While everyone procrastinates at least some of the time, many ADHDers struggle with it more than their neurotypical counterparts. Procrastination is commonly referred to as “immediate mood repair” for a good reason: while it helps us feel better at the moment, it leaves us feeling guilty, dejected, or what many of my clients describe as “lazy” in the long term.

While we all experience at least periodic unwillingness to put effort into something, the root cause of procrastination often resides in the part of the brain that manages “executive functioning.”

In his 2014 book Smart but Stuck, ADHD expert Thomas E. Brown clearly explains how ADHD can impact the brain’s executive functioning. Page 17 displays a helpful graphic and synopsis of the EFs.
Do you have a hard time estimating how long a task will take and always run out of time? That’s executive functioning.

Feel like you need a massive fire lit under your feet before you can start an onerous task, especially those that peers seem to speed through? That’s executive functioning as well.

Does everything feel equally important, making it hard to know which task to do first? You guessed it, EF has a hand in this, too.

There are times when procrastination can become so entrenched that working with a therapist becomes necessary. Quite often, though, I help clients with this. Below is the first in a series of articles about executive functioning challenges related to procrastination in the organizing realm.  

Activation:
Determining the duration of a new task involves some guesswork. Often, though, the more pressing issue for my clients is the struggle with time estimates for repetitive tasks that continually trip them up and take a toll on their self-esteem.

Take laundry, for instance. It involves many steps, each of which can break down the chain of events until the piles feel impossible to tackle. Laundry is not a task but rather a series of steps woven into the ongoing project we call “laundry.”

On page 37 of “Getting Things Done,” author David Allen describes a project as “any desired result that requires more than one action step.” Task lists become muddied by overwhelming projects masquerading as simple tasks, laundry being a good example.

Nailing down the steps of a project uses the executive function that Dr. Brown calls “Activation.” For ADHDers, taking time to identify all the steps needed to complete a laundry cycle can feel excruciatingly mundane and mentally taxing. The brain’s amygdala senses “danger” and thus logically avoids this perceived pain by shortcutting the process and throwing out a wildly optimistic “spitball” estimate.

The optimism leads to what feels like logical reasoning to kick the can down the road. When the deadline nears close enough to elicit sufficient urgency to start, it is often too late to complete the task entirely or without too much angst. Stress kicks in, the brain senses yet more danger, so it avoids the task again, and the cycle continues.

So, how to solve this conundrum?

Triple all those spitball estimates that the brain makes. Although it might sound excessive, it works.

Tripling in Action:
Let us imagine that during the tail-end of an organizing session, my client “Jerry” realizes he has to wash some pants before tomorrow when he embarks on a two-week business trip. His boss hinted that if all goes well, he will likely receive a promotion, so he needs to make a good impression.

“Oh, shoot, I have to wash those pants before packing them,” he says.

“It will only take a few hours to wash them, so I can do it in the morning.”

Jerry just made a generalized spitball estimate. Unfortunately, he forgot to think through the steps to remember that the pants have to be line-dried. His initial estimate will leave him arriving at a crucial meeting looking disheveled, not exactly the look he is aiming for.

Thankfully, we had previously discussed the benefits of tripling his first gut-level estimates. He initially resisted the idea because it felt like overkill, but he realized that the alternative often left him running out of time and perpetually postponing more interesting projects he wanted to pursue.  

Jerry has been practicing this tripling tactic, so he immediately catches himself and triples his estimate.

“Oh, wait a minute, I forgot to triple the estimate. I’ll be right back. I’m going to pop those pants in the washer now.”

A few minutes later, he returns to the room we are decluttering.

“That was close!” he remarks. “I had completely forgotten that I have to hang those pants up to dry. That triple estimate strategy may have just saved me that promotion!”

We wrap our session, and Jerry remarks that this might be the first time he has not had to scramble when packing for these trips. He smiles: “I might actually be able to sleep in a bit and have a decent breakfast for once before a trip. Amazing!”
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Go, Jerry! It is pretty exciting when these tools reap even more benefits than we originally intended.

​Why not triple your estimate next time you hear yourself saying, “Oh, that will only take five minutes.” I bet you will be pleasantly surprised by the results!

Previously, I wrote about using a “parking lot” to remove competing thoughts that otherwise detract from critical daily goals.
 
What happens when we forget to use a digital or analog parking lot? Every competing thought has the potential to take us off track for minutes or hours at a time.
 
Take last week, for example.
 
Earning the ICD’s ADHD Specialist Certificate was one of my 2023 goals. I was rereading ADHD course notes and happily plugging right along until I read a sentence that was particularly “sticky.”
 
If I do my “future self” a favor by using my dry-erase pad as a parking lot, I stay on track more easily. Then “Future Judith” at the end of the day will feel satisfied with "Past Judith’s" progress. I have been using this "past" vs. "future" self tactic for many years to help initiate tasks that are about as enjoyable as watching paint dry.
 
