Show Notes

In this episode, Patrick Casale and Dr. Priyanka Rao talk about her journey from clinical work into the world of coaching, viral social media growth, and the permission to let your path evolve—especially as a late-diagnosed ADHDer.

Her authenticity, humor, and vulnerability about pivoting careers offers valuable insight for clinicians, entrepreneurs, and anyone feeling pressure to “stick to the plan.”

Here are 3 key takeaways:

1. Prioritize Authenticity Over Perfection: Showing up as your real self is what builds trust and genuine connection—whether you’re creating content, leading a group, or sitting one-on-one with a client.
2. Embrace the Pivot (without shame): It’s okay—and healthy—to follow what excites you, even if it means leaving behind something you once worked hard for. Letting go of “shoulds” and honoring your energy isn’t a failure; it’s necessary growth.
3. Impact Can Look Different: Transitioning to new modalities or scaling back can create a ripple effect—from helping more people at once to empowering others through your story. Your reach and impact aren’t limited to direct client hours.

Whether you’re managing a private practice, exploring entrepreneurship, or redefining your role entirely, give yourself the grace to evolve. Your journey doesn’t need to be linear or “by the book”—especially if leaning into your strengths and interests allows you to thrive and serve others more fully.

More about Priyanka:

Dr. Priyanka Rao—also known as Pri—is a Licensed Psychologist, executive coach, and founder of Asha Mental Health and Asha Coaching & Consulting. She specializes in adult ADHD and autism assessments and supports late-diagnosed professionals and entrepreneurs in building lives that work with their brains, not against them. A late-diagnosed ADHDer herself, she brings both clinical expertise and lived experience to everything she does.

• Instagram: instagram.com/ashacoach
• TikTok: tiktok.com/@ashacoach
• Website: asha-coaching.com/divergenttable

🎙️Listen to more episodes of the All Things Private Practice Podcast here
🎙️Spotify
🎙️Apple
🎙️YouTube Music
▶️ YouTube
✈️ Check out available Retreats
🗨️ Join the free Empowered Escape FB Community
🗨️ Join the free All Things Private Practice FB Community

A Thanks to Our Sponsors: The Receptionist for iPad, Alma, & All Things Private Practice — 2025 & 2026 Retreats!

✨The Receptionist for iPad

I want to thank The Receptionist for iPad for sponsoring this episode.

This podcast is sponsored by The Receptionist for iPad, a digital check-in system that eliminates the need to walk back and forth from your office to the waiting room to see if your next appointment has arrived. Clients can securely check-in for their appointments and you'll be immediately notified by text, email, or your preferred channel. Break free from interruptions and make the most of your time. I've been using them for almost three years now and it saves me hours in my week.

Start a 14-day free trial of The Receptionist for iPad by going to thereceptionist.com/privatepractice. Make sure to start your trial with that link. And you'll also get your first month free if you decide to sign up.

✨Alma

I want to thank Alma for sponsoring this episode.

Building and managing the practice you want can be challenging. That’s why Alma offers tools and resources to help you build not just any practice, but your private practice. They’ll help you navigate insurance, access referrals who are the right fit for you, and efficiently manage administrative tasks — so you can spend less time on the details and more time delivering great care. You support your clients. Alma supports you.

Visit helloalma.com/ATPP to learn more.

✨ All Things Private Practice — 2025 & 2026 Retreats

All Things Private Practice has some amazing retreat experiences coming up in 2025 and 2026.

We have two retreats in Queenstown, New Zealand. The first is for Neurodivergent Entrepreneurs from March 1st to 8th, and the second retreat, Beyond Private Practice, focuses on moving beyond one-on-one therapy and creating alternative income streams from March 15th to 22nd.

Spaces are limited, so check the links to sign up today. Doubt yourself, do it anyway!

