Hi Reader,

This isn’t something I chat about a lot but I have the blessing and curse of ADHD.

I spend a lot of time telling other people to get uncomfortable and share their story, no holds barred. I need to walk the walk and do it myself too. So this mail is as much for me as you. And believe me I flinched hard when I hit send on this.

But a quote I also love is ‘share your scars, not your open wounds’. ADHD was mainly a curse but over the years I’ve managed to take the superpowers it gave me and turn that into a unique service 100% based around my strengths that no-one else can offer.

It wasn’t easy - I’ve had to go through hell and back many times to get to this point. I know a lot of my ADHD brothers and sisters still struggle with how to put their unique skills into the world as they don’t fit neatly into society’s safe little boxes. And those voices telling us we can't do it never shut up.

I’m going to share how the unique perspective I've been given lets me create stories for myself and my clients that are so different to what everyone else is doing.

So here are 5 things you can take from an ADHD brand obsessive to make your own story more powerful:

1) Grab people from the first line

As an ADHD person you have a nanosecond to grab my attention or it’s bye Felicia👋 In this crazy social media addicted world most people’s attention spans aren’t that far off. Wherever you’re telling your story - IG post, video, internal team induction etc you need to stop people in their tracks and convince them to give you their tiny attention span.

David Hiut of Hiut Denim said you should obsess as much over your subject line as your email as that’s what’s going to determine whether anyone looks at your work. You can apply that to any communication.

Hook people in with the first line. Your 2nd line needs to let them know why they should stick around. Invest just as much in strong visuals as they are as important as your words to grab attention these days.

Keep the attention going by sharing your own emotions and triggering your audience’s to get that dopamine and cortisol flowing for the emotional connections that stick.

By telling attention grabbing stories unlike anyone else and doing it consistently your audience will slowly learn to stop what they’re doing and listen whenever you have something to say.

2) Take inspiration from everywhere and connect the dots

As an ADHD person you’re always an outsider who doesn’t accept the status quo with an insatiable curiosity that goes way beyond most people’s interests. Don’t copy all the other brands in your space banging on about their product - most of them are just as stuck as you on what to say.

Instead follow the brands and people who have the time, money and purpose to do the things you wish you could. All the best original ideas, services and products come from taking wildly disparate ideas and combing them into something new.

One of the biggest game changers for me was building a system to capture every idea, thought and inspiration I come across. How I do that is too deep a subject for here but finding a frictionless way to record ideas that resonate with you AND being able to easily retrieve them will make your creativity more powerful in ways you can’t imagine.

3) Tell it like it is

ADHD people HATE hypocrisy and can smell it a mile off. We also tend to be outspoken to the point of offence due to our low impulse control. It took a long time but I learned to accept that for every person who thinks I’m a dick for sharing my unfiltered thoughts, 5 others will connect with me in a much stronger way.

For me one of the key ways to be an authentic brand is that you are publicly willing to say no to something out of principle.

So don’t be scared to tell it as you see it. Your tribe wants a leader who speaks for them. Be passionate about the things you stand for and equally the things you stand against.

It can be uncomfortable which is why most people are too scared to do it. But this gives you a huge opportunity to stand out from the noise and make real connections with your tribe.

4) Embrace your uniqueness and share it

So many ADHD people ignore their unique strengths as they think no-one will ever find them valuable. But it’s embracing your uniqueness that gives the edge over everyone else too scared to be different.

If you’re a successful business someone is going to copy you, that’s guaranteed. The best way to make sure they can never catch you is by telling a unique story and doing it consistently. No-one else can copy your story and the loyalty it builds takes years for anyone else to come close to.

So if you haven’t taken the time to go through your story and all the things that have shaped you in creating a business that no-one else can, now would be a good time. And make sure you document it as once you start this exercise it never ends.

5) Extreme sensitivity to your audience

One of the main traits of ADHD is a heightened sensitivity to EVERYTHING just like a dog’s sense of smell goes way beyond most humans. It means we are way more sensitive to others and how they perceive us than most. This can cause crippling perfectionism but it can have benefits if used right.

If you truly love your community then be obsessed over why they should care about anything you put out into the world. From a social post to your booking platform to a welcome mail. Keep asking yourself:

• Why would they care?
• Can I bring more joy here?
• Can I put more of my story in here?

Sit on ideas for a few days and play around with them, let your subsconcious do the work. For all my comms - emails, social posts, talks etc I always rush through a first draft as fast as humanly possible. Then I just sit on it and keep chipping away. The end result being so much better than trying to bash it out in one frantic last minute session.

Having a platform and a voice is a privilege, use it to lift your tribe not bore them.

The one thing

I wrote this for a bunch of reasons but it was mainly because someone said if you share it maybe you’ll inspire someone else who hasn’t closed the scar yet.

We all have our scars and we’ve all learned from them, maybe in ways we haven’t realised yet. So pick something painful from your past that by overcoming has shaped who you are today and made you a better human. Then share what you’ve learned from it.

If you inspire just one person with it then you’ve made the world a better place.

Big love,

Dan🍜

PS I’m going to be talking at the next Countertalk event on Brand Storytelling (details here) on 28th Feb at 7pm at the Bethnal Green Town Hall Hotel. I’ll be speaking alongside Earl of East and Chukus so at least you’re guaranteed 2 great speakers😉 Hope to see some of you there.

PPS I’ve started a LinkedIn engagement group for food biz people looking to up their game on LinkedIn. It’s a really nice, supportive group of interesting people and it’s great to go on the journey with people who are into the same things as you. We’re all starting to get results from consistent posting now so if you’re interested DM me.

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