This Golden Hour

125. Peter Shankman and ADHD Guardrails

• Timothy Eaton

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In today’s episode, we get to spend time with Peter Shankman from New York City. Peter is a single father of one daughter, a globally renowned keynote speaker, bestselling author, and entrepreneur. He shares how he grew up undiagnosed with ADHD, the challenges he faced in traditional education, and how understanding his neurodiversity later in life transformed his perspective and success. Peter emphasizes that neurodiverse individuals aren’t broken—they’re gifted. The key is learning how to channel those gifts, both as children and adults, to unlock unlimited potential. Our conversation explores the impact of supportive environments versus those that misunderstand or suppress neurodiverse traits. Peter discusses practical strategies for thriving with ADHD, such as establishing routines, using technology, and setting up “guardrails” to manage impulsivity and maintain focus. The episode highlights the advantages of homeschooling for neurodiverse children, including the flexibility to nurture unique interests and learning styles. 

Connect with Peter

shankman.com

peter@shankman.com


Peter’s Books

The Boy With the Faster Brain

Faster Than Normal


This Golden Hour

Peter Shankman:

hey. We're not broken, we're gifted as long as we know how to use those gifts. And if we could target those gifts the right way, both parents and kids could target those gifts the right way our future is unlimited.

Timmy Eaton:

Hi. I am Timmy Eaton, homeschool father of six and Doctor of Education. We've been homeschooling for more than 15 years and have watched our children go from birth to university successfully and completely without the school system. Homeschooling has grown tremendously in recent years, and tons of parents are becoming interested in trying it out, but people have questions and concerns and misconceptions and lack the confidence to get started. New and seasoned homeschoolers are looking for more knowledge and peace and assurance to continue. New homeschooling. The guests and discussions on this podcast will empower anyone thinking of homeschooling to bring their kids home and start homeschooling and homeschoolers at all stages of the journey will get what they need and want from these conversations. Thank you for joining us today and enjoy this episode of This Golden Hour podcast. As you exercise, drive clean or just chill. You are listening to this Golden Hour podcast. In today's episode, we get to spend time with Peter Shankman from New York City. Peter is a single father of one daughter, a globally renowned keynote speaker, bestselling author, and entrepreneur. He shares how he grew up undiagnosed with A DHD the challenges he faced in traditional education and how understanding his neurodiversity later in life transformed his perspective and success. Peter emphasizes that neurodiverse individuals aren't broken, they're gifted. The key is learning how to channel those gifts, both as children and adults to unlock unlimited potential. Our conversation explores the impact of supportive environments versus those that misunderstand or suppress neurodiverse traits. Peter discuss his practical strategies for thriving with A DHD, such as establishing routines, using technology, and setting up guardrails to manage impulsivity and maintain focus. The episode highlights the advantages of homeschooling for neurodiverse children, including the flexibility to nurture unique interests and learning styles. Welcome back to this Golden Hour podcast today we're a very delighted to have with us Peter Shankman from New York City. Thanks for being with us, Peter. Good to be back. Grateful that he took time to do this in his busy schedule. Yep, definitely. And maybe we haven't done it before, but hopefully that was a foreshadow of good to be back like, yeah.

Peter Shankman:

I dunno where say something ever. I said, I'm like never been on this podcast before, but

Timmy Eaton:

Good to be here. Good to be here. How many podcasts you think you've been on? Hundreds, if not thousands. Then you're definitely the first of that kind for me, let me just give a brief introduction of Peter, and then we'll get started. Peter's a globally renowned keynote speaker, bestselling author with six bestselling books. Uh, An entrepreneur. He's the host of Faster Than Normal podcast on A DHD and Neurodiversity. And one thing I wanna talk to you about, and we'll get into it, but is the, building a neurodiversity economy, like the idea that creativity, empathy, and unconventional thinking drive innovation. I think that would be really interesting to homeschool parents who are obviously are thinking unconventionally in order to do education the way that we do education. And so we'll have lots of things to talk about. So thanks for being with me. I. Happy to be here. And is there anything you wanna add to that bio?

Peter Shankman:

No, you pretty much nailed it. I'm a single dad based outta New York City born and raised city kid. I run several companies. Always been pretty entrepreneurial and neurodiverse. But, when I was growing up, it wasn't neurodiverse, it was sit down disrupting the class.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah. So tell us about that, because that's something that a lot of parents can relate to, whether they start homeschooling with kids that receive a diagnosis or that they shift, they transition from the public system to homeschool, where their kids were the trouble kid in school, and so they took him home to help him. And then they just saw the gift that it was, that their neurodiversity brought into their lives. So tell us about that. What was that like as a kid and what are the realities of the challenges of that when you're younger?

