This week we’re joined by Ying Deng, known as ADHD Asian Girl across social media. I was able to get to know Ying a bit at the recent International ADHD Conference and thought she’d be a great guest for the show. Meditation is something that I’ve wanted to discuss on the show for quite a while now, but it also isn’t something I’m super knowledgeable about so it was great to have a chance for this discussion.
In our conversation today we get into what mindfulness and meditation actually is - and some about what it isn’t, since meditation isn’t exactly something we get an accurate picture of from popular media. We talk about some of the reasons that meditation can be beneficial for ADHD as well as some of the strategies to help bring meditation into our lives because ADHD can also make it a hard habit to start.
Be sure to check out all of Ying's Mindfulness Course
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checkout where she's on the web with her Linktree
William Curb: I'm so glad to have you here with us today. We're going to be talking about some meditation things, but can you give a quick introduction for people?
Ying Deng: My name is Ying. So for the listeners out there, I'm on all social media with handle ADHD Asian girl. So I got a late ADHD diagnosis in my twenties. So now I'm an ADHD coach. I'm also a meditation teacher. That's really what I do. So I'm really passionate about making meditation more friendly for ADHD folks.
William Curb: Awesome! Yeah. I should add on that. We got to meet each other at the ADHD conference. We are on a panel together. It was a lot of fun.
Ying Deng: Oh, we ate pizza together.
William Curb: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Pizza. I mean, how can we forget pizza? It's the best part.
Ying Deng: I know.
William Curb: But yeah. So we're here to talk about meditation. And I feel like a lot of people might have a very poor view of meditation because like ADHD, the way it's portrayed in popular media makes no sense. Like,
Ying Deng: Yeah.
William Curb: Where it's just like, oh, this is something where you're sitting on a top of a mountain going "ohm", which, you know, probably is not what we're going for right here.
Ying Deng: Yeah. Yes
William Curb: Can you tell us a little bit about what meditation actually is?
Ying Deng: Yes. So meditation, the particular type of meditation I'm trained to teach is called mindfulness meditation. So I'm going to just talk more about mindfulness specifically. The mindfulness really is a type of paying attention, a type of awareness that usually associated with spaciousness, curiosity, openness, accepting to the present moment. So whatever it's your thoughts, emotion, body sensations, like, for example, you know, listeners out there, I invite you to just feel your body right now. Like, is your feet touching the floor? Or are you lying down?
Are you sitting? Can you feel the surface supporting your body? Can you feel your breathing? Like your body parts breathing? This way of paying attention is essentially mindfulness. So that's when your body, mind are together in one place. That's mindfulness. So it's not some you have to go hiking on top of a mountain and do all this spiritual stuff to get to this awareness. I always say people actually naturally have those moments. If you think back to your life, there are moments you feel fully present and alive and your body and mind are united for some people.
And maybe when you're in all with nature for some people, a lot of it is the folks I've talked to, they say is when they exercise, you know, after exercise, you have that mental clarity. You really are in one place. So think back to your past and you probably have moments like that. And I always say that it's not some barrier to entry. Like you actually already feel it. We're just turning our attention towards more of those moments.
William Curb: Awesome. To me, I can that just sounds like beneficial in its own right. But because it just seems like, yeah, I would like to be more present and stuff. But then I'm having trouble verbalizing why that's important to do, though. Can you speak about some of the benefits of doing this?
Ying Deng: Yes. So specifically for ADHD folks, there's research out there have shown that mindfulness meditation would reduce ADHD symptoms for both adults and children, especially in attention. So I primarily have an attentive ADHD and I definitely think it helped me a ton of just being aware and more able to keep track of my thoughts and more aware of if my thoughts go down in a tray, I can redirect it back.
Because meditation really is training the redirecting muscle, redirecting your attention back to whatever focus you have chosen. Also, it has shown to improve emotional functioning and increase self-compassion, improve quality of life. It reduces depression and anxiety symptoms, reduces ADHD parents' stress level, potentially improve executive functioning both in adults and children, and just generally improve general behavior.
William Curb: I mean, and that makes just the reduction in stress seems like a huge benefit since the most common comorbidity with ADHD is anxiety.
Ying Deng: Yes.
