My Brain Needed a Different Tool

Even though I have had a diagnosis since childhood—Mild ADHD, mild dyslexia/dysgraphia—I didn't know until my mother told me as an adult.

No one told me at the time. I was never given support I was aware of, never given a framework, never given the information that might have explained why my brain worked differently. I was just a kid who didn't know he was wired differently from anyone else — except that I kept hearing the same phrase in report cards and parent-teacher conferences: Daniel is a bright boy, but he doesn't work up to his potential.

What does that actually mean? He doesn't finish things. He doesn't meet deadlines. Reading took him 2-3x as long. He did virtually no homework, ever. And yet he tested well — generally between good and excellent grades on tests in all subjects.

This was the '80s: the goal, as far as I could tell, was compliance, not self-knowledge. Teachers offered structure as a demand, without a pathway to achieve it, nor an understanding of what I was supposed to get out of it. Why did I struggle with things other people found natural, like executive function, and excel at things people found difficult, like complex concepts?

Here's what was actually happening: homework felt like busywork because I already understood the material. Classes felt like they ran at half speed. I'd grasp something and then have to sit there and wait for the teacher to finish or everyone else to catch up — so I'd think about other things. Teachers called it daydreaming. What it actually was, I now understand, was a brain that couldn't be made to idle (that would be a waste).

Nobody helped me understand myself other than to insinuate, imply or say outright that I am not working hard enough.

I was certainly not “disabled” enough to need accommodation, but I was definitely different enough that the standard tools never quite fit, kind of like me. And in the professional world, that gap has a cost.

Over a long career I have heard occasional versions of the same feedback as when I was a kid: disorganized. Unfocused. Meetings without clear enough agendas. I understood what they were seeing. I could not entirely disagree with any shred of honesty. Fortunately I was blessed to serve mostly under leaders who appreciated the results and were able to see the full breadth of my mission-focus, leadership, and contributions. Later I was blessed with assistant directors who were complementary to my skillset.

But what I kept wanting to say to critics was that the disorganization they were observing was the visible edge of the difference that gave me creativity and problem solving ability. That what looked like a deficit from the outside was often, from the inside, the reason for success. The good leaders I worked for, and the mentors I had along my education, saw these qualities in me and nurtured them, cultivated them.

My brain doesn't move in straight lines. It moves in all directions simultaneously — finding connections across domains, holding multiple threads at once, seeing the whole shape of something before I can explain any individual part of it. That's usually genuinely hard to fit into a three-bullet agenda.

Still, speaking professionally, colleagues, managers must look at outcomes, appearances, perceptions. The bottom line is…well, the bottom line. One must perform. One must deliver. If your brain does not work like everyone else’s, you had better find away. I have met many accomplished leaders who are non-ordinary thinkers. I find them to be the best leaders. I have also seen not-so-great leaders and learned maybe even more from them.

Here is what I have come to believe: a barrier and a strength are sometimes the same thing. The way we're forced to work within limitations — really work within them, not around them — is often where creativity lives. So what exactly is my workflow? My process?

… Then AI arrived.

I started experimenting in 2022, earlier than most people in my circles. What hit me almost immediately was something I hadn't expected: words are my strength. Always have been. I think in language, I process in language, I work best collaboratively, talking ideas through. For the first time, I had a tool that let me do exactly that. The speed and fluency of it changed everything. Not because AI is magic, but because it finally matched the way (and the speed) I actually work.

AI has never been a replacement for my brain. It has given my brain leverage. AI has become a valuable tool. But AI has many limits.

First and foremost, It lives in my phone — and for any brain, that's not good. Every time I pick up my phone , I'm picking up a device engineered to commandeer one’s attention.

The notification. The reflex. The two-minute detour becomes twenty. Then I don’t even remember why i picked it up in the first place.

Writing by hand is also faster than typing on a phone or keyboard — only voice input can compete, and in that case you are still dealing with a phone.

I've tried everything.

Sketch pads. Graph paper. Ruled notebooks. Legal pads. Every variety of planner — daily, weekly, hourly blocks, habit trackers, gratitude sections, evening reflection prompts. Project planners. Action planners. The kind marketed to executives and the kind marketed to creatives. I always use notebooks The closest I came were action planners but I've never managed to stick to a “system.”

So out of that frustration, the Ai-Ai Planner was born, starting with hand drawn sketches on paper, followed by turn after turn, iteration after iteration, with AI tool after AI tool. Eventually it coalesced.

My intention was to create an open, flexible framework for neuro-spicy brains to work naturally, harnessing their power.

I needed a blank canvas for wide-open creative thinking. So there's a template for that.

I needed containers for organizing — an eight-section modular layout .

The only true structural impositions from my practice are debrief and action fields at the bottom of every page.

Analog by design. Not as a rejection of AI — I use both every day, and I think that's the honest answer to how most of us will actually work going forward. In fact, I specifically designed Ai-Ai Planner so I could feed my thoughts to AI in more organized ways, getting the most out of it. A dedicated app is in the works.

I wrote earlier this year about what it means to plan for an earth-sheltered home—a metaphor for a secure future amidst the realities of facing a second spine surgery. This is the other side of that story — important part of what I've been doing with my mind while my body catches up.

I built the thing I always needed. It's called Ai-Ai Planner — you can find it at aiaiplanner.com. I honestly, I wrote this because I wanted to find the people who know exactly what I'm talking about. If that's you, I'd love to hear from you.