Peter Shankman:

In the public school system in New York City in the seventies and eighties, there, neurodiversity wasn't a thing. It was sit down and interrupt in the class. Stop interrupting, stop trying to make jokes sit in the back of the room, and I came home every day with notes for the teacher and with disciplinary actions and, I just assumed that I was broken. And when you're told you are, for the first 20 years of your life, you spend the next 30 trying to undo that in therapy. And it was difficult because if I had been told that. My disabilities, as they call the board gifts, perhaps things would've been different, and my parents, God bless it they were always very supportive and they, you know, you just watched the beat of a different drummer. But, they couldn't ignore the fact that I was getting sent to the principal's office virtually every day. I wasn't diagnosed until my late thirties and. Once I was, everything made sense. All the things that I'd been doing that I'd got in trouble for, started to make sense in terms of why they were happening and more specifically why I was doing them. Of course, those things today are what has contributed to a pretty decent amount of success that I've had in terms of starting and selling companies. And writing several bestselling books and all these things. My goal was to write a few books that talked about this, both from an adult perspective as well as a kid's perspective. I have a children's book out called The Boy with the Faster Brain. And I have an adult book called Faster Normal and the premise is just, hey. We're not broken, we're gifted as long as we know how to use those gifts. And if we could target those gifts the right way, both parents and kids could target those gifts the right way our future is unlimited. And so that was really the lesson I learned, I didn't learn until my late thirties. But once I did everything really started to open up.

Timmy Eaton:

As you say that, I just think about like, how many kids in history have dealt with this and it was totally not honed. I think to this day, I think it's still a problem because it becomes a realistic thing as far as in a classroom where. It is disruptive, like for teachers or something like that. But like when people aren't educated about it and don't have the skills to know how to deal with it, it just continues on. Do you ever think about that? Just like how many kids have been squashed instead of celebrated and kinda like you said, like channeled in the right direction.

Peter Shankman:

I can tell you that some numbers out there, some estimates out there say that close to 40% of children in schools currently are neurodiverse and not necessarily diagnosed. I can tell you that 78% of people in prisons in the United States are undiagnosed neurodiverse. And it really falls into two categories. There's the type of undiagnosed neurodiverse where the kid still gets care and nurturing from his family, from friends, from from teachers, and they understand, Hey, you're a little different. Let's figure out a way to use that. And that may or may not turn into diagnosis, but it's a start because at least it gives them some something to understand that they're not broken. The other side of the coin is the, is kids who don't get any of that, and they have to find. Alternate ways to get that dopamine, that serotonin and adrenaline that is missing from a neurodiverse life. And the problem with that is that a lot of times those ways come in negative form, whether it be drugs or addictions or crime. And so I was fortunate in that, I discovered vocal music. I discovered singing, and was lucky enough to get into high school performing arts. I was talented enough to get to high school performing arts, the famous school, which helped me a lot. And I discovered creative writing and that of course turned into public. Speaking. And so I've found ways to get my dopamine on the flip side, and much to my mother's dismay, I am also a licensed skydiver. I discovered that jumping out of a plane once was fun. Jumping outta a plane 500 times must be a lot more fun. It's things like that. I've done Iron Man triathlons I've done marathons because you're always on that quest for dopamine and you're always on the quest for serotonin and adrenaline. And when you have a kid who has impulse control problems? Who is getting sent home from school? Because they are either getting into fights or cracking wise in math class, the issue isn't, they are a troublemaker. The issue could very well be that they are undiagnosed neurodiverse. I'm looking for a sub kind of release. For me I'd make a joke in class. I'd get the kids to laugh, that would give me a dopamine hit and I'd actually be able to focus. Unfortunately, never got the chance'cause I was always sensitive.

Timmy Eaton:

So can you educate people that don't have, a lot of exposure to neurodiversity A DHD versus a DD? I know that there's a lot of stuff about inattention and then hyperactivity, impulsivity, but that stat that you just gave 70% of in prison, that's like unbelievable, crazy numbers, isn't it? Also gives like some explanation and some oh, that's some understanding that, everybody needs to have. Can you just educate us a little bit about that? I don't feel like everybody would be able to define neurodiversity and then be able to distinguish between A-D-H-D-A-D-D and how common it is. And then I think this will be really helpful to parents, to homeschool because they actually do have the time to give the attention. But do, they have the education and the the patience or whatever it takes. To channel that child correctly.

Peter Shankman:

It's tough because, a lot of parents, granted now that millennials are having kids and things like that, it's starting to get a little easier because they understood it growing up. But, it wasn't a thing back in the day. It was stop Dili d Causing trouble. Yeah. Yeah. Stop causing trouble. Stop looking around. Stop wasting time. I remember that my parents were very big on not having any distractions during homework, so I wasn't allowed to listen to music. Now we know that neurodiverse people actually thrive when they have music or something on in the background. It's all those sort of things that make the difference once you realize what it is. The funniest thing was when COVID hit, and my daughter of course. Was taking her classes on Zoom from home.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah.

Peter Shankman:

I watched her and never before in my life had I seen her as such a doppelganger of me. She was literally a mini me. And of course the running joke that I used with everyone was, her teachers have always lied to me. She's not a pleasure to have in class. She's a pain in the ass. But it was exactly how I was as a kid. And actually that was a precursor to her getting diagnosed a few years later. The key really is though to understand that every brain has incredible gifts. But not every brain is the same. A Honda Accord and a Lamborghini uh, uh, Tage will both get you to the exact same location. One will do it much faster and one will do it much slower. If I taught how to drive using a Honda Accord, and then someone gives you a Lamborghini and you floor it to get onto the highway the same way you with a Honda Accord, you're gonna wind up smashed into a tree. So the key really is to learn how to drive a different brain, which is usually a different way of driving than we've all been trained to do.