William Curb: Who doesn't have anxiety nowadays?
Ying Deng: Yes.
William Curb: Yeah. And it does seem like something would be very beneficial for anyone with ADHD, even if they're not feeling that anxious to kind of get more in touch with themselves because we do that in a tentative side, even the hyperactive side being just like, I can't sit still being like, OK, well, maybe let's cultivate some of that.
Ying Deng: Absolutely. I mean, for me personally, I think it's especially beneficial for me in the way that I think a lot of ADHD folks were doing things that there's no road map out there. We're always exploring these discovered terrains and territories. So we're oftentimes have to navigate life with our heart instead of a road map set out there, which usually road maps and you're typical.
So we can't follow them anyways. So in terms of that, I was reflecting on it and it really helps me to know, OK, what my energy levels are, what kind of things I can do under those energy levels, what are the things that actually nurturing me, what are things that actually may burn me out? And those muscles I cultivate through meditation, through mindfulness, they help me in general to better navigate my life.
William Curb: Awesome. I had a friend also talking to me how when she was feeling really overwhelmed, especially in planning, if she did like five minutes of meditation beforehand, she was like, oh, I can now figure this out now. I was just feeling this anxiety and that was the block and was just doing a little bit calming down that made it so that I could move forward.
Ying Deng: Absolutely. If we use that example, is listeners out there imagine a time if you have ADHD, you probably have felt the overwhelm of planning. And if you're doing meditation in those moments, it may look like you're pausing and you're recognizing, hey, I'm having this overwhelming feeling. And this pausing is helping us not to go into the storytelling of, oh, if I can't do this, I will fail.
I will do this, this and that. So this pausing already is reversing the storytelling. And we allow it. We're saying like, hey, I'm feeling this overwhelm. Can I let this be? Can I be with it? Even if I, you know, it's not a good sensation. It's not a good feeling, but can I be with it? Can I let it be? And then you investigate where do you feel this feeling in your body?
If it's, you know, on your face, a flash of heat or for me, a lot of times it's my back tends to tense up, you know, it might be your chest, whatever you feel in the body, locate that sensation. And you invite and nurturing either gesture for yourself, like a hand on your heart or sometimes songs or poems or imagine a loved one saying something to you. Like you actually give yourself the self-compassion you need. So that would be what it looked like to practice in those moments.
William Curb: Yeah. A lot of times we have these feelings and it's just so encompassing where we're just like, you know, maybe it's like a hunger cue. It's like, oh, I have to have this piece of chocolate now. And you're like, sit there and go, well, maybe I don't. Maybe I can feel this and I can go, no, that's not what I need to do right now. We could, you know, maybe it's like I really need to check my phone. Maybe I don't.
Ying Deng: Yeah. Yeah. I was actually just listening to Dr. Judd. He's having a new book out called The Hunger Happen and he was just talking about it. And he's like, in those moments, pausing and, you know, thinking about if you do particular thing, like eat that piece of chocolate, what that will make you feel and really like being those sensations and think, OK, if I choose something else, what that will make me feel and really like getting to the body sensations of that.
And that will hopefully help you to make better choices. And also that totally in line with one of my favorite quotes from Viktor Frankl, who is a psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor. He said, between stimulus and response, there is a space in that space is our power to choose our response and our response lies our growth and our freedom. So meditation really is just kind of expand that space, give us a bit more time to think about, hey, how do we want to respond?
William Curb: And I can feel like, yeah, having that pause seems really great. But I can also mentally hear listeners going, I have zero pause already. How can I build something from zero?
Ying Deng: Yes, I love that. So I think for ADHD folks, a few things, general strategies might really work. One is making a fun challenge and gain for yourself. So maybe it's hard to say, I want to sit down to do a meditation for 30 minutes, then do a fun challenge of, can I be aware for two minutes out of an hour? Maybe it's when you put your socks on in the morning. Maybe it's when you're brewing the coffee, you hear the water bubbling up, being boiled, and maybe it's the first step you set out of your house and that cold air.
We're in the winter right now, the cold air hitting you. What does that feel like? What does that two breaths feel like? So make it a fun challenge. How can you be aware for two minutes out of an hour and practice with people? Body doubling works and body doubling will work for meditation. So if you can't find online communities or in-person communities, practice together.
