PODCAST. Space, Scent, and Systems for ADHD with Stephanie Scheller.

Written By Dave

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How to use neuroscience and smart environment cues to help an ADHD brain focus, work, and thrive.

Stephanie Scheller is a self-described nerd who studies the brain and designs business events around what helps ADHD brains learn and remember. In this conversation, we dig into practical ways to shape your space, your routines, and even your senses so work feels lighter and focus lasts longer.

ADHD by Design

From personal need to professional craft
Stephanie fell into ADHD research to manage her own brain. She then rebuilt her events company, Grow Disrupt, around the science. Lighting, food, scent, room layout, and agendas are all chosen to reduce friction and increase retention.

Networking without the icky
We compare notes on relationship-first networking (read New Business Networking), LinkedIn’s shifting rules, and why you should not build your whole network on platforms you do not own. Export your contacts, keep notes, and back up your lists regularly.

Habit stacking that actually sticks
Tie a new behavior to something you already do with similar effort. Visual cues matter. Moving sticky notes, a cup placed in your path, or a printout you must physically handle can turn intentions into actions. More about habits with Rob Hatch.

Gamifying movement
Tiny rewards help. Stephanie loves The Conqueror challenge medals for walking. Dave shares why an old-school Time Timer and our free Pomodoro web tool can be enough to re-spark urgency.

Designing a brain-friendly workspace
Start with ergonomics. Bad chairs, screens at the wrong height, and awkward mice burn cognitive fuel. Clear the visual noise with a weekly “clutter basket.” Then adjust lighting to be indirect and warm, and diffuse harsh shadows so your brain stops flinching at every contrast shift.

The secret lever: scent
Citrus and herb notes, like orange and rosemary, can cue focus when used consistently. One scent for work, another for shutdown, trains your brain to shift modes faster. At events, Grow Disrupt even sends attendees home with the “work” scent to recall learning.

When novelty fades
ADHD loves new. When a system stops working, celebrate that it worked, then swap one element. Change pen color, move the reminder, pick a new walking route, or ask AI or a friend for variations that bring back interest.

Practical takeaways

  • Do a quick ergonomics audit. Raise screens to eye level, try a vertical mouse, and give your feet and hips better support.

  • Create a weekly reset. Toss desk clutter into one bin you sort later, so today’s brain has more RAM.

  • Diffuse your light. Aim lamps at walls, avoid intense overheads, and reduce flicker and buzz.

  • Pick one “work scent.” Use it only during focus blocks to condition your brain.

  • Stack small with small. Pair five squats with walking upstairs, or refilling your water with any trip to the kitchen.

  • Back up what you do not own. Export LinkedIn contacts and your newsletter list on a regular cadence.

  • Make urgency visible. A physical timer or a simple Pomodoro can keep you out of rabbit holes.

Links and shout-outs

Join the conversation

  • [00:00.000 --> 00:05.200] I'm a nerd who studies the brain, um, particularly the ADHD

    [00:05.200 --> 00:07.760] brain, which I fell into trying to figure out how to, you know,

    [00:07.760 --> 00:12.720] manage my own ADHD. Uh, and then I figure, like, I look at all

    [00:12.720 --> 00:14.720] these academic studies, and I figure out, how do I use this

    [00:14.720 --> 00:17.760] information in real life? And we use that information to

    [00:17.760 --> 00:20.880] produce events. So we produce like grow your business, personal

    [00:20.880 --> 00:25.200] growth conferences for small business owners. Um, but we, we

    [00:25.200 --> 00:28.320] build them based on the neuroscience, the ADHD brains, everything

    [00:28.320 --> 00:30.560] from like the lighting to the food we serve, the way the

    [00:30.560 --> 00:35.440] agendas are architected together. Um, we have custom sense and

    [00:35.440 --> 00:40.320] custom coffee blends and custom music all built around studies

    [00:40.320 --> 00:43.120] that have been done so that people can stay focused. They can

    [00:43.120 --> 00:47.200] remember what they learned about. And that is at the high

    [00:47.200 --> 00:50.880] level nutshell. Yeah, that's awesome. That's awesome. So when,

    [00:50.880 --> 00:56.560] when did you discover you have ADHD? Okay, so that's kind of a

    [00:56.560 --> 01:00.880] two-part story because, um, I was in my mid 20s. I'd started a

    [01:00.880 --> 01:04.640] sales training business and I was doing very well with it. And I had a

    [01:04.640 --> 01:08.400] a friend in one of my networking groups that we went out for coffee

    [01:08.400 --> 01:13.120] and her whole business was like, um, helping people get their

    [01:13.120 --> 01:18.080] diagnoses and, and I joked at this coffee. I was like, yeah, you know, I

    [01:18.080 --> 01:20.320] should probably have you like testing for ADHD because I've always

    [01:20.320 --> 01:24.880] wondered. And she'll spit out her coffee laughing. And she goes

    [01:24.880 --> 01:29.760] definitely. I have been watching you. I don't need a test. You

    [01:29.760 --> 01:35.680] are the tests. Right. And I was like, oh, yeah, yeah.

    [01:35.680 --> 01:40.720] What do I do with this? But the problem with for me at that time was,

    [01:40.720 --> 01:48.720] I, I graduated Sima Kimwade from, you know, my very small university.

    [01:48.720 --> 01:52.960] Um, I held down jobs all the way through college. I was a top performer

    [01:52.960 --> 01:56.240] when I got my first official job. I then started and built a business

    [01:56.240 --> 01:59.520] from scratch in five months to replace my full-time income.

    [01:59.520 --> 02:01.920] I was running one of the largest sales training practices in the

    [02:01.920 --> 02:03.920] central. Like I had all these things and so I'm kind of spitting

    [02:03.920 --> 02:10.000] there. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, cool. Great to have that. Um, and I

    [02:10.000 --> 02:15.360] didn't really put any thought into it. Really until 2021, um, because

    [02:15.360 --> 02:21.040] 2020, um, our event business, we'd shifted and the event

    [02:21.040 --> 02:24.160] business was really starting to get legs in like January of 2020, which

    [02:24.160 --> 02:28.880] was a really great time to be an event producer. Um, as a speaker, I

    [02:28.880 --> 02:33.360] understand that too. Yeah. Uh, it was awesome. But then at the

    [02:33.360 --> 02:37.120] end of 2020, we had doubled in size. And so in 2021, I was like, I

    [02:37.120 --> 02:40.480] got a short hair. What did we do? Because not only were we still selling

    [02:40.480 --> 02:43.920] tickets, which was definitely a marketing thing. But like we had people

    [02:43.920 --> 02:47.040] actually showing up to events when they were scared to leave the house.

    [02:47.040 --> 02:50.960] And so I'm trying to figure out what did we do? What was it that was so

    [02:51.440 --> 02:57.200] special for people that they would show up to an event when they were like

    [02:57.200 --> 03:02.000] in this phase? And what happened, and I was actually laughing looking at some

    [03:02.000 --> 03:05.120] of your stuff, um, because you posted a video, and this was a little while

    [03:05.120 --> 03:09.760] or an article about the misinformation on TikTok. Um, that was what sparked

    [03:09.760 --> 03:13.120] me to actually start realizing that some of the stuff that I do,

    [03:13.120 --> 03:16.080] like I would see these videos and be like, I didn't realize that was because

    [03:16.080 --> 03:19.920] my ADHD. And now I realize not all of that is because of my ADHD. But it's

    [03:19.920 --> 03:24.560] not free to be like, wait a second. So I do a ton of habit stacking.

    [03:24.560 --> 03:27.120] If I want to establish a new habit, I used to have it stacking because it

    [03:27.120 --> 03:31.600] ties it to something existing habit. Um, I use visual memory,

    [03:31.600 --> 03:33.520] usual visual reminders and all these things. And also,

    [03:33.520 --> 03:36.800] then I started realizing I built most of my life around the

    [03:36.800 --> 03:41.120] ADHD. Yes. And then all of a sudden I started realizing

    [03:41.120 --> 03:45.200] I built our events around my ADHD too. And so it was kind of this,

    [03:45.200 --> 03:49.040] oh, if I did this by accident, what could I do on purpose? And so that was

    [03:49.120 --> 03:52.800] where that was where I felt like completely down the rabbit hole. And I

    [03:52.800 --> 03:58.240] started reading like academic textbooks on how the brain works. And like

    [03:58.240 --> 04:03.360] does actually understand neuroscience and the ADHD. And and that's where it got

    [04:03.360 --> 04:06.960] really out of control. So when you had the events in 2020,

    [04:06.960 --> 04:12.000] what month would that event? So we had one event in January. That was like the

    [04:12.000 --> 04:16.400] one that we were like, oh my god, it's taking off. We're great. Yeah. Um,

    [04:16.400 --> 04:20.560] and then we had another one in in May. Okay. That again,

    [04:21.840 --> 04:25.520] people were showing up for. Yeah. Um, we had another one in September.

    [04:26.560 --> 04:30.320] And what was really interesting, and then we had another one in January 2021,

    [04:30.320 --> 04:33.520] that again, like what was interesting was that we,

    [04:33.520 --> 04:38.960] we hadn't started selling out our events until the September event

    [04:38.960 --> 04:42.560] sold out. And then the January event sold out. And again,

    [04:42.560 --> 04:46.560] I'm just sitting here going like. Yeah.

    [04:47.600 --> 04:51.360] What? So a lot less competition in the event space during that.

    [04:51.360 --> 04:56.880] There was definitely that, which was kind of nice. Um, where are you based, by the way?

    [04:56.880 --> 05:01.680] I'm I'm based out of central Texas. Our events, some of them were in central

    [05:01.680 --> 05:05.440] Texas. And then especially at that time, we were, you know, picking states that

    [05:05.440 --> 05:12.000] were allowing collections and people to collect. Um, but like we have events that we do

    [05:12.000 --> 05:17.600] all over the US, depending on, um, which event it is. So were you worried at the time?

    [05:17.600 --> 05:22.240] Because of the pandemic of bringing people together in person, like still,

    [05:23.440 --> 05:28.880] was there was our concern there? I mean, I was pretty early. So it was early, but

    [05:28.880 --> 05:32.640] there. So what was interesting, and this was part of what we started to figure out,

    [05:32.640 --> 05:36.000] a lot of the stuff that we did for like my own edification,

    [05:36.640 --> 05:40.480] was all of like the best practices stuff. So like whenever we book a venue,

    [05:40.480 --> 05:47.360] it has to be able to hold at least, uh, at least double our expected attendance.

