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Hi guys, welcome to episode 7 of how to get your sheet together.

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As always, I'm super happy that you're here and that you're listening.

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Let's have a quick look at the question that I received from my subscriber.

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And the question is, why do things take me longer than other people?

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From little things like cooking to making big decisions.

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Okay, so this is a very juicy question again.

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Thank you very much for that.

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Obviously, there are quite a few possible causes and so I just chose a few.

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And I will focus on OCD, perfectionism, getting sidetracked and sleep deprivation.

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Let's start with OCD or obsessive-compulsive disorder.

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OCD is when you have intrusive,

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unwanted thoughts and feelings,

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like fears,

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for example,

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popping up in your brain.

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These are the obsessions.

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And then you repeatedly perform actions,

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these are the compulsions,

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to ease or neutralize those thoughts and feelings.

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Very often OCD is related to certain themes as well.

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I'm going to give you some examples for a few common ones,

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which are contamination,

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bad things happening and perfectionism.

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For example, contamination.

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You fear catching some kind of rare virus,

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which would of course kill you because you touched the poles in the bus and so you

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wash your hands until they are raw.

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Bad things happening would be that you fear accidentally leaving the stove on and

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then the house filling up with gas and then the house exploding and the dog dying.

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And so you have to check the stove a million times.

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I know it's quite extreme.

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than OCD related to perfectionism.

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This wouldn't really have something to do with a fear,

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but more like a nagging feeling that something is incomplete or slightly off.

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For example,

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you could think that your podcast episode is not 100% audible and that leads you to

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record it until it feels just right.

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So of course, all of these examples have nothing to do with my own life, right?

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Now, just in case you wanted to know, there is a difference between perfectionism and perfectionism OCD.

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With perfectionism OCD,

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the thoughts and behaviors are unwanted,

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and that is not typically the case for perfectionists.

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Also,

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perfectionists hold other people to the same high standards,

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while people with OCD tend to focus on their own behaviors alone.

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Now,

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of course,

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these actions,

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so these compulsions,

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can take up time and you can even feel the urge to do them when you don't have the

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time for it.

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And all of that can delay any task that you're trying to accomplish.

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And so this is why I'm mentioning it as a response to this question.

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On top of that,

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OCD can cause quite a lot of stress because the thoughts and feelings themselves

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can be quite horrible.

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And also, you are aware that this is not quote-unquote normal behavior and so you feel ashamed.

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For me, OCD is basically a way to control what feels out of control and that is your own mind.

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And by the way, guys, OCD fairly often coexists with autism and it can coexist with ADHD too.

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I often joke that luckily I have OCD because at least that way I'm not burning the

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house down by getting distracted and forgetting to switch off the stove.

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Now, what can you do to reduce OCD?

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There are a few things,

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and I'm going to talk about therapy,

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reducing stress and boosting your serotonin levels.

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So therapy is really, really effective for OCD.

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And if you go to a therapist,

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you will probably do some form of exposure therapy and you will work on resisting compulsions.

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And it's very, very useful.

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Secondly,

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reducing stress is important because stress is a very common trigger or at least

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can make OCD a lot worse.

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For example,

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my OCD completely spiraled when I was a teenager and I was trying to cope with a horrible,

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horrible home and relationship situation.

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Now, to reduce stress, there is a tool that I use a lot and that is called the 4 A's tool.

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The four A's is basically you trying to avoid or alter the stressor or adapt to the

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stressor or accept the stressor.

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So you can choose any of these A's to deal with the stressor that you have in front of you.

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Say,

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for example,

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that you have a co-worker and this person is a real bummer and is constantly

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telling you that,

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according to the Mayans,

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the planet is going to explode anytime soon.

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That kind of person.

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So to avoid the stressor would be to just run away from her, pretty much.

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To alter the stressor would be that you tell her that you would appreciate her

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keeping her bullshit to herself in a nicer way,

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of course.

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To adapt to the stressor would be that you reframe your thoughts and that you

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change your expectations and standards.

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For example, you would reframe the thought of, God damn, this person is annoying as fuck.

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Why can't she just chill out?

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To listening to her at least gives me a little break from my boss riding my ass.