Timmy Eaton:

I wrote down the question before this interview, as I was thinking through things, I was like, what should parents know and understand if they have that child who has a diagnosis of A DHD or like hyperactivity. In attention. I don't know what the correct words are because to me, I really do see it as a gift. I've talked to a lot of people whose kids deal with dyslexia and there's this book called the di, the Gift of Dyslexia. But it's just that we're not equipped with the tools or the education to know how to help them.'Cause first of all, would you say that it is something that like, requires some help in channeling, or is it like, leave the kid alone and just see what they. Do

Peter Shankman:

it does require some help because you get, realize kids are being raised in a world that says in a lot of ways, if you're different, that's wrong. And so you are out there getting in trouble and doing things differently. I can't tell you how many times I was, given a project to do in school, and I gave the exact answers that the teacher wanted every single time. But I did it in such a way that the teacher, when looking at my work said that's not how to do it. I said, but I got the answers. You just said my work was correct.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah.

Peter Shankman:

And it was this constant battle because I found a totally different way to do it. And the teacher, yeah. Not having been trained for that, just assumed I was wrong.

Timmy Eaton:

That's interesting. You would think that someone would be more impressed by it. Like how did you come up with the answer doing it that way? And so what is the idea? Cause that is something I've learned with dyslexia. Like instead of seeing one path, they see multiple paths. Absolutely. Yeah. And that's and similarity. And that's not, and the thing

Peter Shankman:

is, that's not a bad thing.

Timmy Eaton:

That's an awesome thing. It's why that's not a bad thing. It's those people become millionaires.

Peter Shankman:

Like it's why we've survived as a species. To this point. That's what people don't seem to realize That is why we've survived as a species. My favorite story about this is the mother asks her daughter if she'd like to cook with her make meatloaf, and the mother, the daughter says, sure. And they start making the meatloaf and they take the meat and before they put it in the pan, they cut off a quarter inch on each side. And the little girl says, mommy, why do we cut off a quarter inch on each side? Why do we cut off a little bit on each side? And the mother said, I don't know. Your grandmother always did that way. Let's ask Grandma called. Grandma said, I don't know. My grandma did it that way. Let's call great grandma. They called great grandma in the nursing home. And why do you do this? I dunno why you do it. I do it.'cause my Pam wasn't big enough. The oven wasn't big enough. So it's that concept that if we do things the way they've always been done, you're gonna miss that on a lot.

Timmy Eaton:

I can fit that story into my life coming into the homeschool world. Because I grew up in Chicago, in, in the suburbs of Chicago. In pretty good schools academically. I was the typical kid that said homeschool kids were weird and not socialized. And I said all the same stuff that doesn't even apply to this day'cause it's so common. But, people just don't ask the question like, how should I educate or to think about other ways of doing it. Not, that you're imposing that on somebody else. But that people don't even know the options exist because those those quarter inches been cut off ever since. And nobody even thought they asked the original question, like, why did she do that? My wife was saying that. She said, why am I sending my kid away at six years old when I love spending time with my kids? She's six. Like, why or five? What am I doing? So anyway, that led us into this world and so talk about unconventional thinking. And I'm somebody who's naturally inside the box. I'm like the opposite of the. A DHD kid. And sometimes I regret that because I see it in family members who have that diagnosis, who are. Doing things that my brain doesn't do. Yeah. And so one thing I was wondering is I have several questions. I was thinking like if you were to go back and talk to your teachers back in the elementary, in the middle school, whatever, what would you tell them about how to best deal with you? What would you explain to them?

Peter Shankman:

I think the key is he's not trying to be a troublemaker. I would tell them, Hey, let him. Go to the back of the room and stand up for five minutes an hour, or let him run around in the hallway outside the classroom once or twice. His brain needs chemicals that normal brains make on a regular basis that his doesn't make his man. And if you can let him do that, I guarantee you he'll be a totally different thing. Because here's the thing, I remember in high school when my teachers would get together to talk about their students, sometimes the English teacher. Would wind up in an argument about me with the math teacher because the math teacher would be like, God, I can't stand Peter. He's driving the whole class crazy. He da and English. Whatcha you talking about? He's the most creative. He focuses, he never interrupts because I loved English. I loved too math. He said, I loved reading. I loved writing. I was terrible at math. And so when you love something, you don't necessarily need those chemicals'cause your body's making'em all. When you don't love something, that's the difference. You need those extra chemicals. Your body's not making'em, and that's a problem. We didn't know that at the time, but that was the problem.

Timmy Eaton:

That's so helpful just to hear and understand. So like I have this bias as I've learned about this and as have observed it as a father is the traditional classroom a place for, I mean there's, we should have plays for everybody, but when you got. 25 to 35 kids in a class and stuff like that. Like to me, I'm just wondering I know that not everybody can choose the different alternatives and options that are out there, but I just see it as so beneficial to have a loving parent who can focus in and go. No. You can get up and do whatever you want and you can study whatever you want. Like Are you bored with stuff pretty easy, like stuff that you're

Peter Shankman:

Yes, I'm bored with stuff that I don't necessarily love. If I love it, I'll do it for 14 hours before I even stand up to take a breath.

