Hi, I’m Meredith Canaan and it’s quirky planning season with pumpkins. Hello orange because it is October. October. I love the month of October and nothing to do with energy and effort and what we’re talking about today, but October is my favorite month. I am a witch after all. I love magic. I love all things Halloween. And it’s time for us to get the decorations out for the house. And we have a big gathering for Halloween. I love all things pumpkin spice.

But that is not what we’re talking about today. But as you may or may not have noticed, I get a little distracted from time to time because I am ADHD and neurodiverse and dyslexic and dysgraphic. I have all kinds of neurodiversity. 

 

So I don’t think, like everybody else, I don’t plan like everybody else. My neurodiversity and or my diversities in general make me beautiful and different and unique. And I like to do things my way. And one of the things I wanna talk about today is, the energy and the efforts for those of us that are neurodiverse.

Sometimes our energy and effort swings. Everybody’s energy and effort has swings. But as a neurodiverse person, oftentimes we struggle with how our energy and effort comes out. 

Like, and it, we find it’s very difficult to maintain energy, to maintain focus. We get easily distracted. It’s if we’re dealing with something that’s really boring.

Feedback and Distraction

It’s hard for us to stay alert. And one of the things that can be very helpful in this area of energy and effort is, one of the things that’s noted is the constant need for feedback or stimulation. Recently I learned that I have a strong need for feedback, especially when doing my, not necessarily Facebook Lives. I would love though, if you’re watching to send me a little message and tell me that you’re here, give me a hi or a shout out in the chat because it’s helpful to know. 

For me, I grew up in the theater and I love that live performance reaction. So I know that the joke is landing so that I know that the information that I’m sharing is landing. I love, my mentor Tash, when she does a Facebook Live,

She does a hashtag nodding so that she gets the feedback and the understanding that people are getting and understanding and holding the information that’s being shared. As a neurodiverse person, I totally need that too. 

Feedback helps feed my energy to keep going. It’s one of the reasons coaching is such a great sweet spot for me because the energy inside the coaching sessions when I’m with my clients, whether it’s in the group setting.

Stimulation and Feedback

Hi, I’m Meredith Canaan and we’re here for Facebook Live to talk about energy and effort, which is one of the things that those of us that are neurodiverse or neuro quirky or whatever you wanna call us, little adhd, like me, struggle with. And we struggle with so many different areas in maintaining energy. And one of the things about effort, the effort and the energy to get things done is, and I was talking about this before I got so rudely cut off by my internet was stimulation. The need for stimulation and feedback. 

And for me, it’s powerful both in terms of having a conversation when I go live, when I do something. Yesterday I taught a fabulous masterclass, and the replay is coming out soon. If you would like to know anything about how to, how to plan with your neuro quirky per in mind, I will share the information for the replay of the masterclass, because it will be coming out. You can still sign up. I’ll post it in the chat here.

Next week, we’ll talk about the planner that came out. But right now you could check that out. Anyway, one of the things that I was saying was that, I find for me that one of the things that helps my energy to keep moving forward in my business in a focused way is that I have the need. 

So in a masterclass, for example, I have the need for feedback. And one of the things that was really powerful breakthrough that I just had in my last few things is I normally have a co-host, one of my biz besties usually helps me co-host. And I decided to start flying solo and just being totally center stage myself. And I found that I got really nervous. I needed that body double, that co-working person to give me the feedback that things were going. And so yesterday I brought back my biz bestie Stasha, Washburn and she co-hosted. And I noticed that I was much more grounded. It was much easier for me to share my information. It was much more focused. 

And one of the things that I did in my previous masterclass was Right,right, right, right, right, right. And I know that that is a part of that need for constant feedback. So that’s one of the things in effort and energy when we talk about our neurodiverse brains, is that need for feedback. So you might need to do, your masterclass is different than somebody is recommending. They may recommend, Oh, you should be flying solo, but you actually need to have that biz bestie there, just nodding along, giving you the feedback and understanding that what you say is making sense first and foremost. 

Secondly, I think one of the things that’s really powerful for me is that constant need for stimulation, that stimulation is an access and a path to inspiration.

