The foundation of my work on my blog and podcast has been about intensity, and it's origins came from my work on excitability, also known as over excitability. Excitability is when you receive and respond the world more intensely than others. 

In this episode:

• Excitability as a sign of high developmental potential
• The 5 areas of excitability
• Using your strengths

Links:

Free workbook on Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity!

Embracing Intensity Community

Today’s show is with yet another intriguing person I met on TikTok. I’m especially interested in her experience with twice-exceptionality and the work she’s doing in TV.

Shadi Petosky is an Emmy winner and Wendy’s Employee of the Month-winning TV showrunner. She co-created and showran the Emmy-winning Danger and Eggs for Amazon Prime Video, which was also a Critics Choice and GLAAD nomination. She executive produced Twelve Forever for Netflix and the upcoming live- action, gender-bending sci-fi series Forever Alone with Adaptive Studios. She most recently directed the live-action comedy pilot, Let’s Go Atsuko for Quibi, and her show, Pretty Cursed, is in development at Circle of Confusion TV. She was the animation supervisor for all 72 episodes of the hit show Yo Gabba Gabba.

Show Highlights:

• Why Shadi is intensely passionate about making stuff like comics, art, games, designs, visual effects, and TV writing
• Why Shadi’s personal brand of intensity is “clownish with a Willy Wonka vibe”
• How Shadi grew up living a series of ADHD cliches, being a daydreamer and a nerd later in high school who loved theater and clubs
• In school, Shadi was bullied a lot and involved in many fights; she stayed in trouble, was an extrovert, and says she was never anyone’s favorite person
• Cultural factors that affected Shadi include growing up in rural Montana and then a military kid who lived an isolated and classless existence in remote areas
• Why Shadi’s childhood affected what she thought was possible in pursuing dreams
• How Shadi didn’t have to tone down or tune herself out as a kid, but has had to learn as an adult to handle conflict, deal with people, and tackle her intense irritability
• How Shadi has handled her executive functioning issues in managing other people
• How Shadi uses her fire for good in making TV shows with queer kids and doing fulfilling work that matters, especially when it comes to justice sensitivity
• What Shadi has noticed about the evolution of TV shows in the representation of trans folks and other marginalized groups
• How Shadi’s creativity was affected by the pandemic and quarantine
• How Shadi harnesses the power of her intensity by making lists, going to therapy, DBT, and new medications; she has also tried to cut down on stressful jobs and prioritize leisure time
• How Shadi helps others use their fire by helping young writers, teaching, and working with kids
• Why it’s tough to be vulnerable online

I once again had other plans for this episode but I realized I've hit survival mode for the school year. Every year since 8th grade, I've had what I called Spring Fever when I'd crash at the end of the school year. I've come to realize that it's the fatigue that comes from over taxing my executive functioning skills for too long. 

Add a pandemic, last minute taxes, aging hormones, unfavorable med change and adapting to my son's new schedule getting up earlier Mondays, and my brain's pretty much toast today!

In this episode: 

• My creativity and new thought currently dried up
• Meds are like brain glasses
• Giving grace through the end of school
• I'm opening up some 1:1 spots for coaching and adult learning assessment 
• An exciting collaborating to revamp my website with more info on how that looks this summer!
• Threadless sale 15% off and just added all of Jays Workshop squirrel merch!
• Call recording for Breaking the Stress Cycle available in the Embracing Intensity Community
• Next call on Asyncronous Dev in Gifted Adults with Tiffany Chhuom

Today’s guest had all the markers of traditional success, an Ivy League Education, letters after her name and a well paying career, but she realized she was miserable because she was not being authentic to herself. She broke out of the medical system to help people in a more holistic way. Join us!

Dr. Zarya Rubin is a Harvard-educated physician and certified health and wellness coach who is passionate about helping people heal through functional medicine. She partners with her clients to get to the root cause of symptoms and create a roadmap to wellness.

Show Highlights:

• Why Zarya considers herself a “multipotentialite” who is passionate about many interests and has engaged her entrepreneurial qualities in many varied careers
• How Zarya’s love of opera singing has fared during the time of COVID
• Zarya’s personal brand of intensity means that she has always been “a lot,” but seemed like a “garden variety normal intense person” during her time in NYC
• Why she is intense about political activism and her many passions but has learned to be quieter as she has aged and come into the coaching space, learning to live a slower paced life on the west coast
• How Zarya’s intensity has transformed over the years as she grew up as a shy and quiet child
• How the acceleration from kindergarten to 3rd grade in one year led to Zarya’s inner struggle with darkness and anxiety
• The disastrous outcome of Zarya’s acceleration in school leading her to become a burnt out gifted kid
• Cultural factors that influenced Zarya stemmed from her very Jewish, very intense, and very loud family
• How Zarya had to tone down and tune out for decades to make herself more acceptable to women in friendships and men in relationships, which also meant she dumbed down her education and career
• How Zarya’s intensity never appeared out of control outwardly, but she inwardly dealt with anxiety and PTSD
• How Zarya uses her relentless pursuit of answers and solutions for the good of her clients and her family
• How Zarya’s husband helped her gain a new perspective on social media posts
• What parents of gifted kids really want
• How Zarya harnesses the power of her intensity by embracing, recognizing, acknowledging, and accepting it
• How Zarya’s goal as a coach is working with women in midlife to help them find their spark, joy, and passion again

