Being Brilliant At Your Job Shouldn’t Cost You Everything
There’s a really uncomfortable problem with talking about neurodivergence when it comes to our work.
Because a lot of the focus is around the things we find difficult: the overwhelm, the executive dysfunction, the sensory stuff, the exhaustion, the communication differences, the fact an unexpected call can make us want to chuck our phone into the sea.
And all of those things matter, so we definitely shouldn’t stop talking about them.
In my last blog, The Performance Never Ends, I wrote about how much energy I can spend monitoring myself during meetings, phone calls, networking and all the other interactions that come with running a business. Understanding that has been massively important for me. But there’s another side to this conversation that I don’t want to lose, because I’m also really bloody good at what I do.
I can read a room. I notice things other people miss. I’m brilliant at joining dots, spotting problems and seeing opportunities. I can become deeply invested in understanding somebody’s business and will happily disappear down whatever rabbit hole is required to find out why something isn’t working. Give me a problem that interests me and I am basically a Labrador who’s just been shown a tennis ball.
None of that disappears because some parts of running a business take more out of me than they might take out of somebody else. And that’s where things get interesting, because what if the question isn’t whether neurodivergent people can thrive in business? Loads of us already are.
What if the better question is: how do we keep all the brilliant bits without sacrificing ourselves in the process?
Being exhausted doesn’t mean you’re bad at this
This is something I wish I’d understood much earlier. For years, I assumed that if something left me exhausted, I must somehow not be very good at it. Surely if I was naturally good with people, meetings wouldn’t tire me out? If I was confident, I wouldn’t need to prepare so much. If I was genuinely capable, work shouldn’t require this much effort.
Except that doesn’t really stand up to scrutiny.
I’m very good with clients. I’ve spent most of my working life in roles involving people, communication, sales, strategy and relationships. I’ve presented, pitched, negotiated, managed teams and walked into rooms full of people I’d never met before and somehow managed to convince them I knew what I was doing. Most of the time, I did know what I was doing!
But some of the things that made me good at those jobs were also costing me energy. I prepared thoroughly. I watched people closely. I noticed changes in tone and body language. I thought about what somebody might need before they asked for it. I could adapt my communication depending on who was sitting in front of me.
Those are skills, and the fact that they sometimes come with an enormous energy bill doesn’t make them less valuable. That’s been quite a shift for me, because it means I’ve stopped using exhaustion as evidence that I’m somehow failing. Sometimes I’m tired because something was difficult. Sometimes I’m tired because I’ve been doing something incredibly well and my brain has been working its little socks off behind the scenes.
The outcome might look effortless. That doesn’t mean the process was.
When coping becomes your business strategy
The awkward part is that some of the habits that helped me succeed were probably never particularly sustainable.
Over-preparing is a great example. If you’re worried about getting something wrong, one fairly effective solution is to prepare for absolutely every possible eventuality. Research everything. Think through every question. Make notes. Make notes about the notes. Mentally rehearse the conversation several times and, as we’ve already established, prepare the other person’s lines for them too.
Does it work? Often, yes. You walk into the meeting incredibly prepared and do a fantastic job. Everyone is impressed. Lovely. Unfortunately, you’ve already used half a day’s energy preparing for a one-hour conversation.
The same can happen with over-delivering, being incredibly responsive, saying yes because you don’t want to disappoint somebody, working late because you lost several hours earlier trying to get your brain into gear, or taking on more than you really have capacity for and then somehow pulling it off anyway. From the outside, all anyone sees is the result, and when the result is good, it’s remarkably easy to keep doing the thing that produced it.
I think I’ve spent chunks of my career running on a highly sophisticated business system consisting largely of anxiety, adrenaline and sugary snacks. To be fair, it got quite a lot done. But there’s a difference between something being effective and something being sustainable, and I don’t think I understood that distinction for a very long time.
Nobody gives you extra points for making it harder
I think many of us have inherited some fairly peculiar ideas about what being professional is supposed to look like. Professional people are always available. They respond quickly. They don’t need much downtime. They can go from meeting to meeting without needing to stare at a wall for twenty minutes in between. They answer the phone when it rings rather than looking at it suspiciously until it stops. They also apparently enjoy networking breakfasts, although I remain unconvinced by this.
The trouble is that when you’ve spent years trying to fit that model, making things easier for yourself can feel like cheating. If I choose email instead of a phone call, am I avoiding something? If I don’t put meetings back-to-back, am I being less productive? If I decide that a huge networking event isn’t the best way for me to build relationships, am I missing opportunities? If I need time to think before answering a question, does that make me look less competent?
Increasingly, my answer to all of those questions is: who cares, if the end result is good?
My clients don’t benefit from me having three meetings back-to-back if I’m running on fumes by the third one. They don’t get a better strategy because I answered their email within seven minutes. Nobody receives bonus points because I made the process unnecessarily difficult for myself. Professionalism, to me, looks much simpler these days: do good work, communicate clearly, do what you say you’re going to do, and treat people well. Everything else is negotiable.
Keep the brilliance. Lose some of the cost
This is the bit I’ve become much more interested in since understanding my neurodivergence. I don’t want to make myself less ambitious. I don’t want to stop getting ridiculously excited about ideas, caring deeply about my clients or disappearing into a problem until I’ve worked out what’s going on. Those are some of my favourite things about the way my brain works.
I just don’t want to keep borrowing energy from myself to do them.
So I’ve started looking at the bits around the work. I never book days full of meetings anymore. I leave gaps because I know my brain needs them. I work from different rooms when I need a change of environment. I choose written communication when it makes more sense. If somebody asks me something and I need time to think, I’m comfortable saying exactly that rather than producing an answer on the spot because Professional Hannah apparently has all the answers immediately.
I’ve also become much more protective of the conditions in which I do my best work. I know that there are times when my brain is brilliant and times when asking it to produce anything useful is like repeatedly pressing the button on a remote control when you know perfectly well the batteries are dead. Past me would probably have kept pressing the button harder. Current me is much more likely to change the batteries. Or, depending on the day, abandon the television entirely and go and have a cup of tea.
None of these things makes me less serious about my business. If anything, the opposite is true. I’m finally treating my capacity as something the business depends upon rather than an inconvenient obstacle I need to overcome.
What did it cost you?
For years, I think I measured whether work was going well almost entirely by the external result. Was the client happy? Did I deliver what I promised? Did the meeting go well? Did we win the work? Did the business grow? If the answer was yes, then whatever I’d done to get there was obviously working.
Except I was leaving one fairly important question off the list: what did it cost me?
Not financially. Personally.
Did that piece of work require me to push through exhaustion for three days? Did I spend the whole weekend recovering from a week I’d apparently “managed” perfectly well? Was I constantly anxious? Had I agreed to something I knew I didn’t really have capacity for? Was the business succeeding because I’d become the resource it was consuming?
That’s a much less comfortable measure of success, but I think it’s an important one. Because a business can look successful from the outside whilst being completely unsustainable for the person running it. You can have happy clients, money coming in and a diary full of work and still have built yourself a job that requires more of you than you can keep giving. That’s not success I particularly want anymore.
Sustainable doesn’t mean less successful
For me, this is where the conversation about neurodivergent business owners sometimes goes wrong. We talk about adjustments, boundaries, energy management and doing things differently, and somewhere along the way it can start to sound as though we’re designing smaller lives because we can’t cope with the big ones.
That’s not how I see it at all.
I don’t protect my energy because I have less to offer. I protect it because I know how much I can do with it when it’s available, and there’s a huge difference between those two things.
Building a business around the way my brain works doesn’t mean lowering my expectations. It means creating the conditions in which I’m much more likely to meet them without flattening myself in the process. And yes, sometimes that means doing less. It might mean saying no to something, moving a deadline, leaving space between commitments or accepting that there are only so many people I can deal with in one day before my brain puts up the CLOSED sign.
But it also means that when I am working, I have far more of myself available for the things I’m genuinely brilliant at. That feels like a pretty sensible business strategy to me.
Maybe the cost was never the point
I spent a lot of years assuming that being good at something meant being able to keep doing it regardless of what it cost me. I don’t believe that anymore.
I’m still ambitious. I’m still fascinated by business. I still get overexcited about ideas, care far too much about solving problems and occasionally find myself doing considerably more research than any reasonable person could argue was necessary. I’m not trying to remove any of that.
What I’m removing is the belief that exhaustion somehow proves I’ve worked hard enough, that pushing through is evidence of commitment, or that if I make something easier for myself it somehow makes the result less impressive.
Because my business doesn’t need the version of me who can keep going until there’s absolutely nothing left. It needs the version of me who can still be here doing work I love in five, ten or twenty years.
The goal isn’t to become less brilliant at what we do. It’s to stop sacrificing ourselves in order to prove how brilliant we are.
Following The Dopamine
Have you ever sat down to answer one specific email, only to discover, forty-five minutes later, that you’ve somehow learnt the mating habits of octopuses, reorganised your desktop, found a podcast you’d forgotten to listen to and become absolutely convinced that now might be the perfect time to start a completely unrelated business?