    [05:47.360 --> 05:52.080] Because I really hate going to those events where like you're sitting there, and I didn't

    [05:52.080 --> 05:55.200] realize like, but it's all that sensory stimuli you're sitting there and you're trying like

    [05:55.200 --> 05:58.560] you're uncomfortable, but you're trying to pay attention. But like you're really uncomfortable

    [05:58.560 --> 06:02.080] as you're trying to take notes. And so like I never wanted that. So we always made sure we had

    [06:02.080 --> 06:07.680] tons of room. Um, we always made sure we had a garden that we like practically shove people

    [06:07.680 --> 06:12.160] out the doors into on the brakes. Yeah. Because getting room greenery receptor brains,

    [06:12.160 --> 06:18.000] they retain more information. Um, we already had air filters in the room at our events because

    [06:18.640 --> 06:25.520] I didn't like the smells after one. Right. So we had so many pieces. We still had to do a bunch

    [06:25.520 --> 06:30.000] of stuff. We still had to build out like a, a manual. But we had a lot of pieces that like

    [06:31.440 --> 06:35.520] we'd already been doing a ton of this stuff just because that was what I wanted. And so yeah,

    [06:36.160 --> 06:40.320] yeah. So I saw some of the videos and stuff of obviously not during that time, but like some

    [06:40.320 --> 06:44.960] of the videos of some of your events and things. And yeah, I mean, they are they are very collaborative

    [06:44.960 --> 06:49.120] and and you're kind of working together in groups and things. So yeah, I can imagine it must have

    [06:49.120 --> 06:55.200] been challenging. So having to like separate people, you know, so that they, okay, from across the

    [06:55.200 --> 07:04.480] room, like how can we yeah, or whatever we definitely got some pushback on mask from people.

    [07:05.920 --> 07:12.240] Pushback for or against masks like for people. Yeah, I guess, yeah, I guess there's all types.

    [07:12.240 --> 07:14.880] Well, and then of course, you have the people who don't wear the masks. They're like, well,

    [07:14.880 --> 07:17.600] you know, just put all the people who don't wear masks in one side of the room and the people

    [07:17.600 --> 07:24.400] who do and I was like, that's not works. Yeah, right, right. Yeah. But we, we did pay for COVID

    [07:24.400 --> 07:28.160] testing. So before you were allowed to walk into any of our venues, you had to undergo a test.

    [07:28.160 --> 07:32.000] Of course, then you would take the test. We would serve breakfast out in the gardens so that you

    [07:32.000 --> 07:37.120] had 30 minutes for the test to go through and like there was, there was stuff that we did that,

    [07:37.120 --> 07:41.360] you know, like I said, we stopped serving the phase. So there was never a buffet. It was always

    [07:41.360 --> 07:46.960] plated meals. Yeah. We had someone manning the drink stations. So you'd be like, I want some coffee

    [07:46.960 --> 07:50.480] and then she would work the coffee thing. Yeah. So there was like all kinds of stuff that we,

    [07:51.120 --> 07:57.520] yeah, we said we had to do, but we were positioned in a way that most of us were not. Yeah,

    [07:57.520 --> 08:02.960] that's amazing. That's that's fantastic that yeah, that it's grown like that. You talk earlier

    [08:02.960 --> 08:08.560] about, you know, your diagnosis, but you were in a networking group and you were speaking to

    [08:08.560 --> 08:16.160] somebody who I assume worked in that space or, you know, tell me a little bit about that. So

    [08:16.160 --> 08:23.440] you're, you said you were 22. I think you said when you started, I know, 25. Okay, so yeah,

    [08:23.440 --> 08:28.000] I'm just curious, like, like tell me a little bit about the networking aspect of things,

    [08:28.000 --> 08:36.480] like this networking group you're a part of and what was that? Yeah. So it was a fairly well-known

    [08:36.480 --> 08:41.520] group, but be an eye group. Okay. And so you, every, every Wednesday, I was the education coordinator

    [08:41.520 --> 08:46.880] for the event. So I would get up every Wednesday and I would do this short training on education

    [08:46.880 --> 08:51.440] and how to network better, how to, and so like that was the stuff she started pointing to. She was

    [08:51.440 --> 08:56.480] like, I watch how you run the education sessions every two months, every week. I watch how you

    [08:56.480 --> 09:02.000] sit at the table every week. I watch if she started giving me all these lists of things. So we showed

    [09:02.000 --> 09:06.560] up everyone's day for these and then you went and you did one-on-ones and I think her and I had been

    [09:06.560 --> 09:11.120] three or four one-on-ones at that point just because I was fascinated by what she did and I was like,

    [09:11.120 --> 09:16.560] this is so cool and seriously thinking I should get a test because I was curious and

    [09:17.200 --> 09:24.320] and that apparently, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. Now part of the reason why I asked that too is

    [09:24.320 --> 09:28.720] I wrote a book called New Business Networking. So networking is something near and dear to my heart

    [09:30.320 --> 09:38.480] in an area that that I love always with the emphasis on non-ickey networking, right? Like non,

    [09:38.480 --> 09:44.880] like networking, like how do I, my publisher helped me, you know, I was very green as an author.

    [09:44.880 --> 09:50.000] I'd never, I've written a million blog posts in newsletters but never a book and so my publisher

    [09:50.000 --> 09:55.520] kind of got in me on stuff. Some for good and some not as good, but like the title New Business

    [09:55.520 --> 10:02.080] Networking wasn't quite as sexy as something I would have liked and my website at the time and

    [10:02.080 --> 10:06.240] and some of the training I was doing and I still have a keynote presentation I do called

    [10:06.240 --> 10:13.520] networking for nice people. And so yeah, so like I would, I started, you know, a lot of, I wrote a

    [10:13.520 --> 10:18.160] lot around networking topics and things. I'm always, I'm always interested in that because I think

    [10:18.160 --> 10:26.240] there's so much value in connecting, especially these days too, connecting in person and meeting up

    [10:26.240 --> 10:30.320] and finding, you know, not being the smartest person in the room so you can learn from others,

    [10:30.320 --> 10:36.080] but still finding ways to always call it kind of planting seeds, right? Finding ways to serve others

    [10:36.080 --> 10:41.120] in your network first and foremost and and introductions or advice or whatever it may be.

    [10:42.080 --> 10:47.600] I, yeah, I've worked really hard. I don't tend to attend as many networking events anymore,

    [10:47.600 --> 10:52.400] especially as I've started to realize more of like what are the masking pieces that really drain

    [10:52.400 --> 10:56.400] me and I don't. And so, but I do a lot of like work to do just networking through LinkedIn and

    [10:56.400 --> 11:01.920] connecting with people and I always go in very clear. And when I do go to a networking event,

    [11:01.920 --> 11:05.520] I always use the same thing. I'm like, I'm not here to sell and I'm not here to be sold. I'm here

    [11:05.600 --> 11:11.600] to connect. Yeah. If I can help you either through something I do or through connecting you to

    [11:11.600 --> 11:16.160] someone, I would love to focus on that first. I don't even have a guy who was like, well, I would love

    [11:16.160 --> 11:20.720] to meet with you, but can we meet with an eye on sending each other referrals? I was like, no. Yeah.

    [11:20.720 --> 11:25.680] Because here's the deal. If I don't like, and that was nicer about this, the best. Yeah,

    [11:25.680 --> 11:28.640] I was basically like, I don't know you and I don't like you. I'm not going to promise this end

    [11:29.600 --> 11:37.120] No, of course not. Yeah. Yeah. I've been on LinkedIn now, I guess probably since the very

    [11:37.120 --> 11:41.120] early days, because I was kind of an early adopter in a lot of tech stuff. So I've been on LinkedIn

    [11:41.120 --> 11:45.440] probably. I think I know I passed 12 years, but it's probably like more like 14 at this point.

    [11:47.040 --> 11:51.200] And early on, it was the early days of social. So I would just accept connection requests just as

    [11:51.200 --> 11:58.400] I would accept following on Twitter and follow back and then learn that like, you know,

    [11:58.480 --> 12:05.120] it's quality over quantity. Yeah. And one of the best ways people can use LinkedIn is to,

    [12:05.120 --> 12:08.560] and I was like a keynote speaker for LinkedIn for one of their conferences, right?

    [12:09.040 --> 12:14.320] And I have a chapter of my book about using LinkedIn. So like, I love LinkedIn to an extent.

    [12:14.320 --> 12:20.640] They should be paying me at this point, but whatever. Google did. Google actually did. They hired me

    [12:20.640 --> 12:29.840] for the last six years, but but with LinkedIn. Yeah, I find that and they've screwed something,

    [12:29.840 --> 12:34.560] they've screwed a few things up. They've screwed one major thing up, which is I've always been,

    [12:35.760 --> 12:39.840] I've always said that when you send a connection request, always include a personal note.

    [12:41.680 --> 12:45.680] And say, you know, hey, Steph, it was great meeting you at conference,

    [12:45.680 --> 12:49.360] acts are the B and I event or whatever, you know, I'd love to follow up the connecting and have

    [12:49.360 --> 12:55.440] coffee. And you send a personal note because otherwise, you may not remember that person.

    [12:55.440 --> 12:59.680] And this is my case. So if somebody sends me a connect request and I don't know who they are,

    [13:00.640 --> 13:06.800] I have a system, a process for that, but typically I don't accept the connection requests right away,

    [13:06.800 --> 13:14.000] at least. And and now they've screwed it up where you can only do three a month with a personal note,

    [13:14.000 --> 13:20.800] unless you're paying for LinkedIn. And it's really a shame because now, you know, the more people

    [13:20.800 --> 13:28.160] you accept as connection connections and people that you don't necessarily know, the more it affects

    [13:28.160 --> 13:33.600] the quality of your network because for me personally, at this point, because I know most people

    [13:33.600 --> 13:37.600] that I'm connected with on LinkedIn to some extent, if you reached out to me and you said, hey,

    [13:37.600 --> 13:41.600] Dave, you know, now we're connected on a LinkedIn, you reach out to me and you say, hey, Dave,

    [13:41.600 --> 13:46.320] I see you're connected to so and so a company X. And I'm looking for an in there. I would love to

    [13:46.320 --> 13:50.480] connect with that person. Would you mind providing an introduction? I'm happy to do that.