That'll be easier. Curiosity, we are naturally curious. So use a lot of the curiosity, invite that in in the meditation. I'm like, huh, I wonder if I can try this new meditation style and use that variety to excite us, to design a menu for ourselves. It doesn't have to be sitting there with no music, no nothing for 30 minutes. I oftentimes rotate through unguided meditations, guided meditations. I sit outside when I can with nature because nature actually has a lot more stimulus compared to when I'm sitting inside.
So there's wind, there's sounds. So my body is more just in general, more stimulated and more likely to stay awake, which is a big problem for a lot of folks that we will fall asleep. I will fall asleep often. So those are some general tips. Whatever that has helped ADHD folks to cultivate other habits, those hacks most likely will work with meditation as well.
William Curb: Yeah, because it's not about doing the big gesture here.
Ying Deng: No.
William Curb: It's the building the practice through small increments.
Ying Deng: Absolutely. Yeah.
William Curb: Yeah, I see a lot of people that are like, I have ADHD. I can't meditate so I don't see why. But it's yeah, just go for, well, if you can't sit still for five minutes, can you sit still for two minutes or a minute or 30 seconds?
Ying Deng: Exactly. Exactly. My analogy of cooking, I would bring it in. So for me, when I start to learn sourdough baking, I have to be very strategic and think about, can I first really learn a very basic bread well and then, you know, increase the difficulty? It's the same thing with meditation of, yeah, if five minutes is too much, let's try start with one, try two minutes, three minutes, and just slowly increase that muscle as well as if sitting still is not helping you, then do movement.
There is walking meditation, people walking nature, as well as I personally use movement a lot as a transition from my day to day to the more meditative pauses. So I will use yoga stretches or shaking to get the excessive energy out so I can help myself transition into I can sit down and actually meditate. And there's mindful movements out there that you just do the movements as your meditation. So there's tons of varieties out there.
William Curb: Yeah. And there's also to speak together. There's multiple types of meditation as well. Like we were talking specifically about mindfulness, but I know there's transcendental, which is probably a little bit intense for most people starting because I understand it's. That's more of like the like hour-long meditations and stuff. There's also like loving-kindness and... Well, how about we tell people about... Can I think that's one's really great for just cultivating that good feelings?
Ying Deng: Yes. So that's what goes back to what we talked about mindfulness. The two different aspects, one is awareness and one is loving. So other than training the concentration and paying attention in this very specific way, with the loving part, there's a whole sloth of heart-oriented meditation, loving-kindness meditation, joy meditation, stuff like that. The most common one people know is called meta, which is loving-kindness meditation.
It's when you have a sincere wish for yourself and others to not go through suffering and to live their life as peaceful as possible and not go through suffering. A lot of times people and me too, I would do my meta loving-kindness meditation towards the end of my practice. So I will be sitting there for a while now and that will end my meditation with, I wish all beings in the world live life with as little suffering as possible, things like that.
It takes time, it cultivates. At first I was like, huh, this sounds fake. I wouldn't have thoughts in my head like I have doubts. I'm like, this sounds kind of fake, but the more you do it, the more you just orient your heart towards that loving, open-heartedness towards yourself and towards others.
William Curb: Yeah, and I think that's that point too that you might not see results immediately.
Ying Deng: No, yeah.
William Curb: Which is very hard with ADHD.
Ying Deng: Yes, it does take time. I remember when I was in grad school and doing meditation with body skin, I'm like, am I doing this right? They're saying like, oh, imagining light filling your whole body, you know, body scan your foot and all the way up to your head or other way around. I was just like, am I doing this right? But it's kind of like learning any new skills, like thinking back to when you first learn swimming or riding a bike, it takes time. It just takes a lot of time for that muscle to build.
William Curb: Yeah, do people have like a, we have a sense of like how long it might take someone to like see any results rather than just being like, because I know when I've done meditation in the past, I don't currently have a practice just have fallen out of the habit and now I'm going to be like wanting to do that again. It can feel like, why am I doing this? This isn't doing anything. Like, do we have a sense of how long it would take for people to kind of get that feeling of, hey, this is making a difference?