For me, it always starts with the best of intentions. I’ll realise I need to check one tiny detail before I reply. That tiny detail raises another question, which obviously requires a quick Google search. The Google search throws up an article that looks genuinely fascinating, which reminds me of something else I’ve been meaning to look into, and before I know it I’ve got so many browser tabs open that my laptop looks less like an archaeological dig through every interest I’ve had over the past month. Past Hannah was clearly very optimistic. Every single tab was apparently too important to close because I might need it later. Present-day Hannah has absolutely no idea why seventeen of them are still open, but I’m sure there was a perfectly good reason at the time.
From the outside, it probably looks like distraction. A complete inability to stop chasing the shiny thing and just crack on with the job in hand. It certainly used to look that way to me. I’d sit back at the end of the morning wondering how on earth I’d been so busy without actually doing the thing I’d originally sat down to do, and conclude that I simply wasn’t disciplined enough. Other people seemed perfectly capable of deciding what they were going to work on and then… just working on it. Meanwhile, I’d somehow wandered into a wilderness of possibilities with absolutely no idea where I was heading.
I’ve started thinking about this as following the dopamine. I know dopamine has become one of those words that’s casually thrown into almost every conversation about ADHD these days, and I’m not about to pretend everything we do can be explained by one brain chemical. Brains are wonderfully complicated, and anyone claiming otherwise is usually trying to sell you something.
But as a description of what this feels like, it comes surprisingly close. It’s more like my brain finds a loose thread and simply can’t resist pulling it to see what happens. Before I know it, I’m blinking into the sunlight wondering how I ended up reading about something completely different from where I started. My brain, meanwhile, is full and happy, rubbing its belly as though this had been the plan all along. In reality, I never consciously decided to abandon that first task. My attention just wandered off for a moment… and that moment pulled up a chair.
For years, I assumed I was just a bit ditzy. God knows there were enough school reports suggesting that was the case. But when I look back now, I know that’s not what was happening. Not even close. Some of the best ideas I’ve ever had, the projects I’m proudest of and the biggest pivots in my career all started because I wandered off and followed the shiny thing.
Everything interesting feels like a breadcrumb
My brain seems to experience curiosity very differently from some people. For them, it appears to be a passing thought. They wonder about something, perhaps make a mental note to look it up later, and then carry on with whatever they were doing. A tiny pause before getting back to the task in hand. Yay them!
Mine, on the other hand, treats every fascinating idea like a breadcrumb that absolutely has to be followed because… well… what if the next breadcrumb is even better? Sometimes that works out brilliantly. Sometimes it ends with me knowing far more than any reasonable person should about something that wasn’t remotely connected to what I was supposed to be doing.
I’ve long since accepted that, like Alice, there are certain rabbit holes I’m powerless to resist. Mention an unusual business model, an obscure historical event or a piece of technology I’ve never come across before, and there’s a very good chance I’ll disappear for an hour and emerge with an entirely unnecessary amount of knowledge. My brain seems convinced it’ll all come in useful one day and, after all these years, I’ve learnt it’s usually not worth arguing.
The funny thing is, it never feels like I’m deliberately avoiding work because avoidance has a very different feeling to it. This feels more like my brain has found an itch it simply has to scratch before it can settle again. I suspect that’s one of the reasons so many neurodivergent people become accidental experts in the most wonderfully random subjects. We don’t always choose our interests. Quite often they choose us, and once they’ve got our attention they won’t let go until we’ve reached Mastermind specialist subject levels of knowledge.
For years I saw that as a weakness because we’re taught that focus and consistency are the holy grail. But I’m no longer convinced that’s true. Looking back, I think this relentless curiosity has quietly become one of my greatest strengths.
This is where my best ideas are born
The older I get, the less convinced I am that my brain is actually as random as I’d always assumed.
At the time, it certainly feels random. One interest appears from nowhere, quickly followed by another, and before long I’ve disappeared off on yet another project that nobody saw coming. If you looked at my CV over the years, you’d be forgiven for wondering whether I simply couldn’t make my mind up. Novelty cakes. Bar work. Marketing. Business strategy. Podcasting. On paper, it looks less like a career path and more like somebody repeatedly throwing darts at a noticeboard.
For a long time, that’s exactly how I saw it too. I admired people who seemed to know exactly what they wanted to do from the age of twelve and then spent the next thirty years becoming brilliant at it. Meanwhile, I was enthusiastically wandering through life picking up new interests like I was collecting Pokémon.
But when I look back now, those interests don’t feel disconnected at all. They all have the same thread running through them. I’ve always been fascinated by understanding people, solving problems and making complicated things easier to understand. The subject matter has changed over the years, but the thing driving it really hasn’t.
I don’t think The Business Oddcast exists despite the fact that I followed lots of different interests. I think it exists because I did. My business strategy work didn’t appear because I suddenly woke up one morning with a perfectly formed business idea. It grew out of years of following conversations, asking questions, noticing patterns and joining dots that didn’t seem connected until they eventually were.
That’s the awkward thing about following something that grabs your attention. It rarely gives you the full picture at the beginning. It simply nudges you to take one more step. Sometimes that leads absolutely nowhere. Sometimes it leads to another abandoned notebook, three unopened browser tabs and an Amazon basket full of things that felt essential at the time.
And every now and then…it changes the direction of your life.
The Problem Isn’t Curiosity. It’s Timing.
Much as I’d love to tell you that following every fascinating idea has been the secret to my success, I’d also like to remain on speaking terms with reality.
The truth is, my brain has absolutely dreadful timing. It doesn’t patiently wait until I’ve finished writing the proposal, sent the invoice or replied to the customer who’s now wondering whether I’ve accidentally disappeared. It turns up halfway through all of those things, taps me on the shoulder and whispers, “This probably isn’t important… but what if we just had a really quick look?”
The really clever part is that it always feels completely logical. Future Hannah will apparently never understand this idea as well as Present Hannah, so naturally everything else has to wait. Looking back, it’s remarkable how many “urgent” ideas have turned out not to be urgent at all. Future Hannah usually copes just fine.
I’ve lost count of the number of notebooks – both digital and physical – containing brilliant business ideas that never became businesses. Half-finished online courses abandoned around week two. Browser tabs I’ve kept open for months because I was absolutely certain I’d come back to them. My Notes app is full of cryptic sentences and random numbers that made perfect sense at the time, and a significant proportion of my camera roll is screenshots that now look like they belong to somebody else’s life.
For years, I assumed the answer was to fight it. Ignore the distraction. Stay focused. Be more disciplined. Unsurprisingly, that worked about as well as telling a Labrador to ignore the interesting smell in the hedge. I could manage it for a few minutes, but I’d spend far more energy wrestling with my own brain than I ever saved by resisting it.
The breakthrough wasn’t learning to ignore those thoughts. It was realising they didn’t all need dealing with immediately.
These days, I ask myself a different question. Not “Should I follow this?” but “Does this need following today?” Surprisingly often, the answer is no. The article will still be there after I’ve sent the email. The business idea can survive until tomorrow. If it’s genuinely a good idea, it’ll almost certainly still be a good idea once I’ve finished what I originally sat down to do.
So I leave myself a trail back. A quick voice note. A sentence in my Notes app that I’ll hopefully still be able to decipher later. A reminder in my calendar. It isn’t a productivity system worthy of a bestselling business book, but it works for me because it tells my brain something incredibly important:
“You don’t have to remember this. We’ve already caught it.”
For years, I worried that if I didn’t act on an idea immediately, I’d lose it forever. Every thought seemed to arrive with an expiry date. The irony is that trying to hold onto all of those ideas at once made it almost impossible to concentrate on the one thing I actually wanted to finish. Now I trust myself to come back.
Not every idea deserves my attention today. Some do. Others simply deserve somewhere safe to wait until I have the time and headspace to give them the attention they deserve. That one shift has probably saved me more mental energy than any productivity technique I’ve ever tried. Because I’ve realised the goal was never to silence that part of my brain. Quite the opposite. It’s responsible for some of the best things I’ve ever created.
Maybe following the dopamine was never the problem
I’m still the person who can disappear down an internet rabbit hole because one question led to another. I still start researching one thing and somehow end up learning something completely unrelated. There are still days when I look at my browser and wonder whether anyone else has ever managed to open quite so many tabs whilst technically doing one job.
The difference is that I no longer see those moments as evidence that my brain is broken or that I’m somehow incapable of focusing. They’re simply part of how I explore the world. Some of those detours lead absolutely nowhere. Others have led to conversations, businesses, friendships and opportunities that I’d never have found if I’d forced myself to stay on the straight and narrow.
Looking back, so much of what I value in my life began with a question I couldn’t quite let go of. The Business Oddcast exists because Stuart and I kept following questions that fascinated us. My business strategy work grew because I couldn’t stop asking why some businesses thrive whilst others, often with equally good products or services, quietly struggle. None of it came from sitting down with a perfectly mapped-out plan. It came from paying attention to the things my brain kept coming back to.