    [13:51.680 --> 13:55.840] Right. But if you say, hey, can you connect me? I'm like, I can't because I really don't know

    [13:55.840 --> 14:04.400] this person at all. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They've definitely made a very big push. And I know this,

    [14:04.400 --> 14:09.120] this, you know, real podcast will come out a little after we record it. But at least as of time

    [14:09.120 --> 14:14.640] of recording, I would say in the past like four months, there's been a very big push towards

    [14:14.640 --> 14:19.520] getting people to pay for LinkedIn. And they're taking away a lot of the stuff that

    [14:21.600 --> 14:27.680] that was really helpful to it. I do still really love LinkedIn. But like, you know, and

    [14:27.680 --> 14:36.160] both I pay for the premium because I want to be able to, when I send a connection request,

    [14:36.160 --> 14:40.640] you know, I get people who who connect with me all the time from events, right? I spoke at

    [14:40.640 --> 14:44.320] this event. And so I know this person was like, oh, my God, I want to connect that. I want to be

    [14:44.320 --> 14:50.400] able to note that because when I go in the chat with someone, I don't want to have to sit there

    [14:50.400 --> 14:54.640] and, you know, try and figure out and let me go check with CRM real quick and see if I put

    [14:54.640 --> 15:01.280] any notes in here. And like, that's how many steps. So yeah, I don't love that. I don't love the

    [15:01.280 --> 15:04.560] boosting posts thing that they've added for the first. There's a lot of things that I'm like,

    [15:04.960 --> 15:13.040] you know, I think the organic reach of a Facebook page now is like 1.6%. So like, if you post

    [15:13.040 --> 15:19.040] something on a Facebook page, only 1.6% of the people that are following or like that page

    [15:20.240 --> 15:25.040] will even see that organically. So without boosting it or paying for it, that's last I heard.

    [15:25.040 --> 15:31.360] It might be better or worse now. I don't know. But yeah, it's a shame. But it's also a reason why I've

    [15:31.360 --> 15:36.400] always been a sheet like this is something I've preached since since the very beginning, which is

    [15:36.400 --> 15:42.800] due and I learned the hard way is don't build your network on on borrowed land on land that you

    [15:42.800 --> 15:51.520] don't own, right? Yeah. Because if you do and something happens, it's gone. And what happened to

    [15:51.520 --> 16:00.240] me in 07 on Twitter, oh, eight, I was on, I started it in 07. Now I wouldn't recommend Twitter

    [16:00.240 --> 16:07.680] to my worst enemy, but that's a different story. I was on Twitter and I had all these friends,

    [16:07.680 --> 16:12.160] people that I would correspond with regularly who I didn't even know their real names in some cases

    [16:12.160 --> 16:17.520] because they had like some random name as their Twitter profile. And one Friday, I went to

    [16:17.520 --> 16:21.440] log in to Twitter and it's of your account has been suspended due to a suspicious activity.

    [16:22.720 --> 16:28.880] And I wasn't doing anything sneaky. And it was obviously a mistake. And it took me several days

    [16:28.880 --> 16:34.080] luckily of using other platforms at the time like Jai Ku and Plurk and all these other competitors

    [16:34.080 --> 16:39.120] of Twitter that are long gone. So reach out to my network there to say, hey, who do we know at

    [16:39.120 --> 16:45.040] Twitter? We need to figure this out because I need to get my access back. Yep. And I used the

    [16:45.040 --> 16:52.560] analogy of like quite dated analogy. So I apologize to the younger listener, but of somebody breaking

    [16:52.560 --> 16:57.840] in your house and stealing your address book or your, your roll it X, right? Like, suddenly you don't

    [16:57.840 --> 17:05.280] have any, you can't contact these people anymore. Yeah. And so, so I would always, you know,

    [17:05.280 --> 17:09.920] probably with the premium LinkedIn, I would imagine you can probably back it up. I would hope

    [17:10.560 --> 17:16.000] including those notes that you're taking on people. And I would encourage you and anyone else to

    [17:16.000 --> 17:22.640] make sure to back up your listener, your, your connections, you know, once a month or once every

    [17:22.640 --> 17:28.400] couple of weeks, just in case because LinkedIn could go down. They could think, well, you're suspended

    [17:28.400 --> 17:33.600] for no reason, even as a premium user. Yeah. Like, yeah. Like, there's, there's, there's,

    [17:34.400 --> 17:38.880] and one of the things that I was especially like, you know, for the, you speak into it to the ADHD

    [17:38.960 --> 17:42.640] side, right? Whenever we start thinking about adding in layers of complexity, like, okay, I got to

    [17:42.640 --> 17:46.320] start back into my stuff all the time. Even if you only back it up once a quarter, because that's

    [17:46.320 --> 17:51.040] when you can remember to do it. Like, even that's better than never doing it, because it's going,

    [17:51.040 --> 17:55.680] like, and I always recommend, like, as you're talking, all I keep thinking about is like, all the

    [17:55.680 --> 18:00.560] people who've been freaking out about losing TikTok over the past, like, you know, year at this point,

    [18:00.560 --> 18:04.480] we're like, oh my god, like my whole business revolves around TikTok. I'm like, then you don't

    [18:04.560 --> 18:09.840] have a business. Like, you're, you kind of do, but like, you were really unstable business.

    [18:09.840 --> 18:13.920] None of your stuff should rely on a single platform, especially something you don't own.

    [18:13.920 --> 18:18.080] I had to learn the hard way, even in your mailing list, you should be downloading and backing

    [18:18.080 --> 18:24.080] that up every so often as well, because we had an issue with a very popular emailing campaign,

    [18:24.080 --> 18:29.280] where they just started deleting my contacts. They couldn't figure out why I couldn't figure it out.

    [18:29.360 --> 18:34.960] Oh my god. Oh my god. I'm not joking. I lost almost 800 contacts.

    [18:36.480 --> 18:45.520] That's very, very angry. And so, yeah, like, everything, even even if you can only do it

    [18:45.520 --> 18:49.600] every so often, like, that is still going to be better. Yeah. And you mentioned earlier, a couple

    [18:49.600 --> 18:55.920] things, one about setting reminders, and that's something I live and die by. So I'm constantly,

    [18:55.920 --> 19:02.400] you know, talking to whomever app I use to set reminders as I think of them at certain

    [19:02.400 --> 19:08.320] dates. So you can easily set a reminder once a month or once a quarter, as you said, or whenever

    [19:09.520 --> 19:14.960] to back up and download. Like, I do it every month. My sub-stack newsletter subscribers.

    [19:14.960 --> 19:21.040] Yeah. Awesome. I always export that list so that I have that email list. It's also like,

    [19:21.040 --> 19:27.040] it password protected so that it doesn't get stolen or anything because I'm very careful with privacy

    [19:27.040 --> 19:33.280] and people's contact information. But you mentioned something else, habit stacking.

    [19:34.080 --> 19:40.480] I'd love for you to explain what that is for folks, because I think that is something that can

    [19:40.480 --> 19:45.840] really be helpful and maybe to me as well. And I'm familiar with it, but, you know, we need to

    [19:45.840 --> 19:51.200] practice what we preach sometimes. So I would love a refresher and for folks who are unfamiliar.

    [19:51.200 --> 19:55.440] Our unfamiliar. The other thing I always help people every single time, I talk to someone,

    [19:55.440 --> 20:00.000] I always tell people, remember that your experience at ADHD is your experience. Like, everyone has a

    [20:00.000 --> 20:04.720] different lived experience based on your background, based on, you know, your the extent of how far,

    [20:04.720 --> 20:09.840] and if you have coexisting, you know, diagnoses. So what I always encourage people to remember is

    [20:09.840 --> 20:15.440] one, habit stacking has been a game changer lifesaver for me. But just because I don't walk out

    [20:15.440 --> 20:20.960] through how I do it, but like, I recommend trying it. And if you need to tweak it to find the way

    [20:20.960 --> 20:25.040] it works for you, tweak it to find the way it works for you. And if you try it a few times and it's

    [20:25.040 --> 20:28.800] not working, don't beat yourself up over it because everyone's going to have different things they

    [20:28.800 --> 20:33.840] respond to. So all that said, habit stacking is the idea that if you have a new habit you want to

    [20:33.840 --> 20:39.040] create, you tie it to an existing habit. So we all have existing habits, some things that we do

    [20:39.040 --> 20:44.560] that we've gotten on autopilot almost or that we like brushing our teeth. Most of us,

    [20:45.360 --> 20:50.160] most of us don't need a reminder to brush our teeth in the morning. A lot of times it's because

    [20:50.160 --> 20:55.600] it's tied to something else that we've turned into a habit, right? So the idea of habit stacking is

    [20:55.600 --> 21:01.200] that if you have a habit that exists, then tie a new habit to that. Now the caveat I always give

    [21:01.200 --> 21:08.000] people here is the new habit has to be tied to a habit of existing effort, right, or equal effort.

    [21:08.960 --> 21:15.360] For example, saying that you are going to go to the gym every evening after you finish eating dinner

    [21:15.360 --> 21:19.200] because you could eat dinner every day because that's a habit. Those two things are not

    [21:19.760 --> 21:26.480] equivalent in effort, right? That's probably not going to stick. But if you say, okay, every time

    [21:26.480 --> 21:34.000] I go upstairs, I'm going to do five squats, right? It's not a lot of effort to go upstairs,

    [21:34.000 --> 21:38.480] it's not a ton of effort to do five squats. That's something you can start to tie together. Now,

    [21:38.480 --> 21:44.160] for me, personally, something like that, I need a visual reminder because I will go up the stairs

    [21:44.160 --> 21:49.120] and then be like, I forgot, right? And you only get to do that so many times before your brain goes,

    [21:49.120 --> 21:54.880] oh, these two habits aren't sad. So I would put like either a little sticky note of a guy doing squats,

    [21:54.880 --> 21:58.800] like right on the stairs. And I would usually do like a sticky note so I can move it up the stairs.

    [21:59.120 --> 22:04.480] Oh, yeah, that's great. Because otherwise change blindness kicks it. And so now I see the sticky note,

    [22:04.480 --> 22:11.680] I don't see the sticky note. The example I use all the time for people is I tied, I'm really,

    [22:11.680 --> 22:18.640] really bad at drinking water. I am not, this is not, it's on the weekends, I get dehydrated.

