ADHD, Personality and Communication with Kerri Goodman (Season 2, Ep. 12)

In this episode, host Lacy Estelle sits down with guest Kerri Goodman, certified life and ADHD coach/consultant for an enlightening conversation about understanding and embracing our ADHD brains and how can we navigate the challenges it sometimes presents while staying true to ourselves. They discuss the importance of understanding ourselves and adapting our communication approach to effectively connect with others, all without compromising our core identity. 

Lacy and Kerri explore this question by diving into the DISC assessment, a tool that helps identify our natural behavioral styles and communication preferences. Through personal anecdotes and expert insights, they shed light on the journey of self-discovery and share practical strategies for finding peace, patience, and productivity in our daily lives. If you've ever wondered how to overcome the challenges of ADHD while staying true to who you are, join us on this episode as we dive deep into finding harmony between our unique traits and the world around us.

Links & Resources:

About the DISC personality assessment, www.kerrigoodman.com/personality-assessments.html 

Kerri Goodman’s website: www.kerrigoodman.com

Kerri Goodman’s podcast, I Meant To Do That
Free resources from Kerri Goodman:
Core Values Worksheet and Relevant Tips and Strategies
Three Steps to Eliminate Over-thinking and Take Action (worksheet)

Reach out to Lacy at:
Email: podcast@anADDwoman.com
Facebook group: @anADDwoman
Instagram: @anADDwoman
Website: www.anADDwoman.com
Lacy’s Facebook group:
Mothering the Storm Accountability and Support Group 
 
 

Transcript

Lacy Estelle [00:00:00]:
 
 Hey, guys. It's Lacy Estelle with an ADD Woman podcast, and I am so excited to bring you a guest today. Her name is Kerri Goodman. Now, Kerri Goodman ditched perfectionism and people pleasing and embraced living authentically and true freedom in Christ. As a professional life coach and human behavior consultant, she aims to help women like you shift their mindset and build fulfilling life using strategies, routines, and practical steps that complement their strengths, values, and intentions. You can begin by downloading her free guide to uncovering your core values and tune into her own podcast. I meant to do that. Welcome to an ADD Woman podcast. I'm your host, Lacy Estelle. A Christian, a wife, a mother, a fellow ADHD, or a writer, and now a podcaster. This is the podcast where we talk about ADHD from a Christian woman's perspective and everything it intersects with our moods, our work, our relationships. The list is endless. We're going to dig deep into the core of our faith. We're putting our brains under a microscope and measuring ourselves based on the truth of God's word. It's not going to be easy, but I know it will be worth it. So, are you ready to embrace joy, peace, and even some self discipline? Or are you perfectly content with life passing you by while you procrastinate doing the dishes for the 600th time? The truth is, understanding our ADHD brains won't always be comfortable. In fact, I've venture to say the more I know my brain, the more frustrated I can become with it. But there is wisdom in embracing it, and there is joy and peace in molding it to a mind of Christ, not of ourselves. But you have to want it. So, do you do you want more peace, patience, and productivity? If so, you are in the right place. It's awesome to have you on today. Kerri, how are you?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:02:02]:
 
 Hi, Lacy. Thank you. I'm doing great, and I'm so happy to be here with you. Been looking forward to our conversation.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:02:09]:
 
 Me too. I'm really excited. Can you tell us about the specific work you do and why you do it? What got you into it?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:02:18]:
 
 Oh, that's a great question. I started doing coaching back in 2016, and it sort of came out of left field for me. I had been in a difficult time in my life and experienced a lot of growth and transition and transformation. And from that place I discovered, you know, I think that I want to use my skill sets, the things I learned about myself, my strengths, and do that with adults, which was completely never would I have thought that. It would work with adults, especially women. Because that's part of my story is just impostor syndrome, thinking I don't fit in with the adult world. And so for most of my life, I worked with kids and teens and made that shift, and I absolutely love it.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:03:08]:
 
 That's awesome.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:03:09]:
 
 That's awesome.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:03:10]:
 
 Now you told me in previous conversation that we had before we were doing the live podcast, you said you worked primarily with children with learning disabilities, is that correct?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:03:20]:
 
 Sometimes. Well, usually learning disabilities were part of the equation, but basically kids and teens that have a slew of letters after their name with diagnosis. Yes, absolutely. And pretty much all of them had ADHD attached to their paperwork too. And so, yeah, a whole combination.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:03:40]:
 