So these days, when I find myself halfway through writing an email and suddenly wondering how something completely unrelated works, I don’t immediately assume I’ve failed. I make a note, finish the email and then decide later whether it’s worth following. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn’t. But I’ve stopped seeing every distraction as evidence that I’m doing life wrong.
Because after all…some of the most important things in my life started with a distraction.
The Business Advice You’re Never Given
Someone I met recently at a business networking event emailed me asking me some questions about business, specifically business partners. They recently had a bad first-business experience and major financial reversal and wanted some guidance about shared business ownership.
Speaking to the person I could tell that their enthusiasm and energy would not be down for long, and they already had Plan B in the bag and ready to launch.
They stayed in touch and wanted some guidance as to “what next”… and as their next venture was very firmly in my “wheelhouse” we got along like pyromaniacs at an open house.
My initial advice was “”get a job”, might as well be earning whilst the flywheel of business spins up to speed. In my early years temping and ad-hoc jobs kept me in pasta and baked beans and very much got me through the economic choppy waters of a new business venture.
Before we get to the specific email in question here’s the three bits of advice I shared and it is broadly speaking the three things I suggest to anyone thinking of becoming self-employed or launching a new venture:
1) What’s Plan B if it goes wrong? Even if you do not have Plan B fully plotted, know what the signs are that you need to stop Plan A. What’s the cut off?
2) Do you have savings? Start today. Even if in debt, savings are a habit, even if it is a fiver a week, start today. If you are in debt, pay down the highest interest stuff first, and once that is paid, go to the next highest and so on. At the end, start saving the exact amount you were paying a month in debt as a reminder of what you have achieved. Well done you!
3) Is your lifestyle that of a monk in a cave? Get rid of every subscription, or payment you absolutely can and focus your attention on the basics and build from there. You will need every ounce of focus, attention and desire to grow your business. Financial jeopardy is always going to be a distraction, so reduce your outgoings as much as you possibly can.
These three points were the main area of our conversation, we exchanged pleasant series of emails and I thought no more of it… Leaving the door open to further correspone in future, because in business, you never know…
After a few weeks with no contact, I received this email, BOOM:
“Hi Stuart
Just on my morning commute to work (yep back to the 9-5!) and in the middle of the next business planning cycle.
I made friends with this girl who is an absolute fire cracker. She works in a high end clothes store in [UK TOWN] and is a demon seller. So I have been trying to convince her to start a side hustle with me.
I sent you the google drive link to the business idea. [REDACTED] sales training.
I think it’s time to give up on her. She has that employee mindset and is just full of ideas why not to do it.
I really don’t want to go into business on my own again. Where’s the best place to find co-founders who are super talented and available. I talk to so many people and it’s so rare to find people I would go into business with.
I’m really not fussed what it is at this point. Just want to make some proper money.
Any advice would be appreciated“
Wow… That’s quite a chunky chew…
So I replied… and with their permission, here is the reply.
This is business advice about business partners learned the hard way, over 30 years. If you are going into business with someone else, take INDEPENDENT LEGAL ADVICE. Do not use BizWoo sourced from a spicy on the Interwebs, do your own due diligence! USE YOUR OWN JUDGEMENT!
enjoy…
TO: Business Contact
FROM: Stu Morrison
SUBJECT: Business Partner Hell – Eye Witness Report
[NAME]
Well done on getting a job – they are useful for regular money whilst you figure out how to earn “f@ck you” money. But bosses suck, so get with the getting…
With regards to your email…
WOOOOAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH…
Stop…
Take a moment, few deep breaths, box breath… in to a count of 4, hold (count 4) out (count 4), rest (count 4) do that a few times before reading the rest of my reply.
::BREATHE::
::PAUSE::
::EXHALE::
::PAUSE::
DISCLAIMER
I am not a lawyer, advisor or coach, I am, at best, an unreliable witness and your mileage may vary… that said… Here’s some direct, and unfluffy insight from someone who has spaffed so much money up the wall chasing pipe-dreams that I eventually had to build another wall, french drain, and sewer system…
You have an inner fire that is not going to be contained by a 9-5, you know that, I see that, but you need discipline to focus that into a laser. I’m not talking about “gym bro” type discipline, I am talking about the ability to remain on task, on mission and dialled in. Whatever the distraction, and there’s always a distraction, you keep showing up and doing the do.
Now, sure, that sort of grit, the get-it-done mentality is a given, right? Yeah, but here’s the point to it, no matter how much you THINK you have it, until the rubber hits the road, you may never find out if you ACTUALLY have it.
But like any “fucking hard” thing, you do it BECAUSE it IS hard. What’s the point otherwise? Right?? So if we know that the way to reach our goals is going to be one long hard slog, we better have a pretty frickin’ amazing reason for doing it.
And that’s what you’re missing. You’re missing a “why”.
So, why do I do what I do? My why is – 2 reasons…
1) I NEVER EVER EVER EV.AH. E.V.E.R. have to have a boss. Because bosses suck the joy out of life, and are usually wrong about everything and I never had a boss who didn’t think his position didn’t afford him some sort of grace and favour with the staff. We should all somehow bow and scrape… which I am never going to do, king or pauper, we’re all born with an arsehole and I am too fond of pointing that out for that employer/employee relationship to ever last long. Four jobs before the age of 23 and one of them was a five-year apprenticeship started at 16. So, yeah, bosses can do one. As you see, I REALLY do not want to have a boss ever again.
2) To keep my family from starving. Initially it was to keep myself from starving, and to be frank, I was doing a piss-poor job of that before I met my wife. Now, not saying “go get wifed up“, but sometimes you need to be fighting for more than just money and fame for yourself.
I’m better at fighting someone else’s corner than my own, or I used to be. Now I am a diamond-tipped, Teflon-coated mutha-fucker if pushed. Wasn’t always like that, but as that famous business philosopher Al Capone said: “You need two things in life, a smile and a baseball bat. 99 out of a hundred you just need a smile…” What people also don’t appreciate was the bit most people fail to quote: “the other guy also needs to know you have a bigger bat than him“.
Don’t go and buy a bat. This is not bat advice 101. This is:
YOU NEED A MISSION ADVICE.
A reason why. Beyond the fiscal reward, because earning money is straightforward, most people complicate it. Here’s my formula:
Find something you can replicate over and over, that’s not too complicated and is already in demand. One of the hardest things to do in business is change someone’s habit. Designing products, creating new systems and offering new ways of doing something is always, hands down, the hardest thing to sell.
Why?
Changing behaviour is hard; as a business or salesperson it’s the single hardest thing you can accomplish.
You ever try stopping a habit? Now you’ve got to convince someone else to do that, with words and pictures only… Good luck. It’s quicker to stand in your garden and burn tenners.
So. Don’t go and try to create a whole new marketplace – find a marketplace with money in it, and find a reason that you want to get into that market. You can sell anything, you know that – so why not sell something you love, have a passion for or otherwise just want to be involved with?
I found posters, novelties, and writing. I used websites and business to build out my wealth but remain passionate about communicating in the written form, as well as having fun and enjoying life. You also need an economic engine to provide for your lifestyle. Lesson for another day.
OK… Lecture over…
… to your actual email…
“I made friends with this girl who is an absolute fire cracker. She works in a high end clothes store in Guildford and is a demon seller. So I have been trying to convince her to start a side hustle with me.“
This sentence has one of the highest red flag counts for a potential business partner I think I have ever read.
Let me break it down.
“I made friends with this girl“
Exactly how, how did you make friends? Party? Queue for self-checkouts? I am going with ‘chance encounter’. So you have no idea about her values, what she’s made of under pressure. How will she react when you’ve got 14 days until payroll of £300K and only got £200K in the bank and a customer who’s just filed for bankruptcy owing you £200K…
You know how you do when in a “burning building“, how will SHE do? You have started to build your armour, how’s hers? Nothing will save your business if two business partners are not aligned, in sync, and fully understand where their respective strengths and weaknesses lie and are absolutely rock solid in their conviction for the business.
“who is an absolute fire cracker.”
Run, run fast, don’t look back. These people are absolutely essential, but make for terrible business partners. If she has dyed hair, then “AWOOOOGA!”…
Now, speaking as a fully-fledged and diagnosed member of the ‘Spectrum Gang’ and having had varying shades of bright hair colours, this is why I say run.
I know, I’m a fucking nightmare to be in business with.
Two reasons;
- LOTS OF GREAT IDEAS!!!!
I have learned to prune viciously and quickly.
and - ALL OF THE DETAIL ALL OF THE TIME.
I mean, the length of this reply, seriously? Who does that?
How you do one thing, is how you do everything, and if they are always coming up with GREAT IDEAS be careful, because that energy can be very hard to pin down to the grind of making it happen once the great ideas have been had. ::stuart skips away to his next project::
Some businesses thrive on that relationship, but for that to work the partnership understands the dynamic and is self-aware enough to ensure it never becomes a problem. Jobs & Wozniak spring to mind. But for that to work, you both need to know each other and have a “in the trenches” bond to make it through the tougher times.