    [22:19.520 --> 22:24.800] We've learned this and we've learned, so what I had to do was I tied going downstairs,

    [22:24.800 --> 22:33.120] my offices upstairs to taking my, my tumbler and refilling the water. And so every single time I go

    [22:33.120 --> 22:38.800] downstairs, I have to have my tumbler and I have to refill it, which means it has to be empty. So

    [22:38.800 --> 22:44.640] half the time, as I'm getting ready to go downstairs, I like, well, I'll stop. I'll come back to

    [22:44.640 --> 22:48.720] grab my tumbler half the time. It's still mostly full and I'll end up drinking it as I go downstairs,

    [22:48.720 --> 22:54.240] as I refill. Right. But the way I back that habit was I literally got a visual, I got a tumbler

    [22:54.240 --> 22:58.000] and I got several tumblers so I could change them out so that they were always the same. And when I

    [22:58.000 --> 23:02.320] would come upstairs in the morning, I would just put the tumbler in front of the stairs. And that was

    [23:02.320 --> 23:06.960] my, and once that started to connect now, I start to go downstairs without my tumbler. Remember,

    [23:06.960 --> 23:10.480] I was like, oh my god, you can have something and I come running back. But like, it's going,

    [23:10.480 --> 23:15.120] it's choosing and existing. It doesn't take me any thought to go downstairs and I'm going to go

    [23:15.120 --> 23:19.600] downstairs. Yeah. But if I need to drink more water, let's tie that to something I'm already going to

    [23:19.760 --> 23:25.840] do. And that is have it sacking in its finest. Yeah, yeah, that's a great example. Yeah, yeah,

    [23:25.840 --> 23:32.640] that's a great example. Yeah. Yeah, no, I like that a lot actually. It's a good one. And also just

    [23:32.640 --> 23:40.880] drinking water helps for all the obvious reasons too. I mean, I have a terrible back and a lot of

    [23:40.880 --> 23:49.440] back pain that comes and goes, but part of it's just being older, I guess. And so I need to stretch

    [23:49.440 --> 23:57.840] frequently. And so by drinking a lot of water, well, you know, biobrakes come right? So you

    [23:57.840 --> 24:04.480] have to go pee. And so you have to get up to pee unless you have some weird setup. I do not.

    [24:05.920 --> 24:10.720] I don't need a problem. Yeah, yeah, not you, not you, but like anybody. We're not going to

    [24:10.720 --> 24:15.840] get to that one. Yeah, yeah, right, right, right. So, uh, so yeah, so you have to get up and

    [24:15.920 --> 24:20.080] and something else I learned when I was, uh, I read a couple of books about Mind Health.

    [24:21.200 --> 24:28.960] And I learned about something that stood out to me was that when you are, because I tend to snack

    [24:28.960 --> 24:36.320] especially at night and not necessarily on good things. And what I learned is that often when

    [24:36.320 --> 24:43.680] you're hungry, it actually, it's actually your thirsty. Yeah, right? And if you're thirsty,

    [24:43.680 --> 24:48.400] it usually means you're getting dehydrated. So if you're hungry, you're like,

    [24:48.400 --> 24:53.280] ah, I could use something to eat. Instead, go get some water or, or, or coffee or whatever.

    [24:53.840 --> 24:59.360] But, and if you're feeling thirsty, then yeah, definitely drink water or, or something,

    [24:59.360 --> 25:05.360] because yeah, you, you, you are dehydrated probably at that point. Yeah, so like you tie that to,

    [25:06.000 --> 25:12.240] okay, so after dinner, if I'm hungry, my new rule is I have to get, I have to drink a whole glass

    [25:12.240 --> 25:16.080] of water. And then if I'm still hungry 10 minutes later, then I can get a snack. Right? That

    [25:16.080 --> 25:20.080] starts to make that shift. Like I was thinking, you're thinking with like needing to stretch more.

    [25:20.080 --> 25:23.680] So if I were doing something like that, what I would probably do is say, okay, I'm going to tie

    [25:23.680 --> 25:28.720] stretching to my bats and brakes. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to get a couple of visual

    [25:28.720 --> 25:34.640] reminders to put around my office. So when I stand up, like maybe I would get, I have these

    [25:34.640 --> 25:38.800] chirp wheels that are great for like their, you roll over them and it stretches your back. It's

    [25:38.800 --> 25:44.400] fantastic. I might get a couple of chirp wheels and put them in a really obnoxious place for a

    [25:44.400 --> 25:49.200] few weeks, like in the middle of the office. Yeah, every time I leave them like, oh, I gotta stretch.

    [25:49.200 --> 25:53.440] I might get like one of those bars that go across the thing so that I have to, you know, stretch up.

    [25:53.440 --> 25:59.200] And that, so I would find a few visual reminders to start tying the two so that then you have,

    [25:59.200 --> 26:05.200] I'm going to go to the bathroom probably. So I'm going to use this existing habit to create a new

    [26:05.200 --> 26:10.640] habit and I'm going to do it by building in, building in these visual reminders for myself.

    [26:10.640 --> 26:15.600] It's interesting. You know, like I, I'm looking at my floor because in my office here, I have a

    [26:15.600 --> 26:25.520] mat and I have the actual stretch instructions printed on paper right by the mat. And yet, I don't do it.

    [26:26.400 --> 26:34.080] I wonder if you could move the stretch instructions around, like put them

    [26:34.880 --> 26:41.200] on the sink in the bathroom so that you have to move them to wash your hands. So now it's like,

    [26:41.200 --> 26:46.000] do you know, I'm not, I'm now you have to carry it back to your office. Yeah, I'll put it and just

    [26:46.000 --> 26:51.600] have like a stack of them in the bathroom. So once you wash your hands, then you put a new one on,

    [26:51.600 --> 26:55.200] you carry that back in it, like even something like that, we're finding that for me.

    [26:55.840 --> 27:00.640] That's a good idea. Super physical, right? That's why I need the visual reminders. I need something

    [27:01.120 --> 27:08.640] to hold on to with that. And I've putting things in my way has consistently been one of the best

    [27:08.640 --> 27:14.000] ways to tie something together. So the sticky notes on the stairs as I'm walking up that are moving,

    [27:14.560 --> 27:20.240] the tumbler that literally, you know, blocks me or that I did kick down the stairs many times.

    [27:20.320 --> 27:29.280] Yeah. Right. Yeah. But I know I think the visual reminders is is a great, a great idea. And also,

    [27:29.280 --> 27:35.680] like almost it's almost like a like a tangible nagging. Yes. Like a self nagging, right? Like it's

    [27:35.680 --> 27:41.200] not like some your spouse or partner or friend or someone nagging you. No, it's like you nagging

    [27:41.200 --> 27:47.360] yourself like, hey, come on. Yeah. You need this. You know, you need it. If you try one visual

    [27:47.360 --> 27:50.560] reminder, it doesn't work. You can find it. That's the cool thing. You can find another.

    [27:50.560 --> 27:56.000] Find another. Like there's so many, there's so many different ways you can play this one.

    [27:56.000 --> 28:02.400] So you can find the one that stands out for your brain. Like that's fantastic. Yeah. I just started

    [28:02.400 --> 28:08.720] walking again. I was back in, I'm in Nashville and I would end and kind of a little in the

    [28:08.720 --> 28:15.680] burbs a little end. But I was back in Toronto where I'm from for like about 10 days recently.

    [28:16.160 --> 28:21.120] And my mom was in the hospital and it was like, I don't know, like a few miles between

    [28:21.840 --> 28:26.240] where I was staying in in the hospital. So like last winter when I was back,

    [28:26.880 --> 28:30.800] I would just walk to the hospital every day. And it's in my old neighborhood where I grew up.

    [28:30.800 --> 28:36.080] So it's kind of cool to like walk around. But I was just like, I love being in a city and walking

    [28:36.080 --> 28:41.600] everywhere. I always say that like I believe in like accident and a exercise, right? Where like

    [28:42.320 --> 28:48.320] I used to ride my bike in Toronto like 45 minutes in the morning to work and then 45 minutes home.

    [28:48.960 --> 28:54.960] And it was pleasurable to like ride and just the fresh air, watching all the gridlock traffic.

    [28:56.000 --> 29:03.360] You know, going by. And so I've just started walking. There's a trail not far from my house.

    [29:03.360 --> 29:07.680] And I was doing it pretty well until you know, life turned upside down for a while and I

    [29:07.760 --> 29:12.960] forgot that I stopped doing it. And I've just started doing it again. But getting to your point

    [29:12.960 --> 29:19.200] about like even like rewarding yourself, if you could do it in the process too, right? Like for

    [29:19.200 --> 29:26.080] example, like I'll listen to a podcast or I'll record some audio, you know, I think out loud. And

    [29:26.080 --> 29:32.480] so a lot of times I'll record myself speaking. And then I'll I'll listen to I'll listen to that

    [29:32.480 --> 29:37.120] later or look at the transcript later to pull out the most important things. Of course, these days I

    [29:37.120 --> 29:41.120] can do that with AirPods. And people just think I'm talking on the phone. So I'm not completely

    [29:41.120 --> 29:47.600] a lot, I haven't completely lost my I'm not the madman walking down the street. I love the

    [29:47.600 --> 29:51.440] idea of tying, especially something you know, you need to do to something you really want. Like

    [29:51.440 --> 29:56.080] having a book that you're only allowed to read when you're on the treadmill or hat or an audio or

    [29:56.080 --> 30:00.640] something. The other thing. Okay. So we've also started getting back into the walking thing recently.

    [30:00.640 --> 30:08.880] Have you ever heard of the conqueror event medals? The conqueror event medal. Yes. Okay. So

    [30:08.880 --> 30:12.960] you'll have to look at me that we've been having way too much fun of it. My husband and I.