 Do you feel like your background in that helped you with your transition to working with adults, even though it seemed like it was going to be totally different, do you find yourself still applying some of the same things that you applied with the kids to the adults that you work with?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:03:55]:
 
 Lacy that's a good connection there. Absolutely. And I never would have thought so when I moved from working with teens to adults, I remember being surprised that adults aren't that much different from teens. So, so many of the things that I learned applied, working with them, because a lot of the things that we're struggling with and the obstacles that we face, it's just a continuation, it's just a different setting, different expectations. But a lot of those things just we move forward with life and we just try to push through. And so, yeah, I was surprised by that.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:04:30]:
 
 Yeah, I would believe it because I know that I carried a lot of the emotional weight that I had as a teen. I carried it right into my early twenties, all the way up to my thirties, and it took years of having a mature adult mind to really dispel that. So today we are talking about how ADHD is not your personality type. And I'm so excited for you to talk more about this. I think that you really can help us shed some light into this because I've been talking in previous episodes all about ADHD and shame and ADHD even like, conflict resolution and how we can make the mistake of thinking that our ADHD traits or our ADHD symptoms are who we are, it's not who we are. So can you tell me a little bit more about what you felt about yourself before you were diagnosed, but even before you just started to kind of resonate with some of those behaviors before you even saw a diagnosis?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:05:31]:
 
 Sure. Well, for me, since I was working in the special education arena as well as in other social service areas, I looked at that label as such a negative thing because I would see the limitations that came with it. I'd hear what parents would say when their kids would have that label. And I didn't realize that I had ADHD at the time. I knew that I was something, but I had this belief that, you know what? Most likely, no matter where you're at, you can grow and you can learn things and you can develop skills. It might be hard work but most likely everybody can. And so what I didn't like was the limitations that was put on it. And almost like, this is your personality type. And even once I was diagnosed and moving into well, I self diagnosed myself 15 years ago, so did research and things, and the official diagnosis was a year ago. However, once I moved to in the adult world, too, I just noticed there was still so much of that. But even outside of ADHD, we tend to make judgments about who we are and our personality. And not only ADHD brained people, but all people focus on those weaknesses. And they think, because I am disorganized because which isn't a personality trait, but because I am this, therefore I can't do that, or I lose my temper because of this, or I can't regulate my emotions in this situation. And so there was, I feel like, all of those limitations put on us because of thinking we're this set personality and there's no movement and we're right.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:07:20]:
 
 Right. Yeah. That feeling of being stuck. And now okay. And Kerri, I apologize if I'm putting you on the spot here. I normally would not ask a woman to share her age of diagnosis. Would you mind sharing with my audience? Because I think it's really important. I know a lot of the women that listen to me. They've reached out to me, they've told me their ages, and they're like, I just got diagnosed last year, and I feel like looking back over my life, I feel kind of angry. And I know that I felt that way even at my late diagnosis. But could you also share what age you were diagnosed?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:07:53]:
 
 Sure. I was diagnosed at age 52, and I'm 53, and I know exactly what you're talking about because I've heard those things too, and just that mourning of what could have been. Yeah, I think that that's why it's so crucial to have podcasts like yours and resources out there, because there is hope. And I think it's natural, don't you think, to have that time where you recognize this was hard and it was maybe harder than it needed to be. But most people go through hard things and they don't know things that if they would have known it back then, they would have made different choices or life could have gone a different direction in some way or another. And that looking back, and that regret. It's best not to do that for too long. It doesn't bring anything positive, but I think it's natural to do that.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:08:44]:
 
 It is. Yeah. I think I talked in a few episodes back about how you will go through grief and you'll grieve your ADHD brain just for the sake that once you do have that diagnosis, you feel like, oh, my gosh. Clearly, when I did this and I did that and I did this, and you kind of look back on your life, like, as mistakes. Right? And you just kind of see all those your whole timeline stretched out. Right. And for whatever reason, all the things that stick out to you are this wrong choice or this wrong choice or this choice that was really difficult. And I find that women like us who are Christians who look to Christ the best part about that grieving process is just a constant reminder to yourself and even to the things around you and the choices you made and the people that you may have hurt is that God will still use all of those things in one way, shape or form. He works everything to our good. So even if you're looking back on it and you're like, oh, I wish I would have done something different, or I wish I would have known that this wasn't just my personality, that you can have faith that God will still use it to give himself glory. And that's ultimately what we want him to do with all the things that we do anyways. Right. I want to talk a little bit about how you did mention before how ADHD doesn't look the same in everybody and how personality is impossible to measure. So can you tell me a little bit more about that? And then I also want to hear when you're working with clients about how you do go about helping them to recognize their strengths and their weaknesses and to get unstuck, per se.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:10:25]:
 