“She works in a high end clothes store in [REDACTED] and is a demon seller.”
Says who? Never believe a salesperson when they say they are the best… THEY ARE SALES PEOPLE, THEY LIE FOR A LIVING! I know… I am one.
And when I say “lie” I mean bend the truth to the letter of the law and not beyond, whilst also showing the biggest upside to the customer.
“Oh, you look amazing in that, pair it with these shoes…“
See, you’re thinking about new shoes… and… Who owns the business? Family member? I’m going to say an aunt? Pure guess, but I know the store type and have done websites for a few in the past. I no longer do retail store websites because this type of owner broke me. 🙂
“So I have been trying to convince her to start a side hustle with me.” – AWOOOOOOOGA! Red flag trifecta. Cue the confetti canons, dancing girls and frustrating days ahead.
Business partners do not need convincing, it should be a mutual agreement, you’re dancing not wrestling. Plus, what happens if it goes wrong?
Let’s say, one year from now, everything’s proper fucked, people owe you money, cashflow is tight and their rent is due and you cannot, absolutely CAN-NOT, afford both of your wages. Who gets paid?
Do you do 50/50? How will they react knowing they cannot pay rent? And, with that domestic stress, how will they be performing? How quickly does it become “I was doing OK until you roped me into this bad idea, my aunt was right about you all along“?
You see when it is all cake and candles, running a business is a joy and, to be honest, a piece of piss once you get the hang of the cycles and master the mindset. But when it goes wrong, yeah, it will blow up like a Council JCB hitting WW2 ordnance. It’ll make quite the mess of your life. I know. Been there, got the drunk festival tattoo.
“I really don’t want to go into business on my own again. Where’s the best place to find co-founders who are super talented and available. I talk to so many people and it’s so rare to find people I would go into business with.”
Good idea, spread the risk, but that also comes with risk as you identified; how do you find reliable business partners?
By showing up and being reliable! You don’t find your tribe, they find you. If you want to be considered a proper business owner by other’proper’ business owners, then you have to walk the walk, a real chicken & egg scenario.
Having a side hustle is a great way to begin. You met me networking, and that’s where you find the gold — the people who show up, and where you find the people you want to work with.
You can also obsess about a specific business, contact the owner, ask for some advice, but they’re busy, they don’t know you and are likely to be dismissive. Unless you do something for them first.
A website audit was my way in. A piece of work with absolute business value, offered without any strings. Do business, don’t do business – here you go. That sort of thing gets remembered and remarked upon. And that’s when I did the hard yards – nowadays I rarely get asked to “audition”. That’s a privilege of rank and seniority, but you can achieve that in a short time with the right focus and of course product or service.
I would suggest you disconnect “time for money” as soon as possible, finding a way to have some income without having to work for it. A Stocks and Shares ISA with dividend stocks is a good shout. It’s going to take a while to get any meaningful income, but it’s the practice, the dedication, the life skill of saving, and getting some income.
Get proper financial advice — don’t listen to a weird rando on the emails.
So, to your final line…
“I’m really not fussed what it is at this point. Just want to make some proper money.”
Danger, and biggest red flag – you have ambition burning a hole in your pocket, and nothing the market likes better than someone keen to “NOT MISS OUT“… oof, I have been taken a few times because I naively fell for someone’s promises and wasted time, money and sometimes a lot of both at once. Be careful, tread softly and be strategic. Sure, AI is everywhere, but soon it’ll be a commodity like the “internet” . Plus, I got really lucky and ‘timed‘ the early internet wave right (right time/place) and AI is already starting to lose its lustre and small businesses are wary of new tech.
I often suggest “toilet paper and teabags” as my strategy. I offer businesses something they can’t do without, or will buy no matter what. Hosting, websites.
Also have other interests too: diversify from your main business to protect income sources. It’s more than just one thing, you’ve got to take a step back and do all the things at the right time and for the right reasons. Going out and shouting “I WANNA DO BUSINESS” is likely to end badly, desperation is never attractive in business or dating, again, red flags.
Your best strategy: find something you can get passionate about. Is that [REDACTED] sales training? Maybe? But ask yourself these questions before proceeding:
Is there a big market for this [INSERT BUSINESS IDEA]?
Are there businesses with budgets to spend on [INSERT BUSINESS IDEA]?
How many people do you have to convince in an organisation before you get an invoice paid?
Do you have a list of those people right now?
How long to get to those people?
3/6/12 months?
Can you fund the business until you are positive cashflow?
Plus what about the current competition? Are there already businesses doing this? Are you simply treading on their toes and inviting a costly legal battle? Even if unfounded, if they’re established their pockets will be deeper…
See how it starts to unravel. So, find something you can scale – that you have a ‘moat’ around, something you can protect. Forget Intellectual Property (IP) – that’s a moat but requires deep pockets to truly defend.
So what’s the best approach?
Find something you can get passionate about, go digging, get into an industry that you like, and do a deep dive. Spend 6 months REALLY understanding the numbers, the logistics, or the capacity. Find something that’s a broken pain point (oh, they’re everywhere). Something that causes genuine costs to a business. Next, find something, or someone, that plugs that gap, fixes that issue, bridges the problem.
Introduce Player A to Player B – with you taking a cut of whatever the outcome. Low risk for you, easy sell for each potential player. Eventually you get good at sniffing out where there’s opportunity, and that 6 months becomes 90 days, becomes a month, a week… you sniff out the deals quickly. If there’s no way for me to make a cut, then I introduce them anyway — then that’s two people who owe me 🙂 (or at the very least will remember me!).
Then you find something that is such a good fit between the two players that you buy into one or other, or both sides of the sale, and then you own a piece of the businesses. That takes longer, requires more stamina and insight, but here’s the thing, you have learned to manage your risks at every stage. You own the pie, as well as the tray it’s baked in! You might eat the pie, but you have the tray left to bake another, and it’s the recipe and ingredients that are just a cost of business.
You have to do the hard yards to get to eat the pie. It’s just how it is.
Well… Now I want pie and have to go eat.
Here endeth whatever this is/was…
Go get stuck in…
EPILOGUE
You might ask “What gives you the right to pontificate and opine on such matters, Treacle?” and, from the safety of the visitors side of the bullet proof glass, I would confess I’ve had some business “break ups” over the years, including a few “sub-optimal” endings. So I feel 100% qualified to share the lessons learned from being there when trust, money, and lack of principles play out.
Business partners can be very financially beneficial, or a lifestyle wrecking ball. Choose carefully because one type lifts you up, challenges you and always has your back. You remain equals and if the project ends, you have a useful business ally to call on in future.
The other type throws a strop, ignores the Share Holders Agreement (your business ‘Bible’ when it comes to partners), and demands unfair compensatation in a two week window, or they’ll close operations until compliance. This is all without seeing the most recent accounts. Before Christmas. Whilst you’re dealing with a friend’s funeral.
Yeah…
::deep breath::
Sometimes in business, it takes the best of you to make it past the worst of someone else and that’s why I feel very qualified to share my thoughts.
Working With Your Brain, Not Against It
There is a very specific brand of frustration that comes with knowing exactly what you need to do… and still not being able to do it!
It’s not because you don’t care. Not because you don’t understand it. Not even because you’re particularly busy. You can be sitting right in front of the task, fully aware that it would take about twenty minutes if you just cracked on with it, and yet your brain is skipping around a field, picking daisies. Not a care in the world!
For most of my life, I didn’t have any language for this. I was late diagnosed, which means I spent 51 years assuming that this was just how I was. Inconsistent, easily distracted, a bit unreliable when it came to getting shit done. I had zero idea my brain was neurodivergent, which is laughable really now I know that it clearly is.(Narrator: the signs were always there!)
I just thought it was ‘special’ and not in a good way. And that conclusion didn’t come out of nowhere either. It was born for a million moments where I was quietly made to feel like I was buffering ‘normal’.
I still remember an English teacher telling me “80% of this essay is brilliant, and the rest is pure fairy land,”. Now I’m proud of that part of me that wanders off on fabulous tangents, mid sentence. It’s a hugely important part of who I am. But back then I was filed under “lovely, but a bit strange”. And it left me pondering whether it was a world problem, or my brain. I had no idea that my magnificent brain just needed the right conditions.
So I did what most of us do. I tried to fix it.
For years, I assumed this was a discipline problem. That if I could just be a bit more consistent, a bit more focused, a bit less prone to wandering off mid-task, everything would finally get in line. Then when it came to work I bought into the idea that the ‘winners’ were the ones who showed up the same way every day and just got on with things, regardless of how they felt. It never crossed my mind that I might be aspiring to a rulebook my brain missed the memo for.
Most business advice is not for us
The majority of business advice isn’t neutral. It’s built for a very specific type of brain. And that brain is not mine. Which kinda sucks really.
