Well, welcome everybody to Modern Financial Wellness. I'm your host, Jim Grace, and as you know, this is the podcast dedicated to helping you have a healthier relationship with your finances. I'm really excited to talk to my guest today, Laurel Black. Laurel is the director of Executive Functioning Coaching. She works with students at Research ILD and also works as an ADHD and executive function coach with adults at Bright Minds Coaching. Welcome, Laurel, to the show. Thanks so much for joining me.

Thanks, Jim. It's so great to be here. I'm excited to get into our talk today.

We'll obviously explore kind of high level, what ADHD is, what executive functioning is, and how executive functioning and ADHD kind of apply to one another, how that gets in the way of managing your finances, and hopefully some practical tips and ideas that people can put to work in their own lives right away that can be really helpful. And so obviously we're going to talk about ADHD today, a lot of couples and money and finance overall. But I think executive functioning, one of the reasons I was really excited to talk to you in particular is it feels like even if we don't have adhd, we should be aware of executive functioning skills and how they apply in our lives. So. So I think if people are hearing this upfront, I just wanted to make the disclaimer like this is for everybody, not just those that, that hate have adhd. So absolutely.

Yeah.

Again, excited to talk to you. Can we zoom out and just like very high level talk about neurodivergence and adhd? Like, what are those things and how should we think about them?

Yeah. So, you know, I think neurodivergence, neurodiversity, being neurodiverse, started as a movement, think about 20 years ago just to build awareness that, you know, there, there really is no such thing as average. That's okay. There are all types of people. Some of them have diagnoses and some don't. So that's kind of this umbrella idea that it's everything ranging from down syndrome all the way to ADHD to autism to mental health challenges that someone might be going through for a period of time. So it's kind of an umbrella term just to acknowledge that there is diversity. And that's true in all areas of life.

Right. We all know that we're all different. However, having it as a term does empower a lot of people. Right. It's kind of like person. We have this term person first language of are you a person with ADHD or is ADHD a major part of your Identity and who you are. And I would venture to say that that's changed a lot over the past 20 years. As an example, I have diabetes.

I have type 1 diabetes. And that isn't part of the neurodiversity umbrella. But I describe myself as a diabetic. I'm not a person living with diabetes because it affects the way that I live. It affects what I care about. You know, I'm really into nutrition because of that. It's part of my identity. Whereas some people might say, no, I'm a person.

I'm great. Diabetes is the side thing. It's the same with neurodiversity. You could say, yes, I'm living. I'm trying to be as kind of normal as possible, and I'm managing my adhd, whereas other people say, darn it, this is my identity. I'm proud of it. It makes me creative. It gives me this, like, spice that I bring to life.

Right. There's a lot of pride in that now. And so I think it's more how we approach each person and just get to know them and who they are and what they care about, rather than kind of hedging and, like, being nervous. I think curiosity really can bridge a lot if you're ever uncertain of how to kind of refer to someone or what they're dealing with.

Yeah, it's.

It's awesome who they are.

Yeah. That's such great advice. Cause that was actually one of the questions that I had for you is like, how do you describe this? Because I've heard people say they're adhd, and it's like, that gets into this idea that that is part of their identity. And it's like, I don't. I don't know, but I'm hearing you say, like, it depends on the person and how they relate to it and how they apply it to their lives.

Yeah. And a lot of the work that I do, especially this is kind of a model of coaching, is. It's not about a paper that you give me before you start that lists out your diagnoses and symptoms. Coaching really gets into, okay, who are you? And. And who do you want to be? Like, how do you want to be? How do you want to carry yourself? If that aligns with how things are going, awesome. Let's really elevate that. If that's not how things are currently going, which is part of what we'll get into today. Right.

That's why your episodes exist, is like, how can we nudge ourselves to elevate a little Bit closer to who or how it is we aspire to be. So what ADHD or a specific diagnosis can do is provide clarity. And that's what coaching does as well, is it's not, oh, do you meet this symptom or this one? It's really about, who are you and how do you operate and how would you like to operate a little bit more smoothly?

Yeah. And that description. Yeah, that makes me think too, there's so many great overlaps between the worlds of coaching and financial planning. Right. So a lot step one, oftentimes when we sit down with clients is, where are you at to today? And if that's. And where will you be in the future? And if you're not going to be where you want to be, how do we get you there? Right. In a way that's going to work for you? So always, it always strikes me that there's so many great similarities between the coaching world and the work that we do with clients. So obviously, if people are reaching out to coaches or financial planners, something's going on.

Right. They want to make some change and move forward. So if somebody has ADHD and it's impacting their finances, let's, let's assume what's, what's happening. Can we talk about these executive functioning skills a little bit? So what's going on with executive executive functioning?

Yeah, yeah, I'll tie all those together. You know, a lot of it is based in the neuroscience that there are certain things for all humans that are going to make us lean forward and go, oh, right, that make us really care. And at a really kind of crude, basic level, those are the things that biologically keep us going as a species. Right. So that social interaction, I would, I would argue that that's honestly number one, before sugar, before sex, before money. Like, those are the things that all as humans are going to make us lean forward and be interested and pay attention.

And I'm hearing your thoughts. Why is that? Why is that so important to you?

I ask, I like to ask people that same question just to get to them to think. Step back and think is because, let's say, you know, way back when, caveman era, whatever, it's not a scientific term, but if you didn't have food, if you had strong social connections, there's a chance that someone could help you get food. So it's a slightly longer term, like, way to pay attention. But one of the most painful things we can experience as like, tied with hunger is it feels just as painful in a slightly different way to feel Excluded or rejected.

Right.