The Power of Listening

And what I mean by that is I will often listen to it, So I’m gonna give you two really powerful examples. Driving across the country in our rv, I was listening to Untamed by Glen O’Doyle and Lucky Bitch by Denise Duffield Thomas. Great books, by the way. I totally recommend them. I was listening to them while I was driving and listening to both of them, all of a sudden the outline for my best selling book soon to be named, started downloading into my brain as I was driving.

So shortly thereafter, I got to a Google doc, I made a Google folder, I made a document, and I started writing down that outline. Yay. And I’m celebrating that win, by the way. So it’s that need for stimulation that helps spark your inspiration to get you moving, especially if you struggle in this area of energy and effort in creating things for your business. And it may not look how you think it looks. It may be really hard for you to just say, I’m gonna plop my butt down in front of my desk today. It’s six o’clock or eight o’clock in the morning, or whatever it is, two o’clock in the afternoon.

If that’s the time when your energy flows and get something created, you may need other types of stimulation. The second example was just recently, so you may have noticed that I had promoted Amy Porterfield and Digital Course Academy. And I love her. I love her stuff. I love the way she shows up. She is one of my mentors and an example of a boss I’d like to be like.

And I started listening to her webinar as I was writing my own. I found that she would say something. Now, don’t get me wrong, don’t copy anybody, no plagiarizing, no anything like that. But you can use what people have put out there as the inspiration or the spark, especially if you’re neurodiverse, to do it your way.

She would say something and phrase something and I was like, Oh, this is what I would say, and this is how I would phrase it. 

There’s both the idea of understanding how I’m unique and contrasting the information and the stimulation that I’m getting, which can be very helpful. Take a class, take a program and go, Oh wow, this is brilliant and this is how I do it differently. For example, I teach the five stages of a sales process. Well, a lot of people teach it, but that level of sales and conversion in that section, I think that’s where I bring some of my uniqueness in the beliefs and how important your beliefs are, but that inspiration or stimulation can be what helps spark your energy and effort to get you moving.

And so I invite you to figure out what are those things. It can also be those things that piss you off. You see somebody, doing a hard pushing sale and I need to have a timer and I need to do those types of things. And you’re like, Man, I hate that, that energy of a hate can be the spark of this is how I do it differently.

This is what I think is important. Here is my value. I gotta make a post about this. So it can be that you want to find the world and the people that inspire you both for the powers of good and inspire you. In those ways of the things that are, that I would totally not do it this way and this is how I would, it can be so helpful when you’re stuck, especially at trying to get started in trying to have that effort to move forward. And so those are my keys.

Integrating Feedback Into Your Business

So one, if you’re somebody that needs feedback, how much feedback do you have integrated inside your business? Is it, do people know that? There’s always an opportunity to hit reply to the email, to send a comment below and say, Hey Meredith, I struggle with this. Can you help? I’m happy to help. Send me a little message, send it to me anywhere. love@meredithcanaan.com.

Be open to that type of feedback. And how do you create that as a structure, as a scaffolding for your success where you need it?

So that’s number one for the feedback. Whether it’s asking people to say, hashtag nodding in the comments, whether it’s having a co-host on your master class, so you can just focus on that one face that’s like, Yeah, yeah, this makes sense, this makes sense. 

So perfect example, yesterday in my master class, I said something and apparently I said it silly enough, I think Stasha almost spit out her tea. Which is good. It means the entertainment factor was there. So that feedback’s powerful. So one creative structure for that. Two is if you need a stimulation to get your creative juices flowing,

How Do You Get Your Creative Juices Flowing

What are those things? Who are those people that can help you get those creative sparks flowing? 

Like I said, I will listen to a webinar, especially somebody who I know nails it. Both Amy Porterfield, my coach, Tash. I’ll watch them do something and I’ll be like, Ooh, I like the way they did this. How would I say this my way?

Start here: 

How would I do this in my element? For my uniquely wired brain. And I think that’s the place where it helps bring out that differentiation. It brings out that diversity, because there’s somebody out there who might connect more with the way that I squirrel, the way that I talk and spirals the way that I energetically speak through things versus somebody else. 