It’s built for people who can decide to do something and then… just do it. No internal negotiation. No sudden urge to make a cup of tea, scroll something deeply irrelevant, and then question all of your life choices halfway through opening a document. No weird moment where your brain nopes, and disappears off to learn something fascinating but entirely unhelpful. (I once lost a solid hour researching what to do if you’re stuck in a lift. Do I need that information? No. Do I now avoid lifts? Absolutely yes!.)
And the thing is, this generic advice is given like it’s universal. Which means that when your brain bumps into it, it feels like a ‘you’ problem. You’re inconsistent, you need more self discipline. You haven’t found the right system. You’re just not good enough. (Spoiler alert: you absolutely are.)
But what if it’s not that you haven’t found the right system — it’s that you’ve been trying to force yourself into ones that were never built for your brain in the first place? Read that again. Because once you understand that, things start to make a lot more sense. Not in a dramatic “everything is fixed” kind of way, but in an ‘aha’ lightbulb above your head kind of way. Because it explains a lot.
Force it…I dare Yyou (really don’t)
When something doesn’t work, the natural instinct is to push harder. To sit there longer, try to force focus. Override whatever resistance is showing up. And to be fair, that can work for a while. You can absolutely drag yourself through a task with enough internal pressure and a slightly aggressive pep talk. But it comes at a cost.
Because every time you factory reset your brain in the hope it will operate against its natural patterns, you’re overriding signals that are there for a reason. That starts an energy fire that leaves you with tiredness and some lingering shame that something relatively simple has wiped you out for the rest of the day.
This is where the boom-and-bust cycle can creep in, and this was my strategy for far too long. You have a few days where everything flows, you get loads done, you feel vaguely invincible… and then suddenly replying to an email feels like you’re in an internal small talk convo. From the outside, it looks inconsistent. From the inside, it feels like your brain has just done an emergency stop with no warning.
These patterns aren’t random
One of the most useful shifts, and also one of the most annoying to accept, is that your patterns aren’t random. They’re information.
The times you can focus for hours without noticing. The moments where starting feels completely impossible until something suddenly clicks. The tasks that you avoid with Olympic-level skill, even though you know they matter. That’s not chaos. That’s data.
Executive dysfunction often shows up as that gap between intention and action, where you know exactly what needs to happen and yet… tumbleweeds. Not because you’re incapable, but because the conditions for action aren’t in place. Once you start looking at what those conditions actually are, things get a bit clearer.
You begin to notice when your brain is more receptive, what kind of tasks pull you in, and what are your resistance triggers. It doesn’t magically solve everything, but it does mean you’re no longer trying to operate blind.
When it’s interesting it works
There’s a particular brand of shame that comes with only being able to focus on things that are interesting. It can feel childish, or unprofessional, or like you should really be able to just get on with things regardless.And yet your brain has its mouth clamped shut and is shaking its head vigorously as someone is trying to spoon rice pudding into it. (Is that just me? yuck!)
For many neurodivergent people, interest isn’t optional. It’s the thing that actually switches the lights on. When something engages you, properly engages you, focus can be almost effortless. Time disappears, ideas connect, and you suddenly look like a highly functional adult who absolutely has their life together.
When it doesn’t, even simple tasks can feel weirdly impossible. Not hard, just… inaccessible. Like they are in a giant claw machine and no amount of pound coins and patience allows you to access one. Which is why trying to ‘business’ whilst ignoring that reality tends to backfire.
Designing work that has some level of ‘shiny new thing’ built into it isn’t indulgent. It’s practical. Because It’s the difference between pushing a giant rock uphill and surfing the focus wave.
When it feels like your idea, your brain chills out
There’s also something annoying that I’ve noticed over the years. Well, there is plenty that is annoying, but I won’t gallop after that squirrel. Tasks change depending on how they feel internally. I can have things collecting dust on my ‘to do’ list for days…weeks even, that feel impossible to start. Then suddenly the planets align, or whatever, and I complete them in 20 minutes.
The task didn’t change. Neither did the deadline. The only thing that shifted was my brain moving it from something it was told to do, to something it came up with itself. Like that boss (we’ve all had one) that dismisses your genius idea in the bored-room (yes that was intentional) only to “I’ve got an incredible idea” weeks later!
Because the moment something feels like a “should,”we’re back to the rice pudding shoveling. Not because the task is unreasonable, but because it feels imposed.
When it feels like a choice, even if nothing else changes, there is less friction. It becomes more doable, and far less dramatic. And once you notice this, it’s really helpful. But also horribly inconvenient, because you can no longer use the “push through the pain” strategy anymore.
It was never about trying harder
What becomes clear over time is that this isn’t about a lack of effort. Most people I know with neurodivergent brains commit to everything like there’s a million pound prize at the end of it. Cleaning the bathroom? I’m spending 4 hours with an old toothbrush making sure every inch of it is showroom sparkly. You with me? But…and it’s a big BUT. That effort, when it comes to business, is being poured into toeing the line with systems that don’t actually fit. And applying more effort to a mismatch doesn’t fix it. It just makes you even tireder, even faster!
A more useful question at that point isn’t “how do I try harder?” — because let’s be honest, you’ve already tried that and look where that got you! (no shame, just fact stating!) It’s “how do I make this easier to start?” Because that’s usually where the whole thing falls apart.
And that might mean changing when you do something, how it’s structured, or what you pair it with. Not in a dramatic, “new life, new me” kind of way, but in small, slightly less punishing adjustments that your brain might actually agree to. It’s not about lowering the bar. It’s about removing enough friction that getting to it doesn’t feel like wrestling a grizzly bear every single time.
You’re not the problem
The biggest shift isn’t tactical. It’s how you see yourself. Because when you move from “I’m unpredictable” or “I’m an out of control nightmare” to “my brain works differently,” something settles. Not in a dramatic, life-is-fixed kind of way, but in a quieter, “oh… that explains a lot” kind of way.
You stop trying to force yourself into ways of working that never quite fit, and start paying attention to what actually does. Less fighting it, more working with it — which, annoyingly, turns out to be far more effective.
You start to notice your patterns, and after a bit of practice, you start to trust them more. Instead of constantly second-guessing yourself or trying to override everything, you begin to work with what’s already there. I’d be lying if I said it suddenly made everything easy, but it does take the edge off that constant feeling that you’re getting it wrong. And without that shame everything feels a lot more doable.
So… what now?
You take this and you use it. Not perfectly, not consistently, and definitely not in a way that suddenly turns you into one of those people who just “gets things done” without thinking about it. Knowledge is power… but it’s not a miracle. Annoying, but true.
The goal is to stop assuming the problem is you. Because it isn’t, so let that shit go. When something feels hard to start, or weirdly impossible for no obvious reason, you pause long enough to ask a better question. Not “what’s wrong with me?” but “what does my brain need here?”
Because once you see it, you can’t unsee it. And after that, you can no longer pretend you don’t know any better. So you build something that actually fits your fabulous brain. Bit by bit. Adjustment by adjustment.
And then comes the life-changing bit: you realise you were never the problem. You were just trying to run on instructions that weren’t written for you.
Protecting Your Energy When the World Won’t Slow Down
Firstly, I just want to give a shout out to any readers who have mastered the art of understanding the unpredictable beast that is ND energy. A confusing little fecker that might give you a whiff of hope that there’s some petrol in the tank… and then you do the most mediocre of chores and feel like your brain has been turned into a smoothie.
If you haven’t mastered that, then… well, how the devil are you going to protect it if you don’t even know how it works? Just kidding. As you were. Keep reading.
So, let’s assume you’ve got at least some understanding of how your energy behaves, in all its unpredictable random sparkliness. The next step is protecting it. Because you’re living in a world that won’t slow down. Not even a teeny bit. Not even if you ask it really nicely.
And this is the bit no one wants to talk about. The world isn’t going to adjust itself around your capacity. Deadlines still exist, clients still want quick replies, and life in its many forms keeps moving at the same pace regardless of how you’re feeling. Which is why protecting your energy isn’t optional. It’s sanity maintenance.
And when you’re neurodivergent, then that’s double funzies, because your energy isn’t linear. It fluctuates. It spikes. It drops. It goes out for a pint of milk and comes back 3 days later. It’s that crazy unpredictable drunk uncle that you don’t want at your wedding.
So, this isn’t about escaping the world. It’s about learning how to stay in it without acquiring yourself a one way ticket to burnout town!
The world isn’t built for you. Accept it…and move on
Most systems are built on the assumption that energy is stable. That you wake up, work, produce, and repeat. Nice, neat, and predictable. Lovely for people whose brains behave like that. Big fan. Congratulations to them. Except that’s not how a lot of ND brains work.
Some days you can fly through work like you’ve unlocked a secret level of existence and suddenly you are unstoppable. Other days, opening your laptop feels like a hostage negotiation between your fingers and your brain. Same person. Same workload. Completely different capacity.
And yet… none of those changes how the world responds to you. You’re still expected to show up, deliver, reply, and keep things moving — even on the days where your brain has very much not signed off on that plan. No one pops up and says, “Ah, I see your brain has gone offline today, let’s circle back when it returns.”