 Yeah, and if you don't mind, I just want to back up to your last statement that you said, which was phenomenal. Not only though do we have those mistakes in the ways we hurt people, but because of our unique makeup, we also have those successes and those ways that we blessed people that maybe aren't so evident to us. So one example is some of us have this almost like a radar or this we can pick up that someone else maybe is different. They don't necessarily fit in with how someone could succeed in that element. Meaning, like, for example, working with the kids that I did, I knew how to without even recognizing it at the time. I knew how to connect with them and make them feel valued and important and help draw out their strengths. So often there's that piece oh, absolutely. We don't notice that. And it's a shame factor that I hear that you talk about a lot. All right, so with personality yes. So disc is what I use to help people understand one component of their personality that actually we can get some understanding on and measure. Because personality is so vast, we can't take assessment or a quiz to find out maybe what Hogwarts House we would be in or whatever. All those things that we do for fun, they only tell us so much because our personality is our background, our experiences, our sense of humor, our beliefs, our core values. All of these things together form what we call personality.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:12:05]:
 
 Right?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:12:06]:
 
 And when we look at who we are, often we're considering, especially with ADHD, we're thinking about how do people see us? How am I behaving, how am I communicating? That part of personality we can get some clarity on. And that's the part I think of it as like an iceberg where you have the top of the iceberg is smaller. It's all what you can see and then everything underneath is what I don't know about you, Lacy, and you don't know about me, but we've had a conversation before this. So you've probably picked up some pieces of my personality based on my behavior. Right. So with ADHD, we tend to categorize ourselves as all having those behaviors that are those ADHD traits, right? And so when we see those behaviors, we can tend to think, this is me and I resonate with these behaviors, but it's going to look different for each one of us. And Disk helps us to get clarity on this is how I behave. This is the predictable way that I often behave when different situations come up at work, at home, and how I communicate. And when I work with clients, I help them gain that understanding using an assessment and talking it through and applying it to their real life so that they have that understanding.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:13:35]:
 
 Yeah, I think that is huge because even beyond just doing it at work or along those lines, understanding kind of the why behind some of your choices. I mean, that's kind of the whole premise of my podcast. I know it's a little bit of the premise of your podcast is really just taking a step back, looking at your behaviors, asking yourself, what sort of mind's eye was I using when I did that? I often will say, was I letting my ADHD take the wheel or was I letting Jesus take the wheel? Or was that just an emotional Lacy taking the wheel kind of thing. And when we can dial that back and recognize like, okay, I did this because this happened and that was either in my best interest or maybe that wasn't the right way to communicate with somebody because the other person has a different personality. And that can be so critical in helping us to continue to not just gain recognition in our chosen field, but to help us build self confidence in ourselves. Because oftentimes, like you said, when you have as an ADHD person, we tend to recognize it in somebody else. We can pick it up pretty quickly. And so you almost speak the same language and when you realize as a person who had ADHD most of your life, but it was undiagnosed, there was a lot of times where I felt like, almost like there was a language barrier. Like how come my traits don't match up with who I want to be? How come when I try to convey this idea or this thing, I want to do to somebody else. They don't understand it, or they second guess it, or they don't really see where I'm coming from. And I think that that can be huge in where you say you work with people to help them learn how to communicate better with everybody around them by first understanding themselves, but then also in recognizing how to kind of better understand others. And I can only imagine some of the success stories you have. Can you tell me about any particular story you have either with yourself or with a client that you really felt like when they shared that with you or when you thought about it, you were like, Got it. AHA, I got it. That was it?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:15:54]:
 