Resources:

Wild Lilac Wellness

Visit Zarya’s website to get her FREE Guide to Becoming Stress-Proof

Instagram Wild Lilac Wellness

LinkedIn Wild Lilac Wellness

I've observed a lot of themes around integration and disintegration recently so I thought it would be a good time to do a quick overview of Kazmier's Dabrowski's theory of Positive Disintegration.

You can find a more comprehensive overview on ep. 154: On Positive Disintegration with Chris Wells, and my Blog Post “Finding Treasure in Ruins.”

Dabrowski believes that intensity/excitability is a sign of high developmental potential, and neuroses, which we might call neurodiversity, anxiety, existential depression etc., can be positive if they move us towards our higher selves. 

In this episode:

• 3 factors of positive development
• Dynamisms are the inner and outer forces that drive our actions.  
• 5 types of integration and disintegration
• Resources on integration
• 5 Types of overexcitability
• Thoughts on Integration
• Over identification and/or rejection of certain parts of our identity
• What is Dabrowski's Sweater?
• Getting your conflicting parts to communicate with each other.

Today’s show focuses on strategies for success. My guest combines her late-in-life diagnoses, training, and experience to help clients accomplish their goals.

Maaya Hitomi is an ADHD coach and academic strategist who supports ADHD, autistic, and otherwise neurodivergent clients to build strategies for better coping. At Structured Success, Maaya’s own coaching and consultation practice, she builds upon her Master’s training in psychology, her experience as a coach, and her lived experience as a neurodivergent person. Being ADHD, autistic, and dyslexic herself, Maaya credits her academic and professional success to the coping strategies she learned along the way. Focused on collaboratively building individualized coping strategies to support her clients, Maaya helps them make the healthiest thing the easiest thing.

Show Highlights:

• Why Maaya is intensely passionate about giving people tools to understand how their minds work as she teaches coping strategies and learns alongside them
• How her mom didn’t acknowledge Maaya’s ADHD early on, and her official ADHD, autism, and dyslexia diagnoses didn’t come until her university years
• In school, Maaya was always seeking to learn more and caused problems because of being bullied and feeling socially awkward
• Cultural factors that affected Maaya include her privileged upbringing in the suburbs and gifted programs at school
• Why Maaya’s intensity is less of a problem now because it’s been identified and accepted
• How Maaya was always “too everything” in elementary school, so she put her head down and spent some lonely years in high school, which was the worst thing she could have done
• How Maaya’s intensity got out of control when she stood up to a bully and was overwhelmed into shutdown mode--an act that had far-reaching effects
• How Maaya uses her fire for good by using her personal acceptance and sharing her knowledge and experience with her clients
• How Maaya has collected “nuggets of truth” along the way and developed coping strategies that she can share with clients
• How Maaya helps others use their fire by bringing strategies and options to them with which to fashion a workable system

Resources:

Connect with Maaya:  Structured Success

Find Maaya on Twitter: @structuredsucc

Find Maaya on TikTok and Instagram

I’m super thrilled to share the recording of Nneka Coxeff’s talk on Writing to Heal from this month’s guest community call! You can find the full discussion in the Embracing Intensity Community!

The wRITE to Heal Project was developed by founder and editor-in-chief of BLP magazine, Nneka D. Coxeff. As a Master Life Coach and Empowerment Practitioner, she offers transformative writing classes, workshops and wellness retreats to gently guide clients through the raw emotions of grief caused by loss, tragedy and transition.

About Nneka:

Nneka D. Coxeff is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Black Lace + Pearls magazine, a creative and healing arts publication devoted to empowering women around the globe to live out their divine purpose. A by-product of BLP magazine is her wRITE to Heal Project where she hosts writing workshops and wellness retreats in order to guide guests through the emotions of grief caused by death, tragedy and trauma. 

Through writing prompts, exercises and discussion, she assists guests in breaking free from the torture caused by unanswered questions and the sin of blame. She encourages them to sit with the pain and to own all their emotions in order to move through them and acquire some clarity and guidance. Nneka understands that relationships can be devastating to the soul when abruptly interrupted. However, she believes that it is our relationship with Self that needs to be strengthened in order to understand and to move forward.