    [30:13.600 --> 30:18.400] So you pick a medal, right? A trail. And they have some really cool. So I'm currently doing

    [30:18.400 --> 30:24.480] Yosemite walking through Yosemite because it was like, you know, a shorter trail. But they have like

    [30:24.480 --> 30:29.920] you can walk to Mordor and destroy the ring. Like you can do like Star Trek and star, like there's

    [30:29.920 --> 30:38.320] all kinds of fun ones. And as you go through as you log distances, it unlocks views and postcards

    [30:38.320 --> 30:42.400] and like all sorts of things that you get to see, which is really fun. And then when you finish it,

    [30:42.400 --> 30:48.880] you get an actual like physical medal in the mail. So it's made really fun. And some of these

    [30:48.880 --> 30:54.560] medals are really cool looking. So it's made it really fun to get back into exercise. Like

    [30:55.440 --> 30:58.880] my husband and I both chose different medals. We're both going through it. And so now it's turned

    [30:59.040 --> 31:03.760] into like, yes, we're still walking in the evenings. But then like, you know, occasionally we sneak out

    [31:03.760 --> 31:08.480] on our own to try and get ahead of the other. So wait, wait, wait, wait. So are you doing this like

    [31:08.480 --> 31:15.440] on a treadmill with like some VR thing or like? No, so we walk. Okay. I don't I know everyone's

    [31:15.440 --> 31:19.200] on to be able to see this. But we walk around. So you walk wherever, right? Go walk on the

    [31:19.200 --> 31:24.640] and then you log. Of course, now the app does not want to load. Okay. And I'm trying to show you

    [31:25.600 --> 31:30.240] that's hilarious. Um, so as you log, you go in and log and then you log it in the app and then

    [31:30.240 --> 31:34.240] you can click like see view. And so wherever you've gotten to on the trail, then you can look around.

    [31:34.880 --> 31:41.760] Oh, that's like a layers thing. So I see. So your so your phone. So the app is tracking your

    [31:41.760 --> 31:50.320] your your walking and then you can kind of like a layers kind of VR or not VR exactly. But you know,

    [31:50.400 --> 31:55.360] you can yeah, you can look at it around and see kind of a Pokemon go kind of deal. Yeah.

    [31:55.360 --> 31:59.280] Like so you hold your photo, but then you just like turn it and you get to see the whole area.

    [31:59.280 --> 32:04.400] You're like turning around with your phone. So it's it's very very Pokemon go. Um, it's

    [32:04.400 --> 32:10.160] which has been just fun. And so like, you know, like the next one I want to go walk along the

    [32:10.160 --> 32:16.080] Amalfi coast, um, which is the next one, right? I'm like, be gorgeous, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    [32:16.080 --> 32:18.640] I've watched a lot of the real one. And it was quite nice.

    [32:19.520 --> 32:24.400] Breathe that I'm like, I'm glad I did use that many first because it was shorter. And I was like,

    [32:24.400 --> 32:28.000] I want to do this one. It'll be pretty. But now I'm like, I want to get done with it. So I can go do

    [32:28.000 --> 32:32.800] the Amalfi coast. Like I have this thing to look forward to. So do they and they send you so they

    [32:32.800 --> 32:42.080] send you a metal like like a like a kind like a coin or like a badger. So it's like a it's each

    [32:42.400 --> 32:46.480] like specific to so like there's the assembly metal that I'm going to get is going to be different.

    [32:46.480 --> 32:50.720] It's a different design, celebrating your semity compared to the one that my husband will get because

    [32:50.720 --> 32:55.600] he got he picked a different a different course. Sure. So it's it's not like just the circle. It's like,

    [32:55.600 --> 32:58.960] you know, it's got, I think it's got some of the some of the mountains and some of the views

    [32:58.960 --> 33:05.680] engraved on it. And it's like they're very, very that's a great. So what's the app called again?

    [33:06.320 --> 33:12.240] It's called the conqueror, the conqueror event medals. And they go viral online every

    [33:12.240 --> 33:15.600] so often. So you like when you go look at it, you're like, oh, I've seen this.

    [33:16.480 --> 33:19.440] Because that was definitely like my husband was like, oh, I started doing things. I was like,

    [33:20.640 --> 33:26.000] I've been seeing things. So yeah. And there is something is there is something to be said for

    [33:27.040 --> 33:32.960] the tangibility of things like yeah, I'm I'm very digital, but I'm also very analog. And I

    [33:33.680 --> 33:38.560] I find, you know, just writing in a journal on paper or a to-do list on paper is just way

    [33:39.280 --> 33:47.520] better. Yeah. I even like the my non-sponsor here, but for the if somebody's not seeing this,

    [33:47.520 --> 33:57.360] my time timer. Have you seen this? No. Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah. So like you time it for an hour. So

    [33:57.360 --> 34:02.000] this is a visual timer. And they're actually originally made for children. And there still are,

    [34:02.000 --> 34:07.360] but like with ADHD, if you're working on a task, let's say you're going for like inbox zero and you

    [34:07.360 --> 34:12.400] need to finish your emails and you have 30 minutes to do it, you'll have the timer on your desk.

    [34:12.400 --> 34:18.320] And you'll as you as I like look at one email and then I go down a rabbit hole because the emails

    [34:18.320 --> 34:24.880] about whatever. And I go and, you know, Google or chat GPT or somewhere and suddenly I'm I get

    [34:24.880 --> 34:29.360] lost and distracted. I look back. I have this on my desk or I look back and I'm like, oh crap.

    [34:29.360 --> 34:33.600] Like I've 10 minutes has passed with one email. Oh my god. I've only got 20 minutes left.

    [34:33.600 --> 34:36.080] And so and then it beeps annoyingly, which it will now.

    [34:39.040 --> 34:44.400] But that has been and you know, I've reached out to them. I'm like, come on, man, you guys should

    [34:44.400 --> 34:50.640] sponsor wise worlds. This is like, this is the perfect thing. But because I've seen those. I've never

    [34:50.640 --> 34:54.560] gotten the dopamine rush. And so I just watched you moving that timer. They also and I was like,

    [34:55.360 --> 34:59.680] it adds urgency, right? Like the gamification aspects, right? It adds that

    [34:59.680 --> 35:05.840] urgency because you see, you visually see it. Like I built a Pomodoro timer. I coded it.

    [35:05.840 --> 35:12.400] It's on y squirrels.com or the resources section. And so you can put up on one tab or one screen.

    [35:12.400 --> 35:18.880] You can put up the Pomodoro timer. It's 25 minutes and press start and it will count down and

    [35:18.880 --> 35:23.760] you can work and glance at it. And it's counting down in your other screen. If you have multiple

    [35:23.760 --> 35:30.800] screens or another tab or what have you. So it works well digitally. And it's free. Like I just

    [35:30.800 --> 35:34.320] built it. I get ideas of things to help people. And I just build them.

    [35:36.320 --> 35:42.080] And but yeah, the time timer I'd heard about. And so for multiple guests on the on the podcast

    [35:42.080 --> 35:47.360] and finally bought one. And I'm like, oh, okay. So there really is something to be said for

    [35:47.440 --> 35:53.840] in real life. Yeah. Yeah. That physical, that physical element. I think that's the cool thing.

    [35:53.840 --> 35:57.040] And I will, you'd mentioned the paid versus free, the conqueror stuff. You do have to pay for

    [35:57.040 --> 35:59.920] your metal. Like Matt was laughing. He's like, you're basically buying it. I was like, you are,

    [35:59.920 --> 36:05.360] but you're also like buying motivation. So to clarify for people at front. Yeah, they're not,

    [36:05.360 --> 36:10.960] yeah, they're not sending it free. I didn't expect that. But like I love finding the stuff that

    [36:10.960 --> 36:15.920] we get excited about. And then just leveraging that. And like, and there is something about

    [36:15.920 --> 36:21.120] it being physical and tangible. And I do the same thing. I have to have a ton of digital.

    [36:21.120 --> 36:26.160] And I have E ink writers that I used to do my to do like to do out through. And I don't do it

    [36:26.160 --> 36:30.320] through them anymore. Because it's not quite as like, there's not quite as much dopamine in

    [36:30.320 --> 36:35.360] scratch or off the E grider if there is like with my notebook. So yeah, I hear you.

    [36:36.320 --> 36:42.640] Yeah, it's interesting. Like it's it's yeah, just finding ways to to do to get stuff done, right?

    [36:43.600 --> 36:48.000] And whether you're gamifying it or finding some way to kind of make it.

    [36:49.600 --> 36:55.120] Yeah, one of the curses of ADHD, which I think is quite common among. And as you mentioned,

    [36:55.120 --> 36:59.520] like, you know, everybody's different, of course, but there are, I mean, I always say it is an

    [36:59.520 --> 37:05.360] acronym. Like it does stand. And while there's only one type of ADHD, there's, you know, three

    [37:05.360 --> 37:12.240] presentations, you know, the hyperactive and attentive and then, and for hydroactive and

    [37:12.240 --> 37:19.840] policy of inattentive and combined. Yeah. And but the consistent thing I've come across often

    [37:19.840 --> 37:24.160] with people. And again, not everybody's the same as the is this curse of novelty where

    [37:25.360 --> 37:32.960] it it's it works wonderfully. Yeah, for a time. And then the novelty wears off. I'm sick of

    [37:32.960 --> 37:39.280] these metals or I'm, you know, yeah, all right, enough of that. Or I kicked the water bottle down

    [37:39.280 --> 37:43.760] the stairs too many times in the middle of the night or, you know, or by partners getting annoyed by

    [37:43.760 --> 37:48.080] it or whatever. And the novelty kind of runs off. And then you're like crap. Now I got to find

    [37:48.080 --> 37:53.600] something new. Do you do you find that happens to you too? And what do you do about it if it does?

    [37:54.240 --> 38:01.840] Yeah. So I definitely do. And my biggest thing with working with that kind of novelty drain,

    [38:01.840 --> 38:08.720] right? So when the novelty wears off is I guess a couple of fold. One is understanding why trying

    [38:08.720 --> 38:13.840] to understand why something did work, right? So the stair thing, you know, the the the tumbler at

    [38:13.840 --> 38:18.480] the top of the stairs worked because it was physical because it was annoying and because it changed.

    [38:18.480 --> 38:22.080] Okay, so the tumbler at the top of the stairs isn't working anymore. What else could I tie this to?

    [38:22.080 --> 38:25.840] Is there something else I could do that would feel novel that would feel interesting? Okay, the

    [38:25.840 --> 38:30.160] metals are no longer working for me. What was it about those that did work? What did I really like?

    [38:30.160 --> 38:35.760] Well, what can I do instead? And one of the great things, you know, about today's day is sometimes

    [38:35.760 --> 38:39.520] you can just go to one of the AI bots and be like, I can't think of what, but I love these. They're

    [38:39.520 --> 38:43.600] no longer working for me. Here's what I loved about it. Is there another option that would have

    [38:43.600 --> 38:50.720] that novelty concept for like the to do notebook for me? I have discovered I found two things.