• Neurodivergent Entrepreneurs in Queenstown, New Zealand: allthingspractice.com/new-zealand-neurodivergent
• Beyond Private Practice in Queenstown, New Zealand: allthingspractice.com/new-zealand-income-streams

Transcript 

PATRICK CASALE: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the All Things Private Practice podcast. I'm joined today again by Dr. Priyanka Rao, also known as Pri. Licensed psychologist, executive coach, founder of Asha Mental Health and Asha Coaching and Consulting. She specializes in adult ADHD and autism assessments, and supports late-diagnosed professionals and entrepreneurs and building lives that work with their brains, not against them. A late-diagnosed ADHDer herself. She brings both clinical expertise and lived experience to everything she does. Welcome back. Happy to have you on.

PRIYANKA RAO: Thank you for having me.

PATRICK CASALE: [CROSSTALK 00:01:30]-

PRIYANKA RAO: Can't believe you let me come back.

PATRICK CASALE: …that you blew up on social media.

PRIYANKA RAO: I know. It's wild. It wasn't even that long ago last I was on here. And it's a totally different world for me.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah. I mean, for those of you who don't know, like, and maybe you didn't listen to the first episode, which I recommend you go back and listen to, anyway, what's that been like for you to go from like, "Hey, I have like, some followers." To like. "Hey, I have a viral sensation overnight, over 100,000 on Instagram, and getting invited to do all the collabs in the world."

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, it's been a wild ride because I'm not even, like, a huge social media person myself, and so it was just never on my bingo card to, like, end up in what some people call influencer territory. But I will never call myself an influencer.

But yeah, I mean, I went from, like, I think in January I had, like, under 200 followers. And I think I just cracked, like, 111, 000, which is just bonkers and amazing, because it's been this, like, really cool experience where I've really connected with a lot of people. I've got folks that like comment on most of my posts or send me messages, and share their stories. And so, the reach has been, like, really cool and really different from anything I ever imagined. And so, that's been awesome.

And I had a little bit of a learning curve in terms of understanding, like, what it means to have a platform, and like, how all your choices matter and impact people. And like, I have a voice that a lot of people listen to, so I need to be mindful around it. Like, that was, like, a big shift for me to, like, get used to, like, oh, I can't just, like, thoughtlessly tag a bunch of friends in something, because, like, somebody is going to comment on that, or somebody is going to, like, notice the holes. And so, I've learned to be a lot more, like, intentional and mindful than I was in the beginning, when this was just like a fun project.

PATRICK CASALE: Okay. Does it still feel like a fun project?

PRIYANKA RAO: It does, because I'm doing it the way that, like, I want to do it. Like, I don't do the viral trend thing. I haven't done the dancing TikToks. Like-

PATRICK CASALE: Never have I ever.

PRIYANKA RAO: I curse all the time. I'm just doing it like as me. So, it does still feel fun. And I'm talking about the stuff I want to stuff I want to talk about. Also, I've had a friend who's helped me with strategy. His name's David, and [INDISCERNIBLE 00:03:47] strategy, and he's amazing.

But we've been friends for 20-something years. And so, he'll regularly be like, "Pri, you don't need to be posting about the Backstreet Boys." And I'll be like, "Yes, I do, though, because that's fun." So, like, I've had the space to just, like, play around and do the fun stuff too. So, yeah.

PATRICK CASALE: That sounds like a win-win then. And I know it comes with a lot of pressure and sometimes responsibility to, like, get it right. And in reality, like, we can't really ever do that. We can just be really intentional about how we show up and what we say. But putting our own voices is really, really important to all of that we do.

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah. I mean, I think the people that, like, grow their following have the kind of reach, do it because they're real humans. Like, people don't need another robot. They don't need somebody perfectly curated anymore. They never did, but they don't even want that anymore. So, yeah, totally. Like you know, really clearly if I'm your person or not, if you go to my socials, and I love that, and that makes it feel better for me too.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, it probably feels like safer. It probably feels more connective, opposed to, like, having a platform that is large but full of, like, conflict. And, you know, I wouldn't want to have that type of platform.

I see a lot of marketing professionals who, like, post things just for controversy sake. And I'm like, "How do you fucking sleep at night?" Like, I get so overwhelmed by my comments and my posts. And I'm like, "Did I say the right thing? Did I hurt someone's feelings?" Like, I am so in my head about it. I can never live like that. But anyway, congrats on that success.

