I learned that medication isn't enough.
ADHD affects much more than our focus.
It impairs executive functions like planning, prioritizing, and our ability to sustain effort toward a goal.
It affects our ability to regulate our emotions, our behavior, our sleep.
It's not one program in our brain that works differently; it's the whole operating system.
It can affect every aspect of our lives.
And there are a ton of strategies out there that can help.
Cognitive behavioral therapy, coaching, even meditation or regular exercise can help make a huge difference understanding your brain.
I knew I had trouble focusing, and I knew my medication helped with that.
What I didn't know was that getting overwhelmed all the time had to do with poor working memory, and that making lists helps; or that the reason I ran late all the time wasn't because I didn't care, it's because ADHD'ers have a skewed sense of time, and that using a timer could teach me how long things actually take.
Mostly, I expected to learn what I actually learned: that ADHD is real; addressing it is important; and medication is not enough.
What I didn't expect to learn: that I wasn't alone; I had an ADHD tribe; what a difference it would make to connect with it.
There are people with ADHD in every country, every culture across the globe.
Yes, even in France.
(Laughter) And this tribe is awesome.
Comparing myself to people with neurotypical brains, I felt really bad about myself.
Why couldn't I keep my house clean or finish a project in time, instead of waiting till the very last second?
But seeing the positives in fellow ADHD brains helped me recognize and appreciate my own strengths, ones I couldn't see when I was just staring at my weaknesses, which is what I'd been doing for decades.
But ADHD brains have a lot to offer the world.
We tend to be generous, funny, creative.
ADHD'ers are 300% more likely to start their own business.
We not only think outside the box; we're often not even aware that there is a box.
(Laughter) We may struggle when our brains aren't engaged, but ADHD brains are great at tackling tasks that are urgent, working with ideas that are new, wrestling with problems that are challenging, and dedicating themselves to projects that are of personal interest.
This YouTube career I'd stumbled into was all of those things.
At 32, I was divorced, miserable, and had no idea what I was doing with my life.
At 33, I'd started my own business, and was connecting with ADHD experts.
By now, at 34, I have a team of volunteers helping with the channel.
I'm engaged to this amazing man who helps me produce the channel, works right alongside with me, is doing the slides right now - and, as we discovered, also has ADHD.
(Laughter) I'm working on reaching out to schools so that kids don't have to wait until they're 32 to learn about their brains.
And I'm doing my very first TEDx talk here with you today.
(Cheers) (Applause) But wait!
There's more!
Wait.
(Applause) That did sound like the end of the speech.
I'm sorry, it's not.
(Laughter) I'm happier and more successful than I've ever been in my life.
So, what happened?
How did I reach my potential?
Three things: one, I learned about my brain, my ADHD brain, both on my own and by connecting with others who have it.
If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it is stupid, unless it happens to chat with another fish and realizes fish aren't great at climbing trees, and that's okay, there's plenty of ocean.
Two, in learning about my brain, I found and stumbled into a job that engages it.
If you spend all your time trying to get a fish to able to climb a tree, you'll never see how far it can swim.
It turns out I can be me and still be successful.
I just had to find my ocean.
Three, I learned strategies for challenges I still face.
I have no fish analogy for this one, I'm sorry.
(Laughter) I guess I learned how to swim.
Once you know what your brain's challenges are, you can find solutions to them.
Once you look past the stereotypes and assumptions about people with ADHD, and dig deeper, you learn what ADHD actually is.
It's not people who won't stop fidgeting, or getting distracted.
It is brains that are chronically underaroused, trying to get the basic level of stimulation all brains need.
It's not about procrastinating or not caring.
It's having executive function deficits that make it hard to get started.
And it's not people being lazy or not trying enough.
It's kids and adults struggling to succeed with a brain that doesn't always want to cooperate in a society that wasn't built for them.
Society is our user's manual.
We learn how our brains and bodies work by watching those around us.
And, when yours works differently, it can feel like you're broken.
So, what I'm trying to do is reach out to these people wherever they are in the world, and tell them, "You are not weird.
You are not stupid.
You do not need to try harder.
You are not a failed version of normal.
You are different, you are beautiful, and you are not alone."
If you don't ADHD yourself, chances are you know somebody who does.
They're your employee, your boss, your friend, they're in this room.
I hope this talk helps you understand them better.
If you do have ADHD, welcome to the tribe.
(Applause) (Cheers)
Anyone in the room thought about sex today?
(Laughter) Yeah, you did.
Thank you for putting your hand up over there.
Well, I'm here to provide you with some biological validation for your sordid daydreams.
I'm here to tell you a few things that you might not have known about wild sex.
Now, when humans think about sex, male and female forms are generally what come to mind, but for many millions of years, such specific categories didn't even exist.
Sex was a mere fusion of bodies or a trickle of DNA shared between two or more beings.
It wasn't until about 500 million years ago that we start to see structures akin to a penis or a thing that gives DNA out, and a vagina, something that receives it.
Now invariably, you're probably thinking about what belongs to our own species, these very familiar structures, but the diversity that we see in sexual structures in the animal kingdom that has evolved in response to the multitude of factors surrounding reproduction is pretty mind-blowing.
Penile diversity is especially profuse.
So this is a paper nautilus.
It's a close relative of squid and octopus, and males have a hectocotylus.
Just what is a hectocotylus?
A detachable, swimming penis.
It leaves the [body of the male], finds the female through pheromonal cues in the water, attaches itself to her body and deposits the sperm.
For many decades, biologists actually felt that the hectocotylus was a separate organism altogether.
Now, the tapir is a mammal from South America.
And the tapir has a prehensile penis.