The problem is that external demand stays consistent, while your capacity didn’t get the memo. So, when those two things collide, pressure builds. And when that pressure sits there long enough, it turns into stress, then exhaustion, and eventually burnout.
Which is why this whole “just push through” approach doesn’t really work for brains like ours. (It barely works for anyone, to be honest, but that’s a rant for another day.)
Urgency will eat your energy if you let it
One of the biggest drains on your energy isn’t actually the work itself — it’s urgency. Everything suddenly feels important. Everything feels like it needs doing now. Everything feels like it will fall apart if you don’t respond immediately.
But a lot of that urgency isn’t real. It’s artificial deadlines, other people’s poor planning, and those “quick favours” that somehow take half your day and leave you wondering why you opened your laptop in the first place.
If you’ve spent years being reliable, helpful, and responsive, you’re probably very good at jumping straight into action mode without even questioning it. It feels productive. It feels responsible. It also quietly sucks the life out of you.
The problem is that urgency pushes you into adrenaline. And adrenaline is great … in small, occasional bursts. As a lifestyle choice? Less ideal. You end up running on “just get through it” energy, which works, right up until it really, really doesn’t.
A small but surprisingly effective shift is asking yourself: “is this actually urgent?” Not “does it feel urgent” but is it genuinely time-critical. Because those two things are very different. Even if your brain insists they’re identical.
Energy boundaries are different from emotional ones
I’m the queen when it comes to chatting about boundaries. It’s like I discovered them, 51 years later in my life, and now they are my specialist subject. In fact, it pretty much is that! But most of those conversations are about emotional ones. Protecting your feelings, managing relationships, that sort of thing. Energy boundaries are slightly different. They’re about protecting your capacity.
Because you can technically have the time to do something, but not the energy. You might look at your calendar and think, “Well, I’ve got an hour free,” but your brain is already fried, your sensory load is maxed out, and you’ve made approximately 47,000 decisions already that day. That hour is not usable. It’s like a mirage hour.
This is where one of the most useful sentences you’ll ever learn comes in: “I don’t have capacity for that.” Not followed by your life story. Not turned into something apologetic, or a giant discussion. Just that.
It sounds simple, and it is. It’s also wildly uncomfortable if you’re used to over-explaining, over-justifying, and making sure everyone else is fine first. But it works. Quietly, efficiently, and without wringing out what little energy you had left.
Saying no without it being a 3-part drama
If you’re anything like me, saying no doesn’t just happen. It comes with a full internal production. You draft the explanation, rehearse the tone, anticipate their reaction, and try to make it sound reasonable, valid, and entirely non-offensive to anyone, ever.
The irony being that by the time you’ve finished explaining, you’ve used more energy than the original task would have taken. How’s that for efficiency…or lack of it!
The truth is most of that explanation is for us. It’s working hard to make the discomfort of setting a boundary feel safer. But “no” doesn’t require a backstory. It doesn’t require a breakdown of your week, your mental state, or your entire life context. As Stu taught me once, it’s an entire sentence. And the more you practise it, the less energy you leak trying to make your boundaries palatable for everyone involved. I promise you it starts to feel easier the more you try it on for size. In fact, it’s so incredibly freeing. Because it’s you having your own back.
Not everything is worth the cost anymore
One of the biggest shifts that comes with protecting our energy is realising that just because something is possible, it doesn’t mean it’s sustainable.
We ‘could’ say yes. We ‘could’ take it on. We ‘could’ push through.
But then we could also decide to deep clean our entire house at 11pm on a Tuesday night. Half of my teenage years were spent piling the entire contents of my bedroom floor onto my bed at about 10om, then crying and putting it all back onto the floor. The question is… should we?
Because every “yes” is stealing from a limited resource. And if you’re not consciously deciding where that energy goes, it gets spent by default. Usually on the loudest, most urgent, or most guilt-inducing thing in front of you.
Protecting your energy means getting honest about trade-offs. Letting go of “shoulds”, looking properly at commitments, and actively choosing long-term stability over the short-term approval that we can often crave. Sweet dopamine.
Sometimes that means making decisions that don’t look particularly impressive on paper but feel a lot safer in our body. Which, frankly, should be the only measure that really counts.
Recovery doesn’t protect itself
One of the sneakiest things about energy is how quickly we decide we’re “fine again”.
You have one good day. Maybe two if you’re feeling particularly wild. You wake up, your brain is cooperating, you answer a few emails without wanting to lie down afterwards, and suddenly you’re like, “Right. I’m back. Power Rangers…let’s go!.”
And off you go. Rebooking everything. Saying yes to things. Catching up on the 463 tasks you’ve been avoiding. Possibly reorganising a cupboard for emotional reasons. Fully convinced you’ve turned a corner.
Newsflash. You haven’t turned a corner. You’ve just found the exit of the car park.
Because early recovery energy is not a full tank. It’s not even half a tank. It’s more like your car has stopped making that alarming flashing noise and you’ve gone, “Great, let’s drive to Scotland.” You’re out of the danger zone. That’s it. But you’re not on the home straight yet.
And this is where we accidentally undo all the progress we’ve made. Not because we’re reckless (well, some of us can be!), but because it feels so good to have energy back that we immediately spend it. All of it. In one go. Like a toddler with birthday money.
Then we’re surprised when we crash again.
Protecting your energy at this stage means doing something deeply unnatural: not filling the space. It means leaving gaps. Building buffers. Resisting the urge to “catch up” on everything all at once. Saying no to your old pace, even when your brain is loudly insisting that this time will be different. (It won’t. Your brain is a liar when it’s excited.)
Recovery isn’t just about getting your energy back. It’s about not immediately burning through it the moment it returns.
When boundaries feel like a scratchy jumper (and they will)
Protecting your energy isn’t just practical — it’s deeply inconvenient on an emotional level. Because when you start doing it properly, things come up. Guilt. Fear. That slightly sick feeling that you’ve just disappointed someone. And sometimes actual pushback from people who were very happy with the old version of you. The one that was constantly nodding like their head wasn’t attached properly. Saying yes, staying available, and overextending herself. Funny that.
That doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. It means you’ve stopped being as convenient. And yes, it does feel uncomfortable. Really uncomfortable. Like you’ve put on a jumper that technically fits but is somehow both itchy and judging you.
You’ll be tempted to soften it, to explain more, to just do the thing this once because it’s easier than holding the boundary. But every time you do that, you teach people (and yourself) that your limits are optional. The real work here isn’t setting the boundary. It’s holding it when it would be much easier not to. This is a huge part of my life story, so believe me when I say I get it. But I’m also now boundaries number one fan!
You don’t have to live at the pace of everything around you
The world might not slow down. That’s true. Deeply annoying, but true. But that doesn’t mean you have to speed up to match it, because that’s how you ended up here in the first place. Remember?
Protecting your energy long-term often means your life looks a bit different. Less stuff, more intention. Not churning your output like a sausage factory. Which, depending on your previous operating style, can feel suspiciously like you’re “not doing enough”. But you are. You’re just not doing everything, thank god.
And yes, sometimes it can feel like you’re not keeping up with everyone else. Like you’re dawdling while the rest of the world is power-walking past you in Lycra, with a podcast on 3x speed. But I can promise you this: they’re exhausted too. They’re just better at pretending they’re not.
What you gain instead is something far more useful: stability, sustainability, and the ability to keep going without repeatedly crashing and having to rebuild yourself from scratch every few months. This isn’t about doing less for the sake of it. It’s about doing what actually works for your brain, your body, and your life in the long term.
Because if it only works when your brain’s on fire and your nervous system is halfway out the window, it doesn’t actually work.
After Burnout: What Real Recovery Looks like for NDs
ROLL UP, ROLL UP. THE WILDEST SHOW IN TOWN HAS ARRIVED! YOU’VE GOT A VIP, FRONT ROW SEAT TO SEE CRASH & THE BURNOUT BLUES BAND, featuring songs from their greatest hits album, like “Marshmallow Brain” and who could forget “ANGRY FOR NO DISCERNABLE REASON!” plus that all-time classic “Zero spoons & fucks to give.”
I know, I paint a very rosy picture of the old ND “Burnout”, funtimes, shitz ‘n’ gigz… but until you understand exactly how your energy arrives and how you need to manage it, you will repeat the same pattern of burnout, over and over and over…
Ask me how I know? Yes! ::ding ding ding:: correct answer, I know, because I’ve been there several times, full send to destination fucked (said in “Matt Rose Aussie Guy Voice”).
I’ve been through the fully immersive “Life Hurricane” simulator on several occasions, from humble dust devil, to full on Cat5 Katrina and every time I reflect on how we got here and clearly see all the warning signs. From the first roof tile rattling all the way to “Oh no, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore…” in what seems like a blink of an eye.
But the real kicker is yet to land, when you inevitably crash-n-burn harder than a cut-price electric car using auto-steer, and you are absolutely wiped emotionally, physically, spiritually. You surface, as addicts might identify, with “a moment of clarity” (I know I did), as you realise that it all has to change, everything, what came before was unsustainable. The way you found that out was to Live-Action Role Play* using a strategy that required an ill-advised amount of energy burnt in an unreasonably short time-frame. (*hat tips to the LARPers!)