As a consultant, she helps her clients put voice to their truths, experiences and life lessons learned along the way in order to help them heal and to inspire others as well. Everyone has a story to tell and it is Nneka's mission to help individuals value their journey, own their truth and stake claim to a more enlightened tomorrow. Writing has been a tool of healing throughout her journey and it is through this artful gift that she assists others along their path of ascension. You can find out more about Nneka and her wRITE to Heal Project at: blacklaceandpearls.com/write-to-heal.html

This is a part of our 2021 Embracing Intensity Community Speaker Series.

You can find the full discussion recording in the Embracing Intensity Community. You can support this work by joining the community, or supporting us on Patreon! 

Links:

Embracing Intensity Community

Write to Heal Project web page

Follow Nneka!

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Support the wRITE to Heal Project on Patreon! Link Coming Soon!

Have you ever felt like you were taking up too much space? My guest today shares how he moved from talking up space wherever he went to channeling his own unique powers to bring out the best in others. Join us!

Landon Young is someone I met on TikTok, which is unique as a social media platform that allows people to connect across social groups that might not normally interact. Landon describes himself as a “regular guy” who enjoys what he does as a North American Digital Brand Manager at Nike.

Show Highlights:

• Why Landon is intensely passionate about sneakers, storytelling, his dream job at Nike, playing guitar, and spending time with his wife and daughter
• How Landon’s personal brand of intensity includes empathy and passion as someone who is relentless and focused on the process
• Growing up, Landon was always labeled as gifted and was supported by his parents
• How Landon overcompensated for his issues with giftedness before medication helped him find balance
• How cultural factors affected Landon as he grew up in a Mormon home;
• He had a strong desire to excel but didn’t know how to process and regulate emotions
• How Landon finds joy in discovering connections with others
• How Landon has to tone himself down frequently--something he didn’t know how to do when he was younger: “I took up too much space and didn’t know how to channel my superpowers.”
• How Landon learned to recognize the moments when he tends to get out of control
• How Landon uses his fire for good as an “energy giver,” which he feels is his calling in life
• How Landon loves helping others at Nike as he teaches retail employees about new products and innovations and creates campaigns for product launches
• Habits that help Landon harness the power of his intensity include meditation, lots of water, and healthy supplements
• How Landon benefitted from the book, Essentialism by Greg McKeown
• How Landon helps others with true leadership, which is recognizing their potential, tapping into it, and finding what they are good at
• Landon’s parting advice: “Learn to acknowledge and leverage your ADHD in ways that build up your life with a superpower for balance and happiness.”

Where to Find Landon:

 Instagram: @HeyitsLando

 Tik-Tok - @heyitslando90

This week is a bit late and short again, but it's for a great reason! I hyper focused on a project the last two days that's ready to share as a collaborative effort!

The 2E Hub!

A place for gifted, creative and twice exceptional folks to share, learn and explore!

Links:

2E Hub

Free Workbook on Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity

My guest today shares the keen awareness he’s developed of his ADHD diagnosis and how it impacts his life. Join us to hear the story of the good he’s doing in the world.

Ross Watt hosts the International ADHD Party on Twitter and is one of the ADHD-Hub co-creators. He’s working hard to make a difference for kids and adults with ADHD.

Show Highlights:

• Why Ross is intensely passionate about ADHD, writing poems, and encouraging others
• How Ross’ personal brand of intensity means being hyper-focused with a chip on his shoulder and always investigating things in deeper ways
• How Ross grew up being strong-willed, determined (especially when told he couldn’t do something), opinionated, and argumentative
• How Ross’ parents nicknamed him “Half-a-job,” which was a dig that led him to compare himself to others and find that he didn’t measure up
• How Ross’ adolescent years were a big contradiction
• How Ross has had to tone himself down and tune himself out when he knows he shouldn’t say something but feels like he will explode
• How Ross has had to learn when to speak up and when to be quiet
• How Ross’ intensity got out of control when he left his parents’ house at age 16, determined to prove everybody wrong
• How Ross uses his fire for good, helping others with diplomacy and patience
• How Ross helps others develop their ideas and disprove their opinions of themselves
• How Ross formed the habit of not telling others what he will do--just in case he doesn’t follow through
• Why Ross is very set in daily routines
• How Ross helps others by being honest and giving them belief in themselves
• How to figure out if you’re a “carrot” or “stick” person

Resources:

Connect with Ross:

Twitter: ADHD

ADHD-Hub 

This week I get to share the talk from our March guest call is on Honoring Your Sensitivity with Leah Walsh. You can find the full discussion and video in the Embracing Intensity Community!

In Sanskrit there are 96 words for love. I seriously wish we had that many words in English for the word sensitivity! A word whose origins mean "capable of feeling and sensation," what does being sensitive mean in today's culture?

Join us for this creative exploration of sensitivity, how sensitivity is a shared trait across neurodivergent experiences, and how curiosity and community can help in honoring your own sensitivity.