And that's something we can come back to too. That's a strong proclivity for ADHD is because we sometimes miss out on satisfying other people financially or with the commitments we make or following through on promises. Often people with ADHD are kind of funny. We're silly. We're the class clowns. Right. If we can't satisfy the teacher or our parents by getting good grades, sometimes we might have made them laugh or be someone they wanted to have around. And that really break it down relates to that.

So social value, we want to feel socially valued because that way people have our back and we have theirs. So we're still feeling that value and relevance. The other things that relate to that core kind of how do we pay attention? This is all our dopamine system is of course, things like sugar. Right. If we're feeling really unmotivated, it's 2pm We've already done a lot of work that day, but we haven't gotten everything done. That's when we're like, okay, let me get a treat, let me get some cat. The other things are obviously biological. Like sex is how we continue as a species that makes people pay attention.

And then money. Right. Money has power to get you what you want. So if you're having a hard time paying attention for a lot of people with adhd, some people might go for a treat, some might look to shop or buy something or go back to that shopping cart and just get that stimulation of is this something, oh, maybe I want that, maybe I want that. Instead of. It's a way for us to satisfy the need that we want to pay attention to something. Just maybe not our top priority thing right now.

Right, right, right. So we have these things inherently in us that are moving us forward.

Yeah.

And ADHD impacts those mechanisms. Yeah.

So I can touch on that real quick. So with adhd we can't sort and filter those things relative to our goals. So I might. My favorite definition of ADHD is that it's a disorder of goal or behavior. And a lot of us think goals as like man, financial planning. I get you guys probably talk about like 30 year goals, you probably talk about 10 year goals, 5 year goals, 1 year goals. A goal for especially someone with ADHD is what are you trying to accomplish in the next 30 minutes? So those are many goals, hopefully leading to those bigger goals. But for us, a lot of times we'll sit down to do work and if it's not specified, we actually don't know what our goal is.

In the next five minutes, what it is that we expect of ourselves. And that relates to a struggle with the broader executive functions, which I can describe real quick, which is sorting, filtering and prioritizing. Filtering, sorry, and prioritizing. Like which one of these things should make us lean forward and pay attention the most. We have a really hard time separating things that are top priority to low.

Priority because everything makes you lean forward, essentially. Is that what is.

And novelty is really powerful. So if you've been working on a task for. For. Oh my gosh. For me, working on a task and I have ADHD as well, as may have been apparent so far, I have ADHD as well. So I've been working on the same task for 12 minutes. That's actually quite a long time. That as soon as the idea pops up that maybe I should check that email from my colleague that wanted to know something, I might just switch tasks real quick.

And I'm still giving myself credit. That still feels good because I'm working, but that really throws off my productivity and my flow state. So, yeah, it feels relevant. Or if I, If I get a notification for an email, I. That's new. The novelty gives us that dopamine boost and the fact that it has a social reward that someone else expects something of us often makes that seem higher priority than it truly actually is. Like, no, that person could wait till next, next Friday to hear back from us. But to us it's like, oh, it's new.

It's something different to think about. So we have parts filtering, all that stuff that could get our attention.

Yeah, yeah. And I've. I've noticed that before. It was kind of not confusing, but it was interesting to hear you maybe clarify it here a little bit. This idea that ADHD folks are. Lack focus, I think is a common conception, but it's almost like there's too much focus. There's. You're too able to focus on too many things.

And that novelty kind of draws you into many areas. Right. It's like the ability to.

Yeah.

To focus on many things at once, but that causes the problem. Right, right.

And my, My connection there is that we always feel like we might be working all day, but we never feel like we got anything done, like checked off. And that leads to a huge kind of damper on motivation for subsequent days and tasks.

Right.

And that's something we can get into in a little bit. But a lot of the problem with ADHD is it's more of like a floodlight on what's going on rather than A spotlight. And when there's all of these different things we could be doing or paying attention to, especially if all of them are late, which is kind of a common thing, unfortunately for some of us. Yeah, they all kind of get this equal little bit of the floodlight of attention rather than like a zoomed in, super bright crystallized view of what we really truly need to do in that 10 minutes, in that hour or in that day.

Yeah. When you were talking about goals oriented behavior, is that how you described it? I want to make sure I got that right. So goals oriented behavior, you mentioned how financial planning is always is really based on looking into the distant future. In a lot of cases, 5, 10, 15, 30 years, when we're looking at retirement. And it's been interesting as I've learned more and more about adhd. I've talked about this on the podcast before my wife has adhd and when we've sat down to talk about our finances as a financial planner, I'm trying to communicate to her the big picture and what, what the future holds and therefore what we should be doing today. But often that conversation goes off the rails because we're looking so far into the future. What my wife wants to know is like, tell me specifically what we need to be doing today.

Right. And I really related. When you kind of describe that. Interesting.

Yeah. And that's. I'll bring it back to. You know, a lot of people have heard executive function, so let me kind of finish describing those because it really relates to what you just mentioned. So the director at where I work, Research Institute for Learning and development, our director, Dr. Lynn Meltzer, has this analogy that executive function is kind of similar to being at the top of a mountain where you can see everything. You really have that forest view. You see where you want to go and you say, you know what, I think I should head a little bit north.

I don't know.

To the right. Whatever you want to say. And then take this path. I think there's a bridge. Let's see. Executive function is the ability that when something comes up, gets hard or is unexpected, you're able to flexibly. You know, with this term I really like is agility. Kind of with agility, backtrack to that original goal and say, does that original goal, Is that still where I want to go? Or could I go over here? And.

Or if you still want to stick with that same destination, what are other flexible ways that you could get there instead? So that relates to being able to organize the options that you have, organize your resources so that's a big category of executive function. That's probably the one that comes to mind the most because you can see it when it's not there.

Right, Right.