Ying Deng: Yeah, so the best I can think about in this particular case, I'm thinking about a study about meditation practice specifically for ADHD adults, I believe. What they did is they did eight week courses. So it would be eight week of 90 minute session courses. And they start to feel result after eight weeks, you know, even within the eight weeks towards the end, they start to really feel the result of it.
William Curb: So it is something that people are going to have to put in more than just, you know, being like, I'm a weekend. So, and I think that's an even better reason to be doing this with some sort of accountability because.
Ying Deng: Absolutely. Yeah.
William Curb: But also being like, hey, we're going to do this for a number of weeks. That makes it much easier.
Ying Deng: Yes. Yes. And yeah, actually we'll be offering courses later this year. I will offer two courses of introduction to mindfulness courses. And since, you know, I'm still in teacher training, so most likely those would be free with donation base. So people out there, if you're interested, you're welcome to join. And yeah, I personally find being a community really helps. I actually work for mindfulness startup. That's how much I believe it. That's just me.
William Curb: Yeah. I mean, because it is, you know, it's really funny to describe mindfulness as being hard. When really it's like very, very easy to do, but it's the executive function of making yourself do it. That's hard.
Ying Deng: Yeah. I think it's simple. Like the practice sounds simple. There's very concrete steps you can do, but it's hard in the sense it's going against what our modern society is wiring our brain to do. Like all of the phones and technology, they are trying to get our attention and they're trying to get us, you know, focus on a billion things at the same time. So yeah, we're going against the grain in a way. So that actually gets me excited because, you know, my ADHD flavor is more like, I'm going to be rebellious. So like that becomes part of my motivation.
William Curb: Yeah, I can definitely see that simple. Yeah. Simple does not always mean things are easy. And there's a lot of planning steps that go into it. Like when am I going to be doing this? How am I going to know what's going to be the trigger for me to get going on it? Like because there is a lot of executive function on the back end of like how I'm going to make time for this in my schedule because like many things in my life, it's easy for me to just not do because I don't think about doing it because I'm busy with other stuff.
Ying Deng: Yeah, absolutely. That totally makes sense. So for me personally, I have a few go-to's. Like I have like high, medium, low energy ways of doing meditation. Like if, you know, I have a really good day or I really just I'm fire with meditation. I usually do a pretty long sit down meditation practice.
Usually in my office, if the weather is nice, I'm outside like sitting on my deck because I love that. You know, medium energy way of doing it may look like I will lean more heavily on a guided meditation. I should say the high energy one, I usually am on guided. I'm just listening to music or and just really doing the practice by myself. The medium energy version, I usually lean on a guided practice, you know, maybe 15, 20 minutes guided practice. That would be my medium energy way and low energy way.
Yeah, sometimes I'm just like, I'm walking in nature and I'm like specifically paying attention to my body walking or, you know, visuals and sounds or I'm having the go-to meditations of like, yeah, I'm, I'm letting my dog outside of the backyard so she can does her business and I'm just doing a little walking meditation and doing meditation at the same time of wishing all beings have as less suffering as possible. So I built in two different versions for myself and I fully recognize all different versions are welcome. I'm not bashing myself when I'm on the low energy days. I think that's what's important is not self-criticized when you can't do the high energy version all the time.
William Curb: Yeah, because, and I think that's an important thing for us to recognize is that, hey, we can do this in a way that's going to work for us on that day because we're not always going to be at the same energy level, ability to focus, ability to go of our thoughts and stuff.
Ying Deng: Yes, yes. Well, that's actually brings to an interesting point of what meditation is not. We're not actually trying to get rid of thoughts. What we're training is redirecting is, you know, imagining your sky and all weather is just come and go and you can hold it all. There would be sunny days, like good thoughts, there would be rainy days, like anxious thoughts, or worry thoughts, or fear thoughts. They come and they go. We redirect to this spaciousness that holds it all and instead of being tangled with any particular weather or any particular thoughts.
William Curb: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense to me. Yeah, and approaching it from that, like, yeah, non-judgmental, I'm having this thought does not make me a bad person.
Ying Deng: Exactly.
