Embracing Intensity

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