Like… How do you do things that are good for you and necessary?
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Last time I had to do The ThingTM, I didn’t go “let’s do The ThingTM,” I went “let’s get ahead of people yelling at me and do The ThingTM.”
Start with the smallest possible thingie.
Inspiration.
… alas, much falls to neglect relying solely on this method.
lolno
(The answer is find a way in which the thing is good and necessary for someone else. Works occasionally.)
I need accountability, the threat of failing someone looming over my head. Oh… You mean good for me. Nevermind ᕕ(ᐛ)ᕗ I hadn’ t read the complete question
Accountability doesn’t even work for me.
But then again I’ve never had someone bring on accountability that wasn’t a negative asshole. I could see it helping if they were positive.
It doesn’t always works for me either,
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ but helps a lot of times.
I’ve seen an interesting talk by Russell Barkley recently where he said that accountability only doesn’t work for ADHD behaviour modification if it’s delayed. Which, most social accountability kinda is - “You forgot that we were going to go somewhere, I just silently won’t invite you next time”.
So what he suggested is that you should take on more accountability than normal people, and make sure that consequences hit you immediately, otherwise your brain, with its limited short-term memory, just won’t correlate behavior and consequence and not learn from it.Don’t really remember what else was in that talk, but what I took out of it is that my husband gets a water bottle and can spritz me down like a cat if he sees me procrastinating or getting too sidetracked while getting ready for something. I’m not happy about it, but it’s very effective.
I personally like to imagine me doing things for my future self. You know those moments when you feel really grateful towards yourself for having done something good in the past? I try my best to chase that feeling.
Just say “Oh yeah future me, you’re gonna absolutely love present me for this”, and wash those dishes like a boss.
I really like this and will try using it. Thanks for sharing!
I listen to an audiobook or podcast when doing mundane stuff like dishes, vacuuming or laundry. Didn’t start out as a hack or plan, just noticed how much more I got done listening to something I’m interested in.
Yuuuuup. And if I’m stuck on my phone, repeatedly opening Voyager, remembering I need to do something, closing it, then opening it again, I can hit play on my audiobook or podcast. Then I get up and go do stuff.
This is how I force myself to exercise. I get to listen to my audiobook/music for 20-30 minutes
Heavily distract myself by listening to a podcast or audiobook and charging my phone.
I’m actually using this as a positive. There are some I relisten to because I enjoy them so much, its enough to keep a good amount of my brain on it, and let’s me do other things since my hands are free.
When I miss parts because I start down some other train of thought, since ive already listened to it so many times I know exactly where I am and what happened.
Thats about the best I’ve got.
Edit: Apparently audiobook now autocorrects to audiobookshelf, which is very funny to me
Edit 2: This doesnt always work, as I should be folding laundry right now. Going back to folding laundry.
What are the ones you enjoy on repeat?
Dungeons and Daddies (not a bdsm podcast). Especially the specials, but I relisten to the seasons. I caught it early about 4 or 5 episodes in, my daughter was just born, and I spent a lot of evenings alone cleaning so my wife could rest. I’d basically listen to all of the episodes before the next came out, just listening while doing dishes or cleaning bottles or whatever.
Its been a favorite since.
Therapy and prescription drugs.
All the things here.
The method I’ve been having most success with lately is a severe restriction of myself.
Part of that is because if I don’t wanna do the Thing, it’s so incredibly easy to forget the Thing, my mind doesn’t wanna hold it.
Currently, the routine I follow when I fail to self-motivate is
- Drop my kid off
- Maybe remember pills
- Maybe remember caffeine (coffee is my goto)
- Sit on the couch, think about my day
- The remote is close, do a YouTube on my TV.
- 4 YouTubes in, now understand the Chinese role in ww2 and the life cycle of 2 different moths, realize I have things to do.
- Get up, forget the things, make too much food.
- Watch things on my phone/scroll Lemmy/play mobile games
- Oh crap I have to get my kid
I have found that removing individual parts, like telling myself “no YouTube today”, only works temporarily, until I get distracted by something else, then I forget the new rule. So all it really does is reorder the schedule above.
BUT, I have found that removing all of the distractions, even the important ones like food, until I have begun the important task, helps.
So based on what I typed above, my rule for the day looks like No YouTube, no social media, no mobile games, no breakfast, no sitting on the couch I have to spell out each thing, I can’t just say “no distractions”, because the me in the moment thinks it’s a break or I’m warming up to doing the thing, some nonsense.
After an hour of doing the Thing, I get a break for breakfast, it is important. But once ive put that time into doing the Thing, it’s a lot easier to get back to it.