About Leah:

Leah Walsh (she/her) is motivated by one desire: to support conscious and creative people to uncover their unique potential and bring that light into the world. Leah sees every human as a beautiful and unique flower in life’s garden, but being your own flower can be hard work! It means cultivating a strong mind, deep roots, and a clear heart to allow your flower to grow, adapt, & bloom. Leah’s work as a Life Coach supports people to do just this. Her signature coaching programs support highly sensitive, neurodivergent, and introverted leaders to ground their confidence, cultivate deep-rooted belonging and awaken their unique impact. To learn more about Leah’s work, visit leahkwalsh.com

Links:

Embracing Intensity Community

Free Workbook on Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity

Leah's Website

Future Embracing Intensity Events

Today’s show focuses on support for highly sensitive and introverted leaders. Join us to learn more!

Leah Walsh is a speaker and life coach who is motivated by the desire to support conscious and creative people in uncovering their potential and bringing their light into the world. Leah sees every human as a beautiful and unique flower in life’s garden, but she knows that being your own flower can be hard work. It means cultivating a strong mind, deep roots, and a clear heart to allow your flower to grow, adapt, and bloom. Leah’s work as a life coach supports people in these ways. Her signature coaching programs support highly sensitive, neuro-divergent, and introverted leaders to ground their confidence, cultivate deep-rooted belonging, and awaken their unique impact.

Show Highlights:

• Why Leah is intensely passionate about staying grounded, exploring belonging, and speaking truth with honesty and love
• How Leah grew up in a very neurodivergent family where her parents were supportive of the differences in the way their kids were wired
• How the culture of service in Leah’s family gave her a profound capacity to feel empathy for others and have a strong bond and connection to the land where she lives
• How Leah feels and connects through relationships
• How Leah had to tone herself down when she didn’t have the language to describe what she was going through
• Why she found ways to give herself permission to be real and authentic
• How journaling helps Leah identify what she is feeling
• Why it’s important to tune into your body
• How Leah uses her fire for good in her life coaching practice
• Why self-compassion is essential in Leah’s practice as a life coach
• How Leah works as a “shame extractor”
• How Leah helps others use their own fire by using the acronym DOES
• How COVID has cracked open new possibilities
• How Leah resonates with neurodiversity and how we embrace our beauty and intensity

Resources:

Leah K. Walsh 

Visit Leah’s website for more information on her seasonal meetup, The Brave Intender Club.

This week's episode is a fairly quick one as I got inspired for a new project this week and went down a hyper focus rabbit hole for days! 

In this episode:

• Update on my latest project & upcoming course.
• Do it yourself mentality. 
• Being a maker, not a marketer.

Links:

Free Harness Your Power Workbook

Adult Learning Assessment

Embracing Intensity Community

Community Events Calendar

Today’s guest launched into the world of twice-exceptionality because of the unique strengths and challenges that came with parenting her two sons, now teenagers. Her work now meets the needs of kids like her sons, along with helping other parents and educators through her therapy practice, support groups, and parenting programs. Join us to learn more!

Debbie Steinberg Kuntz is the founder of the Bright & Quirky Summit, which features fantastic guest speakers and leading experts on “everything twice-exceptional” for parents and educators. Debbie is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist who specializes in twice-exceptional (2E) kids and families.  Her annual Bright & Quirky Child Online Summit attracts over 15,000 people from 95 countries, and the 2021 version is coming up in just a few days. It’s a free resource, and you can sign up now by using the link in our Resources section below.

Show Highlights:

• Why Debbie is intensely passionate about unlocking the world of twice-exceptionality
• Why Debbie’s relationship with intensity borders on workaholism and being “tenacious to the point of imbalance”
• How intensity affected her family as she grew up, and why she readily recognizes the strengths and challenges of twice-exceptionality in parenting her two children
• As a parent, Debbie looks for teachers who have raised boys before
• How Debbie wants to empower parents in the way they view their child against our cookie-cutter educational system
• How Debbie learned to embrace uniquely wired people as a Jew growing up in America
• How parents can talk to their kids about being 2E
• What Debbie has discovered about the line between asynchronous development and twice-exceptionality
• Why Debbie is a huge fan of neuropsychological assessments
• Her advice for parents about finding professional help
• How Debbie harnesses the power of her intensity through the polyvagal theory and asks, “Why?” and “Why now?”
• Debbie’s best advice about parenting comes from Kristin Neff, who says, “Talk to yourself like you would talk to a best friend.”
• How Debbie helps others use their fire by teaching them to pursue the intersection of what they are good at and what they enjoy
• The Bright & Quirky Summit 2021, coming in a few days; it features 29 experts tackling the timely theme of “Taming the Overwhelm”

Resources:

Debbie’s website:  Bright And Quirky 

Sign up for the March 8-12, 2021 summit

Find out about last year’s summit:  Bright And Quirky 

I’m excited to share our first guest call for the 2021 season in the Embracing Intensity Community with Brendan Mahan, of ADHD Essentials, on the Wall of Awful!

From Brendan’s website:

“Everyone fails. Some, like those with executive function challenges, fail more than others.

