17 ADHD Hacks That Actually Work (The last one is a MUST)

0:00We're going to go through 17 ADHD hacks that actually work. Right. And how do you know that they actually work? Is these things that you do? Tried them all. Tried and tested all of them. Really? Well, having spoken to 250-odd people now on the podcast and thousands of people at events, these are the ones that keep on coming up. Some of them are quite obvious and some of them are a bit out there and a bit quirky, but often they're the ones that I feel work the best. And then we've got some user ones as well. people have sent some in at the end. Yes, user-submitted ones at the end. I just feel like a lot of ADHD hacks that already exist out there, they must be written by neurotypicals because they don't work.

0:47And I mean ones that just advise you to buy another notebook, for example. I listened to that and I had so many notebooks that had the first page filled out and then abandoned. um why does that not work why didn't that why what is what is the fantasy of a new notebook that adhd people fall for all the time well they're so fun to buy i think you get a bit of dopamine when you're in the shop or you're on amazon and you see the colorful new notebook and it does make you feel good in the moment because it it's like oh i'm taking steps to improve my life and that feels good i think that's the same reason people join the gym But once a bit of time passes and you're over that honeymoon period and you've done the first to-do list, then you just discard it and it joins your 50 other notebooks.

1:35It's a bit like doing that Sunday healthy shop where you're like, right, I'm starting my diet tomorrow. I'm going to go for this big healthy shop. And then the next day you don't go to the gym and you go and buy more ice cream. Yeah, we decided to go on Healthkick. So we buy all of the supplements. And I still have a cupboard full of supplements at home. You know, all the vitamins, they've all gone out of date. I've tried all the hacks that neurotypical people told me to do, and none of them worked. So I think this episode, hopefully, will go through 17 that are tried and tested by people who actually have ADHD to really benefit the audience.

2:10And then afterwards, user-submitted ones, which are absolutely genius. Even more genius than the other ones. Hopefully, yeah. They really are out-of-the-box, those ones. But yeah, genius. So we'll get to those at the end. Yeah, they're really, really fun. Right, should we start? counting down from 17. Yes. So yeah, start with 17. And we're going for bracelets. Yeah, so this one really beneficial, actually. So anyone will have a time of the day when their brain is at its most optimal. My brain is best in the evenings, and it's very sluggish in the mornings. So I take advantage of nighttime brain to help our morning brain.

2:49And in the evening, when my brain is good and focused, I think of five high priority tasks that need to be done the next day. Five tasks that are important for progressing the podcast, for example. And I write each task down on a little rubber bracelet. And when I wake up in the morning, I put all five bracelets on because first that acts as a memory jog. It reminds me of those five tasks. And as I go through the day and I complete each task, I then take off the corresponding bracelet from my wrist, put it in a bowl, and if I fill up the bowl, if I complete all five tasks, then I reward myself, for example.

3:28I buy something off my Amazon wish list. So I gamify it as well. Yeah. I had another imagination of what other things you might do to reward yourself.

3:41That's what I do six.

3:46And a bonus idea for the bracelets is if you put a load of the bracelets on top of your washing machine when you put your washing machine on you can put a bracelet on too and having the bracelet on with washing machine written on it will remind you that you need to empty the washing machine great all right okay number 16 body doubling yeah body doubling i think most people would have heard of body doubling um so i'll get that one out the way first body doubling is like this is really interesting phenomenon where if you bring somebody into your physical now, your surroundings, you somehow sort of feed off their energy.

4:24And it enables you to get over that procrastination hump, enables you to start the task that otherwise you might struggle to do if you were on your own. For example, if you are struggling to start tidying your flat, that could be really hard. But if you invite a friend over and someone's just sat on your sofa, then suddenly their mere presence in your proximity gives you the energy to start the task and to get the cleaning done. And it can be done, it doesn't have to be face-to-face also. If you're struggling to get through your emails in the morning, you could call up your body double and you could both be virtually on a Zoom call together.