    [38:51.360 --> 38:57.120] One, changing out the pens that I use helps with the novelty. And so I'll use one pen until I'm

    [38:57.120 --> 39:00.640] starting to be like, yeah, I was really boring. And then I go find a new pen. And I get to buy

    [39:00.640 --> 39:07.840] myself a new pen. I rarely ever finish out a pen. Like, I don't run out of ink. This is a cool

    [39:07.840 --> 39:13.200] new teal ink pen. And I want to like see the tea. And so that creates, so find ways to thread

    [39:13.200 --> 39:18.480] some novelty into something that I want to keep doing like a to do list every day. Even when I

    [39:18.480 --> 39:22.080] know it's going to like reach a point of boring. And the other thing I also do is like,

    [39:23.200 --> 39:27.040] sometimes it's okay to give yourself permission to take a break. Maybe the to do list

    [39:27.120 --> 39:31.360] is not working for you. And you need to take a break for a little while. And trust that you'll come

    [39:31.360 --> 39:39.920] back to it when you when it's time. Like there's I think 80 years in general. And especially those of

    [39:39.920 --> 39:48.160] us who got to adulthood and had to figure out how to be adults. Yeah. We have this idea in our head

    [39:48.160 --> 39:52.160] that like if something were to have to work forever or that like if it's you know, it's a personal

    [39:52.160 --> 39:59.920] failing. If something's not working. And it's not it's it's just who you are and how your brain

    [39:59.920 --> 40:06.880] functions. Your brain needs novelty. It's okay. If something's no longer feeding you to be like,

    [40:06.880 --> 40:11.280] I think it doesn't make it less because it doesn't work for you anymore. It just means that you're

    [40:11.280 --> 40:19.440] in a different space and time. And that's okay. So I love that. And I think, you know, you raised

    [40:19.440 --> 40:24.480] some good points there. Like if it's no if the novelty has run off, it doesn't celebrate first

    [40:24.480 --> 40:29.600] of all that it was working. And then and then instead of thinking it doesn't work anymore,

    [40:29.600 --> 40:35.040] think about a way that you might be able to tweak it by changing the color pan or whatever it is.

    [40:35.040 --> 40:38.640] So that you know, you mentioned earlier about the water bottles. Like you've got several different

    [40:38.640 --> 40:44.640] water bottles, different colors and stuff, right? So again, just maybe finding ways to kind of tweak it

    [40:44.640 --> 40:52.080] into into making it kind of refreshed rather than new. And then and then yeah, celebrating that.

    [40:52.080 --> 41:00.560] And also you mentioned, you know, using AI with the caveat for everybody that, you know, be careful

    [41:00.560 --> 41:08.320] about. Yes. Believing everything you you your AI agent may tell you. And also, you know, don't

    [41:08.320 --> 41:12.560] build a relationship with it God forbid. And don't share private, you know, your personal information

    [41:12.560 --> 41:19.680] with it either. But that all aside, yeah, I mean, yeah, AI agents have been just absolutely so

    [41:19.680 --> 41:26.800] helpful in so many ways. And so yeah, as a as a partner in a sense, not a friend partner,

    [41:26.800 --> 41:31.920] but in a partner sort of sense, you can actually brainstorm alternatives like you're saying. So if

    [41:31.920 --> 41:37.840] you can't think of a way, the water bottle things not working anymore, you know, what could I use

    [41:37.920 --> 41:44.000] instead or what can I do? And asking whether it's chat GPT or Gemini or, you know, her

    [41:44.000 --> 41:51.920] Plexigate anthropic or you name it, asking it and then and then maybe brainstorming for some ideas.

    [41:51.920 --> 41:58.960] And also talking to to people too, right? In real life, you know, other Y squirrels as I like to say.

    [42:00.240 --> 42:04.400] So you've applied like a lot of these these principles that you've learned about your

    [42:05.200 --> 42:11.520] applying sort of the research and neuroscience and sort of space design and things like that into

    [42:11.520 --> 42:18.320] your events. What are some like environmental factors that can help professionals with their

    [42:19.120 --> 42:24.880] their space like where they work, whether it's, you know, solar printers, presumably like yourself

    [42:24.880 --> 42:29.760] or like myself or people that just work for home versus, you know, if you work in an office,

    [42:29.840 --> 42:33.520] if you're in a cubicle, I mean, I've been there cubicle. Yeah.

    [42:36.480 --> 42:41.120] Besides a comment, I mean, obviously, you can request to come a kind of

    [42:41.120 --> 42:45.680] accommodations, but it's not always one, it's not always reasonable to work. And two,

    [42:45.680 --> 42:49.200] there's still a lot of things like I have a lot of people when I come in and do these talks

    [42:49.200 --> 42:53.920] and and and they're always like, you know, we can't give everyone a $3,000 chair to make them come

    [42:53.920 --> 42:58.400] from, I'm like, I'm not going to encourage it. But, you know, what you could do is give

    [42:58.400 --> 43:01.600] them permission to have a stool at their desk, if they're chair, if they're regular too short,

    [43:01.600 --> 43:05.760] like let them figure out how to work with the ergonomics. Some of these rules around cubicle

    [43:05.760 --> 43:11.360] requirements are insane, right? Like, if they're they're best hot needs to be higher because they

    [43:11.360 --> 43:16.400] need that ergonomic support. And I will, I always encourage people do think in terms of ergonomics,

    [43:16.400 --> 43:23.280] because your brain eats a lot of glucose. It eats a lot of your resources. And if you're having

    [43:23.280 --> 43:28.080] those resources eaten up by your body trying to compensate because your chair's terrible or because

    [43:28.080 --> 43:33.280] your computer screens at the wrong level or the lighting will talk about like all so pay attention

    [43:33.280 --> 43:39.120] to your ergonomics look into like is my keyboard at the right level is my mouse like I tell people

    [43:39.120 --> 43:42.720] all the time I got this really stupid weird looking mouse everyone gives me weird looks when they

    [43:42.720 --> 43:50.080] see my mouse. But it like it eliminates the the same one. Oh my gosh. Do you have that? Let's see. Yeah.

    [43:50.080 --> 43:56.080] Yeah. Yeah. So much more comfortable. If you're listening to this, it's I forget it's a

    [43:56.080 --> 44:01.680] logitech. I don't have my glasses on. It's like an MX something, right? I don't must not have the

    [44:01.680 --> 44:09.520] exact same mine's called MX master three for Mac. I believe it's a logitech, but either way,

    [44:09.520 --> 44:15.520] if you look at like a sideways mouse, y'all. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. So ergonomics is one of the first

    [44:15.520 --> 44:20.000] things that I tell people to look at because most of us have something in our in our office setup

    [44:20.000 --> 44:24.000] that's not working for us, whether it's the computer screen, the desk, the mouse, the keyboard,

    [44:24.000 --> 44:29.120] whatever the chair. So, ergonomics is one of the first things because it is it's kind of like

    [44:29.120 --> 44:33.440] trying to go to work with the parking brake on like it's draining your gas whether you notice it

    [44:33.440 --> 44:38.400] or not. Same thing for clutter. And this one I know is really hard for ADHDers like clutter gets

    [44:38.400 --> 44:44.080] everywhere stuff gets everywhere. What do you mean? My office is completely clean. Yeah. It's the

    [44:44.080 --> 44:50.640] version of my office you can see. But it happens like throughout the week stuff gets added.

    [44:50.640 --> 44:54.800] This is that I have paperwork right here that I have to send my accountant right like all the stuff

    [44:54.800 --> 44:59.280] clutter's up. And the problem with this is again, it's that parking brake concept where we have

    [44:59.280 --> 45:03.760] changed blindness built into our brains where your brain is registering the clutter. It's just not

    [45:03.760 --> 45:07.440] telling you about it anymore because it's decided, oh, the clutter isn't life threatening,

    [45:07.440 --> 45:12.000] but it's still eating up, you know, think about it like a computer. It's like a it's like a software

    [45:12.000 --> 45:16.560] running in the background eating your RAM. And so you don't have as much. So, what I encourage people

    [45:16.640 --> 45:22.320] to do is get a clutter basket. And just have it below or out of sight. At the end of every week or

    [45:22.320 --> 45:26.240] the beginning of every week or whenever, everything that doesn't really need to be on your desk that

    [45:26.240 --> 45:31.680] is just like, you know, I have probably, I don't know, way too many fidgets. Like all the extra stuff,

    [45:31.680 --> 45:36.560] now the fidgets stay within, within reaching distance. But there's other stuff on my desk that

    [45:36.560 --> 45:40.640] I don't need to, you know, the box for the headphones that I'm not ready to throw away because

    [45:40.640 --> 45:45.680] what if I need it for some reason? Yeah. Goes in the clutter basket. And then in six months when the

    [45:45.680 --> 45:49.520] clutter basket's overflowing, I'll go through all throw away the stuff I haven't needed. But this

    [45:49.520 --> 45:55.920] way it's nearby, but it's not eating bandwidth. There's a great satisfaction. Sorry to interrupt.

    [45:55.920 --> 46:02.880] There's a great sense which in there, by the way, like every month or two, maybe all like empty my

    [46:02.880 --> 46:08.080] desk drawers and the crap I have in boxes on the floor or whatever. And I'll put it all into like one

    [46:08.080 --> 46:13.680] big box and I'll take it to my living room and literally dump it all on the floor like just a mess.

    [46:13.680 --> 46:18.640] And then I'll put on a podcast or an audio book or something in my headphones. And then I'll just

    [46:18.640 --> 46:25.600] start going through it all. And I'll just separate it in a garbage recycling, keep it,

    [46:26.720 --> 46:32.240] whatever, right? Like just repiles or four I can't remember. And then I'll just go through it.

    [46:32.240 --> 46:37.280] And they're, you know, and it's, I'm listening to some comedy podcast or whatever I'm listening to,

    [46:37.920 --> 46:43.040] I'm entertained and I'm doing it. And then, you know, it doesn't, nothing takes as long as it seems.

    [46:43.040 --> 46:48.800] So it doesn't take as long as you expect. And there is a great satisfaction in completing that

    [46:49.360 --> 46:53.200] that I'm asking and something that I'm going to remind myself to do this weekend.

