Am I the only one who feels like productivity/organization tools for ADHD people is like bicycles for blind kids? Like, "yeah I can see how a functional person could find this useful, but what the heck am I going to do with it?"
this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2023
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I just have a dry-erase board for planning out my week at work and at home I fly by the seat of my pants and spend months attempting to form good habits
It took me 25 years just to start brushing my teeth once a day, no idea how long until I get it up to twice a day.
heard recently that people with ADHD can't form habbits in the same way neurotypicals do, thats why we struggle with this shit so often!
I try to brush before bed, and when I shower. Thats like.. 1.5 times daily (most days), i'm almost there :P
We can, but they are extremely limited. I've a habit of checking my keys, phone and wallet are in my pocket when I leave the house. I also have the habit of thinking, "I need to brush my teeth" in the mornings. Unfortunately, forming a habit of actually brushing my teeth is more than my brain can handle (hence the work around).
Medication helps a lot, with even minimal habit forming. It vastly accelerates it from 5-10 years, to maybe 6-12 months, for simple habits. I can lock in 1 a year now!
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Holy fuck I am not the only one.
The only way I'm able to get anything done is by externalising my memory. I just make sure I have reminders on a smartwatch so that they forcibly are brought to my attention even if I'm away from my PC/phone.
I hear you. They can be a time sink (bone apple tea?). For me, basic BuJo on paper has been the answer for years. Recently though, I've started to use Google Tasks and Calendar to push tasks at me more than the pull of paper and pen.
My most used app for this is the built in alarms app.
I have so many alarms, no other app forces you to pay attention like an alarm.
Goblin tool. You give it a task you want to do and it breaks it down into smaller tasks/steps which you can keep breaking down. Also has a tone rewording tool and a tool for checking if you are taking something in the wrong tone. Super helpful for people with ADHD and Autism.
Oh, that looks really promising. But I'm extremely hesitant to use something like this if it can't be done 100% local and offline
Edit: Maybe I'll use it just for the most basic, non-personal stuff, like cleaning my room. Actually yeah, I think that's okay
They have an app for $0.99, but I believe it still needs connection for all the back end task generation and stuff. Hopefully it works for you as another tool for the tool box!
What it spits out from just the words clean room is pretty damn great, more than enough to convince me. And while I'm generally very careful with AI, I think in this instance it's best for me to swallow my damn pride, and accept the help it can give me.
The About section does mention the wish to move this to open source solutions, which I'd very much love to see. I'm looking forward to whenever that can happen.
Be wary of falling into the new tool new toy cycle. I have a huge problem of wanting to try new tools despite the current solution working absolutely fine.
I'm down to Ticktick for tasks and habits, and Obsidian for notes.
Habitica for daily tasks (I like the RPG feel), gobin.tools for breaking down tasks into manageable increments, and the pomodoro app Focus To-Do to keep momentum. I use a paper calendar for appointments and dates and index cards to keep track of tasks that don't have a specific date involved.
Goblin.tools is interesting! The chef tool will be a huge help!
I’ve been messing around with obsidian (a note-taking/thought-keeping app only for people who like to tinker and customize so wouldn’t necessarily recommend here), but having something that syncs between all my devices is FANTASTIC. It would still be nice to try something more grab and go, but I would highly recommend considering apps that can be easily accessed and edited from multiple devices.
only for people who like to tinker and customize so wouldn’t necessarily recommend here
I seriously cannot tell if this is sarcasm
lol. I meant it seriously but now I see my mistake.
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I'm finding Obsidian.md really great, it's become my daily checklist, to-do lists, shopping lists, calendar, and notes archive all at once. It doesn't give reminders (there might be a plugin for that actually) but I always have it open on a second screen and I sync it between my phone and my computer, and I've been much better at keeping track of things since I started using it.
The program is kind of a lot, but it's worth putting in some effort to set it up in a way that works for you. Although to be honest I think I only figured out how it works because I was also motivated to use it for Dungeons and Dragons. Otherwise I'd probably still be using my old mess of sticky notes.
Just a shame that it's not open source. I've been using Zettlr instead, it's pretty much the only FOSS alternative that doesn't pester me into syncing my stuff to a cloud, which is the one thing I like most about Obsidian.
How do you go about using it? I have a strong case of out of sight, out of mind, so I set it to launch automatically when I login, otherwhise I would just forget about its existence.
I have it set to launch on startup, and always open on my second screen. I have to make a point to check my day's task list before opening any other program, add new tasks as soon as they come up, check things off when they get done (free dopamine), and note down any unresolved items at the end of the day.
