What It Is
ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), despite the clunky name, is less about “deficit” and more about the brain’s regulation system failing to balance attention, impulse, and motivation. In simple terms: the system that tells the brain when to focus, how long to focus, and what deserves attention — is faulty.
A normal Nincompoop brain drifts in and out of attention as needed: a bit distracted here, a bit impulsive there, but usually able to pull itself together when required. The ADHD brain, however, struggles to filter what’s important and what isn’t. Everything feels equally interesting or equally boring. Focus becomes unreliable. Time perception gets warped. Impulse control weakens. Boredom hits like a sledgehammer. But when something finally grips attention, the brain may hyperfocus on it for hours, ignoring everything else entirely.
It’s not a matter of intelligence or effort. The regulation system itself — the brain’s internal volume knobs — simply don’t function like they do for most people.
How The Nincompoop Mind Exaggerates It
In ADHD, several of the usual Nincompoop shortcuts get dialled wildly off balance.
First, heuristics dominate. The brain skips deliberate analysis and defaults to instinctive, knee-jerk reactions. Quick decisions are made without reflection, because reflection never quite arrives on time.
Lazy thinking shows up, not out of laziness itself, but because sustained mental effort is unusually draining. The brain seeks immediate reward — fast tasks, fast stimulation, fast gratification — rather than delayed outcomes.
Habitual thinking can’t stabilise. Where most people settle into routines, ADHD struggles to maintain them unless the activity is novel or emotionally engaging.
Projection can quietly feed into self-judgement: “Others probably think I’m careless, unreliable, or lazy” — reinforcing guilt and shame.
Social mimicry also suffers. Following social norms — like sitting still, waiting your turn, or enduring long-winded small talk — becomes an exhausting performance, rather than an automatic behaviour.
Time perception becomes distorted: 5 minutes feels like eternity if you’re bored, while 5 hours vanish when hyperfocused. The Nincompoop brain’s usual weak grasp of time becomes fully unreliable here.
What It Feels Like
Internally, ADHD feels like living inside a pinball machine. Thoughts bounce rapidly from one topic to the next, often interrupting each other mid-sentence. Starting tasks feels impossible; finishing them feels even harder. The intention to act and the action itself constantly misfire:
“I need to do this — but first I’ll check that — oh look, something shiny.”
It’s often deeply frustrating, because there’s usually awareness that you’re not functioning the way others expect you to. You know what needs to be done. You simply can’t seem to make yourself do it when you should. This leads to guilt, shame, and exhaustion, which only feeds the cycle.
Emotionally, ADHD amplifies reactions. Frustration arrives quickly, but so can enthusiasm. Boredom is unbearable. Waiting feels torturous. And often, self-esteem takes a beating, not because you’re incapable, but because your Nincompoop regulation system refuses to co-operate with polite schedules.
What It Could Look Like If Understood Properly
The Nincompoop lens sees ADHD not as a “broken” brain, but as a very familiar brain — one running the same shortcut systems as everyone else, but with several core dials snapped off entirely.
The goal isn’t to “discipline” ADHD into submission with sheer willpower. Willpower is a limited and unreliable tool for anyone — but especially for a brain whose regulation system is faulty. Instead, it’s about building external structures that substitute for the internal ones that aren’t functioning well.
Immediate rewards help. Breaking tasks into tiny chunks helps. Physical movement helps. Visual reminders, alarms, routines, and strict scheduling — not because the person lacks ability, but because they need scaffolding where others might rely on instinct.
Most importantly, shame is useless here. The person with ADHD isn’t choosing distraction. They’re managing a mind that struggles to filter, regulate, and pace itself. What looks like inconsistency from the outside feels like constant internal chaos from the inside.
The Nincompoop approach accepts that everyone’s mind runs on shortcuts. ADHD simply exposes what happens when those shortcuts refuse to line up.