    [46:54.480 --> 46:58.800] Well, the only thing to do is especially if you've been eating up lesbian with for months now,

    [46:58.800 --> 47:04.400] as you're like, then you have a little more capacity to be able to, oh, I can. Like it makes a

    [47:04.400 --> 47:11.600] bigger difference than most people realize is clear the clutter off the desk. I use the, so I know

    [47:11.600 --> 47:15.280] for a sake of time, I want to talk about two more that are really, really helpful people in the

    [47:15.280 --> 47:21.360] centers or miss don't think about. One is lighting. And lighting, again, if you're in a cubicle,

    [47:21.360 --> 47:25.440] you only have so much control of this. There's a few things that are really important. One is,

    [47:25.440 --> 47:29.360] as much as possible, try to avoid overhead and direct light, light your light, diffuse,

    [47:29.360 --> 47:34.400] either get diffusers over lights. If you're in a cubicle and you're allowed to get a, get a light

    [47:34.400 --> 47:40.720] that you can put some sort of diffusing shade over and then angle it at like the cubicle wall,

    [47:40.720 --> 47:47.520] so it diffuses. Shadows end up eating into, again, brain capacity because every time that shadow hits

    [47:47.520 --> 47:53.360] your brain's like, like, some part of your brain pays attention because that's how the brain is

    [47:53.360 --> 47:57.520] programmed is to pay attention because that shadow could be a saber-toothed tiger coming to eat

    [47:57.520 --> 48:02.400] you. It's not. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So those shadows tend to be really harsh on the brain. Again,

    [48:02.400 --> 48:06.880] it eats up capacity. I always talk about your space design being kind of like,

    [48:07.200 --> 48:12.800] for me, the super secret thing that I can do that I set up once and then I don't have to think

    [48:12.800 --> 48:18.960] about again because it's just there. I don't have to reset my lighting every single week. So as an

    [48:18.960 --> 48:23.760] ADHD, that's great for me to be able to do something once and not mess with it. So think about your

    [48:23.760 --> 48:30.320] lighting, eliminate overhead, try and eliminate like the really harsh blue-backed tones or if you can

    [48:30.320 --> 48:37.040] avoid doing fluorescence because that buzz will kill you. But like, just even if you just get lighting

    [48:37.040 --> 48:42.560] the lights in my office are all aimed at the walls so that they're diffusing through the room,

    [48:42.560 --> 48:47.040] they're warmer colored lights to try and keep the room feeling a little more welcoming and calmer

    [48:47.040 --> 48:55.120] because I tend to go into like basically attention spirals. And so thinking about your lighting and

    [48:55.120 --> 49:05.440] that's usually able to be done cubicle or your own space. And you can buy like these Wi-Fi connected

    [49:05.440 --> 49:11.120] light bulbs that can change color too. So you can actually, without too much difficulty, you can

    [49:11.120 --> 49:18.400] actually even program like your Alexa or whatever it is to change the color throughout the day,

    [49:19.120 --> 49:27.360] basic rim of day to kind of match the sort of circadian rhythm kind of deal. I'm always like I'm

    [49:27.360 --> 49:34.800] careful with that because I always try to like, you know, I'm not a scientist and I'm not a doctor

    [49:34.800 --> 49:39.760] so I never pretend to. But like I bought like blue-blocking glasses. But then I've learned,

    [49:40.880 --> 49:46.400] I've learned that like the scientists, it's not necessary, they don't necessarily even work much.

    [49:46.400 --> 49:52.080] And I learned this because ever since Andrew Huberman created his own and sells them for hundreds

    [49:52.080 --> 50:01.120] of dollars, I just saw a video kind of basically sharing that it's BS. And actually he on

    [50:01.120 --> 50:06.960] on on originally on earlier recordings of him, he talked about how a lot of these don't work.

    [50:07.600 --> 50:11.200] And then and then he has his own now to cash in on, which is just like, oh god.

    [50:11.520 --> 50:19.760] It's bad. But we're lighting personally, sorry to interrupt. And I always like having learned that

    [50:19.760 --> 50:26.400] I have ADHD at 50. I'm always like and I joke sometimes I like I want to talk to more neurotypical

    [50:26.400 --> 50:30.640] people. I mean, nobody's like 100% neurotypical. It's all spectrum sort of, but then there's,

    [50:30.640 --> 50:35.840] you know, obviously ADHD, ADHD. But I always want to speak to like a neurotypical person like,

    [50:36.720 --> 50:42.080] is it like don't these lights drive you crazy? Like, is it isn't it you too? Because I think most

    [50:42.080 --> 50:48.480] people hate floor as a lighting. And and all these light bulbs nowadays that are like these bright LED

    [50:48.480 --> 50:56.240] daylight color that just like drives me insane. Yeah. I'll shut up. Number two. Okay. No, like you're

    [50:56.240 --> 51:00.160] saying I'm on roll. I'm almost rolling my head because like you're so and I was in or I walked

    [51:00.160 --> 51:04.080] into a room the other day. And this is what I talk about a lot of people. Like I walked into the room

    [51:04.160 --> 51:09.600] the other end to a room the other day. And like I got dizzy in the room because the lights were

    [51:09.600 --> 51:15.120] buzzing and they were flickering. It was really bad. And other people in the room were like, well,

    [51:15.120 --> 51:19.040] I mean, like they're, you know, they're not great, but like it's not that big of a deal. And I was like,

    [51:19.040 --> 51:24.880] here, it's we're just more sensitive to that stuff. Like that's how our brain works. And there's

    [51:24.880 --> 51:30.320] things about lighting too. Like I remember being in a McDonald's once years ago. And in the bathroom,

    [51:30.320 --> 51:34.560] they had blue lights. And I'm like, what the hell? And I learned that it was because it was in a

    [51:34.560 --> 51:40.160] rough area. And a lot of junkies would go and shoot. And in order to see your veins in the blue

    [51:40.160 --> 51:48.960] light. And I've also heard about how malls spray they have like a pink kind of hue light on the

    [51:48.960 --> 51:55.360] outside of the malls. And the reason why is because it brings out the acne in your face. It makes

    [51:55.360 --> 52:01.120] you look terrible. And that's to try to get teenagers not from to stop them from hanging out outside

    [52:01.120 --> 52:06.160] of the mall at night. So the light actually, it's like the same reason why they pipe in like classical

    [52:06.160 --> 52:12.560] music or anything. That's like a deterrent on teenagers. So anyway, I totally fell down a rabbit hole

    [52:12.560 --> 52:18.720] there. So okay, so this is the rabbit hole that I like dive into because so what does lighting do?

    [52:18.720 --> 52:23.520] And like I haven't talked about it, but like different colors do do different things to your brain.

    [52:23.520 --> 52:27.440] And so having stuff, there are ones you can get, like you said, the even program to be like,

    [52:27.440 --> 52:33.840] hey, let's work with some warmer, brighter, more, more white colored one. Then then let's like

    [52:33.840 --> 52:40.320] ease it into more yellows, like working with that. It does change focus points like how you're the

    [52:41.440 --> 52:46.480] it has an impact on the brain more than people realize. And I, I usually try not to nerd out too deep

    [52:46.480 --> 52:50.320] on that stuff. But like, if you really want to get into it, anyone who's interested, I have a ton of

    [52:50.480 --> 52:55.920] studies saved that are like, what does lighting? What does color? What does scent? Because that's the

    [52:55.920 --> 53:02.160] that's the one that no one ever thinks about. So one of our biggest ones for space that we've learned

    [53:02.160 --> 53:08.800] to leverage is scent. And so get a scent that is your office scent or that is your working scent.

    [53:08.800 --> 53:13.680] And what it does is the as you get your brain trained and that's what, but as you start to use

    [53:13.680 --> 53:18.320] the scent consistently during work hours, that now becomes a work scent. So your brain smells that

    [53:18.320 --> 53:25.280] is like, okay, I've got to like, in a support focus. So there's different sense you can use

    [53:25.280 --> 53:29.920] that do tend to support focus and stuff. I worked with, I worked with the actual like,

    [53:31.440 --> 53:33.920] and I'm blanking on, it's not a Scientologist, it's a

    [53:38.160 --> 53:42.160] and he's like, he's one of the top ones in the nation. I was like, here's what I want. He thought

    [53:42.160 --> 53:45.440] I was nuts when I went to him, but I was like, we need to use these, like it needs to have these

    [53:45.440 --> 53:49.280] types of scent in it because this is what that does to the brain. But we created a scent just for

    [53:49.280 --> 53:55.360] our event that helps people stay focused. The other thing it does is scent also is very closely

    [53:55.360 --> 54:00.800] tied to memory. And so particularly if you have an activity, so I do a lot of fantasy writing too,

    [54:00.800 --> 54:06.160] like I write fantasy books. I have certain scents that are only for writing fantasy books because

    [54:06.160 --> 54:09.920] because it's tied to memory, because I've been able to use that scent when I really got into

    [54:09.920 --> 54:14.960] something, it moves me over to that. It starts sparking all those memories and pulling me into

    [54:15.040 --> 54:20.320] that space. Yeah, that's interesting. A lot quicker. So scent is something people don't think about

    [54:20.320 --> 54:25.440] that again can be a background piece. And again, you can get like really cool scent. If users

    [54:25.440 --> 54:30.640] read can be like, hey, so like let's say you work from home, like I do, from eight in the morning

    [54:30.640 --> 54:34.960] to four o'clock in the afternoon, I want you to pipe this scent. And then around four thirty,

    [54:34.960 --> 54:38.240] I want you to start switching over to this scent. And it's been a great way for me to start

    [54:38.240 --> 54:42.400] disengaging my brain from work because all of a sudden the home scent starts. And I'm like,

    [54:42.720 --> 54:48.960] okay, I gotta ask, what are the focus, what are the focus sense that you have found that that

    [54:48.960 --> 54:55.760] that worked best? Okay, so citrus based and herb based both are focus driving. So herb based

    [54:55.760 --> 55:02.880] being like some of the sharper ones. So rosemary is really good. It's not necessarily herb based,

    [55:03.680 --> 55:11.600] but for like, like for trees. But that puts me in the Christmas mode. And I'm just like,

    [55:12.400 --> 55:18.720] really chill. And yeah, not everybody, yeah, like cardamom and cinema, right? Because those are,

    [55:18.720 --> 55:24.880] first of all, those are not focus sense. Those that, but so, right, I'm going to go.

    [55:24.880 --> 55:27.520] I'm going to go Christmas shopping all the time. Right, right, right.