It actually has a level of dexterity in its penis much akin to what we have with our hands.
And it uses this dexterity to bypass the vagina altogether and deposit sperm directly into the female's uterus, not to mention it's a pretty good size.
The biggest penis in the animal kingdom, however, is not that of the tapir.
The biggest penis-to-body-size ratio in the animal kingdom actually belongs to the meager beach barnacle, and this video is actually showing you what the human penis would look like if it were the same size as that of a barnacle.
(Laughter) Mm-hm.
(Laughter) So with all of this diversity in structure, one might think, then, that penises are fitting neatly into vaginas all over the place for the purposes of successful reproduction.
Simply insert part A into slot B, and we should all be good to go.
But of course, that doesn't exactly happen, and that's because we can't just take form into account.
We have to think about function as well, and when it comes to sex, function relates to the contributions made by the gametes, or the sperm and the eggs.
And these contributions are far from equal.
Eggs are very expensive to make, so it makes sense for females to be very choosy about who she shares them with.
Sperm, on the other hand, is abundant and cheap, so it makes more sense for males to have a more-sex-is-better strategy when it comes to siring members of future generations.
So how do animals cope with these very incongruent needs between the sexes?
I mean, if a female doesn't choose a particular male, or if she has the ability to store sperm and she simply has enough, then it makes more sense for her to spend her time doing other biologically relevant things: avoiding predators, taking care of offspring, gathering and ingesting food.
This is, of course, bad news for any male who has yet to make a deposit in her sperm bank, and this sets the scene for some pretty drastic strategies for successful fertilization.
This is bedbug sex, and it's aptly termed traumatic insemination.
Males have a spiked, barbed penis that they literally stab into the female, and they don't stab it anywhere near her vagina.
They stab it anywhere in her body, and the sperm simply migrates through her hemolymph to her ovaries.
If a female gets too many stab wounds, or if a stab wound happens to become infected, she can actually die from it.
Now if you've ever been out for a nice, peaceful walk by the lake and happened to see some ducks having sex, you've undoubtedly been alarmed, because it looks like gang rape.
And quite frankly, that's exactly what it is.
A group of males will grab a female, hold her down, and ballistically ejaculate their spiral-shaped penis into her corkscrew-shaped vagina over and over and over again.
From flaccid to ejaculation in less than a second.
Now the female actually gets the last laugh, though, because she can actually manipulate her posture so as to allow the sperm of certain suitors better access to her ovaries.
Now, I like to share stories like this with my audiences because, yeah, we humans, we tend to think sex, sex is fun, sex is good, there's romance, and there's orgasm.
But orgasm didn't actually evolve until about 65 million years ago with the advent of mammals.
But some animals had it going on quite a bit before that.
There are some more primitive ways of pleasing one's partner.
Earwig males have either really large penile appendages or really small ones.
It's a very simple genetically inherited trait and the males are not otherwise any different.
Those that have long penile appendages are not bigger or stronger or otherwise any scott66@example.net.
So going back to our biological minds, then, we might think that females should choose to have sex with the guys that have the shorter appendages, because she can use her time for other things: avoiding predators, taking care of young, finding and ingesting food.
But biologists have repeatedly observed that females choose to have sex with the males that have the long appendages.
Why do they do this?
Well, according to the biological literature, "During copulation, the genitalia of certain males may elicit more favorable female responses through superior mechanical or stimulatory interaction with the female reproductive tract."
Mm-hm.
These are Mexican guppies, and what you see on their upper maxilla is an outgrowth of epidermal filaments, and these filaments basically form a fish mustache, if you will.
Now males have been observed to prod the female's genital opening prior to copulating with her, and in what I have lovingly termed the Magnum, P.I. hypothesis, females are overwhelmingly more likely to be found with males that have these fish mustaches.
A little guppy porn for you right there.
So we've seen very different strategies that males are using when it comes to winning a female partner.
We've seen a coercion strategy in which sexual structures are used in a forceful way to basically make a female have sex.
We've also seen a titillation strategy where males are actually pleasing their female partners into choosing them as a sex partner.
Now unfortunately, in the animal kingdom, it's the coercion strategy that we see time and time again.
It's very common in many phyla, from invertebrates to avian species, mammals, and, of course, even in primates.
Now interestingly, there are a few mammalian species in which females have evolved specialized genitalia that doesn't allow for sexual coercion to take place.
Female elephants and female hyenas have a penile clitoris, or an enlarged clitoral tissue that hangs externally, much like a penis, and in fact it's very difficult to sex these animals by merely looking at their external morphology.
So before a male can insert his penis into a female's vagina, she has to take this penile clitoris and basically inside-out it in her own body.
I mean, imagine putting a penis into another penis.
It's simply not going to happen unless the female is on board with the action.
Now, even more interesting is the fact that elephant and hyena societies are entirely matriarchal: they're run by females, groups of females, sisters, aunts and offspring, and when young males attain sexual maturity, they're turfed out of the group.
In hyena societies, adult males are actually the lowest on the social scale.
They can take part in a kill only after everybody else, including the offspring.
So it seems that when you take the penis power away from a male, you take away all the social power he has.
So what are my take-home messages from my talk today?
Well, sex is just so much more than insert part A into slot B and hope that the offspring run around everywhere.
The sexual strategies and reproductive structures that we see in the animal kingdom basically dictate how males and females will react to each other, which then dictates how populations and societies form and evolve.
So it may not be surprising to any of you that animals, including ourselves, spend a good amount of time thinking about sex, but what might surprise you is the extent to which so many other aspects of their lives and our lives are influenced by it.
So thank you, and happy daydreaming.
(Applause)