William Curb: I don't have to focus on it. Or like, yeah, I was thinking of letting go thoughts in the sense of like just that cloud floating by.
Ying Deng: Watching it.
William Curb: Yeah,
Ying Deng: Yeah, fleeting by exactly. I actually experienced that a lot when I first started meditating. I was hyper aware I was a very judgmental person, but now looking to that statement, I would say like, huh, in those moments, I just had thoughts of judgment. I wouldn't label it as I was a judgmental person. And then the next step would be how do I feel compassion for myself? Even I would judge myself for judging other people. So yeah, that's why you need both loving and awareness. Because if it's only awareness, wow, I was really aware that was a judgmental person.
William Curb: Yeah, I've been there. Yeah, it's just like, I'm aware of this, let's fix it. And I was like, no, that's not what we're not here to fix things.
Ying Deng: Yes, yeah, exactly.
William Curb: Yeah, so I guess that also brings up the idea of like, are there like wrong ways to meditate?
Ying Deng: That's a good question.
William Curb: Like there's obviously like things that just straight up aren't meditation.
Ying Deng: But that's what's interesting because in real practice, a lot of times what meditation could look like is you spend a long time thinking about planning your day or you're going back and ruminating about things. But then how you practice in those moments is noting of I note was very simple past and future. I don't go into labeling exact thoughts and emotions. Sometimes that's difficult for me.
I would just be like past, past, future, future is the moments of redirecting and remembering like, hey, we're still watching this mental morphing sensations. I personally don't think there could be wrong ways to meditate. But of course, meditation don't replace like therapy or psychiatry or any sort of mental health care. So that's the caveat out there. I think it's one of those things, even if you feel like you had a bad meditation, like even if you feel like you had a bad workout, it's still a good workout.
William Curb: Yeah, as long as you're doing the right direction, it's the act of doing it, you know, I can't be like, well, I watched TikTok for 15 minutes. That was my meditation.
Ying Deng: Exactly. You can count on that. Yeah, exactly.
William Curb: Like I watched TikTok for 15 minutes. That was my workout for the day. I saw some people lifting things.
Ying Deng: Yeah, that's not going to work.
William Curb: Outside of that, yeah, just building the habit and the idea that even bad days are building your ability to do it, I think especially in bad days.
Ying Deng: Especially in bad days, especially in those meditations that think like, oh my God, I just spent the whole time thinking about the future. But then you're so aware that you were thinking about the future. You were not so entangled with all the planning and worry or fear or excitement.
William Curb: All right. So I was wondering if there was any thoughts you wanted to leave the audience with?
Ying Deng: Yeah, I would just really encourage people to explore varieties of meditations out there. Like variety is excites ADHD folks. So notice what works for you specifically, because what works for my ADHD brain or other people's ADHD brain may not work for your ADHD brain. And as well as just don't be afraid to tweak the practice. I was really afraid at the beginning of like, oh, I should be following a one particular way of meditation.
No, I found that I need to mix things. I need to do movement, then transition into meditation, or do guided meditations at the beginning and then transition into unguided. So try things out, tweak things and see what works for you and use all the hacks that will help you build other hobbies and habits and using those hacks for meditation.
William Curb: All right. And if people want to find out more about you and more about meditation, where should they go?
Ying Deng: Yes, you can find me at ADHDAsianGirl.com. I have my meditation page there. I have some meditations on my YouTube channel, also at ADHDAsianGirl. And like I said, I will be offering courses this year. So people stay tuned. I will hopefully reach out to William and then offer more information in the future.
William Curb: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm sure people will really get a lot out of this.
Ying Deng: Oh, thank you so much for having me, William.
This Episode's Top Tips
We can engage in mindfulness during daily activities like putting on socks or brewing coffee. By focusing on the sensations we can work on being present in the moment.
ADHD can make it hard for us to build our practice so we can mix up our routine with guided and unguided meditations, sit outside to connect with nature or engage in mindful movements to cater to how we’re feeling on any given day.
We don’t need to meditate for long periods and if we find that challenging, start with shorter, more manageable sessions and gradually increase the duration as we build the habit.
Body doubling can be a great way for us to get into a meditation practice. Partner up with someone or join a community for meditation sessions to make the practice more engaging and accountable.