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Speaker 1: All right, Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Albert Einstein, Walt Disney, Abe,

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Speaker 1: Lincoln Mozart, Da Vinci. What do they all have in common?

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Speaker 1: I'm Patty Steele. ADHD next on the backstory. We're back

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Speaker 1: with the backstory. You don't have to tell me. It's

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Speaker 1: frustrating if it impacts you or somebody you love that

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Speaker 1: ADHD gets such a bad rap. How come? Well, maybe

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Speaker 1: because if it doesn't impact your life directly, you think

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Speaker 1: it's just some kind of a behavioral thing, but it's not.

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Speaker 1: And if it's channeled in the right way, it can

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Speaker 1: really have some incredible benefits. In fact, some folks who

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Speaker 1: study it claim it's an entrepreneurial superpower. Now, going back

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Speaker 1: in time, of course, it wasn't recognized as a neurodifference.

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Speaker 1: Folks that dealt with it were considered odd different, incapable

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Speaker 1: of really achieving any kind of meaningful success. So then

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Speaker 1: where did the idea of it being an entrepreneurial superpower

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Speaker 1: come from? What's the story with that? And who were

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Speaker 1: these wildly accomplished folks who were able to channel their

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Speaker 1: ADHD into huge success? Okay, it is a really long list,

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Speaker 1: so bear with me. I'm going to start with Albert Einstein,

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Speaker 1: Walt Disney, Mozart, Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton, Abe Lincoln,

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Speaker 1: Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham, Bell, Agatha Christie. I'm up to

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Speaker 1: more recent people like John F. Kennedy, John Lennon, Michael Jordan,

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Speaker 1: actor Ryan Gosling and Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles and

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Speaker 1: Michael Phelps, as well as a whole bunch of billionaires

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Speaker 1: like Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Elon Muskin, Richard Branson. And

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Speaker 1: that's just the short list. All of these people were

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Speaker 1: either diagnosed with or showed crystal clear signs of ADHD. Now. Hippocrates,

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Speaker 1: the father of modern medicine, was the first to talk

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Speaker 1: about ADHD. He lived in Greece around four hundred BC,

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Speaker 1: and he wrote about some patients who couldn't stay focused

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Speaker 1: on any one thing for very long and had super

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Speaker 1: quick reactions to things. He called it an overbalance of

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Speaker 1: fire over water, and he recommended a bland diet and

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Speaker 1: a lot of water and exercise. Today, psychologists say people

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Speaker 1: who deal with ADHD struggle to concentrate on basic things

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Speaker 1: like school, but often have the ability to hyper focus

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Speaker 1: on things that engage them. Take a look at the

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Speaker 1: inventors and entrepreneurs on that list, like Edison, Disney, Gates, Musk,

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Speaker 1: all of whom were so hyper focused on whatever they

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Speaker 1: were working on they didn't even take the time to

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Speaker 1: sleep or eat enough, so their creative output was non stop.

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Speaker 1: Now let's take a look at a few of these people.

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Speaker 1: Going way back, there's Leonardo da Vinci. He was a

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Speaker 1: great example of somebody who couldn't concentrate in school, but

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Speaker 1: his father allowed him to take a deep dive into

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Speaker 1: the things that fascinated him, from art to invention, that

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Speaker 1: brought him legendary success. Then there's Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. As

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Speaker 1: a really tiny little boy, he was a prodigy who

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Speaker 1: could bring an audience to tears with his music, and

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Speaker 1: then he'd suddenly stop in the middle of a performance

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Speaker 1: and he'd run off to play with the cat or

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Speaker 1: look for a treat. But his music speaks for itself.

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Speaker 1: And imagine being Thomas Edison. He was the youngest of

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Speaker 1: seven kids in a family with big personalities but not

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Speaker 1: a lot of money. He was sent to a crowded,

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Speaker 1: one room schoolhouse and after twelve weeks his kind of

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Speaker 1: overworked teacher had enough of his inability to sit still

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Speaker 1: and learn. Now. Lucky for him, his mother decided to

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Speaker 1: homeschool him. Her belief in him and her patience allowed

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Speaker 1: him to fall in love with learning. He loved technology

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Speaker 1: and literature, especially Shakespeare, but it was his intense curiosity

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Speaker 1: and zest for constantly trying new things that eventually brought

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Speaker 1: him a fortune that now would be worth hundreds of

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Speaker 1: millions of dollars these days. Bill Gates has talked about

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Speaker 1: really struggling with ADHD, which was part of the reason

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Speaker 1: he dropped out of Harvard to start Microsoft. He says

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Speaker 1: he couldn't concentrate in class because all he wanted to

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Speaker 1: do was just get going. Same thing for Ryan Gosling,

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Speaker 1: the actor and super businessman. He couldn't learn or even

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Speaker 1: sit still in school either because of his jumpiness and

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Speaker 1: endless chatter. He really had a rough time making friends too. Finally,

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Speaker 1: his mom pulled him out and home schooled him. He

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Speaker 1: says that year learning at home saved his life, also

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Speaker 1: turned him on to acting, and we're glad for that now.

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Speaker 1: In addition, there are the super athletes who combined the

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Speaker 1: hyper focus with hyperactivity, which experts say allows them to

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Speaker 1: push their skills to a whole nother level. Fourteen time

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Speaker 1: Olympic gold medal winner Michael Phelps says his mom suggested

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Speaker 1: he try swimming since he couldn't sit still due to ADHD,

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Speaker 1: and that her support and positive reinforcement pushed him toward

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Speaker 1: Olympic success. His mom says he needed to do something

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Speaker 1: that allowed him to concentrate on what he loved and

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Speaker 1: to never have to stop moving. Michael Jordan, an NBA

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Speaker 1: legend and a billionaire business guy, says the same thing,

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Speaker 1: focus on what you love and never give up. He

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Speaker 1: believes his ADHD made him intensely persistent in basketball as

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Speaker 1: well as in business. And then there's Beatle John Lennon. Now,

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Speaker 1: like a lot of these folks, he came along a

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Speaker 1: little too early to be formally diagnosed, but as a

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Speaker 1: kid he was really hyperactive, struggling to pay attention in school,

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Speaker 1: finally dropping out before he finished college. When it came

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Speaker 1: to his passion, though, his ability to hyper focus kicked

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Speaker 1: in as he wrote music and course worked on his

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Speaker 1: performance with the Beatles. Now there's a lesson here for

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Speaker 1: us if we're dealing with ADHD, whether personally or with

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Speaker 1: somebody we love. Keep looking forward. Even the most successful

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Speaker 1: folks failed as much as they succeeded, but they kept

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Speaker 1: pushing forward with few regrets. On the upside, folks with

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Speaker 1: ADHD tend to be risk takers, and that's part of

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Speaker 1: what helps them discover new thoughts and ideas, new ways

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Speaker 1: of doing things. It also helps them to not fear failure,

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Speaker 1: but to treat it as an opportunity to keep learning

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Speaker 1: and innovating. As Thomas Edison said, I have not failed.

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Speaker 1: I've just found ten thousand ways that won't work. I'm

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Speaker 1: Patty Steele. The Backstory is a production of iHeartMedia and

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Speaker 1: Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Doug Fraser. Our executive

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Speaker 1: producer is Steve Goldstein of Amplify Media. We're out with

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Speaker 1: new episodes twice a week. Thanks for listening to the Backstory.

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Speaker 1: The pieces of history you didn't know you needed to know.

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Speaker 1: Three