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ADHD Jobs

ADHD    Blog    Personal Growth    Time + Energy

The Best Job for Your ADHD Brains is Work You Love

Caren Magill, MA, CPT, RYT & ADHD Life Coach, MA, ACC, AACC, RYT
July 20, 2021

Head's up, there could be affiliate links ahead!


“Do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life”.

Confucius

I don’t love that quote.

It not only goes against everything my parents valued (which was hard work at any cost), but it also creates a sense of failure if your job feels like work. And the truth is, I’ve never met anyone who actually has a job that doesn’t feel like a job. No one.

ADHD Jobs

But for your ADHD brain, there’s some element of necessity to this statement. It’s more like “Do what you love and you won’t feel like your career is a string of misfit opportunities and personal failures”.

ADHD’ers simply can’t function if we can’t focus, and working at jobs that don’t fire up our brains can lead to mental torture, failure or both.

So how do ADHD brains find jobs we love?

Tip #1 = Identify what interests you.

For someone with ADHD that might be 472 different things (<- I can relate), but there are always a few that stand out. Typically, it’s the ideas or subjects that you keep circling back to after a cycle of distraction.

It’s also helpful to understand the intersection where your passions, talents and character strengths align. This is generally where you’re going to find sustained interest, rather than a fleeting flash-in-the-pan obsession (yes, we all have these).

Personally, I have a talent for writing, a passion for content creation and hope and optimism are high on my list of character strengths. All of these culminate into the creation of this website and my coaching practice.

Tip #2 – Think about personal struggles you’ve overcome.

Not only do you have intimate knowledge of how hard the struggle can be, but you have the compassion and confidence of having walked through it. That can be weight loss, trouble learning math, starting a small business, doing taxes or organizing a disorganized home. If you’ve lived that problem and solved it, that’s a good place to look for engaging work helping others do the same.

Tip #3 – Look for opportunities that play to your ADHD strengths, not your weaknesses.

We’re surprisingly good in a crisis because intense situations engage our brains. We’re also great at brainstorming, connecting dots and creative work (like blogging!).

We may or may not be great with keeping time, staying focused on repetitive tasks, being consistent, or organized(<-I suck so badly at this!). So look for careers that aren’t overly dependent on these qualities, unless you’re really good at them!

Jobs for ADHD people

Get to know your ADHD strengths and blindspots

No two ADHD folks are exactly alike. We all have different strengths, weaknesses, interests and curiosities. Getting to know your strengths at work can be super valuable in finding the right work for you. I know that may sound like an obvious step, but often we don’t take the time to truly understand ourselves because we struggle to stay focused on what feels good and what doesn’t.

Our brains are wired to focus on whatever feelings are strongest for us and the reality is, we have a tendency to focus on negative thoughts and memories. This is true for everyone, but especially people with ADHD, when it comes to capturing our attention, bad is stronger than good. In psychology, this is known as the negativity bias and it’s alive and well in all of us.

Because of our negativity bias and our general distractibility, we may not notice when we’re doing work we enjoy or when we receive positive feedback on something we’ve done. That’s why it’s so important to create a practice of daily reflection and make a point to celebrate small wins. Ask yourself at the end of every day – what felt good today? When did I feel most engaged in my work? What felt good to work on today?

Journaling these reflections or using them as prompts for family dinner conversations is a great way to keep these ideas top of mind.

I can’t stress this enough – if you have ADHD, you have to be intentional about looking for your shining moments or they will be lost in the abyss of distracted thoughts. So write them down, reflect on them, and use them as data points for finding your ideal job and best work environment

Resources for Finding Your Strengths

  • Strengths Finder Test (Fee Based)
  • Via Charter Strengths (Free)
  • Kolbe test – (Fee Based)
  • Enneagram Test – (Free)
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About the Author

Caren Magill, MA, CPT, RYT & ADHD Life Coach

Caren is a Certified ADHD Life Coach. She teaches women with ADHD how to harness the best parts of their brain to create a life they love.

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Comments

  1. Mary connors says

    July 18, 2022 at 3:08 pm

    Good morning!! 🌞
    Could you please lead me in the right direction to getting an ADD life coach?? I just turned 60(😳😬🤭🤫😉) and I just can’t go another week feeling scattered and disorganized!! I have to start things on Monday.. exercise plan,meditation,organization ,consistency blah ,blah,blah and it’s Monday and I have already messed up .. I can’t stand these feelings of so much being in my head that I have to get done and ultimately getting nothing done !! So then I justify picking up my
    phone to just “check” something and the next thing you know it will be tomorrow and the cycle starts all over again!! For someone that can not stand wasting time .. that seems to be the thing I do best !! Could you please tell me where I can just start to get out from under these feelings and the way I have been doing things so I can feel like a useful and productive human being?? Thank
    You , mary connors

    Reply
    • Caren Magill, MA, CPT, RYT & ADHD Life Coach says

      July 18, 2022 at 6:04 pm

      Thanks for the comment, Mary. That’s what I do 🙂

      Reply
  2. Anna says

    August 30, 2022 at 5:33 am

    I love this so much! I also love the way you write, it just draws me in, I can tell you enjoy writing! Thanks for the info as well as the tricks and tips to help find a job all us ADHD-ers can actually enjoy and be good at.

    Also I’ve always been interested in blogging but never knew how to start or if I’d even be good at it, what made you want to start?

    Reply
    • Caren Magill, MA, CPT, RYT & ADHD Life Coach says

      September 29, 2022 at 5:03 pm

      Hi Anna, thank you!

      Ive always been drawn to creating content! It’s something I can’t NOT do, if that makes sense 🙂

      Reply

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I'm a fellow ADHDer with a mind that works faster than a quick-dry nail polish. I have figured out how to master my ADHD brain through self-care, intentional productivity and simple lifestyle adjustments and I'm here to help you do the same.

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