Timmy Eaton:

And is that a typical thing with a DHD? That's the difference.

Peter Shankman:

Yeah. With neurodiversity as a whole with, but definitely with a DH, adhd. We have something called Hyperfocus. When I wrote faster than normal, I got a contract from random House with a year to write the book and I did all the research. Every single bit of research in the first two weeks, first, first month maybe of the contract. And then I proceeded to forget about it for 10 and a half months because a DH ADHD and my editor called me. She calls me, she goes, Hey, how's the book going? I'm like, oh, it's going great. I can't, I'm almost done. Yeah. Hung up the phone. I'm like, shit, I hadn't written this thing. And hung up the phone and booked a flight the next morning to Tokyo from Newark leaving at 10:00 AM I got on the plane with a sweatshirt, a pair of headphones, my laptop. And my power cord, and I sat down on the plane. We took off, I wrote chapters one through five on the flight out. We landed in Tokyo. I went to lounge. I took a shower and I had a plate of sushi and got back on the same plane, same seat three hours later, and wrote chapter six through 10 on the flight home and landed 36 hours later with a book. People think that you spent$5,000 to go nowhere. No. I spent$5,000 to have zero distractions from writing a book.

Timmy Eaton:

That is

Peter Shankman:

a massive difference. So you have to know yourself and know what works for you.

Timmy Eaton:

And it's just something I just so cannot relate. I envy that type of ability to hyper focus. And I've seen that I have a brother-in-law who's 40 some years old and we'll be at a family thing and if he's bored enough, even at this stage, he'll start getting into everybody's stuff and just trying to stir something up because. But he is definitely the most successful when it comes to worldly success. He's rocking it, he's just and I also argue that,

Peter Shankman:

What's really interesting is that I could sit there for 36 hours nonstop and write a book, and I can also stand in front of a room full of 50,000 people and give a keynote address, which I've done hundreds of times. And that is my happy place. I love being on stage. But put me in a dinner party. With five other people, and I will be in the second bedroom playing with a cat in about three minutes. A DH people. By, by and large, are the most introverted extroverts you'll ever meet in your life. Put me on stage and I am great when I control the audience, but if I have to make small talk and, pretend that, oh, how's everything going? Good. And your daughter, your hats said great, and you wanna die. I shoot myself in the head. I wear a little button sometimes that says it's a little button with a movable thing. It says, social battery status. And it goes from a hundred to zero. And if it goes below 20%, people know, okay, leave'em alone.

Timmy Eaton:

So how does it manifest itself now?'Cause you said in. Later, thirties or something like, so how long have life? Yeah, so I've

Peter Shankman:

known about it for about almost 20 years. I've known about it for 15, 17 years, something like that. And I, before that I just thought it was weird. Now I am weird, but I have the ability to deal with it. So a lot of it for me, and you'll find this true for a lot of people and for parents listening, start working on this with your kids now because it'll save you a ton of hell growing up later in life. The way my life works. I am the most successful when I have guardrails in place to use my A DH ADHD to its advantage, but to prevent it from going off the rails. So what I mean by that I'll give you an example. I start every day, usually between 3 45 and 4:00 AM because. I get up, I walk two inches to my right outta my bed, and I am on my p on bike. Or if I don't have bike the couple days a week, get under my kid. I walk to the gym and I am lifting by 5:00 AM. The reason for this is I can get the dopamine, the serotonin, the adrenaline I need from exercise. I have a prescription for medication. I take it maybe four to five times a month. Those are mostly when my assistant puts the word pill day on my calendar, which means that I have four more meetings in one day. I can't handle four more meetings in one day without a pill, but most other days I can get the chemistry I need from the bike or from lifting enough to get me through the day. So exercise has to be meant. And now, if I'm waking up at a quarter four in the morning, obviously I'm gonna bed early. And so I've made peace with that. I go to bed early. It turns out I miss nothing from a business perspective. I've never regretted missing one party. But I've always regretted missing the workout. The second rule and again, these are guidelines that work for me my closet is. Literally labeled. It has two sides to it. One side says office slash travel. The other side says, speaking slash tv. Office slash travel is T-shirts and jeans. Speaking slash TV is button down shirts, jackets, and jeans. When I get out of the shower, after the bike, I ask Alexa, tell me about my day and. If I am not traveling or if I am traveling or whatever, that determines what I wear. My suits, my vests, my sweaters, gorgeous pieces suits from Italy, but those are in my daughter's closet because if I had to wake up every day, said I wonder what I should wear today. Oh, look at that sweater. Wow. I remember that sweater. Laura gave me that sweater. Wow. I wonder how she's doing. It'll be three hours later I'll be naked in the living room on Facebook and I haven't left the house. So you have to understand how your brain works. Other things include, just making sure I'm eating healthy, I try to limit my drinking. I don't think I've had a drink in about four or five months. The problem is I don't miss drinking. When I'm not drinking. I can go. Years without having a drink.