Typically, my pad is within arm’s reach to park competing thoughts. Sometimes those competing thoughts revolve around other tasks I need to do. Quite often, though, the competing idea starts with an innocuous “I wonder. . . “
 
I forgot to ensure my pad was nearby on this particular day. Then I read the “sticky” suggestion regarding RSS feeds. I bet you can guess what happened next.
 
“Oh yeah, I tried to set up RSS feeds a few years ago to stay on top of relevant organizing news.”
 
“I wonder what happened with that?”
 
“Oh yeah: I tried setting it up, but it wasn’t working, so I cut my losses and moved on.”
 
“I still think they could help me keep up with the news. I wonder if I just had the wrong idea as to what RSS entails.“
 
Before I knew it, I had scratched the curiosity itch and felt immediate satisfaction in finally understanding RSS feeds. That is until I looked at the time. A half hour had passed, and I was no closer to finishing the critical task, and it was getting late. The satisfaction immediately morphed into guilt; had "Past Judith" remembered to use my parking lot, I would have quickly parked that curiosity where it belonged, off to the side, so I could continue focusing on my goal.
 
Luckily it was only a half hour, but a half hour here or an hour there is how a day starts with lighthearted hope and ends with a resounding thud.
 
The parking lot is no panacea for all distraction woes, but it gives us a fighting chance to feel satisfied with our efforts by the end of the day.
 
So how about it? There is nothing to lose; how about giving the parking lot a shot? If you want a refresher on how it works, click here. The more you use it, the more you will remember to use it. The more focused you can be on those tasks, the more likely you will feel good about working towards those important goals by the end of the day.

What does a parking lot have to do with organizing? Seemingly nothing, but, plenty. A world of pings and rings distracts us from our intended tasks. Let us not forget that incessant internal clatter, either. It is a miracle that we get anything done with all the noise.
 
For those with ADHD, it is even more challenging to ignore those pings, rings, and internal noise than for a neurotypical individual. According to what I have read online and in various books, we only have four “working memory” slots. Working memory is the section of our brain where we temporarily store information while we work with other information. 
 
For instance, to mentally add two large numbers, we must remember the first number, the second number, and also do the addition. I am grossly oversimplifying the concept, but the gist is that we do not have infinite working memory slots to hold multiple thoughts simultaneously. If we happen to pick up a ringing phone as we add those two numbers, the visual process and resulting thought could boot out one of the two numbers. Now you only remember the last number and the new thought. Goodbye, first number; back to the drawing board.
 
Those with ADHD face a more considerable challenge with working memory. The same goes for aging neurotypicals. So, what are we to do if we have important tasks to complete, yet we repeatedly pull ourselves off-task, regardless of our best intentions? We can turn on our phones’ Do Not Disturb or Airplane Mode. We can mute audible or visual cues that alert us of unread emails. 
 
What about all those competing thoughts that pop up during every waking hour? I have read varying statistics stating we have anywhere from 6,200 to 10,000 thoughts on any given day. That is a lot of distraction deterring us from essential tasks! 
 
So how can we give ourselves a fighting chance of staying focused? We can use a “parking lot.” Years ago, I was in a multi-departmental meeting. There were complex issues to discuss, so naturally, many offshoots grew from the main discussion. I learned a great tactic in that meeting. 
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The facilitator set up a large Post-It easel pad and labeled it “parking lot.” Anytime someone had a related question, concern, or idea that was not on the agenda, we wrote it on the “parking lot” so we did not forget it but could avoid going off-track. Someone later added the parking lot ideas to the next meeting’s agenda or captured it elsewhere to be addressed at a later date.
 
At the time, I found it to be a novel concept. It can truly be helpful and you do not have to spend money to use this tool. Your parking lot could come in various forms:

• A dry-erase board
• A daily planner
• A pad of paper
• A digital task app
• A voice-activated digital assistant, such as Siri, Google Assistant, or Bixby.

 
You might notice that I did not include loose scraps of paper. Sometimes we do not have a choice, but I prefer getting ideas onto or into something that is not easily lost.
 
When working at my computer, I enjoy using a dry-erase board. The board sits within arm’s reach so I can quickly capture the thought instead of impulsively going off-task. As a competing idea pops into consciousness, such as returning a text message, I write, “return Sarah’s text,” on my board instead of halting progress to text her right then and there.
 
It can be a boon for getting things done when combined with a timer and Pomodoro sessions. 
For the Pomodoro, I set my timer for twenty-five or fifty minutes. When the timer rings, I take a short break. I can stretch, move around, and spend a few minutes attending to those other tasks or scheduling them into my calendar or digital task list. After my break, I can sit down for another focused Pomodoro session.
 
