“Maybe success isn’t about climbing the ladder—it’s about realizing you were never meant to be on that one.”
Table of Contents
- The Myth of “Making It”
- When Success Becomes a Moving Target
- Brains That Don’t Wait Their Turn
- Rewriting the Timeline of Achievement
- The Pressure Cooker of Productivity Culture
- Micro-Wins, Macro-Peace
- The Global Lens: India, Malaysia, and the ADHD Hustle
- How to Build an ADHD-Friendly Definition of Success
- The Power of Slow Greatness & Thelucammmagz Quote
The 8-Year-Old Who Wanted an Oscar
At eight, while other kids played pretend weddings, I watched A&E’s Biography. I was obsessed. The show promised answers—if I studied successful people long enough, maybe I could replicate their magic formula.
I wanted to be famous. Maybe an Olympian. Maybe an actress. Preferably both. I wanted my story told in glossy montages and slow-motion applause.
Except, I couldn’t act.
And my Olympic dreams fizzled out before puberty.
So I chased success elsewhere—with degrees, jobs, titles, and a to-do list that screamed “overachiever” but whispered “exhausted.” I thought if I just kept ticking boxes, I’d earn the right to feel proud.
But the only thing I mastered was burnout.
The Productivity Lie We’re Sold
Society teaches us that success is discipline, consistency, and grind.
If you want something badly enough, you’ll “just do it.”
Except my brain doesn’t run on Nike slogans.
I had ideas—hundreds of them. I started projects like fireworks and finished them like confetti: scattered, beautiful, incomplete. My consistency was being inconsistent. My discipline was surviving another day without losing momentum.
So I did what “successful” people do: I doubled down.
I chased degrees. I got my first at 20, a master’s by my mid-twenties. I took every job that sounded impressive enough for LinkedIn.
But all I earned was the art of pretending I was fine.
The Career I Hated (And The Freedom It Gave Me)
At 25, I landed what should’ve been the job.
An advertising agency. My own business cards. An open office that smelled like ambition and burnt coffee.
I lasted a few months.
The fluorescent lights buzzed louder than my thoughts. My brain felt caged. I took “stretch breaks” so often my boss thought I was allergic to sitting. Eventually, they fired me.
I should’ve been devastated. Instead, I felt free.
That’s when I realized something crucial: I wasn’t lazy. I wasn’t broken. I was simply not built for the 9-to-5 machine.
When the pandemic hit, I stopped pretending. I went freelance. I wrote. I created. I moved with my rhythms.
And then came the diagnosis—ADHD. Suddenly, the puzzle pieces made sense.
The ADHD Paradox: Brilliant, Burnt Out, and Beating Yourself Up
ADHD is like having a brain that’s both a Ferrari and a shopping cart.
Fast, impulsive, chaotic—but capable of genius when the conditions are right.
It explained everything: the last-minute college essays, the panic-fueled articles that still somehow worked, the burnout cycles that left me doubting my worth.
We ADHDers live in a world built for “neurotypicals”—people who can plan, organize, and regulate without their brains turning it into a circus act. We’re told to “just focus” and “try harder,” as if we haven’t already been trying since birth.
Famous names—Michael Phelps, Simone Biles, Richard Branson—turn ADHD into a headline-friendly superpower. But for most of us, it’s not about winning gold medals. It’s about not losing ourselves.
Redefining What “Success” Even Means
For fifteen years, I thought success meant a good job, a steady income, a sleek apartment, and people saying, “Wow, you’ve made it.”
But that definition was written for someone else’s brain.
My ADHD forced me to redefine success—not as achievement, but as alignment.
Success isn’t working harder; it’s working with your brain instead of against it. It’s designing a life that feels good, not one that looks good on paper.
Here’s how I started to rewrite that definition.
1. Make Life Strategically Easier (and Sometimes Harder)
For years, I believed life had to be difficult to count.
If I wasn’t struggling, I wasn’t trying hard enough.
Turns out, that’s nonsense.