Timmy Eaton:

But if I'm in a

Peter Shankman:

situation where I have one drink, I'm not having one drink. And that is, again, a neurodiversity thing. It is very much about the concept of all or another. The, I've de I've described it in the past as people who are neurodiverse specifically, especially A DHD, we have two speeds and only two speeds. We have namaste and I'll cut a bitch and there is absolutely no middle ground there. So be aware. Of where your limits are, right? I don't drink, I rarely drink because it usually doesn't end well. I'm not running around in pillaging villages, but instead of one drink, I'll have five. And when I go to sleep, I'll wake up the next morning. I won't have gotten up and worked out'cause I feel like crap. Now I feel like crap, but I haven't worked. So I might as well ruin the day and have two bacon, egg, and cheeses and then a pizza for dinner. Right now it's two weeks later. I've gained 10 pounds and I'm miserable and I hate everyone. Why start that? If you remember a movie called War Games in the eighties the computer learned that to prevent nuclear war, the only winning move is not to play.

Timmy Eaton:

Obviously the commonality of impulsivity, like you said, all or nothing. There's probably a range of people that experience that, but that's common, right? That's that's a, oh, without

Peter Shankman:

question. Again, I'm not a doctor, but I could tell you what is for me and for a lot of people that have interviewed both for the book and the podcast, and it is very much a real thing for us. Yeah. There is I joke that you ever. Get home from work and you don't want to cook. So you order a pizza, you have a couple of slices, you put the rest in the fridge, wrap it up, sit file, leave it in the fridge for like tomorrow. That's called leftover pizza. So I've never had leftover pizza in my

Timmy Eaton:

life. Yeah. I'm I don't think we have either. In our family,

Peter Shankman:

if I order a pizza, I eat the pizza. And, it's like leftover wine. It's not real. Yeah. So the premise for me is to understand that when my kid was born. She was like three or four on when she started developing a taste for pizza.'cause she's my kid and we live in New York City. We, we would order it a pizza. She'd have a slice and a half, I'd have six. And I couldn't understand why I was gaining weight. And so now we go to the pizza place and we order a slice or two a piece and eat them and go home. You gotta understand yourself. You gotta be true to yourself.

Timmy Eaton:

That's the concept that you're saying of guardrails. The thing that's hard to reconcile is if the behaviors are impulsive and that's something that is just a reality to deal with. Guardrails are hard.

Peter Shankman:

They are. So what you do is you put them into place in such a way that you don't have to think about them. A couple of my friends who have been through uh, AA or things like that, they call it playing the tape forward let's say it's 4:00 AM and my alarm goes off and I don't wanna wake up, I don't wanna work out. And that happens to all of us, right? All night, whatever. I simply asked myself, okay, you don't have to work out, but let's play it forward. If you don't work out now it's 3:45 AM Let's fast forward to 6:00 PM Have you worked out well? Yeah, I can go to the gym this afternoon. Okay. Are you really? You really gonna go to the gym this afternoon? Or are you gonna come up with an excuse as to why you shouldn't? Because you're really freaking good at doing that.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah.

Peter Shankman:

Okay. So now you haven't worked out how you feeling? How have you been feeling all day? Have you had that same level of energy, had the same, or has your A DHD kicked in and you're really not the focus and you haven't done that much today? So it's about playing the tape forward. How am I gonna feel 12 hour ahead? Peter has never ever regretted working out.

Timmy Eaton:

But even that requires motivation. That requires discipline. No, it totally

Peter Shankman:

does. And I'm not perfect.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah, you gotta choose it.

Peter Shankman:

I screw up every once in a while, but the key is. To screw up less than you don't screw up.

Timmy Eaton:

And like you said, you gotta set it up in a way that you set yourself up for success. Don't set yourself up for failure.'cause you know the outcome, if that's what you're gonna do. If you don't put up the guardrails, you can tell the outcome. You can tell what's gonna happen. I think that's what you talked Exactly. What about families that are like do you have siblings?

Peter Shankman:

I don't. I think my parents after me, they're like, screw this. We're getting a dog.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah. Right away they knew it right away.

Peter Shankman:

Oh yeah.

Timmy Eaton:

But like it is common, isn't it? Like you said, it must be somewhat genetic, your daughter.

Peter Shankman:

It is very genetic. Yeah. And, but the interesting thing is it does skip generations. It does. I equate it to perfect pitch. My, both my parents have perfect pitch. Skip my ass and my daughter has it.

Timmy Eaton:

Would you say that it's over-diagnosed or that it's ill diagnosed? Here's a comparison. Like when COVID hit, everyone said they were homeschooling and people at homeschool are like, dude, you're not homeschooling. That's not, you're not homeschooling. Your kid is

Peter Shankman:

working for on zoom from home. Yeah.

Timmy Eaton:

And you're hating it like. Homeschoolers like their kids' home and it's a productive experience when you're doing it right in a productive way. I guess the comparison to that is like when you see people that say, oh, I have a DHD, my kid has h adhd, and you go, no, you don't. You're just trying to I bet you Peter could just be like, look at a kid and be like, no, for sure. I can tell like you, you're not gonna take the facades like,

Peter Shankman:

I'm pretty good at figuring out. I pretty good knowing in a couple of seconds whether or not you have it, but I'd say the bigger picture, it's not so much overdiagnosed oh I can't find my keys. I must have a DH adhd. No, you don't. You don't have a DH adhd. You're an idiot. Put a bowl by the front hallway and put your keys in them when you come home. Dumb ass. You know that, that's not even, that's what I'm saying but on the flip side. If it does seem like a lot of people and adults specifically are getting diagnosed with it more lately than we've ever seen, that is actually happening. Not so much because it's being overdiagnosed, but rather because parents are bringing in their kids because the kids actually do have them. And when the doctor is discussing the symptoms

Timmy Eaton:

Oh yeah.