I enjoy my dry-erase board because it has limited space to write. I force myself to calendar or input the task into my app then because I need a fresh slate to write down new ideas that inevitably pop up as I start my next Pomodoro. Additionally, I can avoid dealing with a daunting list of tasks to address at the end of the day when I am already tired. 
 
The biggest drawback to this tool is that it is too bulky to use on the go. So, one could employ a daily planner, so long as it contains blank space to write the ideas before they leave the working memory slot. 
 
We can use paper pads too. The benefit is that we can quickly capture the thought before it is forgotten. Its Achilles’ heel is that ripped-off papers might add more bulk to an existing pile of clutter.
 
A digital planner or task app can work too. The benefit is that many of us typically have cell phones within arm’s reach, but for me personally, it has a significant drawback. As I age, I notice that fleeting thoughts flee my consciousness much faster than they used to, so I have to get the idea out of my head quickly. A lot could distract me on the way to getting the task into the app, thus knocking the thought out of my working memory until it randomly pops up again later on, usually at the wrong time to address it. To enter the task before the idea evaporates into thin air, I have to:

1. Grab my phone.
2. Unlock my phone.
3. Actively ignore any new notifications that have popped up since I last used my phone.
4. Open the task app and type the task. 

 
At any given time during these steps, another thought could race in and knock out the idea I wanted to remember. I am left holding my phone, ready to type, and frustratingly racking my brain for the thought that disappeared into the ether. So, rather than forcing myself to jump through those hoops, I skip the steps by more quickly grabbing my pen and dry-erase board. When I take a break, I schedule any tasks or add them to my digital task app.

You can use digital voice assistants too. For instance, if you are working and remember that you need to buy milk tonight, you could launch Google Assistant on your digital device by saying, “OK, Google,” and then, “Remind me to get milk tonight at 7 pm.” The reminder will ring at the appropriate time instead of ruining your focus when you cannot go to the store.
 
Whichever tool you use, a “parking lot” for dumping distracting thoughts can help keep us on track. We can then avoid the dreaded, “It’s 4 pm already! How did that happen? I was supposed to be done, but I just sat down and got started!” Getting those competing thoughts out of your working memory and into a receptacle outside of your memory gives you a fighting chance to get things done that truly matter. 

Why do so many of us feel like we are spinning our wheels but not reaching our goals? It all boils down to keeping our eye on the prize or “the ONE Thing,” as Gary Keller and Jay Papasan refer to it in their book, The ONE Thing The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results. Easy in theory, challenging in practice.
 
As we focus on a task, distractions seem never-ending. We can start on the right path if we write them down to return to the task at hand. Some might even have well-organized tasks and project lists, or maybe even software devoted to staying organized.  
 
Yet after weeks, months, or even years of dedication to our tasks, we can become exasperated when our goals seem as far away as ever. Some may have stopped creating goals altogether because the recurring disappointment is just too painful. Keller says that most of us are doing as much as humanly possible to reach our goals, but the problem is that we should be doing the opposite: we should be “going small.”
 
Instead of completing all those tasks, we must decipher the most crucial task that gives us the biggest bang for our buck. How often do we stop to identify those needle-moving tasks? When running his real estate company, he found that his high performers were not completing their self-assigned tasks during the week. He created a “Focusing Question” to ask every day, and it made a massive shift in his company, Keller Williams Realty. Perhaps you have heard this question in articles or seminars: “What is the ONE Thing I can do, such that by doing it, everything else would be easier or unnecessary?”
 
Before even asking this all-important question, though, we must address six fallacies that lead us down the wrong path.
 
"Six Fallacies"

“Everything matters equally”
Checking items off task lists feels good in the moment, but where does it lead us? Unfortunately, not far if those tasks were not the best way to move closer to our goals. With great insight, he states, “If your to-do list contains everything, then it’s probably taking you everywhere but where you really want to go.”
 
Instead of trying to do it all, we need to push the famous Pareto Rule (“80% of outcomes result from 20% of preceding factors,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle) to the outer limits. Once we have determined what 20% of all tasks will result in 80% of the results, we need to narrow it down to the most significant needle-moving activity.

“Multitasking”
Thankfully, those of us who ever resented that age-old interview question about multitasking (because it was not our forte) have been vindicated. Multiple studies have now shown that multitasking does not work when competing tasks demand a lot of thinking. Keller dives into more detail: we can switch tasks rapidly and do two things simultaneously, but we cannot focus on two things at the same time. Apparently, multitasking wastes 28% of workdays. Additionally, I have read that it takes our brains up to twenty minutes to return to focus after dealing with a distraction. Thus, multitasking truly seems to be a losing proposition.