 Yeah, sure. Well, I have used this assessment and the process that I use with myself, with my own family, with groups and teams, and with individuals. And I'll say that I do not know one person that didn't think, wow, that was so beneficial and helpful. One client that I'm thinking about right now is she was having a lot of difficulty with her superior. Her superior had some personality traits that were maybe more she said, I'm not diagnosing. She said she's narcissistic. And so there was a lot to work with here here's a point on that too. We can only deal with ourselves, right? We can only communicate and make the behavioral adjustments on our end, and then it's up to the other person and what they do. So with this client going through the disc, understanding her natural traits and her quote, we call it like your natural self. And then there's another graph that describes your adapted self, and we can talk about that more later. But when looking at both of those and considering how she normally would communicate and interact with her boss, she recognized this person's eating me alive. It's just not working yet. This was her natural way. This was her way where she was really operating in her strengths. So what she needed to do was adapt. So she needed to find some ways that she could adapt so that she could communicate more effectively and not have all of this chaos and continual conflict with her boss. However, whenever we are adapting from our natural way, we feel stressed, right? We can only do that for so long. We can adapt. But it's like they talk about the mask that we wear with ADHD because we're trying to fit in. It is exhausting. We tend to even pick up impostor syndrome because we're feeling like we don't even know who we are anymore in that setting after a while. So when you're doing it intentionally and you're thinking it through and you're using your own intentions to do it, it's different than that. Reaction mode not really in control. You don't even know you're adapting. You don't even know what's going on, and suddenly you're feeling very inauthentic. You're feeling like an imposter. You're feeling like you don't have integrity. And integrity is so important to many of us. We really want to be who we are. We don't want to pretend we're someone that we're not. But with disk, it gives you that language so that you can make those adaptions that help you to connect and make that communication. You're not changing who you are. You're in control of it.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:18:48]:
 
 Yeah. And that, I think, is the key point. I remember somebody telling me a long time ago, oh, well, Lacy, you're like a chameleon. Anybody who you become friends with, you just kind of adapt to how they are. And I was like I took it really personal and really frustrated. And I kind of asked myself, like, I got back and I asked myself, why do I do that? Do I do that? Because I don't know who I am. And I think maybe some part of it was that. But I did notice, and I'm curious, did you look over my report? Because I did the disc assessment. Because what I noticed was a lot of my natural reactions were really closely aligned with my adaptive reactions. Is that pretty common or is there usually like a pretty wide gap between both of those?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:19:30]:
 
 Yeah, it really depends. And adapting isn't necessarily wrong. One thing I love about the disc report, it's very neutral. When you get the report, it's going to show you have a tendency, you may have these strengths, you may have these, and then we go through it together. It's very positive experience. But with those two different graphs, sometimes those adaptations and you see yours were very close, often they're not. And it's because I'm working with people who are. I'm under stress, I have a new job, I'm going through transition, all of those things. I'll see those graphs looking different. And it could be because the person is making adaptions because this job is such a wrong fit for them.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:20:17]:
 
 Right.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:20:18]:
 
 And subsequently they're stressed out. It's bleeding into all areas of their life because they're working so hard to try to fit where they don't fit.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:20:28]:
 
 Yeah.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:20:29]:
 
 Other times it is because of a confidence issue or people pleasing or perfectionism or they feel like, I need to be this way because this is the expectation I believe they have. And then it's time to do some mindset work, really dig in, look at perspective, see what is true and what isn't true. And so there's that kind of thing that's going on as well. So it just depends. And then sometimes when someone's in their sweet spot, they're in a good place. Those are more matching up. But they're both you. So it isn't a negative like, oh, this is pretend me. It doesn't necessarily mean that at all. But you'll also notice that the behaviors that we do, they sway a bit and we end up adjusting depending on what's going on. But normally there's the one trait that is high, and it'll be high on both of them. And that's the trait. That the behavior that people see the most in you. Did you notice that you had one?
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:21:26]:
 
 I think I did, and it actually kind of scared me. It was something along the lines of actually, hang on, let me go back to it, because it was something along the lines of leadership. But I noticed that it tended to paint me, and I feel like I'm not this way. Like it said that I can almost be assertive to a fault. And I know that it did tell me this is not a for sure thing. You kind of need to go through it with somebody who understands it and see what's true and what's not true. And I would say that there was a part where it says she has high ego strengths and may be viewed by some as egotistical. I guess I can ask you, and you can be totally honest with me, your first impression, do I seem egotistical?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:22:13]:
 
 So I'm so glad you brought that up. And anybody takes the report, we go through it together. Normally, Lacy, I wouldn't have even sent it to you. You would have gotten it when we do it and go through it together. So in part of the report, it gives you this is how others may perceive you, right? That's not maybe who you are or how you are. Here's the key thing. There are other personality behavioral styles that you interact with all the time. And they would look at someone, you are the high D. So there's four different factors that are measured. We have dominance, influence, steadiness, and compliance. And based on where you're high and where you're low, that helps us to see these are some of the ways that we predictably, behave and communicate. And so with the high D, by the way, people are high D are phenomenal. We could not exist in the world without them. They do have that leadership component. Sometimes someone who maybe is higher in the S, right, or higher in the I may see that decisiveness that you communicate more decisively. Your viewers will have to let you know if they think that you come across as if you know what you're talking about. Some people may see and experience that decisiveness as ego. Doesn't mean you have a high ego, but can adjust and make sure you're like, you know what? I don't want to come across that way. So I might say, what do you think? There's different ways that you can communicate so that you can soften a little bit.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:23:51]:
 
