Meditation for ADHD: A Brief Introduction

Of all the natural coping methods I commonly see recommended for those with ADD, one that, to me, doesn't get nearly enough props is meditation.

I don't know why this is. Perhaps it's because it's just too New Age-y for some folks. Maybe it's because those acquainted with the issues of ADD find the idea of prescribing intense concentration to treat focus problems as lofty, perhaps even laughably so.

Whatever difficulties can come in learning to meditate (I'll get to those in a moment), I still think it's a shame not to try. The benefits of meditation to the ADD mind are profound in both a practical and emotional sense. First and foremost, it helps with hyperactivity, teaching one the art of stillness and calm. It's also a highly comforting balm to the emotional distress we so often experience, while creating a mental state excellent for gaining insight and unraveling bad habits. And of course, it helps with focus.

I myself learned to meditate via a hypnotist (hypnotism and meditation are essentially the same things; the differences between them split hairs along the lines of how the trance states are used, but that's really up to the user either way). He was actually an entertainer, and with trademark ADHD "look at me!"-ism, I volunteered to be a "subject" for his stage show. I found the experience of hypnosis so profound, I bought some of his CDs and started to learn self-hypnosis. The CDs contained ambient electronic music as well as progressive relaxation hypnotic inductions and instructions, including guided visualizations and behavior-modification exercises. Pretty basic stuff.

Chances are, I wouldn't have been able to learn the discipline if I'd tried to start from scratch, no music, no direction, just me sitting down, closing my eyes, and trying it. I needed the voice on the CD to give me direction and keep me focused until I'd been doing it for quite some time on my own. But that's what worked for me. For many people, visual stimulus is required to get into a meditative state, or some kind of meditative physical activity, like yoga, or a repetitive action. Things like drawing, getting lost in music, light housework, gardening, working with your hands, can all be good ways to get into the mindset.

Some good resources:

Pandora Internet Radio. Design an ambient music station of your own to help you with meditation. (I use "Kitaro" as my foundation, personally.)

Frederick Winters. This is the guy I learned hypnosis from.

Self-Hypnotism. This is an instructional article I wrote for eHow.com.

Illuminescence on YouTube. This user creates videos with hypnotic visualization and binaural beat music to assist in achieving a trance state. Just sit somewhere comfortable and watch and listen, preferably in the dark.

The False ADHD Dichotomy: Blessing Or Curse?

"The more the core self - the deepest impulses - is suppressed, the more compulsive are the attempts to compensate by satisfying superficial, infantile, instant-gratification impulses and desires." - Gabor Mate

The above is a quote from Gabor Mate's book, Scattered Minds. As planned, I purchased the book and am now reading it. I highly recommend this book. I'm finding it revolutionary, in fact, and hugely resonant in terms of my life. As I stated in my previous post, Dr. Mate's approach to ADD is rather different from the standard dialogue on the topic; it is his contention that ADD is not purely genetic, but also triggered by childhood emotional pain and profound stresses (and thus, curable, at least to an extent).

Before this point, the books by Dr. John Ratey (Driven to Distraction and Delivered From Distraction) had been my bibles in terms of understanding and coping with my ADD. I think I might just have a new one, at least for this period in my life. This is the first time I've encountered someone who talks about the root emotional causes of ADD in a manner that makes sense - and is really cutting and critical - but is not judgmental and does not blame.

I've always encountered a sort of polarized set of opinions when it comes to the "value" of ADD, resulting in an ongoing argument about whether the condition is a blessing or a curse. This is often tied to opinions on where the condition comes from and whether it's actually real. On the one side, you have the people who might say that ADD is a massive pharmaceutical scam, or a cop-out for bad parenting, or just plain immaturity that people make excuses for. On the other hand, you have the people who point to the (superficially) positive qualities of ADD (creative, often ingenious thinking, predisposition to generosity and compassion, etc.) and therefore treat ADD as a purely or predominantly genetic condition, one to be regarded as a positive or even to be deified (as is done with the horribly misguided "Indigo child" fad).

The sheer grounded common sense of Gabor Mate's approach to the problem, however, is beyond refreshing. I've always found myself frustrated by both standard points of view. One way, I feel blamed, shamed and insulted, and with the other approach, I feel like I'm being told that my problems aren't really a problem at all.