    [55:29.760 --> 55:37.120] But so finding a scent that is, so I've got someone who uses a rosemary orange candle that she,

    [55:37.920 --> 55:41.920] she got a light because she doesn't like to light candles because she's like, oh,

    [55:41.920 --> 55:46.320] I'm going to forget to blow it out. Fair, that's my issue too. But she got one of those like

    [55:46.320 --> 55:51.760] warmer things. And so it melts the can, so it diffuses the scent of the air. And it's just a rose

    [55:51.760 --> 55:59.040] rosemary orange, I believe, something like that. So so primarily citrus and herb finding some

    [55:59.040 --> 56:03.760] combination of those two helps with purking the brain up and helping it focus a little.

    [56:03.760 --> 56:09.840] That's amazing. That's, that's a really great tip. And for, for anyone who's curious about this,

    [56:10.880 --> 56:15.920] and I don't, I don't have science or data, but I do know that like, well, just as we were talking

    [56:15.920 --> 56:21.360] about lighting, I do know how I feel in certain lighting environments. And yeah, really even beyond

    [56:21.360 --> 56:26.560] the science, like you have to do what, what, what makes you feel best, right, regardless of whether

    [56:26.560 --> 56:32.880] they're science backing it up or not, you know, within reason, of course. And then with sense, like,

    [56:34.400 --> 56:42.720] like a friend of mine told me that, I think it's Palm Springs, or maybe Miami, it's some city

    [56:44.080 --> 56:51.920] that's quite affluent in an affluent area that pipes in scent in the city. And the city actually

    [56:52.000 --> 56:58.880] has a smell. And he told me this. And I was like, yeah, right. And I actually did look it up and

    [56:58.880 --> 57:04.400] researched it. And sure enough, yeah. And you can actually buy that scent, you know, in a perfume

    [57:04.400 --> 57:11.120] or or a cologne or whatever, if you're like longing for that city. And you know, in Toronto back

    [57:11.120 --> 57:16.480] in the day, when the, when the bars let out, you know, there was a brilliant pizza place, which had

    [57:16.480 --> 57:21.600] that great pizza, at least it was delicious for me, because I was probably drunk. But they would

    [57:21.600 --> 57:27.200] pipe in, they would, they would have the fan in the window and all that scent of pizza out. And I

    [57:27.200 --> 57:33.760] will add also a friend of mine, he has a TEDx talk about this. He does this for brands. He does like

    [57:34.640 --> 57:42.480] like odor brands or something. And what he does is like, he told me once he did this for like a big

    [57:42.480 --> 57:50.560] grocery chain, like a Kroger, or Publix or whatever, where there was a brand that makes Mexican

    [57:50.560 --> 57:57.680] foods, taco shells, you know, tortillas, all that. And so they decided to pump, they pumped out

    [57:57.680 --> 58:06.320] sort of the smell of Mexican type of food within the store on Tuesdays. And they sold a ton of

    [58:06.320 --> 58:11.600] Mexican. And they sold a ton. And then also by the way, subconsciously, that also works with

    [58:12.320 --> 58:17.280] music too. So like, they're like, you know, mariachi music on the background really quiet,

    [58:17.280 --> 58:23.280] it's like, we should do tacos tonight. There is some psychological, there is psychological stuff

    [58:23.280 --> 58:29.120] to this. And the way Vegas, like the wake casinos are designed to pump in oxygen to keep you awake.

    [58:29.120 --> 58:35.440] So you keep. And sense and music. Yeah. Yeah. I can send you, I do have the studies that I love

    [58:35.440 --> 58:40.400] to see. I can definitely because that was, that was a really big thing for me, right? I'm, I,

    [58:40.480 --> 58:46.320] I have what is, right? I don't, I have this diagnosis through my friend who that's what she did for

    [58:46.320 --> 58:51.360] a living, right? And the more I've learned, the more I've been like, oh my god. Yeah. Um, this is

    [58:51.360 --> 58:57.440] weird. But I also, I don't have a PhD. And so everything we do, right? I work really hard to

    [58:57.440 --> 59:02.240] make sure we don't do anything unless there's some sort of backing behind it. Like I want an

    [59:02.240 --> 59:07.280] academic study that's pure food and published to back. And there are a ton of studies about what

    [59:07.280 --> 59:11.680] scent does, what color does, what lighting does, what music does, all of these are things that like

    [59:11.680 --> 59:17.360] we don't think about leveraging for ourselves. But this is something you can set up. Again,

    [59:17.680 --> 59:23.600] like put some, like think about your lighting, even if you just, like one time go spiraled on

    [59:23.600 --> 59:29.520] the rabbit hole and set up your space. And now you have that. Yeah. All as long as you're in that

    [59:29.520 --> 59:35.840] space, like it's really cool. The stuff you can do. I think having, for our events, having a

    [59:35.840 --> 59:41.120] custom scent has been a game changer for us. Um, we have had people who have bought ticket to our

    [59:41.120 --> 59:46.320] vets for the custom scent. We have had people bought our vets for the custom coffee, like people get

    [59:46.320 --> 59:55.600] excited about the stuff. Um, but beyond that, like for us, the scent, especially, um, it puts people

    [59:55.600 --> 01:00:00.960] in throughout the entire year, we send them home with some of the scent. And all they have to do,

    [01:00:00.960 --> 01:00:04.800] because I spent, you know, three days at the event, training their brains that this scent means

    [01:00:04.800 --> 01:00:09.680] acts. It means time to suck focus on your business. And so for the entire, like any time they want

    [01:00:09.680 --> 01:00:14.400] to work on their business throughout the year, they take the scent out, they spritz it. I've literally

    [01:00:14.400 --> 01:00:18.560] had people who've messaged me two years after an event going, so I just spritz it. And I thought

    [01:00:18.560 --> 01:00:21.920] of you and I had to say thank you, because I've been savoring it. How do I get more of this,

    [01:00:21.920 --> 01:00:25.520] because I'm about out. And this is the only thing that gets me to focus on. That's really,

    [01:00:25.520 --> 01:00:31.760] yeah, that's really cool. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, I will, uh, I will definitely, I've got my

    [01:00:31.760 --> 01:00:37.280] scent in candle over there, but I hardly ever use it. So yeah, I'll have to, I do, like, you know,

    [01:00:37.280 --> 01:00:43.120] and it is, it's interesting. I'll send really does trigger memories. Like I like patchouli always

    [01:00:43.120 --> 01:00:48.880] reminds me of like, uh, downtown head shops in Toronto, but like, like back in the day,

    [01:00:48.880 --> 01:00:53.440] I've going to buy like cheap t-shirts and like smoking like Mexican beaties. They were called,

    [01:00:53.440 --> 01:00:59.840] they were like 25 cents for like these terrible, I don't know, not cigarettes, but whatever,

    [01:00:59.840 --> 01:01:05.920] but I'm kind of dating the reference here. No. Yeah, yeah, yeah, or, or, um, uh, when I go into

    [01:01:05.920 --> 01:01:11.600] garage, like with my car, I mean, like an auto shop and I smell gas or oil, especially oil,

    [01:01:12.480 --> 01:01:16.960] I worked at a gas station in a garage when I was a kid. And so that always takes me back to that.

    [01:01:16.960 --> 01:01:21.600] And so yeah, there's, there's definitely, uh, yeah, there's definitely stuff there. On man,

    [01:01:21.600 --> 01:01:26.160] our time is completely raised by here. And I just realized I have another call that I've got a

    [01:01:26.160 --> 01:01:32.240] hop off on. So Stephanie, this has been so much fun. Thank you for joining me. How can people

    [01:01:32.240 --> 01:01:36.400] find out more about you, your events and all that good stuff? And if you need a speaker,

    [01:01:36.400 --> 01:01:40.480] I know a great one that you should talk to you. I was going to say I should probably get some of

    [01:01:40.480 --> 01:01:45.120] your, your, your, uh, you're, I'll, I'll get you some fresh, um, cause, okay, so short answer,

    [01:01:45.120 --> 01:01:51.760] because I need, um, after we, you know, half praise, half fast on LinkedIn. I do spend far

    [01:01:51.760 --> 01:01:55.040] too much time on LinkedIn with a great way to get in touch with me directly. The other thing I

    [01:01:55.040 --> 01:02:00.240] would encourage, like the Grow Disrupt website. Um, so the company is Grow Disrupt and, um,

    [01:02:00.240 --> 01:02:05.200] one, if anyone's interested in, in all of the research studies, I never have a problem sending

    [01:02:05.200 --> 01:02:08.880] those out to people. They're not posted on the site. Probably should at some point that, um,

    [01:02:08.880 --> 01:02:12.800] I'm happy to send those out. But if you fill out the contact form there and you're like, hey,

    [01:02:12.800 --> 01:02:17.840] I heard stuff on wise scrolls, I had questions. My team will get it to me within a day. And it's

    [01:02:17.840 --> 01:02:22.080] a really good way to actually get my attention, um, because it comes in through the website.

    [01:02:22.080 --> 01:02:27.520] And my team tells me to pay attention to it. So, yeah. Those are probably the best options. Um,

    [01:02:28.080 --> 01:02:33.280] and that's, that's growdisrupt.com. Yes. Growdisrupt.com. Yeah. Cool. Awesome. Well,

    [01:02:33.280 --> 01:02:36.640] this has been a pleasure. Thanks so much for your joining me. This has been awesome.

    [01:02:36.640 --> 01:02:41.520] Same. I appreciate that I'm glad I'm excited for getting to continue in real time finally. And, um,

    [01:02:41.520 --> 01:02:45.040] and hopefully this will not be the last conversation we get to have. I feel like we probably

    [01:02:45.040 --> 01:02:50.320] have a few more areas we should discuss. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I don't want to come smell your scent.

    [01:02:51.040 --> 01:02:55.840] Yeah. Don't tell your husband or my wife that I just said that because that sounds really awkward.

    [01:02:56.640 --> 01:03:02.320] If that was the one moment she walked in and heard me. I'm going to say that that needs to be like

    [01:03:02.320 --> 01:03:09.760] the look option for the whole podcast. Come for the speakers. Save for the scent. All right.

    [01:03:09.760 --> 01:03:13.680] This has been fun. We'll talk again soon. Thanks so much. Okay. Thank you.

If this resonates, listen to the full episode for stories, study-backed tips, and a deeper dive into scent, lighting, and layout choices that help you focus. Then tell us what you try and what changes for you.

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