 And that whole scenario that you just said sounds very familiar. If I think of previous relationships that did not work, I feel like I do remember sometimes meeting men, and I find that and a lot of women these days even say this, they feel like in the singles world. That men who are not afraid of a woman who isn't afraid to lead or isn't afraid to just kind of take charge, take control of situations. They feel very put off by that. But at the same time, they crave that. And I will say in previous relationships where before I came to Christ, I can see how not so much my ego, but the way I communicated probably came off very egotistical to mostly you date your opposites, you marry your opposite. So I think I have learned actually, over time that I can come across that way. So that's so interesting that you pointed that out, because I was like, I really don't like that it says that I might be egotistical, but the way that it says it, that makes perfect sense. And I actually have experienced it. So that is so interesting. I did find that a lot of it was correct. I was on just a slope, right? Downhill. So D was high, I was next highest. S was the next highest, and then C was my lowest. And it was very insightful. I was thoroughly impressed. And I'm not one I'm very hesitant with some personality tests and measurements and things along those lines. There's a lot of them that are, I feel like, very tied up in a lot of, like, how do you explain it? Like woo woo sort of stuff.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:25:25]:
 
 Yes. And we won't name those. We don't even use but I don't use any of those. Lacy, I'm with you 100%. I chose an assessment. Not only is Disc very reputable, it's used in corporate all the time, but I also chose the disk provider that puts a ton of time and money into research and development and making sure that their assessments are reliable. And all I know is, from my personal experience working with clients, by the time we go through the report, I will ask them, how accurate is this? We end up going through the report. I've never had anyone who was lower than 95% accuracy. Once we talk through it and they understand the verbiage in the report and we'll make the adjustments, like, this could be true in this situation, but maybe not in this situation. So that's how you make it personalized. And this interaction was a testimony to don't take an assessment and read it for yourself. Make sure that you go through it with another set of eyes. Because, again, what happens is we look through it and we're focused on our weaknesses, and we see it like, that's a weakness either. I don't want that to be me. That's horrible. I look at your report and I'm like, wow, Lacy's pretty amazing. She's pretty amazing. And our reports are very different, even though you might not guess it based on our conversation, we gel pretty good.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:26:49]:
 
 Yeah.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:26:51]:
 
 So they're very different. I'm very low in the D, and so I admire those D traits. I often have to work hard to elevate them when I need those traits so that I can succeed, communicate effectively, get something done that I'm working on.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:27:05]:
 
 Let me ask you this in mind, since my C is low and that's compliance. So my guess is that those might also be the things that deplete me. Is that correct? So kind of like, for instance, I know a lot of women, especially Christian women, and it gets passed around in circles. That whole word submit some of us comes very natural to and others of us it is very difficult to do. What I find too, is it's not even just that compliance like in my marriage, but also just compliance. Even in my faith, trying to surrender the reins of something can be extremely depleting, of not really so much like energy. I can still get through my day, but almost like my mental energy. Would you say that that's true for high DS, low Sneeze?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:27:58]:
 
 These are great questions. We're going to have to have a long conversation afterwards, we'll go through your report. Lacy okay, so let me answer I'm going to try and answer this so that your listeners well, we'll get something out of it too. Is that okay if I absolutely. A little bit. When you're thinking about these four, if you take the disc, there's four things that are measured. The first 1D is looking at how do you tackle the problems and challenges in your life. The C is looking at how are you since we're talking about that low C, the low C is kind of how do you respond to rules and regulations that you don't pick for yourself? Okay. You brought in submission, which we could talk for an hour about that and my belief system on submission and what the word means in the original and all of that. We could have a fun conversation about.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:28:56]:
 
 Another podcast another day.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:28:57]:
 
