ADHD Brains Can Defeat Impulsivity
How to Prevent Fleeting Urges from Becoming Lasting Outcomes
I like myself. I wouldn’t trade my ADHD traits for anything—except one. Impulsivity.
Impulsivity drags me where I never wish to wade. The mere seconds I spend making an impulsive decision can lead to dangerous consequences. Trusting your gut is one thing; surrendering to impulse—chasing quick fixes and dopamine hits—is another.
I’m a very impulsive person. That sudden urge to act scatters my focus and feeds my worry. My reasoning falters in the moments before a decision, and the aftermath brings only more anxiety. While most traits of our ADHD brains can be channeled into productive acts, impulsivity is one that we must overcome.1
Acting on the repeated impulse to eat at 1 AM leaves the body in a state of disarray. Reacting to a provocation while driving happens every now and then, leading to unsavory, often life-threatening, results. Cheating on a significant other can change things forever and harm both partners' health. I've acted on some of these impulses, and I would have fared better if I hadn't entertained them.
To me, impulsivity isn't just about acting without thinking; it's about the desire to act right now. This desire is often depleting and overwhelming, leaving my brain in a hazy state. Impulsive thoughts don't always strike and fade—they can persist for days or weeks, masquerading as careful deliberation when I'm really just looking for an excuse to act on my dangerous impulses.
Impulsivity is the opposite of deliberation. 'I must act NOW' is almost always a manufactured urgency. Nothing deserves to be initiated right now. Unless your house is on fire or your life is in danger, nothing needs to be acted upon immediately.
To fully understand what's so dangerous about impulsivity, we must internalize this: impulsive behavior is built on a feeling at a given moment. The danger lies in how fleeting these feelings are. They come and go, detached from our core values, shifting with our circumstances and state of mind. You're not in a state of rage all the time. You're not sexually stimulated all the time. You're not happy and carefree all the time. Because every impulsive act springs from fluctuating emotions, impulsivity leads us to override our deeper, more stable values.
Impulses start with a deceptive trick: they require minimal cognitive effort. They don't look that bad at first. The initiation force is negligible compared to deliberate decisions. It's hard for a productive, morally-sound effort to be impulsive. Bettering yourself isn’t impulsive because it takes time to improve. The gap between intention and achievement is too wide to bridge in a moment of whim. True decisions require deliberate steps, naturally filtering out those without genuine commitment. Impulsivity, on the other hand, doesn’t require much of you.
Just as electricity follows the path of least resistance, impulsivity follows the path of least reflection. Our minds gravitate toward decisions that require the least cognitive effort. When there's minimal resistance between thought and execution, the 'current' of our impulse flows almost unimpeded. Impulsivity happens when your brain optimizes for the shortest path between desire and action, not the best one.
Understanding how impulsivity deceives us is the start. But how do we overcome it? Here are the strategies I use to combat impulsivity or at least minimize its impact:
Question the Nature of the Urge: Before acting, I ask myself: Is this impulsivity or decisiveness? Decisiveness stems from accumulated knowledge and aligns with my values. Impulsivity demands immediate action without foundation.
Document the Aftermath: Our brains are bad at predicting future emotions (what psychologists call 'affective forecasting'). To overcome this shortcoming, I document my impulsive state in vivid detail. When I was obese with dangerous cholesterol levels, I would write about the aftermath of eating four sandwiches at midnight: the leaden weight in my stomach, the crushing exhaustion, the creeping nausea. I record these feelings with certainty—my future self will experience this again after binge eating. I capture every sensation precisely, creating a warning my impulsive future self shouldn’t ignore.
Redirect the Energy: An urge for destructive impulses often signals pent-up energy demanding immediate release. This energy needs an outlet—just not the toxic one calling to us. I've learned that the specific urge matters less than the pressure building beneath it. The brain isn't picky about direction—it just craves release. It might be satisfied by an intense workout or writing something meaningful until exhaustion sets in. A satisfying meal and a good film can replace the craving for regrettable intimacy. Movement, in any form, helps dissolve these impulsive forces.
Win the First Battle: I’ve noticed that I can't let myself dwell on an impulsive urge all day. I have to fight it. The first few minutes are usually the hardest. If I can rationalize my way out of an impulsive action in those first few minutes, I'll likely defeat the impulse. Idling is when impulsive thoughts flourish. When it happens, I go for a walk. Walking while thinking surprisingly clears my mind and helps me spot the rational errors my impulsive brain is making.
Train Your Consequence Muscle: Like any skill, evaluating consequences needs practice. Before entering triggering situations, spend 5-10 minutes vividly imagining the full sequence of potential outcomes. The key is making it visceral—not just 'I'll feel bad' but detailed imagery of specific outcomes. Practice tracing consequences deeper into the future than your brain naturally goes. Start with the immediate effect and force yourself to identify at least 3-4 layers of downstream effects. This expands your brain's default timeframe for evaluation.
Recognize Your Vulnerable States: Improve your intuition in defining your 'bad days' and learn to separate them from your decision making. On bad days, your impulsive brain is especially unreliable—it mistakes temporary pain for permanent problems. These are the days when you're tired, sexually aroused, stressed, or emotionally drained, and your impulsive thoughts might seem like solutions rather than threats. Learn to recognize these states. Just as you wouldn't trust your night-hungry self to make dietary choices, don't trust your stressed self to make life decisions. Some decisions can wait for clearer days, when your emotional weather isn't stormy.
Build Knowledge: I also noticed the more you know about a domain, the harder it becomes to be impulsive in decisions relating to it. That’s why I’m writing an article on impulsivity.
When you make an impulsive decision, you're not just dealing with the immediate aftermath. You've suddenly entered a new decision tree where all subsequent choices are now colored by that action.
Some opportunities only exist for people who haven't made impulsive choices.
Impulsivity shouldn’t be confused with decisiveness, a great trait to have in a world where many are paralyzed by choice. Decisiveness is quick action built on slow knowledge; impulsivity is quick action built on quick knowledge.