3 ms·
I have a post-it note in my desk drawer that reads "Don't Prioritize, Just Keep Moving". With ADHD, executive function is a challenge, and the moment I try to
by gms7777 5y ago
I have a post-it note in my desk drawer that reads "Don't Prioritize, Just Keep Moving".
With ADHD, executive function is a challenge, and the moment I try to slow down and actually plan out an entire day or I try to force myself to do that one thing, my brain has a tendency to just shut down. The way I get things done is just by doing the next thing my brain latches onto.
Is this ideal? Of course not. But fortunately it (usually) works reasonably well for my job, and the alternative involves being more stressed and getting less done. That's not to say I don't prioritize at all, but I try not to let it get in the way of my flow.
- travisjungroth 5y agoA variation of that I’ve had success with is prioritizing only in a dedicated window and ideally automatically. These days it’s that I work on the most important stuff for a few hours in the morning and drift from there. “Important” in this case will be pretty obvious. Something more structured is I had good luck with spending 30 minutes a day on my oldest tasks. I wrote a script just to pop them up one at a time. It wouldn’t be the most important, but it helped make sure nothing stayed around forever. I’ve also done 30 minutes a day on whatever I least want to do. A small dedicated window is more doable than 8 or 16 hours and is enough to keep things from getting stuck.
- ngold 5y agoAs an indy game dev. It is tough to keep on task. I fail miserably all the time. But I'm better than I was.
- grammers 5y agoFrom my experience, this works with most jobs. Keep in mind that everybody is procrastinating - so as long as you keep moving, you might get more done in a day with your approach than anybody else!
- gaoshan 5y agoDoes medication help you? I've found that it is not actually the magical panacea that it is often touted to be.
- gms7777 5y agoI agree. It definitely helps me (and it helps me enough that I'm willing to put up with the bureaucratic hurdles and considerable side effects) but it's far from a "cure".
- bee_rider 5y agoI wonder if there could be a successful group working strategy in here somehow -- everybody follow this greedy algorithm of just working on what appears to be appealing, then have the coordinator put up roadblocks to funnel the focus toward the most valuable work.