Richard Bandler:  This is an excerpt from “Healing ADD” by Thom Hartmann. It’s about time somebody started to look at what’s considered pathological with new eyes so that we can all see that being different doesn’t necessarily mean that something is wrong with you.

You can take the qualities and characteristics, especially of children, whether they’re supposed to be hyperactive or have a deficit, disorder, or whatever it may be called, and look at it in a non-pathological way. In this and his other books, Thom Hartmann points out how these behaviors were assets in the past and they can be in present and the future, as well. He suggests ways that we can begin to look at what’s supposedly wrong with our children and ourselves, and instead see what’s missing in our educational system, what’s missing in the skills that are taught to psychotherapists, what’s missing in the things we teach our doctors.

Using the techniques in this book, professionals and non-professionals alike can become agents of change and agents of learning. You can learn to use the skills and abilities that come with your genetic structure to transform your life in positive and constructive ways.

Everybody is genetically different in one way or another, but it doesn’t have to mean you can’t function in the society that we have.

Thom’s conceptualization of the ADD syndrome is a refreshing breath of fresh air. In a very real sense, we all are a syndrome “syndrome” is really nothing more than a metaphor itself. The fact is that there is nothing wrong with most of us that a good, clean change of attitude and some new skills wouldn’t fix.

I hope that as you read this book thoroughly, it sinks into your mind that these historical perspectives, and the capacity for transformation, are true about you whether you have ADD or not.