So organizing. But when you think about what it means to organize, that means you have to categorize, and you also have to kind of assign value to stuff. You have to sort, rank, and almost assign value to the things you need to organize. So that's another category is kind of ranking and prioritizing. Um, with that, a bigger picture. Part of executive function is goal setting, but also flexible goal setting. Like, how are you adjusting your goals along the way if they're not working? Like, are you adjusting the time frame and being gentle with yourself? Are you adjusting that? It's not, darn it, I have to do this myself. Like, are you adjusting your approach to that goal?

Right.

Another category, working memory, is one of the most common things that leads to an ADHD diagnosis. Working memory means you just have a really hard time keeping track of all of the things that you need to keep in mind at once. So that classic example would be like getting up from your chair to go get something, and by the time you've gotten two doors down the office, you've already forgotten what it was you stood up for.

Right.

That's another category, and that's the one.

That strikes me, like, comes to mind that I do that. Right. And I don't have adhd. Right. So within this conversation about having adhd, it might be more challenging or more prevalent in folks that are diagnosed, but I think that's something that when we get overwhelmed, we get stressed, we get busy. A lot of us suffer in our executive functioning, and it can have an impact on our lives.

Yeah. And then that's going to lead to this fifth category I mentioned, which is that flexibility. That is its own category. And then I'll come back to working memory. Cognitive flexibility is the term for what I described that like, yeah, all those other things are great, but once you know yourself and what works for you, if those don't work, are you flexible enough to try something else, to talk to someone, to try a different approach.

Right.

And so what you were describing is, is something. That's why we call it executive function. Those are the underlying things that might be exceptionally challenging with adhd. But I like to use this analogy of a gas tank for self control. So there's something called the resource model of self control, which is that we all have, like, limits to our self control. Right. If we've had a long day and we finally had that evaluation meeting at work, maybe. You know, I've had to have an evaluation meeting with someone and say, hey, we got some work to do together.

Right. It's been taxing. Your kids were all like fighting each other and then one started crying. You had to control them. You're trying to watch your weight. All of those things. Each of those things will take away the amount of self control you have left. That's when you're going to go get that.

What do they call them up here? Milkshakes are called fraps. So what?

It's. Yeah, that's a Rhode island thing, I think. Right. I mean, we are in New England, so we're placing ourselves geographically, but yeah, milkshakes, fraps.

Yeah. That's when you're like, you know what? On the way home, I'm just gonna stop and get fast food, like, whatever. Long day, right? So that idea of it's been a long day goes back to this analogy that all of us have our executive function limited depending on what's going on in our lives. So it's really not even about the diagnosis per se. A diagnosis, like I said, can help you get clarity. But, man, if you have anxiety or even a period in your life of feeling anxious because of something in your life going on, that's going to limit your ability to be very flexible. It's going to limit your ability to go back and see bigger picture because you're so focused on details and just getting through it.

Right.

So with this gas tank. Yes, we all have kind of different size gas tanks of this self control we're born with.

Right.

We work at a more or less efficient level. Right. You might really fly off the handle if it's been a super tough day faster than someone else might. Or I'll say, I might, I know myself. And we all kind of might show up at work or show up to an event with different amounts of gas left in that gas tank to exercise self control. And we don't talk about those things that much in our.

Yeah, we don't talk about it enough. And. But we do talk about this idea in personal finance where we shouldn't be making big financial decisions if we're stressed, anxious. Right. And as I'm hearing you describe executive functioning, I'm thinking about all the clients that I work with myself personally. I have two little kids. I have a job in a business. I'm coaching little league now.

And something you said actually stuck with me when you said, when you're working with your wife and you're trying to get to this forest view, right, the super big expansive forest view, what can happen sometimes with that, that dopamine system for ADHD when it's a little bit off, is we'd really just like to get going. We'd really just like to know what the solution is. So in that sense, often people with ADHD can be very, very resourceful under stress. Like, we'll figure it out, we'll figure it out. And so what that means is when it's bigger, longer term, planning it. How do I want to phrase this in a gentle way? We often are like, just, what's this? I have an idea. Why don't we just do this? Hey, why don't we just do this? Why don't we just cut this category out? You know what? Okay, fine, I'll stop buying shoes. Like, we're so quick to jump to the solution.

Right.

Before stepping back and having that flexibility to say, hold on, let's like reclarify what the bigger picture goal is and acknowledge the flexibility there. I know at this point in my career I love a good protocol. Like I love a good will spend five minutes doing this and it makes me seem like a type A person. But it's because I know that otherwise I'll. I'll rush to the solution before I've really clarified the problem or the goal in the first place.

Right, right.

Because it feels good to be like, I've got the answer.

Yeah, yeah. It's a good segue. Thinking about feelings, I want to make sure we talk a little bit more about kind of the emotional component to this. I've come to understand that with ADHD there seems to be an emotional response perhaps more often in managing the day to day. Right. Where does that come from and what's going on there?

Yeah. So there's a couple things, and I'll name them first so that I hold myself accountable to go back and talk about each one. One is just that, you know, part of it is impulsivity. Things come out without that filter without assigning value and without seeing that bigger picture. Part of executive function is also the flexibility to be able to pause and take perspective of someone else before you say something, and that's just not gonna have time to happen. So one is impulsivity, and I'll come back to that. Another one is kind of this. This theme of social value.

I don't know how many studies there on this, but it's. There are on this. But it's something I personally would love to study more. More about, which is there's a lot in the ADHD community now about rejection sensitivity.

Mm.

Which means that we are particularly impacted when we feel like we might be rejected. Someone might not want to hang out with us. Someone might say no. That's not something that I personally feel. I think I'm so impulsive. I just throw ideas for plans out with people, and if they say no, I've already forgotten that I.

Right.

I did them to do something. So I don't really feel that much. But it comes back to that idea of when there are certain things that yield a dopamine boost. Doing well on something, getting more money, winning something, doing a really great job on a task at work. Still, a lot of those do have. Sorry, I forgot to mention, like, a really good meal. A lot of those also have social components. Right.