5:01And just knowing that there's someone on the computer screen next to you, sort of watching you do your emails, it creates that accountability that gives you the energy. Because you don't want to kind of let that person down. You sort of want to show that you're capable of doing something. And that other person being there gives you that accountability that enables you to do the task. So yeah, body doubling is really effective. Is that something you do with your partner? Just having her there helps? It really helped me write my first book, funnily enough. I always struggled to write when I was on my own.

5:32I locked myself away in my office thinking that's what I've been told to do by neurotypicals, like go where there's no distraction. but when I was on my own in a room I was easily distracted and there was no motivation to do it but when I was in a room with my partner or when she wasn't available I took myself off to a co-working space so I took myself off to a place where there were loads of people doing work I didn't need to talk to anyone but just the fact that I was in someone else's presence gave me that motivation I fed off their energy and it enabled me to get the task done that's really that's interesting i've heard it works for a lot of people it's funny when i first heard body doubling i thought it was like in a movie where you have like an ass double and it's like you don't go to work you send someone who looks like you to go to work but it's not that that's a different podcast yeah body doubling okay number 15 frozen chopped vegetables yeah so really simple i've lost track of the amount of money I've lost by buying fresh fruit and vegetables, thinking I'm going to go on a health kick, putting them in my fridge, and then I check my fridge a week later, and they're moldy, smelling, disgusting.

6:44A really simple change is just buying pre-chopped, frozen vegetables. They don't go off, and it just takes away a lot of that friction of cooking healthily as well because you've got healthy fruit, you've got healthy veg in the freezer. So when you want to make a nice dinner, it's already there and it takes away a lot of that. So it's healthy and it saves you a lot of money because they don't really go off. So it's about making your food as accessible as possible. And even if that means spending a little bit more on the food in the first instance, because frozen pre-chopped veg can be a bit more expensive than fresh, but if it means you're actually going to eat it, then I think it's so worth the extra money.

7:24And also sometimes there's no shame in buying kids pre-chopped food. You see that quite a lot in supermarkets because it might be a bit more expensive, but if it's pre-chopped in a packaging that is one portion, the chances of you eating that before it goes off is also going to outweigh, I think, the extra cost that you'll be spending. Yeah, that's a really good one. That was number 15. So number 14, toothbrush. Yeah, number 14. So this one is a bit controversial, but I think it's really important. Many people with ADHD really struggle with hygiene, particularly brushing their teeth. They could be lying in bed at night, doom scrolling social media, and suddenly they forget that they need to brush their teeth or they're aware of it and the task of getting up is too much.

8:09So they just don't. And I think just having either your main toothbrush or a disposable toothbrush next to your bed, on your bedside table at all times, can be really beneficial. Because even if you don't use toothpaste, which I would recommend, like fluoride is better, but it's better than not doing it at all. Just having a toothbrush next to your bed. So you can just give them a quick brush just before you fall asleep. Gets the job done. Less chance of fillings and tooth decay. Genuine question. Why do people with ADHD forget to brush their teeth? a lot of the time is just a memory issue. Unless there is a pressing issue in their mouth, like tooth decay or toothache, that is there bringing the issue into their now because there's a reminder, it's just not something we're interested in doing.

8:56There's no dopamine in brushing your teeth. So it just gets pushed to the back shelf in our mind. And even when we do remember to do it, the thought of carrying on scrolling social media or just falling asleep if we can, is just so much more enticing and it's the path of least resistance. Anything that is high effort, low dopamine, like brushing your teeth, it just gets left behind. I guess maybe like with hyperfocus and things like that, people forget to eat, drink, brush teeth because they're so focused on what they're doing and then they just pass out. Yeah, having a toothbrush next to your bed, maybe some floss as well.