Each failure brings negative emotions – guilt, disappointment. These smaller emotions become stronger feelings of anxiety, shame and even loneliness if one is repeatedly rejected because of their errors. Each time these negative emotions are experienced, another brick is placed into that person’s Wall of Awful.

The Wall of Awful is the emotional barrier that prevents us from initiating tasks and taking the risks necessary to make reach our goals. It is the emotional consequence of having ADHD and it must be understood to be overcome.

Let me help you climb your Wall of Awful™.

Get the free e-book “5 Ways to Overcome The Wall of Awful” here!”

In this episode:

• Who is Brendan?
• What is the Wall of Awful?
• How do we get past the Wall of Awful?
• Brendan's perspective on ADHD
• Being a leader and creating your own narratives around neurodiversity.

Links:

Brendan's Website

Embracing Intensity Community

Free Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity Workbook

I found today’s guest in a most unusual place! It was on TikTok that I first noticed her work with gifted and twice-exceptional people, and I knew I had to get her on the show.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass is president and CEO of Remote Learning Solutions. She coaches neurodivergent PhDs/EdDs on the personal, social, and technical aspects of career and entrepreneurship. In addition to moving clients from deficit-based to strengths-based thinking, she helps PhDs/EdDs develop content across a range of subjects. She helps clients deliver content in the form of ebooks, online courses, workbooks, journals, workshops, and more. Dr. Douglass bases her coaching practice on five values: empathy, justice, love, neurodiversity, and purpose. She worked in higher education for over 17 years in various roles and earned a PhD in political science in 2009 and tenured in Information Sciences in 2016 at the University of Tennessee Knoxville. Her teaching and scholarship have developed at the intersection of information science and political behavior.

Show Highlights:

• Why Kimberly is intensely passionate about coaching and mentoring neurodivergent adults
• How the same issues in our schools with kids are showing up for adults in the workplace
• Why people are taught to believe in a fake meritocracy
• How giftedness means different things for different people
• How Kimberly’s personal brand of intensity is thinking about things in different ways, deep thoughts and issues that can turn into depression, and loving information and data
• Growing up, Kimberly felt her intensity through acting goofy and humorous and always being presentable to white culture
• The distinction between management and leadership
• Cultural factors that affected Kimberly as she grew up in a black Baptist church, being told that she “shouldn’t speak up for herself,” and seeing Christianity as a tool of enslavement
• How Kimberly had to tune herself out and tone herself down when she worked at a university with mean, accusatory people
• Why she feels her intensity getting out of control when she feels dismissed or undervalued
• What made Kimberly take a different look at herself and her son regarding giftedness
• How she uses her fire for good in believing people
• Habits that help Kimberly harness the power of her intensity are tools that organize her thoughts and life
• How she helps others use their fire for good by trying to be neutral and helping people look for affirmation, values, principles, mission, and goals
• Kimberly’s advice: “Take the risk. Find someone who will help you take the risk. Realize that not moving and standing still is also risky; it’s just risky in a different way.”

Resources:

Website:  Dr. Kimberly Douglass 

Facebook: Kimberly Douglass

TikTok: Dr. Kimberly Douglass

I've been hearing a lot more comments lately along the lines of "I relate to your work, but I'm not really gifted." In this episode of Embracing Intensity, I discuss why gifted folks might not recognize their own gifts and some resources to explore if you suspect you might be gifted. 

In this episode:

• 5 Reasons gifted folks might not think they are really gifted.
• My own experience and why I actually believed it despite underachievement.
• 3 of my favorite books & resources to explore potential giftedness.

Links:

Your Rainforest Mind, Paula Prober

The Gifted Adult, Mary-Elaine Jacobsen PsyD

Searching For Meaning, James Webb

Embracing Intensity Community

Free Workbook on Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity

I’m excited to share today’s show with you. My guest has an interesting perspective as an obviously gifted person who has dyslexia. Her experience is fascinating, but there is so much more to her story and work. Join us!

Brenda Bryan is a kickass inspirational speaker and The Diviner of Human Potential. As a transformational coach and Mastermind facilitator, she supports women to unmask and nurture their genius, empowering them to live in the strength of their passion. Teaching through the Raise Your Voice Speaker’s Club, one-on-one workshops, and stages around the country, Brenda demonstrates authentic, warm-hearted humor with a deep wealth of knowledge of the importance of communication in feminine power. Brenda began working in her passion of building community and supporting women in the early 70s. Graduating with a degree in communications, she became active in the women’s movement. Through her activism, she acquired lasting skills in group processing, facilitation, and leadership. She facilitates ritual and teaches sacred art through drum-making and other creative works. For the past 45 years, Brenda has continued to build her toolkit to support women’s empowerment. Most recently, she was inspired to be the founder and CEO of It Must Be Said Productions, which is a platform for stories that need telling, a venue for social change. She believes the weaving together of creativity, innovation, and invention invites future visioning. 