It’s called BURNout for a reason… You have literally burnt through your entire stock of “coping” and now have to rethink the overall game play, whilst attempting to continue living, earning and remaining sane.
And, as you lie there in that fragile state, where breakfast is a life goal, and “dressed before noon” is about as likely as winning a national lottery every day for a year, you realise a horrible truth.
The burnout is not done with you yet, oh no buster… it’s taken you everything you have, maybe even more than you had, to get here. The real challenge begins once you hit the eye of the storm. This calm center allows you to reflect from a vantage point, and assess the size of the storm, and you realise, whatever the magnitude there’s only one route to recovery… The way back is through the other side…
Staring at a blurred wall of thought and vortex of emotions, you’re not wrong to flinch away. Whatever your route to burnout there’s going to be a fair amount of shame and inward blame stacked up ready for you to process and no-one claps their hands together and exclaims “Goody gum-drops, lets play the blame and shame game!“. Here definitely be dragons, and in fact probably these dragons are mere dragonlets of the massive monstrous demon dragons locked behind the door marked “Childhood”. Those deep, ominous rumbling sounds are the bass-notes echoing through your head. Pulsing as your heart beats, an energy hungry beast that gives your enemies a 2X damage for every one hit and wakes you at 2am. Sweating.
It’s natural to want to shrink away. Your bed is safety, the duvet will protect you from the hooded claw, and, who knows, even keep some vampires from your door. But, that’s a lot to ask of bed linen, even if it is from M&S. Lying, passively and waiting for the pressure to release is not progress, that’s stagnation, rotting away in the depressed, comatose lethargy that burnout brings.
It is such a warm and tempting place to remain, forever at the eye of it all, life moving around you, whatever little routine or safety net you draw around you is “enough”. It is… for now. But do not get stuck there, that way victimhood lies, and that is living hell. A learned helplessness, of being coddled and cossetted. It’s tempting.
But you need to know, and fully accept that no one’s coming to help you.
That was my huge revelation from my first round of therapy, after my first major burnout, when my Dr’s were calling my absolute lethargy “depression”, and my all-gas, no brakes bouts of “mania”, were “Nothing to worry about. Drink less caffeine and get more sleep.” (what a Dr. actually said to me).
Oh, and there’s also the insomnia, yeah, “get more sleep“… good one.
At some point you have to make the effort, it’s you and only you. Not your partner, not your family, kids or friends. YOU.
You have to get yourself “well”, what that looks like is unknowable at this point, just accepting that this is on you is enough. When you have hit rock-bottom and the only way is up** an uphill struggle, right when you are at a point when you have no capacity for creating a rational strategy to make your way back is going to look like the least “do-able” decision.
This is why you have a plan before you go in, creating a disaster recovery plan in the middle of a disaster will give you a grab bag of dumb decisions and half-assed ideas. All the while depleting what little energy you already have. Again, hello, been there, done that. 1 star, do not recommend.
The acceptance of that truth will unlock everything else, being kind to yourself throughout will speed up the recovery. Word of warning, there’s “being kind” i.e. nope-ing the family reunion, or skipping the friend’s brunch and then there’s “slacking off on the road to recovery” with behaviours such as “one more hour of doomscrolling AuDHD memes before bed” and “Like my pants, this shirt will do another three days before it needs washing“.
I find that a strict routine prevents slippage of progress. My plan when I fought back the first time was to regain all I had lost, the focus, the 18 hour days for 12 weeks straight. I was a machine, I just forgot to get an oil change, now I am back I am BACK! No, do not do that – it leads to some very fun prescription narcotics that “mellow you the fuck out” as my mate once said. When you recover, do not build the same bonfire just to burn it all down again…
** Never got why that song got the airtime it did, if the only way is indeed “up”, then you must be at rock-bottom, right? Why then are they so cheerfully singing about it?
My guidance would be; bed by 10pm, up by 6am, or 7am on weekends. Bed has to be made, bed clothes folded. 1pt of water, with pink rock salt (for the sodium and trace iron) and lemon juice (helps regulate bowel!), coffee and breakfast. Then get dressed.
That’s my morning and as long as I am in my office by 10am the morning is won! I am often in by 9am, but even though I am more regulated now than I have ever been, I do not chastise a slow morning, these are the perks of the self-employed life. As long as I am not letting anyone down, I can get in at 10 if I want. A “luxury” I afford myself, which is more a need at times.
I won’t detail my entire routine, but that’s my morning and it is part of keeping my life consistent and regulated. Consistency for me is more; accelerate, then coast, accelerate then coast. I cannot just be foot flat to the floor, that way insanity lies. Plus my routine may not work for you; you find the routine that helps, but I know that too many mornings without this simple strategy and things are going to get blustery and likely be headed towards tornado season.
My crawl back to sanity and return to a new-normal was not easy, and had all sorts of consequences. Lost relationships, changing social connections, finding love. But when I returned to a more regulated life, I was different, slightly less angry, slightly more wary of people. A decade of daily othering, and bullying will do that.
The way back is to re-evaluate what your energy budget will get spent on and accept it
You have to realise you have finite “spoons” and so have to ration how they get used. Arguing over a parking ticket? Yeah, I have done that, was it worth it? Yeah, in the moment, but actually that’s 4 or 5 high energy interactions where you spend your precious energy for little to no positive return to your life. Learning to “let it go” can be hard with an innate sense of right and wrong. Some things are simply “not worth it”, as a spend from the finite energy budget. Here’s a list of things that never made the cut after various burnouts…
- Work – I gave up having a job, seemed the same shit whatever building I went to.
- Energy hoovers – people or situations that zap your mood and cost time & energy.
- Worrying what other people think/say about me – I’m odd, deal with it.
- Meeting other’s expectations – you do you, I’ll continue being my sweet awesome self.
- Quid-pro-quo relationships – yeah, that’s not how the universe works, karma is paid forward and I am not one to argue with the universe.
- No longer policing the world – adding to the karmic flow is the notion that some problems are going to be solved by the universe and I do not have to keep score. See someone weaving in and out of traffic? That’s a situation where the universe will come a-calling sooner or later… Someone being an a-hole? Knock. Knock. Muthafuqur… UNIVERSE CALLING.
- Red rope – the red-rope around my time is sacrosanct, I choose where I spend it, you do not get to jump the queue by waiving money at me. Take a ticket, sit down, be patient. I will get to you in due course.
- Firebreaks – whether I am due a break, or not, I will take days off after an intense project or working for a deadline. Allows my brain the time to transition from the project to new stuff and gives me energy recharge and prep time. I try to take Fridays off, definitely in the afternoon, and if I put in a firebreak then it’ll usually be a Monday and Tuesday, giving a longer weekend, and less impact to any ongoing projects.
If I do not respect these life rules I will burn out.
I know.
I have tried not doing these things.
I have burnouts 2, 3 and 4 to remind me of this. So, by a process of elimination I have curated my life to be as respectful of my time and energy as I can be, and ensure others respect these precious things too. No project, or person is worth my life on hold for months whilst I try and extinguish the flaming rubble my life becomes if I let others trample all over my own rules.
There’s no easy way back, and when you do emerge from the maelstrom and the destruction is apparent and everywhere and it can seem hopeless even trying to pick up and start again. But here’s the thing you have to cling to, you get to build it back the way you want. Fresh start, blank canvas, share your insights with those you love and who wish only good outcomes for you. Tell them what you have to do, or stop doing, if they truly love you , they will not only get it, they will advocate for you too.
Do not be shy about stating what you can and can no longer be expected to do. If you keep the household clean, fed and safe and it feels like a one-person crusade then delegate some of it or accept it will not get done anymore. This is not about alienating your loved ones, and those you live with, but more sharing with them the additional burden of the cognitive load and the overall weight of carrying it for the family. Teenagers and adult children living at home are quite capable of doing a load of washing. If they can work out playing a game on an X Box, they can figure out the right washing machine program.
Harder to do this at work, but if you are valued then you should have a conversation which shares the dangers of you shouldering certain loads. An explanation of burnout and paid time off might help them see the economic sense in making the accommodations?
Or think about job sharing, or adjusting your hours, which you should be legally allowed to do, we are in the UK, check local labour laws where you are before flicking the bird to your boss and saying “two days a week or imma be suing your azz”. Maybe not do that wherever you are employed.
After burnout your life is going to change, your capacity to do and cope may change, your tolerance to certain stimuli or situations may be different, and thousands of other minute but highly personal things may alter, but you have to give yourself permission to accept that these are things you have to let go. BE KIND TO YOURSELF. It’s handy to think “would I talk to my best friend/partner/kids like that?” and chances are you’re in an abusive relationship with your internal monologue.
BE KIND TO YOURSELF!
We’ve argued from Ep 01 that self employment is the perfect role for you if you have variable energy, focus and struggle with all the things that neurodivergent folk deal with on the daily. You get to show up as/when you can, and with the flexibility of letting you do what you can at a time that suits you. It’s not for everyone, but if you have a skill that you can monetise, then self-employment may just be the way out that you need.