9:39get the job done just before you fall asleep it's a little bit gross but what's more gross is not doing it at all and then having toothache and an expensive dentist bill down the line true your partners will thank you for it yes and your dentist will hate you for it exactly uh right number 13 clothes bins yeah so this one was a game changer for me so i put three bins in my wardrobe and I labelled the first one as dirty, where I put my dirty clothes, the ones that need to be washed. The second bin is clean, clothes that are clean, ready to be hung up. And the third bin are clothes that are not clean, but they're not dirty enough to be washed, essentially clothes that I can wear again.

10:22Okay, that's a good one. Because mine are all mixed up. I didn't realise, I've got a very poor sense of smell, and I didn't realise that smell can travel from clothing to clothing. Yeah, you get the musky smell. without the bins, you end up just throwing stuff on the floor. The doom pile grows and escalates. These bins, super easy to throw them into. Big labels on each one. Save yourself a lot of money on washing clothes that don't need to be washed. Smells like contagious in the clothes world. It's like COVID for clothes. Yeah, yeah. Wow, mad. Okay, number 12. This one's my personal favorite.

10:56Yours is number one. This one's great. Charges. Yes. So again, this one will stop you ever running out of phone battery. Everyone spends time in different areas of their house. It could be in the kitchen, on the dining table, on the toilet, wherever it is. Always make sure you've got a phone charger in every single location. So wherever you are, you can always make sure your phone's charged. Okay, number 11. This is an interesting one. I have no idea what it means. And this is productivity hacks. Icebergs. Oh, yeah. So this is actually one of my favorite and the one that I think really helps me manage this podcast is everyone in their life will have big tasks that need to be done.

11:37Think of them as icebergs. The trick to getting through them and avoiding overwhelm is really breaking those icebergs down into ice cubes where possible. Ice cubes. Yeah, exactly. And I think it's so important. You can get easily overwhelmed when you look at a big task and you try to think of it in its entirety and think, oh, that's such a big daunting project. For example, when I clean my flat, the idea of cleaning the whole flat is daunting. But if I really break the big iceberg task of cleaning the flat down into ice cube tasks, like one ice cube could be just clean the sink in the kitchen.

12:14One ice cube could be hoover that part of the living room. And then it's much more manageable. And some days it's really important to recognize you might be super burnt out. And even on those days, you have to break down the ice cubes even smaller into crushed ice. And there's no shame if that's what you got to do. You could be triggered by RSD. You could have stuff going on in your life. Some days, just turning on the Hoover or the vacuum cleaner is a task. And some days it's really important to recognize that even an ice cube can be quite overwhelming and to have no shame in needing to break it down to even smaller tasks.

12:48Yeah, that's a good one. icebergs. So the top 10, these ones are really good. Really good ones. I'm just reading it. Okay, so top 10. Number 10, two-minute rule. Yeah, so this is really helpful to getting over procrastination, which I think holds so many people with ADHD back. Rather than saying you're going to commit and do a whole task in your head, For example, going back to the cleaning my flat idea, rather than say I'm going to clean my whole flat, which is daunting, I can say I'm going to clean for two minutes, or I'm going to exercise for two minutes, or I'm going to start writing this email for two minutes.

13:30And a lot of the time, that enables the task to be less daunting in your head. It gets you through that procrastination hump, gets the momentum going, the dopamine builds, and you're actually able to then carry on and complete the task in its entirety. So you're just tricking yourself, really, into productivity. Yeah, you're tricking yourself. You're making yourself believe that it's a really small task when, in fact, it could be a little bit bigger. But that trick can be really helpful to get over that procrastination hump, get that momentum going, and then the brakes are off and you're able to do the whole task.

14:02Yeah, or like I'm just going to wash up a knife and a fork and then you end up doing it all. Yeah. That sort of thing. That's a clever one. This one's great. And we've got sort of visual representation of it. This one is the ideas shelf. Yeah, so the ideas shelf. This actually saved me from burnout so many times. People with ADHD, often we get very excited about new ideas. We can buy that domain when we think that new hobby is our new purpose in life. And then a lot of the time, we can realize that it's not. We abandon the project and we can get a lot of shame and low self-esteem issues because it's yet another thing we haven't followed through.

