This is what works for me and my undiagnosed ADHD. I’ve recently discovered that I may have ADHD and while I wait for things to settle up and get a professional opinion, this is what has been helping me alleviate all the problems that come with ADHD, mostly Executive Dysfunction, Time Blindness and Hyperfocusing (the bad one).
Please note that this is what works for me, and it may or may not work for you.
If you have ADHD, the How To ADHD YouTube channel and the book of the same name written by the host (Jessica McGabe) would be a better starting point for you.
Meta: It’s hard to remember to use all of this tools, so make sure to keep checking and keeping a copy of it somewhere accessible.
Mood and Emotion Regulation
- Frequent Check-ins with oneself, preferably on one single analog place, like my bullet journal.
- Doing activities that are “restful” than “numbing”.
TODO: walking, reading a book, playing with Captain (my pup), talk to a friend (not group), nap, etc. Exercise too can be helpful?
TONOTDO: play Minecraft or games, play guitar (the very energetic one), start coding, working on ideas that really grab you, fixing that one Linux problem, implementing a new feature in a system, etc. - Spending time away from screens and phones. When in doubt, step away.
- Meditating, ideally twice a day.
- Taking mindful breaths to re-center.
- Practice Niksen.
- Tracking emotions and responses.
Time and Task Management
- Alarms and timers everywhere. Make them visible, make them stand out, and there’s no limit to how many you should set up.
- Double, triple layer alarms.
Example: Bigger alarm for a main task, smaller alarm for a subtask. - Time Blocking tasks on a daily, weekly basis to keep things clear. Make sure to UNDERCOMMIT.
- Have a Master Task Inbox to keep things off of your brain and onto paper.
- Use a custom Eisenhower Matrix to categorise tasks and thus, prioritize better.
Decision Making
- Separating cool and hot executive functions. Do all the choosing, deciding (what to do, etc.), when you’re in a cool, unexcited state and write it all down for the future, unclear self.
- Don’t take decisions without taking an inventory of current resources (willpower, time reserves, mental bandwidth, social battery, etc.)
Motivation
- If it works, it works. It’s great. Follow that thought.
- Fill in the planks and jump!
- Make it urgent: atomise and add deadlines
- Make it novel. Add new things, recycle old things to make it new.
- Make it personally interesting, lie to yourself to exeggerate its importance.
- Use Focumon / gamification for long-term motivation and focus.
- Leverage accountability and Hawthorne effect. Live streaming seems to work very well. So does the Study Together Discord server.
- It’s okay to lie to yourself to make things seem more important, and or, exciting.
- Creative hurdles:
- When you don’t know how to start: BRAIN DUMP.
Impulse Control
- P*rn Impulse: ask why you want to: stimulation or relaxation?
Then find a more superior alternative. Example:- Stimulation: exercise, reading a book, watching a video on a thing that you like, reading a comic.
- Relaxation: nap, walking, meditating, playing with Captain.
- Make a Dopamenu, stop letting other things hijack your dopamine system and choose from the menu.
- Time the impulses, if they happen, to contain them as much as possible without suppressing the innate urge.
Hyperfocus
- Random notifications for checking in.
- Schedule specific time for hyperfocusing in anything. “Garbage collection”.
Focus (the better one)
- Long, flowey, defragmented tasks are better for focus than short, fragmented ones. Try to batch things if they are very small tasks and do them in one go.
- Filling up the “stimulo-meter”. Fighting distractions with (healthier) distractions.
- Music works nice, but only if you dial it nice and based on context. Music with lyrics don’t actually help you much unless you’re doing menial chores.
- Using Third Time/Focumon for better tracking.
- 10 min rule: just start it.
Sleep
- Use melatonin with proper dose.
- Avoid stimulating tasks and discussions before sleep. Example: playing guitar, having a fight with mom, etc.