 Yes, but where is this going to drain? You are the things where you have to be exact. And it's not you're being exact on the things that you're picking, but accounting, filling out things that need to be very precise, that precision responding to, like, this is just how it's done. You're more of a pioneer. This is how it's supposed to be done. I'm going to do it that way. When you are forced to have to do it, you can so we can do any of these. We can adjust all the time. Otherwise we wouldn't be where we are today, right in life. So we all adjust. But what this helps us understand is this isn't your strong suit. This is not where you're going to shine. Do not be an accountant. Do not somewhere where you need to be in working in that precision. But you're going to be working with high seas, I bet you. Coach. I end up coaching a lot of high C's and we work well together. I understand them and we go through disc. We understand the. Language when you are in that realm. Yeah, it's going to be challenging for you. But here's the part we haven't talked about. The disk is the behavior and the communication that you and I, we see, we interacting, we're picking up I'm a super high eye, I'm high, I all day long and I'm super low C. So we have that in common. But what we don't see is the why. And you made mention of that. The why like why do I do what I do? Why am I deciding to do something really difficult that requires me to do some compliance? What is driving me to tolerate that compliance where I know I got to do it, I'm just going to buckle down and get it done and then I'll reward myself with an iced coffee or whatever you do to get through it. That why is the second part to your report that isn't disk and it's called the twelve driving forces. That helps you understand more of those motivators. So that's the thing that you mentioned in my intro that your listeners can get to, not that report, but knowing our values, knowing what are those elements of us that are so important that we can't imagine life without them. And we don't all have those same values. So one thing that we can also get in a conflict with people about isn't just behaviors. You could be with talking with a person and working with someone, have a relationship with someone who you do the disk, they're exactly the same. You should be behaving the same. And then you're like, why I'm so thrown off? Why did you do that? What's going on behind that? And it might be because they have a different value system. And when those values collide, then we can have some issues. For example, I noticed on your twelve driving forces that your driver for harmony is pretty low. And it mentioned that that might be stressful when you are needing to work with someone or be in a situation where harmony is really elevated high. And it's because we can't all have the same values. We can't be driven by everything. There's other drivers that are much stronger for you. I happen to have harmony as one of my highest. Yes. And I'm married to someone whose harmony is very low too.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:32:18]:
 
 Let me ask you this. I don't even know if I got to my driving characteristics. So I'm kind of excited that you touched on that. Just kind of looking at it will succeed in chaotic environments. Yes, I can usually find ways to do that. I do tend to focus a little bit too much. Sometimes I've been told too much information and facts and I will almost disregard feelings altogether. And this can be not so good for my kids who need a soft hand, who need more empathy or more they just need for somebody to allow for them to sit and cry or fuss or complain or whatever. So I'm curious, what does that mean really? And I know that we're short on time, but I guess in the shortest version possible, what does that mean for me to have a low harmony? And whereas you have a high harmony, what would be the difference? I might see with somebody who has a similar personality as mine but has a high harmony, whereas I have very similar personality but I have a low harmony. What would be something that a certain scenario how we would handle it differently based on our Motivators.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:33:29]:
 
 Well, the one thing that stands out and of course everybody still, even as we try to look at this, everyone still is very different. Right? But one way that would stand out is stress. What is going to stress you out? That work. Being able to work in chaos. So I'm a risk taker and you're a risk taker. I need that harmony. I need that emotional oneness with the people around me. I want everybody to be on board. I want everyone to feel like they get what's going on and no one is going to be ruffled. You're going to do a better job of making sure that ask goes through, even if someone gets ruffled. We need that. We need people like that. And so when you have values that are more at the extreme, people will notice, they'll notice it a little bit and then we have values where they're more situational and they're not so extreme. But one thing that tying this back to ADHD is you can see how some of the ADHD traits, like you mentioned, that you can see that in yourself, that you can operate in chaos. There's another person with ADHD that that completely stresses them out. They need to have things in order. But here's the other component to throw in there someone can have conflict with themselves. For example, I need things to be in order so I can think and I can operate. And I feel like things are harmonious. I'm looking at your office, which is very clean. You have a lot going on. Look at my background. I have to have this beautiful ocean theme. I have to have my calm colors and things like that. Right? And you have your resources at your fingertips, I'm assuming, in your environment. And I would like that. But more importantly, I need things to be harmonious. For me, however, I am not an organized person. It's very difficult. So I need to keep it that way. And I'm a high eye, which means I want spontaneity. I don't like routine. I want to drop things in a moment and go off and be like what do I feel like? I feel like beach. Let's do it. I don't care if we're going to eat tonight, whatever, doesn't matter.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:35:51]:
 
 You are explaining to me, just so you know, just pause 2 seconds because this is exactly why me and my mother have so many similar traits. But fight like we don't fight, but I'm like, why would you want to do that?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:36:04]:
 
