Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence, thank you Mr Lynch.

Sakamoto's in the background.

My fingers dance. My ADHD slides into first gear—I’ve finally found words. I hesitate, delete.

I know I’m not the only one who scries into the morning mirror of the sky—looking for signs. Or the more obvious plucking of a tarot card for the day.

I check the cricks and crunches of the body, the click-clack of shoulder blades and ankles, and I almost pour out of bed onto my floordrobe.

Further in—further in—where no records can really write it out—towards the depths of the scintillating, oscillating inner—I take a message for the day.

You see there, I want things.

And I don’t know how patient patience is.

I’ve got a million potions bubbling in a million cauldrons, but I don’t know where the hell I’ve left them bubbling. And in truth? I’ve lost interest in some of them—for now.

Back to the matter, or substance, or question at hand:

“How do I move in the world with creative force and action today?”

And the answer.

Fuck.

I’m waiting as I watch the thin landscape of my eyelids—all blood orangey. It’s cloud-watching from behind closed lids. I see:

• Deep subterranean creatures.

• A lobe-finned fish brimming with blue in the thin vastness of space.

• Nautilus bobbing from one side of eternity to the other.

Until—a thousand-petal lotus of thoughts starts to play more Sakamoto’s ‘Made in the Backyard’ and less ‘Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence.’

This is a fine analogy for anyone wanting to understand the difference between ADHD scattered thinking and a streamlined symphony of clarity.

But I return to the vast sea in front of my eyelids.

3 year old me- an electric cord in my hand or some chocolate

(Or inside my eyelids?)

I watch as seahorses dance in light skeleton forms across space.

An answer comes side-swiping across—at first detected as an itchy nose. Nothing profound. So it can’t be THE answer.

But then.

“You can reach anything when you come from stillness.”

OK. Yep. OK.

You see, without ADHD meds, I have several distinct modes:

1. Intense hyper-detective, Empress of the Universe, unlocking secrets.

2. Off with the faeries, floating in a dissociative haze.

3. An octopus on speed with no clear direction.

Sure, there are other states, but being still is a state I have had to WORK on.

My brain—this interface of neurobiology and psychophysical existence—isn’t necessarily more sophisticated or more magical than others.

But. It moves. It connects. It disconnects. At astonishing slowness and astonishing speed. It makes incredible quantum connections.

In my house, we don’t play word association games.

We play word disassociation games.

For example:

• Fish → Pin cushion

• Japanese prog rock → Nail polish

• Lemon → Air conditioning

Try it. It’s a very stimulating game.

You need a word that, when connected to the first, has to be riddled out through six degrees of separation.

Example:

Fish → water → breath → gills → holes → pin cushion.

See?

Anyway, where was I?

Oh. Stillness.

Yes. Action and Stillness.

Stillness is an action too, right?