If you’re wondering how to stay focused with ADHD, I got good news and bad news. The bad news is that you’ll never stay focused all the time; no one can do that. The GOOD news is, there are a few things I tend to suggest to my clients that might at least improve that focus for you.
As always, if you’d rather watch me talk about this, go here. If you’d rather listen, do so below, or listen wherever you listen to podcasts.
Changing your venue or position
Sometimes your brain is failing to focus because it’s bored. The situation isn’t interesting enough anymore, and your brain is starting to seriously need something to keep it stimulated.
Now, obviously, you can try to add interest to the task if possible, but there’s an even simpler thing to try first, if you can: changing what you’re looking at, or changing the way your body is positioned.
If you’re working on a laptop or moveable workstation, try to sit in places other than your usual desk. Go to a different room or a coffee shop. If you’re in an office, try to head to a meeting room or break room. The point is to give your mind the sense of newness.
Can’t leave where you’re working? Then try adjusting your body’s position. Use a yoga ball, a standing desk, or just try to change the way you’re sitting every once in awhile. At the very least, get up to take breaks for water, and bathroom breaks. Sometimes, just that movement is enough for your mind to feel like it’s taken enough of a break to let you get back to focusing.
Try shorter focus periods
Soooo here’s the thing: usually, I talk to clients and they’ll tell me they can’t focus.
“How long do you sit down for?” I ask.
“I dunno.” They’ll respond. “Like…two hours?”
And then I have to tell them to quit that, because two hours is a long time to focus for non-ADHD brains. If your brain can’t focus for two hours, then the best course of action is to try to focus for shorter periods. Try to shorten your focus period by 30 minutes at a time, and see where your sweet spot is.
To add to this, try to remember that things can be done in pieces. You don’t have to sit down and finish everything at once. Sure, it takes a little time management and pre-planning, but in the end, allowing yourself to do one piece of a larger project at a time instead of expecting superhuman levels of focus out of yourself will leave you feeling better about what you get done.
Oh…and you can also mix tasks into your day, instead of forcing yourself to focus on just one thing. Work on that report, then during your break, put some laundry in the wash. Work in an office? Work on that report, then take a break to go through some files, then go back to the report. That variety will keep your brain from wandering quite so much, and it’ll give you the chance to work on numerous things instead of just one thing.
Options Lists
This is, by far, my favorite thing to suggest to people, and I wish more ADHDers had options lists.
Sometimes, our focus is terrible because we don’t have a good, definitive idea of where our energy should go. What you’re working on is busywork, or it’s just to fill your empty time. In that case, your very smart mind knows that you’re not working on anything that really needs focus, and so it’s going to wander. ADHDers need guidelines and routine, so when something unsuspected, like free time, comes up, our brains make a little fart noise and we wind up completely unable to focus on what we’re doing, or to choose what to do next.
The purpose of an options list is to act almost like a menu of things you can do in those moments, without imbuing you with the stress that comes with having to pull choices out of the millions of options that are out there.
Make options lists for different areas of life: chores, personal time, work, rewards, etc, and put those lists either in one central location, or in their corresponding locations.
A note about that rewards list: if you achieve that reward, honor it. Don’t tell yourself that you know you said that you’d watch a movie if you got through your workday but there are dishes on the counter and there’s dust on the floor and laundry to be done and…
Put those things on your priorities list for tomorrow, and reward yourself. The ADHD brain loves rewards, and not only is this a matter of caring for yourself, but it’s also going to help train your mind to hang in there through moments of boredom, because there’s a treat for it at the end of it all.
When you’re focusing on getting stuff done, don’t forget to focus on your own happiness, too.
If you need help making this happen, reach out and let’s get you started.