Show Highlights:

• Why Brenda is intensely passionate about feminism, helping women claim their place at the table, communication, ritual, and loving and nurturing ourselves
• Why Brenda’s personal brand of intensity involves anger over injustices and inequalities in our social order and environment, along with radical self-care and a questioning of authority
• Why Brenda wasn’t well-liked as she grew up because she would speak up and call people out
• Her learning challenges included trouble with reading, spelling, and writing due to dyslexia and being told she wasn’t “smart enough”
• How Brenda has seen positive outcomes from her journey with new possibilities as a  creative thinking problem solver
• How bigotry and prejudice against gay relationships set a tone for how and where she expressed herself
• How Brenda had to reinvent how she shows up and expresses herself in a “conscious becoming”
• How her intensity gets out of control when it’s heightened in relationships when boundaries are violated, but she has learned to manage and direct her passion and anger
• How Brenda uses her fire to help other women who are looking to become more
• How Brenda harnesses the power of her intensity with consistency of thought as she evolves as a human who adventures and takes risks in becoming
• How the personal habits of meditation, drumming, ritual, and spending time in nature help Brenda
• The best advice she ever received is two-part: “Stand up when you fall down,” and “There are no mistakes, only opportunities to learn.”
• Books that have influenced Brenda: Learning to Heal Yourself by Louise Hay, The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, and Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
• How Brenda helps others by loving people where they are and helping them go where they want to go
• Parting words from Brenda: “Embrace your intensity. There is an infinite purpose in who you are and what you bring to the table.”

Resources:

Connect with Brenda:

www.brendarbryan.com

Email: brendarbryan@gmail.com

Phone: 503-728-8700

A couple of weeks ago I participated in an event called Camp ADHD, where folks around the world shared talks and discussion on topics related to ADHD. I spoke about twice-exceptionality, specifically as it relates to ADHD, and the topic seemed to resonate with a lot of folks, so I decided ot share it on the podcast as well! 

In this episode:

• Why the topic of twice exceptionality is important to me. 
• Why it’s important to talk about twice exceptionality.
• Why it often goes overlooked.
• How to recognize when you might be both gifted and ADHD.
• Common themes from assessing 2E ADHD students.
• Strategies that might help if you fit this profile. 

Links:

Camp ADHD on YouTube

Embracing Intensity Community

Free Workbook on Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity

My guest today is twice exceptional and was recently diagnosed with ADHD. She’s super vocal about many things, including social justice, dressing up as Elsa for storytime, and showcasing her great style. Fortunately for me, she lives in my area, so I hope to meet her in person very soon!

Dusti Arab is an entrepreneur and writer who leads the reinvention co., a boutique marketing agency specializing in building platforms and courses for mission-driven women. Dusti is currently writing a book, Braver Than Before: A Roadmap for Investigating Big Life Changes.

Show Highlights:

• How Dusti is intensely passionate about--everything she believes in! She loves to make sure people have access to what they need, including music and art
• Her personal brand of intensity includes being opinionated, drawing the right people closer, and setting boundaries
• How Dusti’s late ADHD diagnosis and twice-exceptionality manifested themselves in her drive to be an overachiever
• Why Dusti’s company is called the reinvention co.
• How Dusti grew up in Oregon, in a very white, very backwoods family in which race issues weren’t acceptable to talk about
• How Dusti loved to escape into another person through musical theater
• How she looked for other role models other than her mother and even tried a conservative Baptist church that resulted in her atheistic views
• How her intensity was out of control in her erratic job history and string of unfinished business projects
• How she went through postpartum depression, which resulted in the most intensity in her life
• How Dusti uses her fire for good in working with people and firms who help women and minorities get elected, along with bridging gaps caused by systematic injustice
• How Dusti learned to manage herself through a productivity system
• How Dusti is busy finishing the first draft of her book
• Personal habits that help with her intensity are getting enough exercise and time-blocking
• Regarding advice, Dusti admits that she was told a lot of things over the years that weren’t true--and she realizes it now
• Books that were helpful for Dusti: The Awakening by Kate Chopin and Everything in its Place by Dan Charnas
• How Dusti works as an amplifier and connector to build a platform to help women spread their big ideas
• Dusti’s upcoming event on January 22

Resources:

Find out more about Dusti and her work:   The Reinvention

Course Mentioned on this Friday: Course Created Live

This week I wanted to take a moment to share about the upcoming plans I have for the year to help gifted, creative and outside the box thinkers connect and realize their potential. 

In this episode:

• Upcoming topics and speakers for the Embracing Intensity Community.
• Refreshing my website Adult Learning Assessment and Coaching information. 
• Creating lots of fun and hopefully useful content.

Links:

My first Comic!

Embracing Intensity Community

Patreon

Free Harnessing the Power of Your Intensity Workbook

Today’s show focuses on highly sensitive people. My guest loves helping HSPs uncover the layers of conditioning put on them by society and bloom in their uniqueness. Join us to learn more.