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Then to accept the stressor would be to find a soother to help you calm down.

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For example, after talking to her, you meditate for 10 minutes.

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My third tip is to boost your serotonin levels.

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And that's because anxiety disorders, including OCD, are linked to reduced amount of serotonin.

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I personally have noticed that my OCD gets three times worse in winter.

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And so that's probably because there's less sunlight.

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And so there's less serotonin going around inside my brain.

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So sunlight would be a very, very good way to deal with that.

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I have created an entire tool that actually goes over certain actions that you can

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take to boost your serotonin level.

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And you can receive that tool when you subscribe.

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If you haven't received it yet, I can always send it to you.

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Then the second possible cause for this particular situation could be perfectionism.

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So perfectionism is having excessively high expectations and standards,

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both for yourself and for others.

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People like this are overly focused on mistakes and so are highly critical.

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They also shrug off compliments and forget to celebrate their success.

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And sometimes perfectionism can result in procrastination because you are afraid

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that you might not be able to do something to your standard or also you know that

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it will take a lot of time and effort to reach that standard and so you don't even start.

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Also,

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of course,

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it can mean that sometimes you take a very,

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very long time to do something because you are trying to make it perfect.

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And so that means that you are slower than other people.

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I have a few tips for this as well.

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First is to find a good therapist once again,

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because then you can dig into where all of this comes from and what thoughts are

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behind it.

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Secondly, what helped me personally is thinking a few things.

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First of all is how important is this really?

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Will this particular thing and having it done quote unquote perfectly affect me in

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a week,

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in a month,

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in a year?

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Like how important is this actually?

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Secondly, is that I say to myself that I'm just learning or I'm just experimenting.

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And so that takes the focus away from the end result and it being perfect.

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And thirdly, I also say to myself that this is good enough.

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So I can feel it when I'm going into the perfectionism route.

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And I just say to myself that, okay, that's enough.

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This is good enough.

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So I talk to myself like a strict parent would do to a child.

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The third possible cause of being slower than other people would be getting sidetracked.

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And this is very, very common in the lives of people with ADHD.

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There are many ways to tackle this, but honestly, that would be a whole different podcast.

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So I'm just going to focus on two major tips here.

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The first tip is when you have something big that you need to do,

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write down exactly what you need to do down to the smallest possible step and then

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tick off every step as you have done it.

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And that will help you to stay on track.

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And also it helps you to feel better about yourself because you are staying focused.

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Ideally,

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you would make this very visible as well,

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like you would write it down on a whiteboard or on a calendar,

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for example.

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Secondly, you could limit your distractions.

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And I'm absolutely looking at the phone here, right?

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Because that is our favorite distraction tool.

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So...

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For example, you can leave your phone off until you have done whatever you need to do.

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Or you can work with apps that block your social media, for example.

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So whatever you can do to limit distractions will absolutely help you to stay

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focused and to avoid getting sidetracked.

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The fourth possible cause would be sleep deprivation.

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And that is because it increases a few of the things that I've mentioned before.

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So it increases OCD behavior and it increases impulsivity and reduces the ability

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to focus,

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which means that you would get sidetracked much more easily.

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So it's very important to make sure that you actually sleep enough.

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So I have a few tips for that as well.

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First and foremost,

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make sure that you actually have enough time to sleep,

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which would be seven to nine hours per night for the average person.

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Secondly,

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it would be to reduce alcohol and caffeine intake because they really mess with

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your ability to sleep.

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Thirdly, would be to make sure that you don't look at any screen at least 30 minutes before sleeping.

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So you could have a shower or you could play a game, like a board game, for example.

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Honestly, whatever that takes you 30 minutes before sleeping and that doesn't get you riled up as well.

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And then last but not least,

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you have to make sure that your room is perfect for sleeping,

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which means that it's not too cold and not too hot.

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Around 20 degrees Celsius is ideal and that there's no noise around and that also your room is darkened.

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So your eyes don't register any kind of light.

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Okay, guys, those were all of my tips for this particular question.

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I hope you enjoyed it.

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And of course, as always, you can send me a question via message.

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Ciao.