You did well at work, and it made your boss happy. It made you proud of yourself so that you are a more valuable asset to your spouse. And I know that's such a biological way to say it, but that's what it comes down to. That kind of social value is huge because that's another source of dopamine.

It's interesting.

Overwarded, we're like, oh, now I can get to work, because I feel good that my husband's proud of me. So now I can, like, go do this other thing.

Yeah. Yeah. It's funny. I. I joke with my wife a little bit. She's very much not motivated by money. So, like, leading into review season, I'm trying to, like, coach her about, you know, maybe you can get a raise or, you know, the financial rewards that come from working. But what my wife always comes back to is just positive feedback.

She wants to know she's doing a good job and she's contributing to her team and, like, she's, you know, getting the kudos that she deserves for the hard work. Right. She's very motivated by what you're describing right now.

Yeah. So I think with emotions, then there's those two main things that are coming to my mind, which is one is just impulsivity. That man, I know I put my foot in my mouth a lot. Like, I say things, and then two days later I'm thinking, oh, my goodness, did I upset that person? Is that really what I meant? Oh, God. Like, how do I go back and fix it? Should I just avoid that? Like, there's a lot of social elements, even to the impulsivity. And the impulsivity, even if it's just internal, is we are quick again to find an explanation for something, and that often fits with a kind of negative narrative we might have rather than reality. So we might be really hard on ourselves or come to that very quick answer, which also is, like, rooted in defensiveness. It's not accurate.

But a lot of times, for all people, we'd rather have an answer that makes sense. It's called coherence. We'd rather have an answer that makes sense than the good or positive or happy or smooth answer. It's like, yeah, well, I guess I'm lazy, right? And that. That can lead to the. It becomes a narrative. I think so.

Right?

I think it's those two things. The impulsivity, wanting to have a quick answer for things, or like, you must have meant this when you said that. Like, no, stop and think. That's not what I meant. And then the other one is that social kind of rejection sensitivity, which the flip side of rejection sensitivity is that you are. We're so, like, compelled and often motivated by positive social acceptance.

Right, right, right. On a quick side note, in this kind of social vein, do you think that those with ADHD are more susceptible than to social comparison? Like, this idea of keeping up with the Joneses we hear in the world of personal finances. Like, are they. And it might not be a fair question, maybe anecdotal, but what are your thoughts on.

Yeah, I have a thought for sure, which is that again, going back to that idea of a disorder of goal oriented behavior, if we aren't super like, okay, I want to be able to retire comfortably, man, I would ask you some questions. You'd ask me some questions about, like, okay, what does that mean to you, Laurel? Like what? How would you define that? We often aren't able to really disaggregate and clarify what it truly means to retire comfortably. Right, like, or send my kids to college. Like, with adhd, we often again skip to the solution without considering all of those nuanced details accurately. We may overthink a lot of them, but without the structures to make those accurate. And like assign value and prioritize each of those elements. So we will skip to the quick answer. And so I think for comparing to the Joneses, that also fits with what I've seen with a lot of people, which is people pleasing, where those are social cues of what it means to be successful.

Right.

One is when you compare yourself to other people, you're like, well, there is a goal to have. I just want to be like that. I don't know how they did it. They're probably doing something evil and illegal. But I want, you know, that's not fair. So that's part of it is the social comparison gives you a goal if you hadn't clarified your own yet. And then the other one is like, I've noticed with almost everyone I work with is there is a tendency to be a people pleaser because that if we can figure out how to make other people happy, we can. It's like our dopamine hit.

Like if we're not taking medication, that's our dopamine hit, you know, making other people happy. But where that gets super murky is you can't define that. You don't know what exactly will make someone else happy because you don't know what their gas tank level is. You don't know what they're going through. So while it feels really good to be able to make other people happy, like your wife is, I'm the same way. I'm at words of affirmation, lady. But, you know, there's no guaranteed way to get those.

Right. Right.

Then this lack of clarity. And for a lot of us, it's that lack of clarity that it becomes this cycle of, well, how am I supposed to engage in goal oriented behaviors if I don't actually know what my goal is?

Yeah. It just becomes this like vicious negative flywheel. Right? Where you're. Yeah. You just can't live up and there's no clarity on how to get there. And you just kind of sit in this anxiety about the whole thing. Yeah, yeah. So we have these emotions.

Right. And there's a lot of different places that they might be coming from. But I've, I've talked to other people on the podcast about this idea of procrastination and overwhelm. And you introduced me to a quote or a concept that I thought was really relevant here, which is this idea that procrastination is an emotional management problem, not a time management problem. And that seems really relevant to this subject right now of what we're talking about. Can you tell us A little bit more about that.

Yeah. And that fits with that narrative of, oh, you know, I have adhd, so I procrastinate. Or like, we a lot. You don't have to have ADHD to say that we all procrastinate on something. So if we can cast it off as it's like, well, you know, sometimes I just get lazy or I'm not motivated. Like, those are surface level things like, oh, I manage my time poorly. But when we really stop and think about like, you know, I urge your listeners that the next time you're. You're procrastinating on something, ask yourself what it is you're scared of because that alone will get you some clarity.

So this, I heard this guy, I'm going to try to say his name correctly. Tim Pichel at Carleton University in Canada. So he's been on like npr, BBC. He has a TED talk on procrastination. He studies it. And the idea is that I believe what he says is that procrastination is that you're avoiding something you don't want to do. And I would, I would invite him to consider an alternative which I is anecdotally I experience, which is that I notice myself also procrastinating on things that I really am excited about, I'm hopeful for and I don't want to let people down. So that's still an emotion, right? There's still a dread there that I'll do this thing that I'm passionate about, I'm an expert on, I'm excited about.