So the new schedule is
- Drop my kid off
- Know I need to do something, but the Thing has slipped my mind.
- Mentally run through a list of things I could do. Because so much is banned, and the Thing is forgotten, this turns up nothing.
- Realize I haven’t taken my pills or made coffee, do those
- After those, I remember why those are all I’m allowed to do, and therefore remember the Thing.
- Delay a bit because the Thing is boring or hard, but still can’t do anything else
- Do. The. THING. (For an hour)
- Breakfast, which feels so good, and dopamines the brain, hopefully making the Thing easier in the future.
- Do more Thing.
I hope this helps. This is only possible because of my prescribed Meth, caffeine, and because I’m actually a lot better at telling myself what not to do than to just do something. Good luck, we all need it.
For me it works with these two tweaks:
- the list is written, never just in my head
- I go through the items one by one and “simulate” them briefly in my head. Then do what feels right, no pressure, also fine to do nothing. Only the “simulation” is mandatory
That is the real miracle method I’ve been chasing all my life.
I’m definitely gonna try that, then.
Tell me how it went. I’m curious if it’s the best of all methods, or just what works for me.
Well I wasn’t more productive (or less productive), but I definitely feel less guilty. Since I’ve been fairly confident that stress from guilt has been preventing me from accomplishing anything, I’m gonna keep trying and see if that works out.
Relatedly, do you find you have to make the list the day of? Is it more the repeating out loud that’s helpful? I expect for me, I’d be able to make a list the night before, but I don’t think I’d be able to make one further out than that without me just ignoring it completely.
Amphetamines
Edit: Seriously, nothing, and I mean nothing helps motivate you the way stimulants can. You can’t do this on your own. Your brain doesn’t produce the dopamine you need to be a functioning adult on its own; you need drugs to make up for it. Fact of life; nothing to be ashamed of.
Sadly my blood pressure won’t allow me to take stims anymore. It SUCKS.
(Yes, I’ve tried other alternatives, but they don’t work for me)
You’re right, the alternatives don’t work. I’ve tried every antidepressant and mood stabilizer in the book.
Try to work on getting that blood pressure down so that you can get the meds you need. Or just do what I do and bypass the doctor. It’s risky but I absolutely can not function as an adult without Adderall so I take my chances. Hell, I didn’t move out of my parents’ house until my 30s, when I finally discovered amphetamines.
I went on Vyvanse, a slow release amphetamine, and 2 weeks later had a heart attack. I’m pretty sure it was related because I’d taken dexies about 10 years before and stopped after a month due to chest pains, and also the first day I was on Vyvanse I got chest pains again, but the doctor said it was fine so I kept taking them.
What is fucking wrong with your doctor
Sometimes “micro yesses” work for me. That’s where you turn “getting started” into something absurdly simple. Like, way simpler than you think. If your goal is to do the laundry, your “micro yes” is not grabbing the laundry basket, or going into the bedroom, or even standing up. It’s to wiggle your toes.
Probably not great but I usually can get stuff done when I’m stoned
High CBD cannabis can help me but it’s hard to find strains that are 3+:1 CBD:THC.
Alcohol worked well too until it very much didn’t.
Yus. CBD (MAX dose 1200mg (dont go even 1mg over)). Caryophyllene along with that maybe helps a bit too. 125mg ashvagandha too.
Wish I could get some DJ Short’s “Flo” strain. “Motivational”'s the most attributed quality it has.
Slowing down my brain is the only thing I’ve found that works.
Phases.
For example, Saturday might be meal prep.
Instead of bearing down and doing it all at once, I’ll bring out the pans.
Then when I’m refilling my coffee, I might put out the cutting board and a couple ingredients.
Then later on I’m like well I’m have to start it so…
It’s just easier that way. Same thing with laundry… First I’ll put the basket out by the door… Lol
Splitting up tasks definitely helps sometimes. Like if I get stuck on something difficult that should be easy doing part and coming back tonight is actually easier than trying to force myself through it.
And yeah, putting things out ahead of time so there is less total work at once helps keep it manageable.
I don’t even mean ahead of time… It can be in the present
If I know I need to cook but I don’t have the mental energy to bring it all together, I’ll just take the first step like put the cutting board on the counter
Then somehow I’ve tricked myself, the process is already underway, and it’s not a stressful thing anymore
It helps to have someone to talk to. If I keep telling my friend “Man, I gotta go to the eye dr and get new glasses.” eventually I get embarrassed about saying it so much that I actually do it instead of telling them.