PRIYANKA RAO: Thank you.

PATRICK CASALE: What we're going to talk about today, apparently, and [INDISCERNIBLE 00:05:27] on me, but you reached out to me after my episode about having to pivot in our careers and the grief that can come with that. And do you want to talk about that a little bit? Of like, okay, you're moving into a space now where you're creating these ADHD coaching programs, and you are filling them, and people are signing up, and your audience is getting bigger. So, it's going to be easier to fill those spaces up, which comes with the mind fuck of, "Do I start to relinquish my therapy career?"

And there's a lot of emotion in that, as I know, because I did that three years ago, and went through an enormous amount of grief, but as well as, like, an identity crisis of I worked so hard for my license, am I, like, abandoning the profession? So, how is this happening for you, and what's this been like?

PRIYANKA RAO: Well, yeah, I mean, that was why I messaged you, because, like, I'm in the middle of a very similar process. Like, I have a group practice. Well, calling it a group is generous. I have one employee so far. And my plan at the start of this year was to grow that, like I said, none of this was on my bingo card for the year.

So, my plan had been to grow that, to really lean into that. I get, like, a ton of requests for assessments. I'd love to train more people to do those, because I don't think enough of us do really good, like, neurodiversity affirming assessments, especially for adults. And so, like, that has been an area of passion of mine, that still is an area of passion of mine.

And coaching, like, really lights me up right now. It's really fun. And it uses different parts of my brain. And I get to, like, connect with people in a different way and at a different scale. And so, I, like, keep going back and forth on, like, do I grow the group practice? Do I lean into that part of me? Do I keep just going with the coaching and slowly scale that one back? Like, what does it look…?

Like, I haven't come to any conclusions, honestly. I mean, I have realized I need to scale back my therapy caseload, and that sucks, because I regularly have people that want to, like, work with me for therapy. I love doing therapy. I have clients that have been with me for years. I've been so fortunate that I, like, never want to say bye to or, like, I mean, healthy when they're done. But like, don't want to arbitrarily, like, end working with because I enjoy it and they're still doing good work. Yeah.

So, I'm like, I need to cut back my caseload. I also don't want to cut anyone from my caseload. I need to create more time to do this stuff. I also don't know where to put said time, so it's a lot of, like, back and forth and, like, totally, I got my doctorate. I spent six years in grad school and postdoc, and then got this license. And like, am I really not going to use it? Or I'm still using. It. I'm still using that background and all, but I did it because I wanted to be a therapist, I wanted to do assessments. Am I really going to stop that?

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah.

PRIYANKA RAO: I don't know. [CROSSTALK 00:08:27].

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah. It's a really hard decision, right? And like what we're talking about, especially for neurodivergent spaces, to have affirming providers, having affirming providers who are black or brown, who are female, like, harder and harder to find. So, it probably feels like there's like, not only pressure to continue to stay that course, but also, guilt and also-

PRIYANKA RAO: 100%.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, it's a lot of emotion involved, because you understand there's a ripple effect in terms of community, and livelihood, and identity, and all of the ways that we can be powerfully supportive.

And I get it to a lot of that degree, you know? Like, when I stopped doing therapy back in 2022, I had clients who listened to my podcast, and they were like, reaching out to me and were like, "Sounds like you're going to retire from this, and I'm just trying to brace myself for that."

And I've had Jeff Gunther of Therapy Jeff on here before, and he has millions of followers now. When he was on here, he was like 100, 000 or 200, 000. And he was like, "You know, my clients are watching my Instagram and TikTok videos and are coming to therapy, and they're like, 'Are you talking about me?'"

And just the realization of, as you grow a platform, whether or not you want to call yourself an influencer, you are having an influence on people.

PRIYANKA RAO: Totally.

PATRICK CASALE: And it impacts that world, right? When we're like, how do I maintain the separation while also maintaining my personhood, and my authenticity, and who I actually am as a person in this profession? It's a hard dance, for sure.