I'm so grateful for the opportunity. It's so exciting to me that I am scared I'm going to let someone down, that it's not going to be good enough. And we get back to what we were talking about before that. Have you defined what good enough would be like? Have you actually stepped back to think about what it is you want to offer this group? Like, I do a lot of trainings, right? So it's like, have you, have you stepped back to think about, like, what you expect of yourself? Laurel? And often it's that we haven't yet. So we put off and put off and put off until we have enough time to make it great or meet the expectations or do it well enough without defining what that means? So the emotions that come up are this like, dread, sense of overwhelm. I call it the gray cloud of doom. Because what happens with procrastination is we leave our expectations of ourselves very vague and cloudy. Often they're really emotionally charged and just Like, a couple phrases like, oh, man, I have all this stuff to do.

It's tax season. Right. Like, I haven't done mine yet. So.

So, yeah, just to make note, Laurel confirmed it's April 4th here, so clock's ticking.

At least I think it's tax season. But it's that we have this vague. It's almost a conveniently vague narrative that seems dreadful because then we're able to continue putting it off because, yeah, that does seem hard. And I'd only put it off if it really were that hard.

Right.

So procrastination becomes this, like, doom cloud of emotion.

Yeah, yeah. And oftentimes. Right. You hear a lot. And I think it's true in my own life and anecdotally that when you finally get that first thing done, you realize it's never as bad as you thought it was going to be. Right. Moving forward. Right.

And taking some steps to start taking some action and moving forward. It gets easier and easier.

Yeah.

Right. Would this be a good transition into the ERAs framework and, like, dive in a little bit? Yeah. Okay, cool. So tell us about the framework, because this seems like a really good place to kind of lead in. Like, where do we go from here? How do we get moving and move things forward?

So I think we've talked about a couple different things that relate to strong emotions. Some of them are social. Some of them are feeling like you let someone down. Some of them are that someone didn't show up for you the way you expected. And then finally, procrastination, that is, you know, procrastination will always have some sort of emotion in it. None of us are proud of that. So I'll. I'll back up real quick just about some of the research on what emotions actually are.

So it seems like a kind of silly thing to clarify, but I really like a researcher local to here at Northeastern University. Her name is Lisa Feldman Barrett, and her. She is a neuroscientist. Like, she doesn't sit with people and talk in chairs. She. She is, like, studying people in whatever machines they use. Right.

She's not to jump in, but she's got a really awesome book. I forget the title. It's like Seven and a Half Lessons about the Brain. Or I'm butchering that, but is that it?

That is, yes. Seven and a half Lessons about the Brain is her first book, and she just came out with another one called How Emotions Are Made.

Oh, cool. I haven't read that, so I'll have to pick it up. Yeah.

I really encourage the Seven and a half lessons about the brain is short. It's great. And they're almost like essays. She is, she's like, you can look my, my sources up online. Like, it's a nice short little book to.

And she does an awesome job. She's obviously a real deal neuroscientist and that gets highly technical, but it's really quote unquote, easy to read. Right. She does a great job kind of boiling that down and making really relatable analogies. When she describes.

Yeah, it's great. I just finished that a couple months ago and I have her other book on my shelf, so. But you know, I really like her frame and that emotions are basically neurologically, they are predictions. Your brain is in a dark black space. Your brain doesn't actually see anything. Right. It's relying on inputs that it gets from your nervous system and then it combines those inputs with your past experience. Experiences and the stories it tells.

So she says that emotions are basically when you make a prediction and then either that prediction is confirmed or, you know, for a really positive emotion, maybe something went way better than you expected. And that's a beautiful part of being human too. And then there's an adjustment period of like, okay, well do we need to like rewrite the stories in our head or not? And then how do we kind of move forward? So she says that emotions are really based on this predictive model that you. We have no idea what's going to happen in a given day. So we kind of say, well, I'm following my routine, I'm going to work. I think I, I think my life is in my control. Right. We'd like to hope so.

When really it is not. And there are some disorders where you're convinced that your life is not in your control. Right. That's a pretty classic outline of depression, is that you feel like you have no locus of control over what's happening to you or what's going to happen to you and if you did something, it wouldn't make a difference. Right. So that's kind of one part of the neurodiversity umbrella. So with that idea that emotions are predictions, I developed something with my team at Research ILD called the ERAS model. And we developed it actually for middle schoolers.

And the quick analogy that I'll use for this that is probably relevant for all of us is to go to the ERAS model and I'll explain it a second. But think about when someone takes too long to text you back.

Okay?

Well, yeah, we all got that, like oh, yeah.

Waiting for the bubbles to pop up, Right. Just staring at our phones. Yeah.

Come on. It's. Come on. I thought, right. I thought this. I thought you were going to text me right back. Why is it a day later? So the ERAS model is something we came up with to help teachers work with their students through unpleasant emotions. And I use the word unpleasant rather than negative because another researcher I really like, Mark Brackett, who runs the Yale center for Emotional Intelligence, has some.

Oh, I have one here, don't worry. Something called the mood meter. That's basically our emotions are in. He puts them in four quadrants of either pleasant or unpleasant and high or low energy, right? So none of them say bad. None of them say, get rid of it quick. And his example is like, you know, the one in the top corner for unpleasant and high energy is enraged. Now, none of us want to feel enraged, but, man, if you're feeling enraged, then that is a really clear signal that something needs to change, right? Like if you're feeling enraged, some of us get enraged about politics. Like, okay, well, then it based on how you're feeling, then you think something needs to change.

So what the ERAS models does is lays out these four elements where you can take your emotion and truly use it as data. Might not be in the moment, but it's something that really gives us the space to look at what that emotion is telling us. So E stands for what is the expectation that could be? What is the hope? What is the goal? What is the dream? What is the assumption? What is the expectation in the moment? And then if there is an emotion, that means there's a gap between the expectation and reality.