Productivity experts like James Clear and Ali Abdaal call it “reducing friction.” The idea is simple: make the good habits easy and the bad ones hard.
For ADHD brains, it’s revolutionary.
My micro-hacks:
- Keep water bottles, journals, and notes visible—out of sight is out of mind.
- Reward first, work later (yes, dopamine before deadlines).
- Use music or podcasts as mental scaffolding for boring tasks.
- Hide cheat snacks and delete one-click shopping temptations.
- Create “speed bumps” between impulse and action—24-hour rules for spending or texting.
Because when your motivation is dopamine-based, willpower is just bad UX.
2. Follow What Sparks You
ADHD brains aren’t powered by importance; they’re powered by interest.
Neurotypicals can do things because they’re supposed to. We do them because they’re fascinating, urgent, or fun.
That’s why Michael Phelps and Richard Branson thrived—they built empires around their obsessions.
Passion is our oxygen.
Even when work isn’t thrilling, there’s always a way to add intrigue. I once found myself consulting on precious metals (yes, gold and silver). It sounded dull until I dove into the history of alchemy. Suddenly, spreadsheets became treasure maps.
If your job bores you, gamify it. Set timers. Add challenges. Find novelty.
And if all else fails—find new work. Because passion isn’t a luxury for ADHDers. It’s the difference between thriving and crashing.
3. Routines Aren’t the Enemy—Rigid Ones Are
I used to think structure killed creativity. That was a lie I told myself every time I missed a deadline.
Now I realize structure frees creativity.
The trick is flexibility. I use “soft” time blocking—mapping my day in broad strokes instead of minute-by-minute torture.
Morning: writing.
Afternoon: admin or movement.
Evening: brain rest or chaos (my favorite).
Doctor Megan Anna Neff calls it adaptive scheduling, and it’s perfect for neurodivergent folks.
Aim for 80% success. Life happens. The goal isn’t to be perfect; it’s to keep moving.
4. Goals Need to Be Short-Term (Because So Are Our Attention Spans)
ADHD and five-year plans go together like cats and swimming pools.
Long-term goals are too abstract to trigger motivation. We need the thrill of immediacy—the dopamine hit of visible progress.
So I stopped making “vision boards” and started making tiny to-do victories.
Example: Instead of “lose 40 pounds this year,” my goal is “drink 2 liters today” and “walk 20 minutes before sunset.”
The magic is in momentum.
James Clear says, “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”
For ADHDers, that system is small, visible, repeatable wins.
5. Redefine Peace as Success
Maslow said self-actualization comes after meeting basic needs.
For ADHDers, meeting those needs is the victory.
We don’t need to be billionaires to feel worthy.
We just need to wake up not hating ourselves for how our brains work.
Success is doing work that fits our rhythm. It’s earning enough to live, without selling our sanity. It’s resting without guilt and creating without fear.
Some days, I write like lightning. Other days, I can barely get out of bed. That doesn’t make me lazy—it makes me human.
🌍 A Note to Creatives in India, Malaysia, and Beyond
In Chennai, Kuala Lumpur, or anywhere creativity thrives under pressure, ADHD often hides in plain sight.
We call it “overthinking,” “lack of focus,” or “restlessness.”
But really, it’s a brain wired for movement in a world built on stillness.
Creative minds from Coimbatore to Penang are quietly redefining success—choosing flexible work, freelancing, or side hustles that align with their chaos. The pandemic made it global; neurodivergence made it necessary.
Success now looks like peace, not prestige.
Pull Quote
“Success isn’t a finish line. It’s the moment you stop trying to earn permission to rest.”
The Quiet Redefinition
That eight-year-old girl who dreamed of fame still lives somewhere inside me.
But she’s calmer now. She understands that success isn’t found in applause or titles—it’s in the quiet knowing that your brain, just as it is, is enough.
I might never have a corner office or a million dollars.
But I have freedom. I have words. I have peace.
Maybe that’s what success really was all along.