Peter Shankman:

Parents are saying, that sounds like me.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah, that's me. And

Peter Shankman:

It's that they were underdiagnosed and never been diagnosed over the course of their life.

Timmy Eaton:

That's right.

Peter Shankman:

Yeah.

Timmy Eaton:

They had no explanation. Have you ever done the Enneagram? Do you know what your Enneagram is? No. That's something that maybe you should look into. It's cool. Yeah. It's like it's Enneagram. It's an ancient personality test. It's not like a new modern thing or something like that. It's like an ancient thing. And when you were describing your feeling, like, how did it feel for you when you were in your late thirties? How did it feel for you when you achieved that type of understanding and made sense basically of your life?

Peter Shankman:

What was really funny is that I'd been with a therapist for about a year a new therapist. I've been with him about a year. I'm still with him today. And one day he just brings up randomly, he goes, we never discuss your A DHD and you never bring it up. I'm like, what do you mean my h adhd? He like, what are you

Timmy Eaton:

talking about?

Peter Shankman:

And he gave me a look. He's really? And, he threw like a test at me and I took the test. It was a hundred questions. If you get over something, like 15 questions are more right or true or whatever. You might be, you might have it, it was 97 questions, right? I'm like, oh, okay. This is something to explore, and that was really the first time. And as soon as that happened, everything made sense. It made sense. Why? As I researching it, why I, I, I never sat still why I would, I could do certain things amazingly and not do the other things. All that kind of stuff. It all started to make much more sense. And that to me became the premise of, okay, this is how I need to uh, a lot of trial and error, but this is how I should probably run some of my life. Yeah. A little better than that. I have,

Timmy Eaton:

and the reason I asked that is'cause when my wife just in the last few years we've been studying the Enneagram and when she found out that she's a Enneagram classic five, it just made so much sense of so much of her life. She's classic introvert

Peter Shankman:

This isn't the ENFJ. Is that what this is? The N Nfj? No, that's the, that

Timmy Eaton:

is the oh, what's that name? I know what you're talking about. Myers Briggs. Yeah. Myers-Briggs, yeah. That I've done. Riggs. Okay. Yeah, and I've done that one too. And that one's good. I, this one I think it's better. I think it'll it causes understanding. It's basically one through nine. You're 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Anyway, but it just made so much sense and it actually brought healing because it was like. Oh'cause I mean you carry this idea that I'm weird or that I'm different or whatever. And then you go, oh, that makes sense of a ton of stuff. And so like with that can you see how your life, what are some specific improvements that happened from knowing do you know what I'm saying? Like even, especially, yeah. I mean you as a public speaker that does this, but you had already been doing stuff, but did it take off a little bit'cause you knew how to channel stuff or?

Peter Shankman:

You definitely start to realize that you've been living your life at a lower percentage of your potential. In 2016 or 17, I had a keynote in Kuala Lumpur, and then. Four days later, I had a keynote in Singapore and normal people would fly to Ku Lumpur, spend an extra couple of days out there and then fly over, maybe an hour to Singapore. I promised my daughter we'd have dinner, so I flew to Kuala Lumpur, gave the keynote, flew back to New York City, had dinner and breakfast with my daughter, and then flew to Singapore and or whatever and. Dude, what's wrong with you? You're crazy. I'm like okay, first of all, 36 extra hours of writing time, number one. Wow. And second of all, I made a promise to my daughter, and everyone thinks that's insane to me, that makes perfect sense. That is my happy place. Being on stage, being on the airplane, being with my daughter at my three happy places. Yeah. If once you understand the way your life works, the only thing you have left to do. Is to make peace with not apologizing to anyone about it.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah, man. That idea of unconventional thinking. It's such a blessing, and if you were to like hold yourself down, that would just make you miserable, like a hundred percent. I just love hearing examples like that where you're not tied down. One concept that we talk about in homeschooling is deschooling, where you have to get out of that institutional way of thinking in order to open up and do that. And I think you just described that. I've been trying to ask permission for things my whole life. I'm a product of that public system that puts you in a line and asked, you have to go to the bathroom, you have to ask for that. You get a drink. Yeah and I think by nature like that, and so homeschooling has been such a blessing to me to be able to go, dude you can make your own decisions and and live the life that you wanna live but just know that the options are there. You

Peter Shankman:

What's wild to me is that my daughter's school, they let the kids sit anywhere they want. And that can mean standing up sometimes and just standing in the back and taking a, a breather or getting some, getting dopamine hit by walking in the back of the room. When I was growing up, the classroom was, rows of seats and you sat and they always put the troublemakers up front there. That and 90% of the schools, 95% of schools in America today still. Have rows and seats, and the no one ever asked why. And it turns out the reason to put that is because in the 17 hundreds, 18 hundreds, when schools first started they were in one room. What the term, one room schoolhouse was a real thing. Yeah.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah.