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, I mean, one of the ways I've navigated some of that is talking more about me, and what's hard for me and my experience versus talking generically about, "I had a client who did blah, blah, blah." But then, that means my clients then know a lot more about me than they did six months ago.

PATRICK CASALE: For sure.

PRIYANKA RAO: And I haven't, like, told them that I have this, like, Instagram account and things. And like, if they're ADHDers, most of them have come back being like, "So, you showed up on my Instagram the other day." So, the algorithms are algorithming. And, yeah, it's weird.

And like, I've talked about that with them too, of like, is this weird for you to see me show up on your social media? And like, what does that mean for our work together? And all of them have been just like delightful, lovely, supportive humans. And like I said, they've all known me for so long that they can integrate that into their version of me. If I had newer people, I bet that would be really disorienting.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I think it could be a little trickier to, like, navigate. But I also think that, like, something I talk about often is that I think and believe wholeheartedly that relatability equates to accessibility.

So, I think when you see, like, your therapist talking about their struggles with their ADHD, or autistic struggles, or whatever, when I used to talk about my gambling addiction openly, like I think it just allows for people to feel seen, and understood, and less alone. And I would argue that with any ethical, like, board or dilemma that I would come across if I ever did, but I mean, that's one part of this, right?

But the other part is, I know what it's like to have a coaching career take off unexpectedly and then have to make some really hard decisions. And back in 2022 when I stepped away from therapy for good, I only had four clients left, and they were people I enjoyed the most, if I'm being honest. And like, it wasn't even really therapy at that time. It was just more like check-ins and shooting the shit.

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah.

PATRICK CASALE: We worked together for six or seven years together, but my coaching programs were exploding. My individual coaching was exploding, like, and I kept feeling this pull in the back of my mind, like when I was in therapy, where I was like, looking at the clock out of my peripheral, like, I have so many other things that I could be doing right now, not even make more money, that was one piece of it. But also, like my ADHD side was like, I am so bored of doing 60 minutes sessions, session after session. And I didn't feel like that felt fair to my clients, nor to myself.

And making the decision to step away from a career that I had worked really hard for, and I had to go through a lot of hoops to get my license because I had a DWI on my record from 2011, no 2002. And I was like, I had to go through unbelievable amounts of assessment with the North Carolina licensure board just to even prove that I was competent and capable of being a licensed clinician.

And I was like, "Am I really about to give everything that I've worked for up in order to move in a different direction?" But you know as well as I do, with ADHD and having interest-based nervous systems, it's fucking hard. You've got to find the excitement and the passion.

PRIYANKA RAO: Absolutely. And I think, like, that's already been part of the equation for so long for me, which is why I, like, went from being a contractor in a group practice to being in leadership, to being in, like, practice ownership, to hiring somebody on. Like, that's how I've been kind of keeping that ADHD part of my brain lit up.

And yeah, right now, like, the coaching stuff is just really exciting. So, my brain's there a lot. I'm fortunate in that, like, I'm still, most of the time, in my sessions, like, jazzed to be in that session with them. I have toddlers, and so my home life is chaotic and exhausting. And I have so many ideas buzzing in my brain and so many things that I want to do that I've now hit a point where, like, I work until midnight or one most nights, because once my kid goes to bed, that's when I've got the time to do the coaching stuff. And that's just not sustainable, and that's not fair to like anybody who works with me.

So, it's really hard to, like, still love it and need to scale it back. And like, I have amazing humans in my life, professionally and personally, that, like, are helping me work through those fields and helping me work through those boundaries, and calling me out when I schedule another new person that I shouldn't.

But that guilt you were talking to earlier, like, I'm in Minnesota. There's not a lot of brown folks here. There's not a lot of great, like, adult neurodiversity affirming autism assessors' period, especially with, like, licensed psychologist credentials, which means it opens a lot more doors. And so, like, when somebody reaches out and they're like, "I've tried so…" Or I do couples therapy, there's not a lot of folks that do like neurodiversity affirming couple's therapy." So, they're like, "I've tried six therapists. Nobody's connected. I really resonated with you. I'm an Indian, and there's no other Indians here that do this. Like, please help me." It's so hard to say no.

