Understanding Attention

Find a therapist to help with ADHD

Distractability is normal.

Do tendencies to move mentally from topic to topic merit being labeled as ADHD?

What you do after your thoughts have been straying is what matters.

I still can hear my mother's kindly voice reminding me, "Susan, finish one thing before you go on to another."

I do not have ADHD. Yet as I look back on the many projects I've had the honor to complete in my 80 years of life thus far—6 books, 300 blog posts on this website that have attracted over 27 million reads, lectures across the globe, enabled a cure for vulvodynia, created a name for the phenomenon of adult sibling alienation, not to mention the many clients I've been honored to have been able to help so that they have more satisfying life journeys and marriage relationships—still, I increasingly appreciate my mother's sage advice.

Or maybe I do have ADHD, not of the hyperactive type but rather of the second kind: scattered focus. How easily whatever is in my line of sight can entice me to switch my focus to it and away from whatever task I had been doing. As I'm writing this blog post, the stunning yellow and pink flowers outside my office catch my eye. It's hot outside today. How tempting it is to........

© Psychology Today