Peter Shankman:

They would try to fit as many kids as they could in a one room schoolhouse. And the best way to do that was to line up the seats by Rose next. Totally. We've changed, society has changed a little bit. Why haven't we.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah. Is the question,

Peter Shankman:

right? Why do we still I don't hold meetings sitting down. If you want a meeting with me, we can go for a run in Central Park. We can grab a coffee and walk around the city. I will meet you at Equinox at 5:00 AM at Equinox, section yards. I'll give be a guest pass. We'll work out together. I'll take you skydiving, whatever it is. But we are not gonna meet in an office at a desk right now. I am in a conference room connected to my daughter's school because I'm, of course, I'm on, you know, I am seven different committees for the school. And they have this conference room that parents who do that can use. And I, so I didn't wanna go home. I have a, my cleaning woman's at home. B I'd find something to distract me. So I'm in a conference room. Hang out here. I'll probably go out, I have another meeting downtown a little later, and then I'll go pick her up later. Again, you make the way work for you. I have, no one in my family was an entrepreneur. Both my parents were were teachers and very successful. My mom wound up as retiring as director of performing arts for the New York City school system. My dad wound up director of the Frank Sinatra School for the Arts. Wow. And then they both were NYU professors for 20 years. So they've done incredibly well. They always had a day job. And they worked every day Monday through Friday. They had the weekends off, they had the summers off. For me, I've been an entrepreneur. I had one job in my life. For my first company, I worked for America Online. Back in the nineties. And I. It was in Virginia, and it was literally my first job outta college. And they let us work that way because they didn't care how we worked long to get the job done. So I'm like, wow, this is awesome. Every company, every job must be like this. And I, white rude awakening my second job in New York City, I was an associate editor of a magazine pretty big magazine. And we had Monday morning meetings at eight 30 and Monday morning, standups at 10 o'clock and check-ins at noon. I'm like, what this is Russia. I can't do this. And I quit. Like a week into it. I'm like, I don't know how to work like this. It was the worst thing in the world. And I went outta my own as an entrepreneur and it never occurred to me that I didn't know how to be an entrepreneur. I just knew that I had to work better if I wanted to survive.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah. This

Peter Shankman:

world. And that was 27 years ago. I'm very fortunate. I've never had a quote unquote real job.

Timmy Eaton:

I just wonder if there could be like something that exists that kind of channels people, because not everybody has the same amount of A DHD or neurodiversity. But like I do feel like entrepreneurial pursuits fit most kids in that situation. Because they do think so differently and they think innovatively. Absolutely. And if we could hone that and nurture that because the fact is inevitably they're not gonna ask permission for it. They're gonna end up doing what they want. Whether it's for their own entertainment because they're bored of something or just because they have the ideas that, that I don't necessarily have. And so can we channel that better, yeah. Yeah. So homeschooling is the fastest growing form of education in Canada, US. And it doesn't look the same like it used to be this two prong thing. It was either pedagogues or ideologues and that's how it was. But it's totally changed now. You can't even categorize because people from all walks are choosing it. So what I'm wondering is. What would you counsel, like newer homeschool families who have kids that have neurodiversity and specifically a DHD what would you tell them that would be helpful as they raise their kids? And especially when they have this open curriculum and they have this open opportunity with time, and they have probably more, I would say, tools to channel their kids in the right way for their futures. What kind of advice would you give them?

Peter Shankman:

So I think the first thing I'd say is, your child is not broken. He or she's gifted. That's number one. If they're diagnosed with some sort of neurodiversity. Stop looking at it as a disease, it's not. That's number one. Number two, awesome. I would talk about the fact that being neurodiverse means that your child can think differently and absorb information in different ways. That gives you an incredible opportunity as a homeschooler because you can decide one day, Hey, we're gonna spend the next week exploring museums in Europe. Why? Because we can't. Right? And the kid is gonna be like, holy crap. That's the greatest thing ever. It's a don't mean massive hit, don't mean hit. They're gonna be. Anna, I joke that being a single dad with a DH ADHD is essentially being an 8-year-old, but with means

Timmy Eaton:

Yes.

Peter Shankman:

Because I get to do all these things for my daughter I picked her up from school a couple years ago on a Thursday night, ran on Thursday night, and she's dad, what's your dinner? I said, I don't know. I figured we get the airport. She goes, what? Oh, yeah, sorry. We're gonna Paris tonight. What? Yeah. Taylor Swift performing on Saturday. I thought you'd wanna see her. Oh, I, but and that's the beauty of it, right? It's about finding ways to, embrace their different brains and let them go full throttle on the things that they love or they're excited about. Homeschooling you have a tremendous advantage over traditional schooling for that. So I would argue that, you can have a lot of fun with that, but like I said, make sure. There are guardrails in place. My daughter and I start out with exercise every morning. She's gotten into it, right? Yeah. There's a gym in our building. So maybe I'm off the bike. I've had my first cup of coffee by 6:00 AM I wake her at six 15. We go to the gym for just 20 minutes. Just enough for her to do a little something that starts to, gets her brain into gear a little bit. Or if it's a nice day, we'll walk to school. It's about two miles. We'll walk to school. So it's those kind of things that really benefit understand that it's not additional, but really what is right nowadays. Have fun.