 Yeah.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:36:04]:
 
 Because I can see it.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:36:07]:
 
 And so you can imagine that sometimes I have that conflict. I have that conflict of needing this and needing and wanting that. My behavior drive is this, but I have this harmony. And so here's the thing. When we understand ourselves, we have more grace for ourselves. We are so hard on ourselves. We are shaming. We carry years, decades, if you have listeners that are 72 decades of feeling like, I'm always messing up. I don't even live up to the expectations. I'm going to throw this in there since you mentioned submission in the church. I don't feel like I fit in with women. Right. And so we have all of that going on, taking the time to truly understand who we are, our strengths, why we do the things we do to as much as we can understand. I mean, some of it's mystery, some of it we're going to be ongoing learning that helps us to have grace, to see ourselves as God sees us. One of the things that I love to just dwell on is that God doesn't love a future version of us. He doesn't love the one person we're going to be after we work ourselves out a little bit and get out your love today.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:37:16]:
 
 Yeah. And yesterday. In all the days that you made the mistakes that you're dwelling on. And this is so timely. I love how God does that, how he matches things up. Because I just talked on a previous episode about I talked about shame and ADHD and then I actually ended up I had enough questions from listeners that they reached back out to me. Can you get more into it? Can you go further with it? And so I did a second episode just recently and I talk about that. I talk about how we have to remind ourselves that Jesus died for us while we were still sinners and that we're going to wrestle with ourselves but also shaming ourselves and living in this constant fear of, oh, I never get it right, or look at me, I just always mess it up and not taking the time. One like you said, to really get to know ourselves, understand our driving forces, understand what we're going to lean towards in any situation, regardless of ADHD, regardless of mental health or whatever, just in general, our nature and our nurture of our upbringing, our environment, all those types of things. Because I resonate with you 100%, where you're in conflict with yourselves. I think that if I had a less cluttered environment that I would be more productive, but I wrestle with myself with the fact that I'm like but if I spend the time doing that, then I'm not spending the time being productive. So I might as well just sit down and get productive. That is something, again, where my mother and I, we differ to where, like you said, mine shows that I can thrive in chaos. And I think it's important to remember that sometimes the people that we've surrounded ourselves with can make us feel like the fact that we can do that is wrong and it's not wrong. And God loves that about us. He built us for those scenarios to be able to thrive, maybe where somebody else falls short. And like you said too, everyone in my house, apart from my preschooler and my infant and my preschooler might have ADHD. We don't know yet. So everybody else in my household has ADHD. And it all comes out in so many different ways. And like you said, where you might have one person who can totally thrive in chaos, I can thrive in chaos. My husband and my bonus daughter, they need silence. And even beyond just silence, they need tranquil silence. So if she is sitting at the table and she's just trying to focus on something that she's doing, either homework or she's drawing, she loves to draw. My middle son, who is a very much sensory seeking child and needs to tap, or he needs to wiggle, or he needs to bounce his leg, or he likes to make a lot of motor movements with his mouth kind of stuff. Oh my gosh, they look next to each other and I can see the steam coming out of her ears. Both ADHD, both struggle with outside sensory issues, but both need something different from their environment to thrive. It's just so funny how you say that, because a lot of people, they'll read their self into the diagnosis of ADHD and instead I really feel like it's just a small glimpse. If you start with ADHD, great, but really take the time to talk to somebody like Kerri, first of all, or to dive in yourself as know what motivates you, what gets you up in the morning. I just joked with my husband yesterday because I said, because I've been doing this thing, I'm not a morning person, or at least I wasn't a morning person, but I wanted to be most of my life. And so now that all of my kids start school really early, I've been forcing myself to get up before them and to get moving quicker. It has been hard, but a lot of it comes down to just looking at my habits and also the things I tell myself. One of the big things they say is part of becoming a morning person or being able to get up earlier is all about what you set yourself up for, your expectation kind of thing. And so at nighttime, a lot of times I'll tell myself like, okay, I'm excited. Tomorrow is going to be a great day, I'm going to be really productive. And then even if things don't happen, a lot of times I wake up in a better mood. My husband and my bonus daughter, they hate mornings, and I don't think that either of them have any real desire to change that. And my husband was thinking about it was his Monday, obviously, after the holiday weekend, and he was like, tomorrow is going to suck. It's just going to suck. And me wanting to fix it all and my personality, and we're similar, but where we're opposite. I was like, got to stop telling yourself that. You just got to tell yourself that. It's going to be a good day. And I'm sure in his mind, he wanted to look at me and just go, shut up. Yeah, just let me complain about it. It doesn't have to always be. And I told him, I'm like, hey, listen, I'm sorry that your wife I referred myself in third person. I'm sorry that your wife is obnoxiously positive. And next time he needs that, he needs to just kind of like, if he tells himself it's going to suck, I think that in his mind, he's like, well, I set the standard so low that it can only go up. Whereas for me, I'm like, no, you got to be intentional. You got to wake up with intention, right? So it's just interesting how the more you learn about yourself, the more you can thrive in any environment. You understand how to communicate with people. You understand how people might view you. That's all just it's so good to have that in your back pocket, that information, so that you can look at everything and you can kind of survey everything and take notice of where you need to adapt. And I want to also say this, too. I love that you talk about how that adaption where as an ADHD person, a lot of us are probably spending a lot of time adapting because I know that the typical school system is not made for the ADHD learner. The cubicle work zone is not usually made for the ADHD learner. It's not stimulating enough. So all of those things can make us feel like something's wrong with us because we don't fit in where we are. But a lot of times it's actually a strength that we are working so hard to adapt to those situations. So I go back and I retell myself. That kind of backhanded compliment I got from somebody about being a chameleon, and I was like, you know what? Maybe I come off that way to people, but really, I tell myself that it's just my way of trying to find some sort of common ground with everybody that I meet and trying to find a way to relate to them so I can talk to them and have conversation. And that's not a bad thing. That's a good thing. Kerri, tell us where my listeners can find you and then also tell us a little bit about you do have something to give them correct?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:44:28]:
 
