Albert Einstein, Whoopi Goldberg, Thomas Edison, Nelson Rockefeller, Richard Branson, Ted Turner, Steve McQueen, Leonardo da Vinci, Robin Williams….Nobel Prize Winner, Genius, Actress, Talk Show Host, Inventor, Vice President, Billionaire Businessman, Media Mogul, Actor, Painter, Comedian….ADHD, Dyslexia, Autism, Aspergers, learning disabilities, attention disorders, behavior problems.  One list of people.  Two sets of labels.  Those labels both describe the same list of people.  Labels have power and they can be limiting, but from just this small subset of a truly large list of talented and accomplished individuals, we have to recognize that not only should we not allow labels to be limiting, we need to quit trying to bucket people into categories.  We spend too much time trying to find what is wrong with a student or child rather than encouraging the unique ways that people interact with the world and helping them to blossom into the great person they can be.  We also fail to recognize, on many levels, how we are designed as human beings.

Largely, this article will focus on ADHD, but my thoughts extend to those who have been identified with other “disabilities.”   I respect that there is something structurally and functionally different about the brain of individuals with ADHD than those who are considered "neurotypical", but I'm not sure that this difference is correctly identified as a disability.

With so much evidence that so many individuals with ADD/ADHD are highly successful, creative individuals, who’s to say that this is not an indication of advanced brain functioning?  We don’t say that individuals who are poor singers, dancers, artists, sportsmen are disordered; however, we have only arbitrarily decided that reading, writing and ‘rithmatic are the subjects by which we would set our standards.  Truly, when humans inhabited this earth, these were not the skills that were required.  We needed to be able to farm the land and survive.  Throughout evolution, somewhere along the line, some majority decided that this is the way the brain should optimally work, that people should be forced to sit and be still and learn in this fashion or they are “disordered.”  As I have watched, those with the attention deficit diagnoses tend to excel in other areas, particularly arts and sports.  No, I have not gathered up these children and conducted testing to support my hypothesis, but I’ve witnessed enough to wage an argument that I’m not so sure I agree how we determine what is or is not a disorder or disability.  I also would strongly argue that we need to accommodate different learning styles and allow our youth more opportunities to have success. We need to recognize different talents and steer people towards their skills.  This will build esteem and keep them engaged.

We did not initially inhabit this planet as a species to be still and studious, sitting 6-8 hours a day in classrooms or working in the corporate world.  We needed to be very physically active to farm, survive and evolve.  The active, creative brain that we find in the individuals that we call disordered served us well in making the great advancements that we needed throughout time.  I see this as evidence less of a disorder and more as individual differences.  Many struggle with taking in information in various formats and are capable of great achievements.  It is the labels themselves that often create the disabilities.I Go back to my example about expectations around sports and arts. If we expected non-athletic children, those who couldn’t sing, or those who were not artists to have to suddenly develop this talent, to be forced to spend the entire day trying to achieve this, labeling them, and in some cases trying to find a way, if possible to medicate them in order to enhance their athletic, creative or other abilities., we would see our mild-mannered bookworms acting out due to the frustration, ridicule and inability to please the adults around them.

This is not meant to be cavalier about neurodivergence, it's only meant to challenge us to think about whether a more inclusive world could level the playing field.