And so, I've had to, like, empower some of the people in my life to be like, "Please scold me when I say yes the next time." So, that can kind of rein it in and, like, I'm trying to hand off more of my scheduling to my admin so that, like, I'm less tempted to schedule based on my feelings and stuff like that, but it's hard.

PATRICK CASALE: It's hard. And it sounds like you feel a lot of pressure and responsibility, too. And it makes a lot of sense. And I think one thing, when we start to think about impact, if we can zoom out from it, one thing that helped me was like, you're having an impact in a different way that creates, actually, more of a ripple effect.

PRIYANKA RAO: Right.

PATRICK CASALE: So, when I started helping therapists start their practices, it was like, well, each therapist that I help will then, therefore, go on to help X amount of people in their community, right? That's a ripple effect that I can have an impact on. When I start to do coaching with people who are like expanding into group practice ownership or whatever else they're doing with their lives, impact, ripple effect, podcasting, free access [CROSSTALK 00:18:35]-

PRIYANKA RAO: Huge impact, yeah.

PATRICK CASALE: …ripple effect. So, that's how I really had to reframe it for myself, because otherwise, I would have felt way too guilty, because what I used to specialize in was like gambling addiction, and addiction, and processed addiction in general, that more so for people who had like done the traditional 12-step. You know, this is a character defect, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and nothing was working, and just seeing it from a very different lens and perspective by sharing myself, and my story, and my experiences. And people were calling from all over the place to be like, "My son, my father, my husband, my whoever." And I felt so guilty stepping away from.

And then, as I moved more into like understanding late-diagnosed ADHD people… I have not taken a client since maybe July of 2022, and our group practice scheduler, and biller, and admin still get requests like, "Is Patrick available? I listen to his podcast. I'd love for him to be my therapist." I'm like, "Hell fucking no." [INDISCERNIBLE 00:19:42] podcast is helpful and like I hope that helps point you in the right direction. But time, energy, and capacity, things we will not get back. Money we can make more of, we can lose more of. But the time, the energy, the capacity, what we do with those things, those are the things that are the most valuable, in my opinion.

PRIYANKA RAO: 100%. And yeah, I don't want to be, like, short-changing my kids on my time or my like capacity, because I'm over-functioning at work.

PATRICK CASALE: Or yourself.

PRIYANKA RAO: That impact thing, like, yeah, for sure, yeah. That like impact thing has really, like, landed for me this year, because I'm going to assume that if you followed me, you either felt validated or learned something, and I don't think I would have in my career as just licensed psychologists doing therapy impacted 111,000 people. It wouldn't have happened.

PATRICK CASALE: [CROSSTALK 00:20:34] right? Because it's not just 111,000 people. It's like people who share your content with other people, or share the concepts, or ideas that you've talked about with other people. So, when we start thinking about impact, it is that ripple effect as it spreads, spreads, and spreads, and spreads.

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, totally. This is definitely a larger impact and in different way than what I thought it was going to be. And part of what's exciting about it is that it's a larger impact in a different way than I thought it was going to be.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, and it might not be that exciting forever. It might be exciting for the next year, or two years, or however long. And I think, especially, for those of you who are listening, who are ADHDers, allowing yourself to have permission to be excited about the things that you are currently lit up for, and allowing yourself to leave them behind when they no longer serve you instead of shaming yourself or saying I'm lazy, unmotivated, I never follow through. I never finish what I start, interest-based nervous system. Moving from the places that really light you up, because that is how you live your best life for yourself.

PRIYANKA RAO: 100%. I mean, I think learning about that interest-based nervous system, a lot of which I've learned from like you and Megan Anna on the Divergent Conversations podcast. But like learning about all that has really helped me with, you should want to do this, you should be putting your energy here. And like, being more understanding of, like, my brain just doesn't do that. And that's okay. Somebody else's brain does.

And so like, the biggest shift, I think, in like, leaning into understanding the ADHD piece, coupled with, like, entrepreneurship, and therapy, and all that is, like, giving myself permission to, like, work with my brain, dropping a lot of that shame around how I thought I was supposed to do things, and the shoulds, and all that crap, and leaning into like, nope, this is just how I work.