I mean, who among us doesn't know the feeling? The constant barrage of contradictory messages that comes every time we enter the professional mental health world, or any discussion of the subject? It's tiring, stressful, and above all, unhelpful, to have to oscillate between being told that one's life is a blessing, a curse, a burden, a problem, a mystery, a myth, a miracle, something pathetic, something extraordinary, etc., etc., etc.

Behind it all though, the individual with ADD feels unsettled. We want to live in a world of neither praise and adoration nor shame and the label of "dysfunctional." We want to be normal, and no, normal isn't just some social construct. We know that something in our minds feels deeply unsettled and wrong, and we all yearn for the feeling of having that be right. We may never have felt what it would be like to to live with "right," but we all have a sense of it, like an empty space in our minds and hearts.

Perhaps we're finally at the stage of a paradigm shift in how our condition is viewed. Perhaps it's a bigger shift than just that, one that might affect the larger culture of mental health and healing in North America.

I, for one, certainly hope so.

Today, my ADHD caused me to completely flake out on the fact that my trombone teaching day was meant to start at 3:30, not 4:00. I missed my first lesson and felt a total ass. In addition to this, I'd forgotten to bring my trombone, which is kind of an essential accessory for trombone teaching.

I got the call telling me I was late while I was on the road with my husband, Ryan. I apologized, then hung up the phone and proceeded to unleash a tirade of verbal abuse upon myself along the lines of how I "f*ck absolutely everything up."

Wanna know the real irony? I had just been in the middle of a conversation with Ryan about how beating oneself up exacerbates ADHD symptoms.

You see, a couple weeks ago, I was introduced to the writings of Gabor Mate, a physician and counselor in Vancouver. He takes the rather radical position on ADHD (and a number of other neurological, behavioral and medical issues) that the real cause of the problem is not pure genetics, but an issue of brain development. One that, Mate posits, is reversible with the right care and personal insight.

I haven't read Dr. Mate's book on ADHD (I hope to have it soon), but I've been thinking about this idea a lot in the past weeks. Certainly, Mate's not the first expert (or "expert") to propose that ADHD is caused by upbringing, but I've always balked at most statements along these lines because they usually go something like, "Blah blah blah, lazy, blah blah blah, bad parenting, blah blah blah, too much TV and video games, blah blah blah vaccine conspiracy blah blah blah boys will be boys and girls and adults don't REALLY have ADD, blah blah blah not enough math/nature/nutrition/discipline." (I hope that's not getting too technical.)

According to Mate, however, it's not BAD parenting, but merely highly stressed parenting and the realities of a post-industrial capitalist society's effects on childhood (i.e., most children are neglected as parents fight for their lives to make ends meet). I'll spare you further paraphrase, and you can read the interview with Dr. Mate (taken by the formidable Amy Goodman herself) here.

The idea of stressed parenting is one that resonates with my experiences, certainly more than any of the other pot-shot explanations. My early childhood was certainly stressed for my parents, who were struggling to survive on a meager, unsteady income while living in the frozen woods of Northern Minnesota - in a house heated only by a wood stove, no less! My parents were both younger than I am (27) by the time they had two children to take care of, and my father's own ADHD made both his working life and his emotional life an intense struggle.

I expect I'll be doing a lot more unraveling of my early childhood experiences, and those of other adults with ADHD in future blogs (it all comes to bear), but for now, suffice it to say I have a strong emotional recollection of tension from that time. It seemed, to my sensitive child's mind, that someone was always upset or on the verge of collapse. I'll be interested in seeing what sorts of thoughts Dr. Mate has about how, precisely, situations like mine cause ADHD, and ever more interested in seeing how the effects of such an ubringing can be mitigated.

But one thing I've found to be quite true over the years is that a solid sense of self-worth is crucial to living with ADHD. Unfortunately, ADHD often comes with a lot of baggage, built from years worth of negative feedback. I've been amazed at how much easier my day becomes when I wake up on the right side of the bed, or when something's just happened that serves as a boost to my self-esteem.

Tip for the day: Don't sweat the small stuff. Remember that other people make mistakes, not just those of us with ADHD. Work on fixing the problem, rather than beating yourself up for it.