I also end up checking it incidentally a lot during the day simply because I use it for so many things, like my schedule, appointment and lecture notes, journaling, keeping track of medication, things I want to work on in the game I'm playing, etc. I'm kind of throwing all my (previously very disorganised) eggs in this basket and it's giving me reasons to check it constantly.
Just now discovered a reminder plugin so I'll start implementing that too.
Actually getting things done is a whole other issue though. Between the ADHD and my other health issues, some days I just end up with a blank template page for my daily note... but I try not to be hard on myself about it.
I personally use Logseq and sync my notes between my computer and my phone using Syncthing.
Logseq didn't work with my brain but for anyone wanting an open-source alternative to Obsidian, this is the closest one.
I use it mostly as an information dump. I love how you can just put things in daily notes and tag something as a #todo or #researchthing and have the first thing automatically added to your running todo list and the second unrelated item is piled in with any other notes with that tag. Which is great if you have no focus.
I've been using TickTick for a while now. It syncs with my Android phone and work computer pretty cleanly. It handles notifications, recurring tasks, skipping a task until the next time, habits tracked differently than tasks, etc. I don't use the premium stuff and it doesn't have ads in it. So, it's free for me.
I've got a keyboard shortcut on my computer ,so I can quickly add new items on the fly. The entry has basic language parsing to pick out the date and things. I can just enter "every monday check the mail #life" and it'll set up and tag the task automatically.
I'm working on finding good ways to make sure that I actually follow my to-do at work instead of latching on to the top item and getting lost on it for the whole day, but it's working for now.
I use the Microsoft 'To Do' app.
On your phone, set it as a widget and put it on your home screen so it's the first thing you see when you unlock your phone.
On your computer, set your browsers homepage as your To Do task list, so it's the first thing you see when you open your browser.
Whenever you think of anything you need to do, just write it in, you'll be reminded of it constantly. Any appointments won't be forgotten, and you can set due dates for any task.
Google Calendar with a ton of notifications per event and goblin.tools to automatically break down tasks.
Same for me. Now that I know about goblin.tools, I will take over the world! Mu-ha-ha
TickTick has served me well for the past few years. I throw them some cash but I hear the free version doesn’t lack much.
Oh my god I have my entire life and my husband and kiddo's entire life on TickTick.
Every tiny thing I have to do during the day is planned out.. I can't even express how much I love that app.
Android user here.
Habits to track my habits and get reminders to do things. I've got things as simple as brushing my teeth in here and have them spread across multiple areas. You can set different goals such as every day, 3 times a week, etc.
Google keep for short reminders/quick access info. The search is good and it integrates with my Google home devices to add items to my lists such as my grocery list
Todoist for task management. I love that I can use natural language when creating a task. I keep both work and personal tasks in here and plan out my day every morning using task time estimates. I've got labels for 5, 15, 30 minutes and higher for estimates for how long a task will take. Helps when I've got 30 minutes between meetings and need to find something productive to do during that time.
Notion for notes. I jumped on the hype train and thus far have found I don't use it to it's full potential. I could probably get by with something simpler but I don't want to migrate again (came from onenote)
Journey for journaling. I try to use it daily and include pictures if possible. This has really helped with my poor memory of past events. They will remind you of throwback entries which are always fun to go back and look at. I also record what I ate for the day (not tracking macros so this is good enough) and also things I'm grateful for here.
Google calendar for work and personal. Wife and I add each other to events which has helped immensely when juggling shared things, doctors appointments, kids events, and more.
Insight Timer for meditations. I try to meditate in the mornings and the premium features gives you access to some courses that I've found really great. It also has sleep meditations which don't always work for me but come in handy on occasion.
Those are the big ones. Every year around Christmas when I take some time off work I try to evaluate my productivity tools and process, and so far these have all been what I've settled on
Question. I tried to do the habit tracking thing but found I was overwhelmed by spending so much time tracking various things that it just became unsustainable. Did you pick specific areas you wanted to address or do you just do everything? I still do medication, but that's because I don't want to accidentally overdose. Again.
I've also never been able to keep a journal to save my life. 2 days is about as far as I get. So kudos to you for all the strategies you have going here.
The habits app is super quick to update. Takes me 30 seconds when I plug in my phone for bed. I do try to pick something to focus on each week, but the nice thing about the app I use is you don't have to do the things every day. Most of my goals are set to some number of times per week.