A final bit of maths before I sign off.
If you work for the national minimum wage, for over 21s that’s £12.21 (time of writing 22 Feb 2026). A 38 hour week gives you £463.98.
Lets say you work in an office doing basic PA stuff, if you were self employed PA you’d charge a commercial rate of circa £30 an hour, and you only have to work 15.5 hrs to exceed your earnings at the full-time job. Work a 30 hour week and you earn £900, less tax and savings etc. and you will take home more than the PAYE position. With the right clients and projects you’d work 8 hours fewer a week and earn more, delivering at your own pace and timescale. It’s not for everyone, but for the right people, probably burnt out from attempting to scale the corporate ladder, then it could literally save your health and wellbeing.
It worked for me and whilst I still managed to burnout a few more times since the first, and biggest time, at least I didn’t have to explain to my boss why Fridays were “not doable” for the foreseeable future. Or playing the shame game, as you lie there on the sofa, feeling like you are letting everyone down, but unable to move.
With the right approach, right proposition to your local business community and a few local networking meetings you can earn a decent enough income without living a shadow life. Burnt out beyond recognition and probably self-medicating in the evening and twice at weekends. A story for another day I feel…
Be kind to YOURSELF and others.
Sustainable Productivity Hacks for Neurodivergent Entrepreneurs
If you’ve ever Googled “how to be more productive” and ended up rage-eating crisps because some bloke in a navy suit told you to just wake up at 5am and hustle, this one’s for you.
Most traditional productivity advice feels like it was written for robots with no sensory issues, no ADHD paralysis, and an unhealthy love for Excel. For the rest of us — the neurodivergent entrepreneurs with fluctuating focus, executive dysfunction, sensory sensitivities, and a sprinkle of perfectionism — that advice often backfires.
We don’t need more discipline. We need systems that support our brains instead of having a little scrap with them. So with that in mind, here are some sustainable, real-world hacks — designed to help you get things done without burning out, selling your soul, or needing to search on the black market for a new nervous system.
1. Build systems, not routines
Here’s the thing about routines: they rely on willpower, and willpower is like the battery on an old iPhone — fine one minute, dead the next.
Systems, on the other hand, are flexible frameworks. They don’t care if you wake up at 6am or 10:37am; they meet you where your brain is that day.
Instead of “I must write my newsletter every Thursday at 9,” try “when I open my laptop, I’ll spend 15 minutes on content before emails.” Same goal, less guilt.
Imperfect consistency is still progress. In fact, it’s the only kind that lasts. “Good enough” beats “burnt out but technically on schedule” every time.
And if you miss a day? You haven’t failed — you’ve just gathered more data on how your brain actually works. That’s useful intel, not a character flaw.
Quick side-rant about consistency (Someone had to say it!)
People love to bang on about consistency like it’s the holy grail of productivity. “Just show up every day!” they say. Like it’s something that comes naturally to everyone.
But here’s the truth: consistency isn’t about frequency. It’s not about grinding out content or showing up every single day with nothing better than an enthusiastic smile.
Consistency is quality and reliability, not repetition. Turning up with weak, run-of-the-mill content just to tick a box hurts your business. Turning up unexpectedly with quality — something that surprises, delights, and actually offers value — builds trust and interest. It’s that old adage of not speaking unless you have something worth saying (I appreciate the irony of me typing this, given that speaking is my specialist subject!).
Reliably rewarding, high-quality content every two weeks will do more for your business than daily posts that are weaker than a US beer. Consistency isn’t doing more — it’s doing better, at a rhythm you can sustain.
2. Leverage your hyperfocus (without exploding)
Hyperfocus is the neurodivergent equivalent of a superpower — one that comes without an off switch. It can also have a mind of its own, but that’s a topic for another blog. You can build a website, design a course, and reorganise your sock drawer before lunch… but forget to eat, stretch, or blink.
The trick isn’t to stop hyperfocusing — it’s to use it strategically. Save it for deep creative or strategic work, not admin rabbit holes. If you know a task will grab your brain and not let go, plan for it.
Set external reminders: timers, alarms, accountability friends — people who can text “drink water!” without judgement.
Keep a soft landing list: low-effort tasks you can move to when your focus drops off. It helps you transition gently instead of crashing into the burnout wall.
Once a week, reflect. What brought you joy? What wrang you dry? Adjust your workload accordingly — that’s not flakiness, it’s self-preservation.
3. Redefine time management as energy management
If you’ve ever looked at your calendar and thought “who the hell scheduled me for this?”, you’re not alone. Time isn’t the problem — energy is.
Neurodivergent productivity works best when you manage your mental fuel, not your minutes. Try energy-based time blocking instead of hour-by-hour scheduling.
Label your day in blocks like “high focus,” “medium focus,” and “low focus.” Do your hardest work during high focus, admin or email in low focus, and gentle planning during medium focus.
Build micro-recovery moments into your day — stretch, breathe, lie on the floor, eat something that isn’t beige. Create fire breaks between tasks; five-minute buffers to reset your brain before diving into the next thing.
And remember, asynchronous productivity is valid. You don’t have to work when everyone else does. If your best ideas show up at 11pm, so be it. Some of my finest work has been crafted when the rest of society are snoozing! Just make sure you rest when the world’s awake.
4. Design your environment to work with you
Environment design beats self-control every time. The less friction you have between “I should do this” and “I’m doing this,” the easier life gets.
Minimise distractions: use noise-cancelling headphones, reduce visual clutter, or change locations depending on the task. (Some of my best ideas have come whilst working in a cafe — part caffeine, part chaos.)
Create sensory-friendly spaces. Adjust lighting, add soft textures, or use ambient sound that soothes instead of overstimulates.
Body doubling, working alongside someone else, even virtually, can also work wonders. It tricks your brain into accountability without the performance anxiety.
Keep friction low: have shortcuts to your current projects on your desktop or in one easy-access folder. Nothing kills motivation faster than the digital equivalent of rummaging through your handbag for half an hour. Set the stage, and your brain will follow.
5. Use tech as your cognitive sidekick
Tech isn’t cheating, it’s scaffolding. You’re not lazy for using tools that make life easier; you’re building a support team for your executive function.
Use AI tools (like ChatGPT ) for brainstorming, writing drafts, or summarising notes. Set up digital reminders, gentle nudges, and calendar alerts to keep track of what ‘future you’ might forget.
Task visualisation apps like Trello, Notion, or ClickUp let you see your workflow instead of holding it in your head. That’s not an aesthetic choice, it’s cognitive relief.
Keep it simple, though. The goal is to support your brain, not to spend three days colour-coding task boards you’ll never open again. I have whiled away many hours on a Miro board, knowing I will almost certainly never look at it again.
6. Normalise rest, downtime & self-compassion
Repeat after me: rest is not a reward for hard work — it’s preparation for it.
Schedule rest on purpose. That might look like no-meeting days, naps, or sensory breaks. Track your early signs of overwhelm — irritability, procrastination, forgetfulness — and intervene early.
Rest doesn’t have to mean doing nothing; it can mean doing something that restores you. Gardening, gaming, stalking the aisles of TK Maxx without purpose. All valid.
Celebrate progress, not perfection. If you got through the day without crying into your to-do list, that’s a win.
7. Build support systems
Sustainable productivity doesn’t happen in isolation. It happens in community.
Outsource tasks that drain your executive function; bookkeeping, inbox management, or even meal prep if you can. (Tesco delivery counts as self-care, I promise.)
Join neurodivergent entrepreneur networks, accountability groups, or yes — the OddSquad. Find your people. They’ll remind you that you’re not failing; you’re functioning differently.
And when possible, communicate your needs openly with clients or collaborators. “I work best with written instructions” or “I might need a bit of notice for meetings” are not admissions of weakness — they’re signs of self-awareness.
8. Give yourself permission to evolve
Your productivity will change — with seasons, stress, hormones, health, or just because it wants to. That’s not failure; that’s life.
What worked brilliantly in January might crash and burn by May, and that’s okay. Instead of seeing it as inconsistency, think of it as calibration. You’re learning your rhythms, not breaking them.
Check in with yourself regularly. Ask yourself “is this system still serving me, or am I serving it”? If it’s the latter, tweak, adapt, or ditch it entirely.
You’re not meant to be a static machine of efficiency. You’re a human — and humans change. The real productivity hack is accepting that evolution is part of the process.
The big reframe
Productivity isn’t about fitting into a neurotypical mould. It’s about designing a system that fits you. Treat productivity like a living organism; something that evolves as you do. What works this month might not next month, and that’s okay.
Your brain isn’t the barrier; it’s the blueprint. The right systems protect you, your business, and your energy. So next time someone tells you to “just be better organised”, feel free to smile, nod, and ignore them completely. You’re not disorganised — you’re custom-built!.
Now go design the kind of productivity that sustains you — leopard print optional. Unless you’re me, then leopard print is compulsory!