Tash and I teach similar things and yet we still do it in a very different way. And some people are gonna be, yes, I like both of these. Some people are like, No, I totally want Tash. No totally want me, blah blah, whatever. So understanding what are those inspirational information? 

It’s okay if you listen to somebody’s webinar while writing your own. It’s okay if you read somebody’s email and have that as inspiration for writing your own. There’s a reason if nobody has told you this before, to keep inspiration files. Swipe files, sales pages that inspire you with information. I love the look and feel of Amy Porterfield stuff and I create things in a similar look and feel, because I think it’s so pretty and so clean and I just, I love it. I love the feel of her stuff. I love the simplicity of the way Tash does things. So I’m an amalgamation of all of my mentors, All of my mentors, and I take inspiration from that. From all of those years. And there’s both the positive inspiration of the things that I like and how would I do it my way?

And the negative inspiration of the, oh my goodness, I hate that they did this. How do I do it differently? Watching somebody sell in a way that I find icky and gross and making sure that I am not doing anything that looks like that, it’s why we need to get on those rants when our values show up and our things show up.

So if you are struggling in the area of energy and effort, what are those few things, those few places you can go to help bring that stimulation that will click the inspiration that will spark you to have the energy to start moving forward. I have a ton of different memberships that I belong to, and mostly I belong to them so that I can sit and listen to somebody else while I work on something of my own.

I need that stimulation to get things done. 

Like the dishes. I need information, in that information part of our neurodiversity, I have that Ferrari brain that has constant need for stimulating information. I’m a constant learner. So I just put it to work, I put it to work, and I put my areas of interest in things that I think will help improve my business.

Whether it’s listening, I will listen to a business book while doing the dishes. Sometimes I listen to fantasy, just to have an idea. Even the fantasy stuff will inspire things inside my business. So those are my invitation for you. So that’s today’s conversation is really, if you’re finding that you have difficulty in any part of the energy and the effort in terms of your business, what is this? 

You could be a stimulation seeker, a feedback seeker. And if that’s the case, how can you put feedback into your sales conversations? Is it getting a co-host for your masterclass? Is it having people say hashtag nodding, asking questions? There’s a reason we ask questions in our master classes and webinars. So that we’re getting feedback to know people are in the right place.

And that was the best thing about yesterday, as so many people felt seen and heard, which means that content was landing with my neurodiverse folks. Woohoo. They had aha’s and breakthroughs. I need that feedback. Woo. And to help you maintain energy. What are those things? Is it stimulation? Do you need to listen to somebody else’s stuff?

Read somebody’s email to write your own. Watch a webinar, do a class, do a thing. And then how you do it in your unique way, because we’re all different. I lay my information out differently. I teach it in spirals. I come at it from this really interesting energetic place. I’m not as linear as other people.

And because it’s the adhd, it makes us multidimensional thinkers. So I’m constantly thinking in three dimensional spaces and spirals instead of lines and linearness. It really is the meanness of me. And so how do you do it your way? And what is that stimulation that can help bring those sparks of information, the spark of creativity, the spark of innovation that has you now have the energy to start moving on one of your projects?

All right, that is today’s conversation. And I will see you next Friday. 

Sorry I missed you guys last week if you hadn’t heard, my daughter got diagnosed with covid two Fridays ago and it went through the house and we all got sick and I had to take the whole week off. Yay me. I took the whole week off. 

I love you. It’s so good to see you. And if you wanna find out more about how to create and plan working with your strengths and with your neurodiversity in whichever neurodiverse strengths you have in the way the areas of your executive function work, check out the masterclass. We did it yesterday live. The replay has not yet been released. It is coming out.

It is amazing, I’m super proud of it. My neurodiversity planner. If you’d like to find out about the planner now, and you don’t wanna wait, send me a comment below. I love you. I will see you next week. Let’s lead a legacy of love together, creating businesses where the world wins and we shine in our uniquenesses with businesses created and designed just for our neurodiversity.