Got it?

So if you were hoping with a silly little text example, you thought, you know, this person always texts you back in a few minutes. You expected them to text you back in a few minutes. The reality is it's been three hours. So as a teenager in middle school, you're like, oh, my God, this person's no longer my friend. I don't think they like me anymore. Are they mad at me? So what the reality step of ERAS is, right? We said the expectation was you thought they text you back quickly. The reality is they have not texted you back yet. And that's where we also do a reality check.

So reality also stands for reality check. Of, is that original expectation always or still realistic? Like, let's go back and check that expectation to see where that came from. Then A would be adjust. How can you adjust? Can you adjust that expectation or can you adjust the reality And I'll get into some more examples of that. And then S is really that commitment piece from coaching, which is what is your step to start? What are you actually going to do of all those things?

Right. What now? Right.

Yeah. And so when we turn that into a little bit more of a grown up example, it's like, okay, you know, when you're comparing yourself to your, these other, these social comparisons or you know, a lot of times there's social expectations of men and women of a certain age. There's family expectations. So eras is still really useful for something like that of what are the expectations on you from other people and what do you expect of yourself? A lot of times we don't clarify those. We just feel this emotion, but we don't clarify like what are those expectations in the first place.

Yeah. And I think this is great. And again, I, I didn't think that we'd connect to kind of this social aspect of this, but I think it's an awesome place that kind of through line through the conversation. So as I'm hearing you talk about this and I'm thinking about examples, oftentimes I think people come to me as a financial planner because they don't feel like they have enough, aren't doing enough financially, quote unquote. Right. And it this like I'm, I'm relating directly to kind of what you're describing here where it's like, well, what is your expecting expectation of where you should be at this point in your life? Right. Based on where you're at.

Yeah, yeah. So first we'd clarify that. Like, let's just be clear on what's on the table in your mind. Then the reality check is, are those expectations all still realistic based on your current reality? So the reality check step is really two things. It's how are you, how much time do you have, how much energy do you have? Right. Like what resources do you have? And that's where procrastination really comes in, which is how we got on this. Right. Of like, well, you have three days.

So let's just look at your current reality. And what that also means is what are your obstacles and challenges? Um, and given those obstacles and challenges, is kind of like, is that expectation still realistic? And then you move on to how can I adjust? So there's a couple ways I'll list out that you could adjust the expectations of yourself. And this works for others too. Like if other people let you down and you're really upset, this works too. It's like, what are your Expectations of that person.

Right, Right. Have you come to expect too much of this person? Right. Yeah.

Right. So then you think about, could I adjust my expectation? We'll stick with myself first as, like, your own person rather than others. Others gets di. I will say when you change your expectations of others in order to avoid emotions, but that can sometimes lead to is like, toxic relationships where it's like, yeah, well, he's doing his best. You know, like, you certainly can. Like, I have a friend who we've come to understand each other over a long time that she's always about 30 minutes late, and now I just know that. So I either lie about the time or, like, bring something to do while I wait. Like, it's fine.

I've adjusted that expectation and we're still good friends. So when you get to the adjust step, it's, are you willing to adjust your expectations or how can you adjust your reality?

Right.

Well, adjusting expectations often is where we get into perfectionism. And ironically, it's some of the people who struggle the most outwardly that have the strongest perfectionism internally. And what that looks like for ADHD sometimes is, man, I've already, you know, missed these two other deadlines. This third deadline, I really can't let this person down. It better be perfect to make up for the fact that I missed those other two deadlines. And then you miss a third deadline, because that's an unrealistic expectation. Right. So you could adjust the expectation by saying, I'm doing the best I can with what I've got.

Maybe I can do a little bit less for the first deadline and then do the rest of it later. There's kind of these different arcs you could take.

Right.

You could say, you know what, I'm just going to do it all Sunday night. I'm going to cancel all my plans and do it all Sunday, which is what happens to us sometimes.

Yeah.

Expectation. You can usually change the timeline or the quality level.

It's. I love the idea of I'm doing the best with what. What I have. Right. I'm doing the best I can with what I have. That. That directly applies to financial planning and the clients that I work with. And again, to back up to this idea of clients coming in to work with an advisor because they're feeling like they're not doing enough.

They're not where they should be.

Yeah.

Is. Can we get you to focus on doing the best that you can with what you have? Right.

Exactly.

And that is sometimes challenging for a lot of people.

Yeah. And then that gets Us to the next part then, which is your react. You can, I know it sounds crazy, be like, oh, change reality. Yeah. You can change your approach. So changing your expectations is what you expect the outcome to be, basically right. Like, well, I'm not going to do it tomorrow. I'll give myself more time to do it.

That's reasonable. Changing reality is where you change how you communicate. You could change what options you're using. Right. You can research alternatives and you can change your environment, which is one that we forget about a lot. So again, you could change expectations and often you're going to need to do both. You can change your reality, which is, wait, can I actually just turn this in one day late, like, because that would just make me feel so much better. So changing reality is communicating, advocating, asking for help, going to see someone for advice, looking up a resource.

Yeah.

I always put research, like, look up alternatives. Look up other places you could go, oh, you wanted to take this, knock your socks off, trip with your kids for spring break. Okay. Look up some other options. That.

Right.

You just Iron man is like, are you trying to get work done, like at the kitchen table? Like, what are you, what are you doing?

Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking a lot as you're describing, adjusting your reality to financial examples. Right. If we're feeling like we're not in the place that we should be, we're not doing enough. We don't have enough. One of the things you can do through planning is gain a lot of clarity of where you currently are today. Right. You can, you can observe your current objective reality financially and you can make adjustments. Right.