14:40I think to really combat that issue is to use this idea of a metaphorical idea shelf. So when you get that impulsive idea, I want to start a business, I want to start this new hobby, I want to jump into this new relationship, I want to start that new job, rather than acting on that impulse straight away, like put that idea on this metaphorical idea shelf, don't act on it straight away. If it's still pulling on your interest strings, if you're still turning your head, looking at this metaphorical idea shelf, looking at that idea after a week, then maybe that's a signal that actually that idea is in true alignment to something you should be doing.

15:17And therefore, there's less chance of you abandoning it when you do action it. I think just putting that like week between an idea and taking that first step can save so much energy and save a lot of people from burnout. What is an example of someone not putting something on the idea shelf and it going terribly wrong? well i think lots of people with adhd we because we're at a lower level of dopamine so when we have an idea to start a new podcast or start a new hobby or start a new candle making business or jump into a new relationship it we get very excited in the early stages and often we don't give ourselves enough time to actually think and consider if that opportunity is a good fit for us and if it's in alignment with our true core passions and what we're actually interested in And a lot of the time, we say yes, because it's exciting.

16:09And then we get over the honeymoon period, and we abandon that relationship. That domain enters that graveyard of domains that so many of us have. We leave that job. And I feel like there's a lot of shame and self-esteem issues that come with this history of abandoning things time and time again. Whereas we just put a little break between the initial excitement and taking that first step. that gives us enough time to almost reflect on the opportunity and then decide if it is a good fit or not. So sort of combating the famous ADHD impulsivity. Yeah, impulsivity is amazing, but I think it has to be managed and to recognize that not everything that you get excited about is worth pursuing.

16:54And it's just putting that pause, putting a break between that initial excitement and taking that first step. Yeah. It's good. And it's also sort of, it helps the person that you might be jumping into a plan with, because the amount of times that I've mentioned a plan to someone who's got ADHD and they get really excited. And then when I really want to do it two days later and they're not interested. So actually it's quite a responsible thing to do. Yeah. I've, I've fallen out with people in the past. People have come to me with an idea and I've gone, that sounds brilliant. Let's do it. I'm in.

17:29And then a week later I've lost interest, but they haven't and they've put considerable time resources energy into the idea based on the assumption that I'm involved and it's a huge amount of shame and embarrassment having to somehow either you ghost them or you have to sort of say I'm really sorry I've lost interest so I think yeah the metaphorical idea shelf is really helpful to save yourself from a lot of shame and burnout number eight okay right we're really getting into the really really really really really useful ones this one massive problem in the ADHD community, reusable shopping bags.

18:04This one's actually saved me so much money. For years, I had a cupboard in my kitchen that was full of reusable shopping bags because every time I'd go to the supermarket, I'd buy a reusable shopping bag because I had forgotten to take ones that I already had. So I had to buy another one, ended up having too many. But now I always make sure that I've got a ton of them in my car. and the extra special bit of this hack is I tell google maps when I'm in the supermarket car park to make my phone beep it notifies me based on a geographical location app you can do this in google maps so when I drive into the supermarket my phone beeps and I've set the notification to read grab a reusable shopping bag so it reminds me I reach over grab a reusable shopping bag and And it saves me the money of having to buy a new one.

18:50Yeah. And do you also have that thing at home, though, where you've got a big cupboard full? You've already said that, haven't you? A big cupboard full of reusable bags, and they all just pour out everywhere. You already did that bit, so we'll move on. This one. Oh, number seven. This is a big one. And you didn't tell me I'm going to be needing to act for this, and I've got to say something as a sentence. Can I let you know tomorrow? You can. Yeah. I think people with ADHD really struggle to put boundaries in place. And I think for many of us, the knee-jerk reaction is just to say yes when we're asked to do something.

