The Divergent Mind: Reframing ADHDThe Deeper Thinking Podcast What if ADHD isn’t a disorder, but a different way of being—one shaped by rhythm, intuition, sensitivity, and pattern? In this extended episode, we explore ADHD as a divergent intelligence, not a deficit—drawing on over thirty-five thinkers across neuroscience, trauma, somatics, philosophy, and disability justice. ADHD is often seen as a failure to comply with linear time and fixed attention. But as Russell Barkley shows, the real challenge is one of time perception. And Gabor Maté helps us understand ADHD as a relational and developmental response, not just a neurological glitch. We turn to Bessel van der Kolk and Stephen Porges to explore how the body remembers overwhelm, and to Bonnie Badenoch and Pat Ogden for a somatic understanding of emotional regulation. This episode is both philosophical and practical. It includes tools drawn from the work of Tricia Hersey, Devon Price, Lauren Berlant, and Saidiya Hartman—helping us reframe shame, rest, and refusal not as failures, but as forms of resistance. ADHD, we argue, isn’t something to overcome. It’s something to re-meet, with deeper attention and radically different design.Why Listen?A compassionate and philosophical reframe of ADHDNeuroscience meets narrative in a somatic, relational lensLearn practical tools grounded in trauma-informed theoryUnpack how ADHD reveals what current systems can’t holdFurther ReadingAs an affiliate, we may earn from qualifying purchases through these links.Scattered Minds by Gabor Maté — On the relational and developmental roots of ADHD. Amazon linkThe Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk — A foundational text on trauma and body memory. Amazon linkRest Is Resistance by Tricia Hersey — A radical rethinking of rest and refusal. Amazon linkListen On:YouTubeSpotifyApple PodcastsBibliographyMaté, Gabor. Scattered Minds. New York: Avery, 2023.van der Kolk, Bessel. The Body Keeps the Score. New York: Penguin, 2014.Hersey, Tricia. Rest Is Resistance. New York: Little, Brown, 2022.