 I do. Okay, so you can find me@Kerrigoodman.com that's my website where I have my coaching, also my behavioral assessments and things like that. You can find me there. And also my podcast. I meant to do that. I am one month into my podcast, so it's fairly new. So come and listen and give me some love. And then, yes, if you go to my website and you click the free tab, I have freebies there. I have two that really flow well with what we're talking about, and there is for one of them, a podcast episode that goes with it with conflict. So one is understanding your core values. You can do that on your own. I have a wonderful worksheet that you can go through. Also some reflective questions to help you see where this applies and just to get more out of it. Doesn't take long. I like everything simple. My mantra is it needs to be simple. Simple and fast, and you can see how it will help you. Otherwise why bother? That's why I looked at it. The other freebie is when your mind feels like you're just overwhelmed. You don't know how to organize what's going on in your day. I have something for that too. So those are two freebies. I probably will ADD more things, so just always come back and check for more. And if you want to work with me, we can set something up and we can do the assessment Lacy did go through together, do some coaching around it, and it's worth the time for sure.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:45:58]:
 
 Yeah, I would say I think I want to learn even more, so I am super excited about that. And so if you are listening, I encourage you, definitely go check out Kerrigoodman.com, see what she offers right there on her freebies. And thank you for taking the time to listen. Thank you for being on Kerri. I love talking to you. I think we're going to have to do this again and talk about a myriad of a million other things.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:46:22]:
 
 Oh, my gosh.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:46:23]:
 
 Yes.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:46:23]:
 
 We did not cover it all.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:46:27]:
 
 Is there anything else you want to make sure that my audience knows before we wrap it up?
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:46:32]:
 
 I want the audience to know you are not broken. You are who you are, and it's a beautiful thing. However, we might be stressing ourselves out because of the way that we're communicating, the way that we are seeing ourselves, and also the way that the environment that we do have set up for us. We don't want to make it hard. We don't want to be putting ourselves in places where we are constantly having to adapt, because that just stresses us out and it doesn't let our strength shine. So make sure that you're also finding ways to be exactly who you are, just that full out. You awesome.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:47:09]:
 
 Well, thank you again. And thank you, everybody, for listening and definitely go check out. I meant to do that by Kerri Goodman. Her podcast is everywhere you can find.
 
 Kerri Goodman [00:47:20]:
 
 Podcasts. That's great.
 
 Lacy Estelle [00:47:21]:
 
 Thanks again, Kerri. This is the end of this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you gained some insight into your brain and your Bible. I'd love to stay connected with you, so be sure to subscribe to the podcast and drop your email at our website, annadwoman.com so you never miss a new episode. Remember, ADHD isn't who you are, it's how your brain is wired. You are a capable, talented, amazing and beautiful woman. And God loves you and your brain.