Slowing Down with ADHD: The Importance and Challenge of Taking Rest
If you have ADHD or similar executive functioning differences, you likely have a mind that is often busy working hard, generating, and moving.
Sometimes this is pleasurable and positive. The goal is not to get rid of the parts of you that help you feel productive, creative, or alive. But the mental load and the exhaustion is real, and the ability to slow down and rest is crucial for optimal functioning with ADHD.
Yet there are specific challenges that make it difficult to effectively take rest.
The Challenge of Rest in an ADHD System
There is tremendous variation between individuals with ADHD, but it is common for the internal world to be active, whether you are getting much done externally or not.
For example, it is common to notice the following tendencies:
- Dropping into daydream
- Drifting into thought loops not directly related to the activity or situation
- Engaging in constant or compulsive multitasking
- Shifting rapidly between thoughts and ideas
- Jumping ahead mentally to future tasks and scenarios
These are just a few examples of experiences that combine patterns of both under and over-functioning, all of which can divert and drain energy in the system.
In other moments, you may notice a heavy quieting inside, which can feel like blankness or shutdown, but this flattening usually reflects a state of overwhelm, not a restorative one.
Many individuals with ADHD carry shame and self-judgment about functioning differently from neurotypical people. You may have taken in messages from important people in your life or from the broader culture that leave you feeling inadequate or make it harder to love and accept yourself.
Your inner critic has an exhausting job. It may not allow you to relax into rest without reminding you of everything you haven’t done or chiming in with other negative self-talk.
Self-Compassion as the Foundation
Learning to support your system in taking rest requires an ongoing commitment to Self-compassion.
When Self-compassion is present, your inner critic, as well as other anxious or ashamed parts, can begin to soften. This makes it possible to get curious about your inner world and to observe it more mindfully.
Too often, people learn to try to control or dominate their ADHD, coming from a place of self-judgment and non-acceptance. This is reinforced by cultural messaging that suggests we need to feel bad about ourselves in order to change.
Medicalized mental health treatment cultures, while doing plenty of good, can also contribute to this messaging, with a focus on observable symptoms as problems to fix. But this can increase shame and get in the way of connecting to and working with your inner experience.
Paradoxically, self-acceptance and self-compassion create a much stronger foundation for change and growth.
Try asking yourself:
What would it look and feel like to accept and love myself exactly AS I AM?
Let yourself linger on that question. When you give yourself permission to respect and honor your natural design, you can begin to work WITH your system instead of against it.
Getting Curious About Your System
Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a helpful framework for working with ADHD and executive functioning issues. It helps to get beneath the diagnosis and work directly with the many “parts” involved in your unique internal system.
We begin by getting curious about the protective parts related to your ADHD that are active in your unique system by asking questions, such as:
Where do you find this part in or around your body? How does it show up? As you focus on this one, can you describe it in more detail?
How are you feeling towards this part? If you feel curious and compassionate towards it, you might ask, What does it want for you? What does it want you to know about it? What is its job in your life?
Rather than trying to control and manage these parts, we offer a safe space for them to share their story and purpose. The goal is to build a trusting relationship between you and each part.
Understanding and Healing the Parts of You That Resist Rest
When you befriend these parts, they will share their fears more openly. They are also likely to share details about specifically how they keep you under and over-functioning, and what they fear would happen if they allowed you to slow down and be present.
We want to gently ask these parts about their fears:
What do you worry would happen if you allowed me to stay with the present moment?
What if you didn’t take me somewhere else?
What do you think would happen if you allowed me to do just ONE thing at a time?
What if you allowed me to stop DOING sometimes and just simply BE? What then?
Your system developed its patterns for a reason, and these parts will need their concerns to be understood before they can relax. This kind of curiosity creates space for change in a way that feels supportive, rather than forceful.
Your parts may be surprised that you actually want to get to know them. Many ADHD parts have experienced years of harsh judgment, attempts to control them, and efforts to conceal them from others.
The trust that develops becomes the foundation for deeper healing. In IFS, the healing process involves helping parts let go of the burdens and limiting beliefs they have carried for years. This creates space for new possibilities, including greater ease and true rest.
Practical Ways to Support Rest
Alongside the inner work, it can be important to develop some practical strategies that help reduce mental load and make rest more accessible.
Here are some examples:
- Creating organizational systems that help your mind trust that things are being held
- Noticing what times of day and environments support different types of tasks
- Developing routines that support self-care and reduce decision fatigue
It can also be useful to find ways of slowing down and relaxing that work for you. The kinds of routines and practices that are most supportive vary greatly, so finding strategies that help you truly rest is a very individual process. It might be:
- Doing something with your hands while listening to music or a podcast
- Intentionally scheduling time to sit and stare at the wall
- Taking a digital detox for an hour or two before bed
Individualized strategies like these can support your system in learning that it is safe and allowed to let go and relax into rest.
Making Space for Rest
As you do this work, your system can learn to pause and allow for periods of rest. You may also notice that you are more able to fully engage in just ONE thing at a time, or that you are able to engage in the present more consistently with less effort.
Your system can begin to experience that slowing down, being present, and settling into rest can actually feel good. Successfully implementing some practical strategies to support rest can also reinforce these benefits.
The goal is not to become someone who doesn’t have ADHD or to take away the pleasurable aspects of it for you.
The goal is simply to create the possibility of sometimes slowing down your pace of activity. Of doing just one thing at a time. And of settling into real, restorative rest.
As mental load decreases and quality of rest improves, overall functioning tends to improve as well.
Looking Ahead
Improvements in ADHD functioning often go along with decreased anxiety and better mood.
Medication and information about the diagnosis can be helpful tools, but they don’t have to be the end of the story.
You are allowed to want more, and you can have more.
Be kind to yourself and try to be patient. Know that you are not alone and that you are deserving of respect and care, exactly as you are.
That is the foundation for learning to work with your system, so you can live with greater ease and feel better along the way.