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I use a list program called any.do (synchs with my iphone and computer) as well as my google calendar. Any.do lets me keep multiple lists by category (and can share them with other people). It also creates grocery list that it sorts by category. Then I use evernote for all of my brain dump stuff and notepad for quickly jotting stuff down (like lists of names 😊).
I quite like habitica as it makes stuff do to sorta a game but definitely wouldn’t work for everyone
Honestly the only thing that has worked for me is ritalin_highdose.exe
I use the following four apps to manage my chaos ✌️:
- Workflowy - General archive and digital memory (Divided in Inbox, Several dossiers/projects, Other, and Archive. I dump everything in Inbox first and sort it when I can.)
- Tasks.org - For its simple todo list widget. Mainly little things I have to do, sorted into 4 priorities by color (app does this automatically).
- A calendar - I use a lot of recurring 'all day' events. (Like for getting notified I need to take out the trash on Wednesday)
- Stock Android Clock/alarm - I have alarms set for a lot of daily recurring things. Like literally alarms for taking medication to alarms for reminding myself I have to go to sleep.
Important things I often put in all several of the above 😊 I tend to swipe notifications away, but if 3 apps notify me, well it works. So garbage on Wednesday is a recurring weekly thing in calendar and alarm ⏰
It's actually a pretty fast setup when you get used to it. But I do put things in at least one app immediately. If I wait, I forget.
Workflowy is truly awesome imho. I put everything in there, even things like the address of my dentist. This way, I have only have one place I have to search for anything I need. It has a great search function. It's really handy that you can share text from anywhere with the app, which then throws it in the inbox. Sorting things is also very smooth, isn't necessary that often, and make me feel good when I do it. Very handy.
I use all of the above in the most basic way. No tag systems or anything; I can't keep those systems up for longer than a couple of days. I only use simple basic, inbuild functions that I can perform quickly. Together they work very well for me.
Hope this is helpful! Good luck! 👍🍀
Todark and Habo. I use them in combination and still forget things. But atleast the design is nice
I'd add MyTherapy to the mix. It's designed for tracking medication. It can pester you into remembering your meds, as well as keep track of remaining supply.
I combine it with a timer cap on my medication. That way I can see if I've opened (and taken) it, or just thought about it.
How does stuff like that work, wont it require consistency from the user which is something people with adhd are bad at.
I use lists but the amount of times i literally fail to put everything on the list is ridiculous.
It requires less consistency I think. You have to set it up once. Then you have to input each time you get more meds to update your stock. That isn't too often either but you need to be consistent in that.
In return you don't need to remember by yourself when to get new meds. And you don't need to remember all by yourself to take your meds everyday, maybe even multiple times a day.
Sounds like a good deal to me.
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I set my wife's phone up with the MyTherapy app. I like (and she hate-likes) that it has its own notification rules separate from the built-in alarms, so her meds notifications are set to make noise every 5 minutes until she actively dismisses it (usually once she's actually gotten around to taking what she needs to take). Doesn't always work, but tends to work. I haven't tried messing with the refill reminders; I should look into that for her.
none
The problem with apps is they put my phone in front of my face, opening up FAR too many options for distraction.
Honestly, a bullet journal was a game changer for me. the fancy ribboned, decorated, instagram-ready craziness people make pictures of, but the basic system created by a person with ADHD for their own of index, monthly calendar with not more than two habit trackers, daily task list, future (more than a month), and a new spread (page) for whatever random thing I need when I need it.
The right notebook makes is a LOT easier. My Leuchtturm1917 A6 lives in my right pocket, with a pen twisted in the elastic. Prenumbered pages, preprinted index, good paper when my fountain pen habit surfaces, and no distractions.
Most of the websites about it are so into beautifying it that the system gets lost, so if it sounds useful try this: https://libgen.is/search.php?req=Bullet+journal&lg_topic=libgen&open=0&view=simple&res=25&phrase=1&column=
The useful information is in parts 2 and 4 - the rest is motivation and fluff.
Disclaimer: I am medicated. Using productivity apps is easier when you're medicated.
Anyway, here's some apps that I use:
- Mozilla Thunderbird: Emails, calendars, tasks and contacts in one place. Also the only functional fully offline calendar you can find on Windows. They are in the process of developing an Android version with the developer of K9-Mail. They're also finally getting to a UI update so it doesn't look like shit, which has previously been a dealbreaker for a lot of people.
- Tasks.org: Simple tasks app I use exclusively as a shopping list. It works. That's about it.
- Loop Habit Tracker: Habit tracker I use for my daily/weekly routines. Very simple.
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