A Clock For Your Desktop
Tara McGillicuddy pointed out in a recent blog post that the most important time management tool for an A.D.D.er is an analog clock. Unlike digital clocks which simply tell time, an analog clock offers a concrete visual conception of the passage of time. For those of you who are tied to your computer, you may [...]
Are You Really Multi-Tasking?
I bet you think you accomplished a lot today. Before you pat yourself on the back, read the description below. Does it sound like your regular work day? “[M] ulti-taskers [...] tend to get part way into one task, then notice a sticky note by the computer and start working on that one, when the [...]
Time Management Tips
Five time management tips from Jennifer Koretsky. Take 15 minutes every single day to plan your schedule. A small investment in planning goes a long way towards reducing stress and overwhelm. Always keep a to-do list. Your to-do list is your friend. It helps you keep track of all those tasks that are so easily [...]
Boost Your Productivity
Here’s another laundry list of suggestions for increasing productivity. Below are the first three suggestions from the list. Nuke it! The most efficient way to get through a task is to delete it. If it doesn’t need to be done, get it off your to do list. Daily goals. Without a clear focus, it’s too [...]
White Noise Helps with Concentration
Here’s some scientific evidence to back up the claim that A.D.D.ers concentrate better with a bit of noise. See: White Noise Helps with Concentration And here’s some additional information on this finding. The noise is believed to affect the child’s dopamine levels, which affect concentration. In children with ADHD, dopamine levels are low, and the [...]
Pen, Paper & Planner: A Methodology for the Capture of Human Interaction both Planned and Present and Its Suitability For Use By Adults Who Have the Fictitious Disease Known as A.D.D.
The first planner that I used was Lotus Organizer® for Windows 3.1. It used an intuitive “tabbed” metaphor (pretty innovative for its time) and could produce wonderful paper calendars and phone directories and contact histories and more. In fact, I spent so much time putting in data and then printing it out that, well, I [...]
Vacation Panic
Vacation Panic: a feeling that you have forgotten something very important but you can’t remember what that “something” is. This feeling becomes more intense – and paralyzing – the closer you come to the beginning of your vacation period. It may disappear during the vacation and it definitely reappears the day you return home. Vacation [...]
52 Tips for (Yech!) Happiness
Don’t be confused by the title of this post. I’m all in favor of happiness. But when someone offers tips on how to be happy I feel the urge to strangle that person. My inner A.D.D. child screams, “WAKE UP! THERE’S A WORLD OF PROBLEMS THAT NEED TO BE SOLVED.” This inner scream is often [...]
Creating the “Action” Habit
I thought this might be helpful to both A.D.D.ers and non-A.D.D.ers. People at the top of every profession share one quality they get things done. This ability supercedes intelligence, talent, and connections in determining the size of your salary and the speed of your advancement. Despite the simplicity of this concept there is a perpetual [...]
Getting Beyond A.D.D. “Paralysis”
A.D.D.ers can easily enter a state of “paralysis” ” of complete inaction” when their to-do list grows exponentially. According to Jennifer Koretsky, this happens when you become consumed by all of the things you must do (“consumed by the future”) and, simultaneously, you are consumed by your legacy of past mistakes (“consumed by the past”). [...]
Handling Procrastination
My favorite tonic for procrastination – which I have mentioned in passing previously – is what I call a dash, which is simply a short burst of focused activity during which you force yourself to do nothing but work on the procrastinated item for a very short period of time – perhaps as little as [...]
A.D.D. and Music
As I write this I have a set of headphones on while I listen to Bowie’s “Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust.” I’ve got the volume cranked so the outside world is drowned out. Music sends me into an altered state. I can think clearly. I can crank out programming code. I can play killer [...]