Timmy Eaton:

Yeah, man. Celebrate it. Is your daughter still in school?

Peter Shankman:

She is, she's 12 years old. She's in seventh grade. Oh, she's

Timmy Eaton:

12. So what are you seeing, like for her, obviously she'll dictate her own path, but I'm saying, what are you seeing for the future as far as her doing? She loves

Peter Shankman:

To sing. She loves to act. She loves to write all the creative things that I wind up doing. She loves. Yeah. And she's also very talented artistically, which she takes after her mom for that because I have no drawing ability whatsoever. So I love seeing that in her. But yeah, she's definitely, she's writing stories. She's doing tons of stuff like that and she really enjoys it. And and it's fascinating to watch her do something that she enjoys versus something she hates because it is literally night and day. Yeah. In terms of how our brain operates. So again, understand that your kids have that ability. You just gotta figure out where it is and let them go to town with it. I'm very fortunate. She's a great kid. We have a good time together.

Timmy Eaton:

I love that you said full throttle and just that idea, like when you do find your interest, it's hyper focus. That's the thing that we need to understand and that's what homeschooling allows is like, you can do that all day and develop and nurture that interest that you have. Last question I was gonna ask you is this is a random question, but are you on time for things.

Peter Shankman:

I am 20 minutes early to everything. If you notice, I logged in for this call probably about 15 minutes early. Because here's the thing, when you're a DHD, again, two speeds and two speeds only, I will either be early or I won't show up. So for me it's about understanding that for people like us early is on time. On time is late. So it's hysterical because my daughter and I will always get to school. I'll drop her off 15, 20 minutes early and we'll hang out, we'll talk whatever. And she said to me a couple years ago, she's like, I love talking to you in these last couple minutes when we have the time. I said, oh, you talk to mom? She goes, no, mom and I are always at a breath.'cause we had a run from the subway to make it up. Yeah. So it comes down to I, I have multiple calendars, I have alarms, my life is structured in such a way that technology is tremendously helpful. Yes. The reason I get up at 3 45 every morning and the reason I can is because. The lights in my bedroom are all automatic. They are internet controlled lights and they are time to wake up at start coming up in a sunrise pattern at 3 45 in the morning. So by four 15 it's sunny in my room. It's those kind of things. I talk a lot about this. I so faster than normal is the book I wrote about that I literally give step by step instructions on what I use. It's everything from, the lighting is automatic. Everything is voice activated in my apartment, all this kind of stuff, because. It makes it easier for me to work

Timmy Eaton:

well, and not everybody might have the means to do that stuff, but like I think the principle that you taught is the guardrails. Like when you said. I either show up early or I just don't show up. To me that's the guardrail that you've put in place.'cause you know yourself and a hundred percent that's what people have to do. You have to do it.

Peter Shankman:

Yeah. Like I said, that's why my clothes are separated the way they're,

Timmy Eaton:

I just want to thank you very much. Thanks for taking time today. I, would encourage everybody to go to shankman.com to check out everything that Peter's doing and also. We'll put those two books on a DHD into the show notes Yeah, my audience will be interested in that and so, so good to talk to. You'll, you have a story to

Peter Shankman:

Yes, please. To close this out, I always answer my own email. I answer every single email. So I am peter@shankman.com, my first name@mylastname.com, and I encourage people to email me. I answer every email, what I'm not allowed to do. Is control. My own calendar, my assistant who's been with me almost 20 years now six months into her tenure with me. I go to put something in my calendar and it says please see your system administrator. You do not have access to this feature. And I'm like, I don't have access to put something in Google Calendar. What the hell? And I said, Megan, I said, who do we know? Who do we call for this? Something's wrong. She goes no, the calendar works fine. You don't have access to it. You can view it. Yeah, you can't write it. I'm like, what the hell are you talking about? She goes, yeah, I took it away. She goes, if you want to schedule something, you email me or you call me, or you come into my office, I will put it in your calendar if it can go. I'm like, that's really a big assumption on your part. Why would you do that? She goes, you scheduled next Friday night, two dinners on the same night. I said, okay, that's not that big deal. Come on. Are you overreacted? She goes, and she looked at me. Deadpan is anything. She goes, Peter, you scheduled two dinners on the same night on separate continents, you're done, and I have not had access to my calendar in. Almost 20 years. So I will answer all my own emails, but if you wanna meet with me, you gotta talk to Megan.

Timmy Eaton:

Underneath her name, in her emails, it says Calming Influence to Peter Shankman. So

Peter Shankman:

yeah, that's her title. Calming Influence to Peter Shankman. Absolutely.

Timmy Eaton:

So good. No, I've appreciated my interactions with her and so that makes sense of some things of our interactions. Exactly.

Peter Shankman:

Exactly. Hey, thank

Timmy Eaton:

you so much for taking time. I appreciate it. Oh, pleasure. Was mine That wraps up another edition of this Golden Hour podcast. If you haven't done so already, I would totally appreciate it if you would take a minute and give us a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify. It helps out a lot, and if you've done that already, thank you much. Please consider sharing this show with friends and family members that you think would get something out of it. And thank you for listening and for your support. I'm your host, Tim Eaton. Until next time, remember to cherish this golden hour with your children and family.