So once you have that clarity and you know that you're spending X on eating out every night. Right. You can make that change and that change will have an impact of what your future reality looks like. Right. So it feels to me like we're talking about empowering people to take control as well.

Absolutely. And that's the main reason that this came up is because originally we developed this for teen, for like teenagers. And man, do they feel like their life is not in their hands. That's why we often see them acting out and doing risky things, is because they're seeing where those limits are of their reality and where the limits are of those expectations. And what it really comes back to now that we've used it with teachers and students and I use, I talk myself through this all the time, is it gives you a sense of agency and control, that, yes, you can control the expectations, and if you can't, you can control the reality, and for a lot of us, it's that, okay, this year I'm going to save a little bit so that in five years I can be saving a tremendous amount just with the interest of those savings or for now we're going to take this type of vacation for spring break so that in five years we can take that. So that's like with the reality. Another thing, there's a lot of research that I really like. A lot of the stuff that Daniel Pink comes out with, he has these little like one or two minute.

They're called pink casts. They're two minutes. They're super short. I think he did it before TikTok was cool. Like, you know, it's a quick short form video. He also has a couple books that are really helpful to kind of put our, our tough behaviors in perspective. But something that he really encourages is getting clear on what the options are before you make a decision. Now, with adhd, sometimes we'll get decision paralysis and we'll think too much about decisions.

So it's great to be able to have a partner or a coach or a financial advisor to talk you through those options.

Right.

But you know, even in workplaces, often it's not about coming up with the best decision together. It's about brainstorming lots of options so that you clarity on what actually the best option could be. And it encourages outside the box thinking. Now, with adhd, we're always thinking outside the box. That's why it's helpful to have someone have us narrow it down.

Right. Whether it's coach, advisor, find. Find somebody that can help.

Yes. And kind of put it in perspective with you. So the adjust step is kind of list all the things you could adjust and then s to kind of wrap it up is. Okay, what do you actually pick one or two steps to start. How are you actually going to start on this? And my favorite phrase from coaching is what would it take?

Yeah, yeah. So this, the steps I think is really critical too. And it's great to have an understanding of your expectations and your reality and make those adjustments. But like, if we don't take that first step forward, we never really make any progress. And I think whether it's ADHD or other clients that I work with, it's kind of like getting healthy. Right. So if you wake up and you're not feeling good about your overall health, it's all of a sudden I'm going to go to the gym every day. I'm going to cut out all the bread and carbs in My diet.

I'm not going to drink any more alcohol. And then, and then we have all these ideas. Right? Um, all great options. Yeah, yeah, all great options as well. But is that realistic for us to actually accomplish? Maybe we should just go take a walk. Right? Step one, like actually implement the advice. And to use a financial example, there's lots of things that you can do to change your financial situation now and into the future.

Right.

Pick one. Right. Building a behavior. Yeah. You know, start small. Take that first step. Do you have any other thoughts about how that first step should look?

So what I always encourage, this is what I ask in my coaching sessions. And I encourage, you can ask yourself this question is like, okay, but what would that look like? Right. So a lot of times it's like, all right, so I'm going to start going to the gym every day. Cool. What would that take? What would that look like? Oh, what would it. And I actually, like, I usually say, what would it take? Okay, you're going to go to the gym every day or you're going to need to join a gym. What would that take? Tell me truly what is going on for you to get that to happen and then you commit to that one behavior.

Right.

So that would be, you know what? Then I'm gonna tell my wife that I want this new thing because I know the social accountability matters to me. And then, let's see, I'm gonna block off time in my calendar to look up options for gyms I could join. But we've already listed two steps. And then I'm gonna pick one to go in person and check out by Friday. So that's three steps and you still haven't signed up for a gym yet. Right. So it's like sometimes I think another thing we can have a whole nother podcast on. This is like, there's a lot, it takes a lot to even get started on one of those steps a lot of times.

And that's why I start. I've started to shy away from the word goals because they're so you can make them as specific as you want, but the steps to get those goals to come to life are what really matter.

Yeah. And that comes up a lot in the work that I do. Goals are great. I think they're super important. Right. We need to have targets in the future that we're trying to hit. But more and more, I think that to be successful later on, we need to focus on really short term behavior. Right.

And, and really boiling it down into what's the next step. That's going to get me moving forward. And if we can do that consistently, that's where we'll see greater and greater results over time. Right?

Yeah. So. And I think the other thing with behavior change and I, I focus on this even with kids as young. I went for it with a kid in fifth grade and I'll, I'll tie it back to finance, I promise. But in fifth grade, his parents wanted me to work on like, getting him to throw his trash away and like brush his teeth more. I was like, okay. I mean, as a fifth grader, it's not just like, okay, I'll do those things more, I promise. We actually looped back and started talking about who this little like 10 year old was and what he cared about and what he valued.

And through a lot of coaching, I got him to say himself, well, yeah, you know, I'm not a slob. And that's part of who he is and who he thinks he is. And so what I would encourage people to do too is when you think about it, even a small behavior change, ask yourself, what makes that important to me?

Right.

And then ask yourself again for that answer. Right? So I want to save money. What makes that important to you? I don't know. I don't know if that's a term used. I want to be more financially stable. Right. What makes that important to you? Because it gives me freedom. What makes that important to you? Because for a lot of my life, it felt like I've just been floating along doing what other people want.

Okay, so what makes it important to you to save money then? And you get to this kind of thing. Third tier depth. Level of. No, really, why does this matter to you? Because if you don't have clarity on that, you're not going to stick with these cute little habits either, right?

Yeah.

It's kind of at a. What's his name? The atomic habit. James Clear. That's like, this is. You're casting a vote towards the type of person you are.

Right.

Rather than like, I just need to go to the gym more.

Yeah, yeah. It always seems to come back to understanding who you are, who you want to be, what's important to you, what do you value? Your why. Right. There's a lot of different, you know.