19:33And the RSD comes into this. People please us. We don't want to let someone down. And we end up taking on too much, overworking, perfectionists. I think it can be solved by rather than saying yes straight away, we say, can I let you know tomorrow? And it's a really simple reframe that, similar to the metaphorical idea shelf, it just puts a gap between the ask of your time and attention and your response to it. It gets you out of that initial fight or flight scenario where you feel compelled to say yes. And can I let you know tomorrow? It just enables you to have a breather. And nine times out of 10, you can then text the person or email the person and say, actually, no.

20:14yeah people pleasing is a big thing isn't it oh people yeah i mean it's huge right it comes up so many times in this podcast it's the quest to avoid rejection not have someone's approval of you taken away rsd horribly painful a quick word from our sponsor we've all had that nightmare you're on that final warning from that friend if you miss their birthday again your friendship is over Finito. And you do miss it. Even worse, you miss their wedding, and you were giving the speech. The speech you forgot to write. I can change. You plead with them, and they say, no, you can't. Well, actually, you can.

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21:28It's almost so simple that it feels like a cheat code to play life on easy mode. Give it a go and use the link in my bio for 30 % off. Just a note though, this code is only applicable on the web browser, not on the smartphone. Back to the show. Number six, don't put it down, put it away. This one is the reason why my flat is cleaner now than it was before. It's helped me a lot. It's so tempting to just come home from work, come home when you're stressed, whatever, and just dump whatever is in your hands wherever you are. And I still do that a lot of the time. But also, I try to remind myself of this mantra, like, don't put it down, put it away.

22:04put stuff in a cupboard put stuff in a drawer put stuff away where possible because when we don't do that it's such a almost reflex of us to just put stuff on the coffee table put stuff down and before you know it your flat is an absolute tip and you're stood there with like so much shame and embarrassment because your flat is so dirty um and just a simple mantra that try to do it as often as you can. Don't put it down. Put it away. Number five. No, everyone who comes in here talks about this one. Number five, cancel free subscriptions. Yeah, it's so important. When you sign up to something and you put in your card details and you sign up for the seven days or the month or whatever it is, make sure you cancel it straight away.

22:47Because how many times I've said to myself, I will cancel it later and I don't. And then I check my bank balance and 1099 has gone out or$49.99 has gone out, as soon as you sign up to a free trial, cancel it straight away. You'll still get the time period that you have signed up for for free, but you won't get charged again. Subscribe to the free trial, go on the email, in the app settings, whatever it is for that particular thing you've signed up for, and cancel the free subscription straight away. So when that renewal period comes around, you don't get surprised by a charge that you've forgotten to cancel.

23:20They make it so difficult to cancel though, don't they? Yeah. It's like they've got this unsubscribe or cancel button there. And it's sort of like one of those tricks where you get the cursor and it moves. And you have to just like... Yeah. I was furious because I won't say the name, but I signed up to a newspaper to read an article. And then to cancel, you have to phone up. Bastards. Yeah. And speak to someone. That's mental. That is an ADHD nightmare. Making a phone call. Yeah. So it still goes out of my account every month. Really? Yeah. Bloody hell. They're probably making quite a lot of money, aren't they?

23:53from people falling into these traps. Maybe that's what they're doing it for.

24:00Come to think of it. Right, number four. Getting quite near the end now. This one is very similar to an Oasis song. Always look back. A bit like don't look back in anger, but the opposite. Always look back. So this one saved me from losing my laptop once. Whenever you're on a plane, whenever you're on a train, whenever you're on a bus, whenever you're in a restaurant, whatever it is, when you're walking away from where you've been sat, always look back. Always look back at where you've been sitting, because time and time again, I didn't do that, and then I have left something behind. Like, it's a really simple thing, but always look back, because the chances are you've put something in the overhead compartment, you've put something on the chair next to you, whatever, and you've forgotten it's there.

24:45Always look back. That's a really good one. I actually went to the cinema on Sunday and I looked back and my wallet was there. What were you watching?