How to ADHD: An Insider's Guide to Working with Your Brain (Not Against It)

by Jessica McCabe

Add urgency. Invite a guest over if you want to get yourself to clean. Sign up for a class with a friend if you want to get started exercising. Set up a “get stuff done” meeting with a co-worker. Turn a marathon project into a series of mini sprints so you can get started before it’s almost due. Adding a sense of urgency to tasks now can keep them from becoming a crisis later. Find the right level of challenging. If something is too easy, it might be too boring; if it’s too difficult, it can be too frustrating and discouraging to keep going. If it’s something you’ve already mastered and you’re having trouble doing it, add some challenging elements to it. If it’s daunting, take it down a notch—and if you’re having a bad brain day, take it down a couple more notches. Lowering the bar can help with perfectionism, too![*3] Tie a task to a personal interest. When you’re doing something you don’t want to do but need to do, ask yourself this: Is there anything interesting about this? You can also incorporate your personal interests into a task. You might have to make the final draft of your paper sound professional, but who says you can’t exclusively use Dungeons & Dragons metaphors to get the first draft done? If your interest is in turtles, maybe you check off items on your to-do list with turtle stickers instead of check marks. You can’t always choose what you need to do, but you have some control over how you do it. Add novelty. Doing boring or repetitive tasks in a new locat...