Jess Hogan, who's been on your podcast before, I asked her to give me a quote for this, like, about me post that friends commented on, and which is so much fun, highly recommend. But hers is that I run on shiny object syndrome and FOMO. And she's absolutely right. Like, the number of shiny objects that she and I pursue together, and the things that light us up, and, like, that's okay, because I've done some really cool shit this year, thanks to that shiny object syndrome.

PATRICK CASALE: For sure. I think it's a balancing act. Like, chasing the thing, not even chasing, I don't want to use that word, but pursuing the thing that feels really exciting, right? And sometimes it leads to unbelievable, unexpected outcomes. And sometimes it burns you the fuck out. And like it is really trying to find that balance and trying really hard to ensure that you are not always pursuing, that you are stepping back and saying, does this still serve me? Does this still light me up? And am I still passionate about it?

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think the line between excitement and burnout is finer the more divergent you are. And so, being really attuned to when am I playing with that line?

And I've flirted with that line a lot, even in the last couple of months. And so, it's just a constant recalibrating process, because, like, what worked for me three months ago is not what works for me today, and I got to be real about that.

PATRICK CASALE: Absolutely. 100%, I agree with that. And, you know, I'm making pivots in my career right now, and there's grief alongside them, because really what it's turned into is the realization and acknowledgement of capacity and limitations versus like, desired outcomes and next step, and they don't meet each other at all.

So, having to be honest with myself is tough, but I find myself in, like, probably the most significant period of autistic burnout that I've ever experienced in 39 years of life. So, something has to give, unfortunately. And that, for me, is a recalibration of like grief, yes, deconstructing internalized ableism, yes, honoring what I actually fucking need for one of the first times in my life, yes. So, it really just turns into a new iteration, a new season, and a new chapter.

And I think that's the way that I'm really trying to view what comes next. Because so many people are like, "You don't have anything planned for next year, or nothing scheduled, or you don't have anything you're announcing." And I'm like, "I don't even know if I can spell my name most days right now." Like, I just need, like, hibernation and dormancy.

And then, I'm allowing my ADHD side to say, like, but this is not forever. This is just for right now. And I think that is really an important distinction, because otherwise, that, like, restlessness and romanticism that comes with the ADHD parts would be like losing their absolute shit.

PRIYANKA RAO: Absolutely I mean, I was thinking that while you were talking, like one of the things that's helped me make space for that recalibrating is to understand that, yeah, I may close a door now, or I may make a pivot now, because that's what I need now. And like that doesn't mean I can't open that door again later, or that that energy might come back at a different point in time, or I might circle back to something exciting in the future. It's just for now.

And I think we have a really hard time with the, like, for now. Like we think, like, if I feel shitty, I'm going to feel shitty forever. If I stop doing this, I'm going to stop forever. And like, part of the work is realizing, like, we don't do anything forever. So, if you don't want to do this forever, don't.

PATRICK CASALE: Exactly. Easier said than done. I think that's why, like, zooming out sometimes and saying, like, okay, if I've felt like this before, how has this turned out? When I have assumed or thought this is permanent, this is finite.

And then, when we're in the thick of whether it's depression or some other mental health struggle, it's really easy for our brains to convince ourselves that this is going to just be horrific for the rest of our lives. And then, we come out of it and we're like, "Oh, you know, clearly this is not permanency."

So, it's just really trying to check and balance, and I think like allowing yourself space to pivot, evolve, adapt, and grow. And this iteration and chapter of your life as an entrepreneur will probably not look the same as the next chapter, but it will help build and lead you on that path of where you go next. Like, I never expected to be, like, I just did a TEDx, and I'm releasing a fucking book with a-

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, you are, with a date.

PATRICK CASALE: But like, that all came from better understanding and talking about my own experiences, right? We just don't know where any of this leads to. And I think the best advice I can give you all who are listening is like, be authentically yourself, tap into your truth, talk about your own experiences, and stop comparing yourself to other people. And that will be the best guiding light in terms of your entrepreneurial journey.