Julia R. Wild is a bestselling author, spiritual teacher, and trauma educator with a Master’s degree in psychology. She’s also a writing, creativity, and life coach. Her first self-help book for sensitives became an Amazon #1 bestseller, and she’s a TEDxMileHigh Blogger. Julia loves helping highly sensitive and empath children and women find their soulful, powerful voice. Part of her work also helps parents of highly sensitive children better relate to their kids. Julia enjoys disrupting conformity and subverting the dominant paradigms so people can express their unique, sovereign creativity and live extraordinary lives. She is a big believer in writing for healing and embracing the shadow as much as the light. She has two projects slated for publication soon, including her Master’s thesis on autism from a spiritual perspective.

Show Highlights:

• Why is Julia intensely passionate about her creativity, being an “old soul,” helping people find their voice, social justice, equality, and animals
• How Julia grew up in a household with extreme abuse and dysfunction in Manhattan but attended an all-girls private school
• How Julia’s personal brand of intensity involves being direct and blunt with a heightened sensory perception of sounds and smells
• Growing up, Julia’s intensity made everything more pressurized and challenging because of her toxic home and stuffy school
• How Julia’s cultural factors involved growing up in the rich environment of NYC, which gave her perspective and helped her be open-minded
• Why Julia has to water down what she says and writes
• How her intensity gets out of control with things she finds too stimulating
• How Julia uses her fire for good to help sensitives set boundaries and self-advocate
• Julia’s Master’s thesis, which gives a new, more balanced perspective to autism
• How Julia harnesses the power of her intensity with self-care, valuing her capacity for depth, and using her intensity in service to others
• Personal habits that help Julia are writing, channeling energy, and finding an appropriate use of humor
• The best advice Julia ever received:
  • From Maya Angelou: “When someone shows you who they are, pay attention the first time.”
  • From the Buddha: “Don’t believe anything because you heard it. Find out for yourself.”
  • “You’ve gotta risk it to get the biscuit.”
• Books that Julia recommends: Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander, Walden, by Henry David Thoreau, Citizen by Claudia Rankine, and The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine Aron
• How Julia helps others use their fire by “unconditioning” people and undoing the layers of conditioning that have been put on them by society
• Parting words from Julia: “Honor your sensitivity. If you’re weird or different, stay weird or different. It’s healing to tell your story, so value it.”

Resources:

Find Julia and her work:  Julia Rose Wild 

This is the final rerun episode for December before we launch into a new season of interviews, solo episodes and amazing guest speakers!

Love is the very fabric of the universe, and I get so excited when I see someone using their intensity to spread the love around. My guest this week is Alexandra Loves, and I actually approached a year ago to be on the show. I’m so glad we decided to wait until now, because my connection with Alexandra has grown and bloomed during that time, giving us plenty to talk about! Alexandra is a Love Attraction Coach, Intuitive Spiritual Guide, and Entrepreneur. She is on a mission to catalyze creative power, and use her intuitive spirituality to guide her clients into their best existence. In everything she does, Alexandra is all about harnessing the power of that abundant universal fabric from which everything is made, Love.

Today, Alexandra and I are talking about how intensity can be a force for good, for love, and for large-scale transformation. Because of her international upbringing, Alexandra feels comfortable talking to just about anyone. Added to that, she never felt the need for all the labels and stereotypes in the world today, yet the world seems inclined to want to place them on everyone. Rather than let that be the reason for toning herself down, Alexandra has fully embraced who she is and what she stands for. Now she is using her gifts to help people find love, find meaning, and find who they really are.

Alexandra is teaching us today how to use our intuition. Once we begin listening, nothing can hold us back, and we can only increase our impact on what is going on around us. Alexandra says it best, “We are changing the world right now.”

More in this episode:

• Alexandra shares why she is so committed to understanding her gifts and using them for a higher purpose.

• Alexandra is on a search of Absolute Truth, and she is OK with that definition evolving over time.

• In love, Alexandra embraces the “Wise Beyond Her Years” label.

• Much of Alexandra’s practice deals with reconciling gender expectations within men and women.

• Alexandra is on a mission to help us understand the dangers instant gratification.

• The cultural factors that have shaped Alexandra’s ability to embrace her intensity and her racial identity.

• The segregation and racial terms that put shackles around Alexandra’s neck.

• Alexandra toned herself down in terms of dating and intensity.

• How Alexandra realized she couldn’t tone herself down anymore.

• Everyone struggles under assumptions and stereotypes, and we need to be aware of that!

• Alexandra was able to heal from a damaging relationship because of her incredible support system and her own intuition.

• What habits Alexandra uses to fuel her fire.

• Alexandra helps women do the hard work of diving deep within themselves.

• Learn to recognize when you are being diminished.

Visit my Embracing Intensity Patreon Page for weekly reflection questions and other self-exploration tools!

