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Short answer, ADHD sucks, except for when it rules (about 1% of the time). I have a very checklist oriented system now. I bootstrap each day by going through m

Short answer, ADHD sucks, except for when it rules (about 1% of the time). I have a very checklist oriented system now. I bootstrap each day by going through my issues and triaging them, blocking out certain portions of the day for particular pieces of work. First block is short tasks like emails etc that take <15 minutes. I also make a habit of noticing when I'm not starting a task because it's too complicated to immediately know what to do, in which case I have a primer task for those in which I work out what the discrete steps are and list those out. Tasks are set into timed blocks. 15 mins for simple ones (sometimes shorter), 2 hours ish for longer ones. If they don't fit in 2 hours they're not chunked small enough. Another tip for ADHD - if you block out 15 mins for each small task and you finish early, give yourself a little reward i.e. goofing off on HN for a couple of minutes.

thawy2025 2y ago
Can you please elaborate your checklist system and primer task you've mentioned?
- 0_____0 2y ago
  My checklist basically has me go through a workflow for bootstrapping the day. -Start a 15 minute time -Sweep events and tasks from three different calendars into my schedule for the day. Each task list is divided into "24-hour" "1-week" "1-month" deadline objects. Each time I read through each list, I move tasks around as neccessary within the list, and potentially mark certain items as not being chunked small enough - e.g. the first thing to do about those tasks is to decompose them into subtasks. Then I look at the list of things I've selected for the day, and assign short tasks to the first block of the day, and then two longer blocks for focused work, using timers all the way. 15 minute timers for the short tasks, 2-hour timers for the long ones. Items don't get deleted off the to do lists when they get transported to my daily list - they get deleted when I go through those tasks the next day and mark them done in my journal. That way I don't lose tasks that don't get done at the end of the day.. None of this matters. You need to figure out what your sticking points are each day and address those creatively. Mine were not starting tasks because I didn't know where to start exactly, and getting distracted during a task. My system still isn't perfect - I often lose track of things after lunch sometime and stop being effective. It's a battle every day, but you get to build your own weapons to fight it. Good luck.

thawy2025 2y ago

Can you please elaborate your checklist system and primer task you've mentioned?

0_____0 2y ago
My checklist basically has me go through a workflow for bootstrapping the day. -Start a 15 minute time -Sweep events and tasks from three different calendars into my schedule for the day. Each task list is divided into "24-hour" "1-week" "1-month" deadline objects. Each time I read through each list, I move tasks around as neccessary within the list, and potentially mark certain items as not being chunked small enough - e.g. the first thing to do about those tasks is to decompose them into subtasks. Then I look at the list of things I've selected for the day, and assign short tasks to the first block of the day, and then two longer blocks for focused work, using timers all the way. 15 minute timers for the short tasks, 2-hour timers for the long ones. Items don't get deleted off the to do lists when they get transported to my daily list - they get deleted when I go through those tasks the next day and mark them done in my journal. That way I don't lose tasks that don't get done at the end of the day.. None of this matters. You need to figure out what your sticking points are each day and address those creatively. Mine were not starting tasks because I didn't know where to start exactly, and getting distracted during a task. My system still isn't perfect - I often lose track of things after lunch sometime and stop being effective. It's a battle every day, but you get to build your own weapons to fight it. Good luck.