PRIYANKA RAO: 100%. I mean, I think that's what I'm living right now, and that's why it's doing well, because I let go of what I thought the path was supposed to be. And I think, like, as therapists, we get, like, it drilled into our heads from grad school that, like, there's a thing to do, there's a path to take, there's amount of money that you're going to make, and that's it. And unlearning all that, like, yeah, I'm sure everyone who's listening to this has already been in that process. Otherwise, they wouldn't be listening to your podcast. But like giving yourself permission to pivot like that is huge, and like to think like something can be different than what other people told me it was supposed to be, and that's fine.

PATRICK CASALE: 100%, 100%. I couldn't say it better myself. Well, I just want to say thank you for coming on. I'm really glad we got to meet each other in person in Scotland, although brief, because it was quite overwhelming for me. And looking forward to hanging out in New Zealand where it will be less overwhelming for me.

PRIYANKA RAO: And I'm so excited.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I'm like, oh my God, we're seven months away now. I'm sure you have not booked your flights, Pri, and you really-

PRIYANKA RAO: 0% chance of booking my flight anytime soon, come on.

PATRICK CASALE: This is like the ADHD friendship, is the autistic part always trying to over accommodate for the ADHDer friends in your life, where you're like, "Book your damn flights." And they're like, "I'll do it like, whatever." And you're like, "Oh my God, this makes me so uncomfortable."

PRIYANKA RAO: I saw your email being like, "You need to book now." And I just giggled and moved on.

PATRICK CASALE: [CROSSTALK 00:29:30]-

PRIYANKA RAO: Yeah, that's funny, anyways.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah.

PRIYANKA RAO: I like to stress my friends out because I went... Oh, I met up with some of my grad school friends in Vegas this last weekend to see the Backstreet Boys, and which, oh my gosh, the best. But I didn't buy my ticket until Monday, and the concert was Friday, and they were freaking the fuck out. They were like, "What are you doing?" And I was like, "I don't know. I'll get on a plane. Like, it'll be okay." It's the ADHD tax.

PATRICK CASALE: [CROSSTALK 00:29:54] live your lives these ways, and just are so nonchalant about it, and carefree. I envy it so much because I have, like, overplanned for scenario A, B, C, D, all the way through Z, and it sucks. It is so much mental energy. And I'm like, "Man, wouldn't it be nice to just do that?"

But anyway, okay, tell everyone where they can find you, what you're offering, and what you're doing.

PRIYANKA RAO: Sure. So, on Instagram, I'm @ashacoach, that's A-S- H-A coach. And I'm also on TikTok, on that same name, though admittedly less on TikTok. 

I have a couple things right now. My main thing is, I have a, like, membership community that recently opened called The Divergent Table. And so, it's focused a lot on, like, connecting with other, particularly, late diagnosed age years, but just generally ADHD adults.

And there's a monthly master class that I teach live, a monthly group coaching calls so you can get coached by me, and a ton, just like discussion spaces, monthly resources, et cetera. So, it's kind of the scaffolding, take what you want, show up when you can, kind of space to connect with other people. Because the biggest thing I've seen is, like, how many people are like, "Oh, it's not just me." And so, really leaning into that community building there.

And then, I also have a group coaching program called Surviving and Thriving. That's a little bit more like high touch deep dive for eight weeks into, like, all the parts of your ADHD life.

And I'm not going to say that I have openings for one-on-one coaching right now, because I'm not supposed to be scheduling those, theoretically.

PATRICK CASALE: No, Priyanka does not have openings for one-on-one coaching. She also does not have openings for one-on-one therapy. So, this is an accountability measure that she can't do that and be reminded of.

Thank you for coming on and making the time today. And I'm looking forward to seeing you on the other side of the world in a few months.

PRIYANKA RAO: Yes, thank you for having me.

PATRICK CASALE: And to everyone listening to the All Things Private Practice podcast, new episodes are out on Saturdays on all major platforms and YouTube. You can like, download, subscribe, and share. Doubt yourself, do it anyway. See you next week.