Are you struggling to stay motivated and focused while pursuing your wine studies? If you have ADHD, you’re not alone. Many individuals with ADHD face unique challenges when it comes to staying on track and achieving their goals. In this post, we’ll explore the four key factors that can motivate an ADHD brain and provide practical tips for applying them to your wine studies.

The ADHD brain processes dopamin in a different way than a neurotypical brain. It lacks dopamin, wants dopamin, but receive dopamin in a smaller scale and different way than the neurotypical brain. So where another person will find satisfaction in making a plan, sticking to it and reach their goal and receive a dopamin reward – the ADHD brain will make the plan, love the idea of the plan and get some dopamin reward the first few days of the plan, then get bored, walk away and forget the plan ever existed. You can read a lot more about this on official sites about ADHD. 

So how do you motivate your ADHD brain? If you want to complete a difficult education like the WSET Diploma, you have to activate the brain into studying somehow! 

There are many different ways to formulate the factors that can activate the ADHD-brain. I’ve tried to boil them down to 4 main points so its easier to get a sense of the overall ideas. Of course these factors works for many a neurotypical brain too! The difference is, the neurodivergent brain will ONLY do things if these factors are at stake where the neurotypical brain can benefit from these but also from lots of other factors. 

So to motivate the ADHD-brain one or more of these factors should be there:

• A sense of urgency or external motivation
• Novelty and play 
• Challenge – but the exact right amount! 
• Interest

Makes sense already? Let’s dive into them and how they relate to wine studies.

A sense of urgency or external motivation

You had a week to clean your house, plenty of time, but somehow you only do it 30 minutes before your guests arrives… The sense of urgency came to the rescue! When it is the absolute last chance to do something, maybe even a little to late, your hyperfocus will kick in and help you get it done. Tips for your guests, don’t arrive too early 😉 Besides urgency, an external motivation will help activate your brain. Getting that certificate, completing that race, getting to tell people you got the job. For others their own internal motivation is enough, but for the neurodiverse brain, the external motivation can really kick in and help you to stay on track.

For wine exams both factors are at play but you might need some help moderating them. The examdate will create an external motivation and a sense of urgency, but if the exam is 6 months away and actually requires you to study for 6 months (yes im thinking of the lovely D3 exam in the Diploma course!), getting a sense of urgency for either all 6 months or only the last 6 days are not helpfull for passing the exam or maintaining a good mental health. 

So how do you use these factors in a good way? Ill show you at the end! 

Novelty and play 

Doing the dishes is something that has to be done every day. Taking the dishes out and put them away, fill up the washer again and start it. Wait and do it all over again… im falling asleep just thinking about it… but uh, a new dishwasher! That sounds fun! For a day or two… uh deep cleaning the dishwasher so its shiny and smells nice, also fun! Fill it up with dishes? No thanks. 

The novelty of something gives your brain some lovely doses of dopamin but of course the novelty will wear off quickly. Endless routine-work is the worst (and yes the dishes are my personal sisyfos). But new gadgets, the brand new calendar that will finally change your life, the new book that you just bought although you haven’t finished the one you are reading yet, even the new cleaning task you finally remembered even if you just pulled everything out to do another task. Novelty is fun and provides sparkles of dopamin!  

While even the word ‘task’ is boring, a ‘game’ sounds fun! Doing a translation assignment sounds a bit dull, but do it in Duolingo with everything set up as a game and with both sound- and visual rewards when you get it right – fun and dopamine-sparkles! 

When you start a wine course or even a new part of it like a new module of the WSET Diploma, the novelty factor kicks in and you get all exited and want to study. But an education like the Diploma takes between 1 1/2-2 1/2 years so the novelty wears off… and those textbooks are definitely not written in a fun and playfull way! So while the joy of the novelty will help you get started – you need to add some other types of novelty and playfulness to make you continue! 

Challenge – but the exact right amount! 

Going for a walk is good for your mind and body. It is also very boring. At least for me. But I love running! I start a running-program, make a plan and each week I can see my self improving and beating my old times. The challenge-dopamine kicks in and makes it fun. I can set the barrier to the exact right amount to keep me going and feel that challenge of seeing if I can run just a little further or a little faster than last time. That is, until at some point I get a small injurie and then can’t run and starting from the beginning of the program seems impossible and I just give up and don’t run for 6 months until I remember that I do love it. The challenge became too much so I walk away from it. 

For some people competition against others is great for dopamine. But I can also become mentally unhealthy so I prefer to challenge myself. And what’s better than wine exams for this? You set the barrier when choosing which program to take, some even have a build in latter you can follow like WSET 1, 2, 3, Diploma so you can follow your own progress. The challenge is fun and gives you lovely dopamin to get started, but… what happens when you are 3 months in, still don’t have a clue how to pass the exam or get all the reading done, or if you fail the the exam and have to do it again? The challenge can seem impossible and it can feel so much easier to walk away. 

So how do you stay on track and find a good way to keep challenging yourself? 

Interest

In high school I had to take two years of French as my 3rd language. In total I have had 5 years of French-lessons. I still don’t speak French…. But I really wanted to learn Italian. They didn’t have it in my school, but I managed to convince my school to let me take italian lessons at an evening school instead but still have it count in my high school exams. For 3 years I went 1-2 nights a week into town after school to do my italian lessons. After one year of lessons I spoke way better italian than French after 5 years of French… why? They are quite similar languages. But I love Italy and the language and the food and the country and the people. So i learned it. Even went above and beyond to learn it, while my poor French-homework layed untouched on my desk. Not that I made the actual homework for my italian lessons most of the time. But I listened to italian music, read novels, spend my summers in Italy doing language school in the morning and then spending the evening in the local bar just talking a lot and slowly learning it. The interest kept me going! 

If you are doing a wine certification I’m betting you love wine. And love reading about wine. And tasting it. But taking the higher certification means you’ll have to deep dive into all sorts of subjects within wine. One of my old study mates imports Grower Champagne. He has an immense knowledge of vintages, producers, terroir and production in Champagne. When he saw that the ‘Sparkling Wines of the World’ module in Diploma only contained about 5 pages on Champagne, he was almost in chock. But the world of sparkling wines is so much bigger that just French bubbles. And if you want to pass that module you have to get to know the wines from all over the world. 

Learning about wine in the general knowledge educations, you have to read about regions you might never even heard of. Learn different soil types and their impact on the vines. The chemistry of fermentation and the range of faults that can occur. The weird system of wine-commerce in the US.  And although you love wine, it won’t all be within your field of interest.  But a few tricks can help you keep you interested and help provide a source of dopamin for your brain. 

Want to learn the tricks? Read more here or book a free online meeting to hear how I can help you with your studies!