Angles, those good things.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's all, it's also critical. Right. So you can have it. Expectations in reality. But it's like, what are, what are you. Who are you trying to be right at the end of the day? And what's. What matters Most.

So, yeah. Is there anything else related to executive functioning or ADHD or your work? Anything that you want to make sure we touch on before we start winding down?

I think a lot of it is the more any of us can give ourselves some space to stop and think about, you know, when we're feeling unmotivated, when we're feeling like we're procrastinating, when we're feeling like some sort of emotion come up. If we can just step out and give ourselves some space. It could be that walk you mentioned, right? Like, give yourself some space to like look at it the way that a friend would look at it. I think that's my number one piece of advice. I know that I guess the social theme is really true, but like, what would a friend say in this situation to you? There's another guy. I'll have to list out all these books. Ethan Cross has come out now with two books. One is called Chatter and one is called Shift.

And they're really about like, what are practical ways to deal with the voices in your head that tell you all these stories about yourself. And then Shift is how can you shift from any given emotional state. And one of his main through lines of his work is this third person view of like, what advice would you give yourself? Yeah, advice would a friend give you if you're procrastinating? Like, what would a friend help you clarify? You know, would they be gentle with you? Would they be cruel to you? That's kind of a hack to give yourself pause and space. Yeah, that just can be really valuable whether you have ADHD or not. Because again, with executive function, that gives you time to get back to the top of that mountain and say, right.

I think it's such an important. Yeah, it's such an important point to, to be closing on because all of this, all these challenges that we have and these emotions that we're feeling are all happening in the middle of our day to day lives. Right. And everything we talked about, so politics, kids, family, work, all this stuff is, is combining to make us feel the way that we are. So it's really critical that you give yourself to zoom out and really reflect and do some of this work so that you can have a plan that you can put in place and feel good about moving forward. So that's awesome advice. There have been so many references. So the first thing that I will say, if you're interested in reading any of the books or taking a look at the research, we'll do our best to link everything modernfinancialwellness.com under the episode post there'll be links to everything and then we also have the resources tab on the website which catalogs all of these things.

So a bunch of additions to the resource database. We thank you for that. Is there anything else that you would recommend in terms of resources? So books people should read, any YouTube channels that you like? Social media, are people doing work that we haven't covered that you'd want to spotlight before we let you go?

I mean, I can think of one more resource, just another book. I'm sure there's a lot on social media. I limit my social media intake again because of my adhd, otherwise it's labor. Another resource that I would recommend is Susan David. So she is a psychologist at Harvard Business School. And so I really like her work because she takes a lot of what we talked about and mentioned that day to day element. This is happening in the like right after one meeting when you're supposed to be having lunch before another meeting. Right.

Like we don't have time to be like let me take a walk with nature and clarity my life purpose. Right, we don't have time for that. But he has a book called Emotional Agility and she also has a podcast. She has some like nice little, very kind of incremental social media posts that really visualize the idea of being emotionally agile. So a lot of her stuff relates to back to the era's model of like what are the expectations you have of yourself? Come on. And then, you know, lean into that emotion as data and ask yourself what is this emotion telling me? So her book talks a lot about that as well. But I like that she does it from a very day to day living your life business perspective rather than, you know, I love Lisa Alban Barrett and like you said, it's all, it's a lot of neuroscience.

So yeah, it's great. It's awesome. So the final question I ask everybody is around what financial well being, that term means to you, if anything. And I'm curious to hear your thoughts on the topic given you're an ADHDer. Like how do you think about financial well being with. As somebody living with, with adhd?

I think it comes back to the idea, we mentioned this a few times, but the idea of like having some agency and the way that finances relate to your life as far as it, it relates to agency. Now that doesn't mean like necessarily full financial freedom at all times where you do whatever you want with all the money in the world. But I think for me it Relates to do you have a sense of clarity and then from there some agency of what you do with your finances and how. Yeah, I think that's what that would mean to me.

That's awesome. Very cool. It's been so great to have you here. If people want to check out you, where should they go? Websites, social media, links. I know you're not there often personally, but where should people go to check you out?

Yeah, they can go to. My website is Bright Mind coaching dot com. No s just Bright Mind coaching. Com. I also work with parents with. If you have kids with challenging behaviors, that's another thing that can take away from your ability to have financial wellness and focus on what you need to do as a parent. So I also work with parents on that. So you can check me out there and then you can also find me.

I'm Laurel Black on LinkedIn.

Awesome.

I have an Instagram and I've never posted on it. It's Bright mind coaching. So maybe if people follow me, I'll post more.

But all right, so we won't post and tag this episode clips on Instagram because you won't be there, but we.

Can, you know, maybe this will be my inspiration to stop procrastinating on that.

So there you go. Yeah. See? See what happened here?

This is great social accountability. We didn't talk that much about that.

But yeah, so there's so much more. I mean, there's so many rabbit holes. You're such a great resource. We really appreciate your time and expertise and definitely would love to have you back and kind of keep talking and explore more of this in the future if you're down to do that. But again, Laurel, thanks so much for taking the time and being here with us today. Appreciate it.

Yeah, thank you. It was great. You know, I feel like I. Every conversation I have, I'm learning something new, too. So thank you so much for illuminating that.

So thank you, everybody for listening. If you liked what you heard or related to it, please consider subscribing to the show. And Again, check out modernfinancialwellness.com where you can find this episode, post all the links to the amazing resources and much, much more, and we'll see you next time, everybody. Thanks again.

Thank you.

Thanks again for listening to this episode. A quick note, although I do hope that the information that we talked about was helpful. In no way is anything discussed on the podcast to be taken as specific financial advice. Please consult your own advisors and do your own research when you're making important financial decisions.