Links:

Alexandra Loves

This December I’m sharing reruns of some of my favorite episodes from 2018. This one is from one of my all time hero’s René Brooks of Black Girl, Lost Keys. She was super amazing when I interviewed her and since then her following has absolutely blown up! I remember being excited for her last Christmas time when she hit 10 K followers on Twitter and now she’s grown exponentially with over 36 K. She’s also lined up a book deal and has a ton of other amazing projects in the works.

She’s also created 6 amazing workbooks on topics relevant to folks with ADHD including cleaning, time perception and “Guarding Your Yes,” and added a variety of great products to her store from T-shirts to fidgets and more! She now started gift cards just in time for the holidays. You can find it all on her website at blackgirllostkeys.com

What I’m most incredibly grateful to René for is bringing awareness to the topic of Twice Exceptionality.

Did you know that you could help somebody by just being honest and transparent about who and how you are? It's such a validating experience to know that somebody really gets you. Today's interview is with René Brooks. René's been a typical ADHD personality for as long as she can remember, losing keys, books, homework, and even her glasses sometimes when they were on her face! Although she was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of eleven, she never received any treatment for it until she was twenty-five. So her experience of learning that she had something real and that it could be worked with, started at that point. Listen in to find out what René has to share today, about growing up as a gifted person with ADHD.

René created a blog, Black Girl Lost Keys, with the intention of sharing the experience of receiving a diagnosis of ADHD later in life, while being part of a demographic that is still mostly skeptical about mental illness. ADHD and giftedness are not mutually exclusive, and many people don't realize that, so it was often hard for René to be understood while growing up. Listen in today to hear her talking about the ups and downs of her life growing up with ADHD, and how she channels her intensity, her fire, and her passions.

Show highlights:

• What's lacking in the world of neurodiversity.
• The similar experiences of people with ADHD within René's particular cultural dynamic.
• What René Remembers most vividly about being a gifted child.
• Being understood, and taken in context, has become more important to René than whether she's liked or not by someone.
• René discusses her ethical stance regarding politics, power, and the abuse of power.
• René has had to learn to pull herself back at times, as she can alienate people with her 'correctness'.
• Why René doesn't speak about the experiences of other people.
• What ally-ship in action really ought to look like.
• We tend to make things so much more complicated than we need to.
• René had a difficult time growing up as gifted, with ADHD.
• People often don't understand that giftedness and ADHD are not mutually exclusive.
• We really need to make space in the world for people who don't follow convention.
• The ridicule that can come from not conforming to cultural norms.
• The story of Henrietta Lacks.
• The way that black people have been exploited and made to suffer in the past by the medical community.
• More honesty and transparency in people would ultimately result in less suffering.

Links and Resources:

René on all social media: Black Girl Lost Keys

Black Girl Lost Keys Blog

ADHD Essentials Podcast

Books mentioned:

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot.

Far From The Tree, by Andrew Solomon

Embracing Intensity Community

Embracing Intensity Store

Continuing reruns for some of my favorite episodes from season 2 for this December! This week, I'm sharing my interview with Kate Arms!

I met today’s special guest, Kate Arms, at the SENG conference recently and was so inspired by her talk entitled "Thriving with Intensity: Mining The Magic From Your Overexcitabilities” that I knew Kate would be the perfect fit for the podcast. Kate is a classic overthinker, high achiever, and multipotentialite who exudes intensity. She gets bored easily as evidenced by a career that includes being a lawyer, an arts administrator, a coach to parents of gifted and twice-exceptional kids and gifted and twice-exceptional adults, and an Agile Coach in a high tech company. She is an eager student of western secular developments from Buddhist philosophy and practices and the Theory of Positive Disintegration and the author of the Extreme Resilience Workbook, L.I.F.T.: A Coach Approach to Parenting, Unblock: Writing Prompts for Works in Progress, and award winning short stories in the literary fiction and horror genres. She hosts two podcasts: Kate’s Nuggets features short episodes with advice on living well drawn from the worlds of coaching, leadership development, and psychology; Leadership Arts Review features conversations with leadership coaches about books about good leadership and the ideas in them. But what really lights her fire is being silly with her four amazing kids.

More in this episode:

• Kate’s shares details about her personal intensity.

• Factors that affected Kate’s intensity while growing up

• Kate describes ways her intensity could feel out of control in the past.

• Channeling ways of questioning others

• Using leadership thinking to question self

• How theater can help intense individuals.

• No one person will have all the answers for you.

• Kate’s personal practices

• The personal passion that fuels Kate's intensity

• The magic question

Resources Mentioned in the Show:

How to donate to help keep the podcast going via Patreon

website: Thrive With Intensity

website: Parents of Twice Exceptional Kids

website: Signal Fire Coaching

Signal Fire Coaching on Facebook

Signal Fire Coaching on Twitter

Undoing Depression, by Richard O’Connor

Making It All Work, David Allen