“A disciplined life”
For anyone who feels guilty about a lack of discipline, fear not. Keller argues that what we enviously witness in others is not a rare quality buried deep in the DNA of high achievers. Instead, what we are seeing is a heavy reliance on habit. High achievers only need enough discipline to repeat the necessary task until it becomes a habit. Their daily routines help them reach their goals. They do not have to white-knuckle it through each day with a massive amount of discipline. What a relief to those of us who never felt like we had giant stores of discipline ready to be used at any moment.
 
Completing large decluttering projects becomes much easier when we engage in habit formation. Clients and I spend time removing roadblocks and collaborating on realistic strategies. Those strategies sustain habits that not only help reach organizing goals but also keep clutter at bay. (For more information on habit formation, see my articles on The Power of Habit and Atomic Habits.)
 
Numerous pop psychology articles reference a twenty-one-day time frame to create habits. This number always felt unrealistically low to me, unless we are talking about easily formed bad habits like eating too much junk food or spending too much time on social media. Indeed, Keller references a 2009 study determining that it takes, on average, sixty-six days to create a new habit (some took as little as eighteen days and others two-hundred fifty-four days). Last year I learned that it could take longer for those with ADHD. All this news might feel disheartening if you thought it only took twenty-one days, but I consider it to be good news. While it might take longer than initially expected to create a habit, it now means we have a more realistic timeframe. Hopefully, we will be less likely to quit a new habit on day twenty-five because we erroneously thought it should be old-hat by then.

“Willpower is always on will-call”
Similar to discipline, we cannot always rely on willpower. Keller references studies that demonstrate diminishing returns. The more we use willpower, the less available it becomes. So, it becomes imperative to tackle our most important tasks first, rather than burn through our reserves on more menial tasks.

“A balanced life”
For many years, pop culture touted life “balance.” In Keller’s opinion, one cannot reach outstanding achievements without getting out of balance. We have to invest a lot of time and energy into reaching big goals. It naturally means that other tasks will be left undone. We have to learn to be comfortable with the “chaos” of unfinished business.
 
Luckily this does not mean that we abandon everything else forever. What good is a life goal if we sacrifice friends, relationships, and health to achieve them? Probably not much, he insightfully argues. Instead, he instructs us to use “counterbalancing”: we cannot get so far out of balance for so long that we lose everything. He argues that it is ok to be far out of balance in work-life to reach lofty goals. In personal life, it is better to avoid those extremes.

“Big is bad”
Many of us fear success because it might mean sacrificing too much: dealing with massive levels of stress, losing social connections, or abandoning health. The good news is that as we work towards that big goal, we adapt. We learn how to manage the stressors better as we grow.
 
"The Focusing Question"
 
After addressing fallacies, he dives deeper into the Focusing Question: “What is the ONE Thing I can do, such that by doing it, everything else would be easier or unnecessary?” We might be tempted to drop “such that by doing it” because it feels redundant, but he argues that it is crucial: “This qualifier seeks to declutter your life by asking you to put on blinders. This elevates the answer’s potential to change your life by doing the leveraged thing and avoiding distractions.”
 
Quite frequently, I advise clients to adorn make-believe “horse blinders.” When decluttering, it is easy to get distracted with related but non-essential tasks. By putting on “horse blinders,” we can more easily focus on the most rewarding decluttering action.
 
The Focusing Question is adaptable to both large and small goals. We can insert “right now,” “this year,” or other verbiage after the phrase “that I can do” to fit the need. We can also add qualifiers to address different areas of our lives. For example, “What’s the ONE Thing I can do today for [whatever you want] such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?” Ask this question every morning to stay on track.
 
The answers to the Focusing question are crucial. Solutions can necessitate “doable” action, “stretch” action, or activity in the realm of “possibility.” Avoid “doable” steps to reach those all-important life goals because they use our existing tools.
 
“Stretch” activities will take us farther. We might need to research what others are doing so that we can do the same. The task might “stretch” us to the edge of our current skillsets.
 
Reaching lofty life goals necessitates “possibility” actions that are well outside of our current limitations. Similar to “stretch” activities, the first task is to ask, “Has anyone else studied or accomplished this or something like it?” Unlike “stretch” tasks, the answer to that question now becomes our bare minimum effort. We need to go in the same direction as the best performers and then go beyond or potentially plot an entirely novel course. Whether the goal is personal (e.g., decluttering your home) or professional (e.g., becoming an expert in your field), “possibility” tasks are the ones that will get us there.
 
Taking “possibility” action net more significant rewards in the distant future, but how do we avoid the temptation of less critical tasks that net immediate (albeit smaller) rewards? Use his
 “goal setting to the Now” technique to connect emotionally to distant future rewards, rather than to the smaller immediate reward.
 
We connect someday goals to immediate goals through a series of questions.

• To reach that someday goal, we need to ask, “What’s the ONE Thing I can do in the next five years to be on track to achieve it?”  

• Then we ask, “Based on my five-year goal, what’s the ONE Thing I can do this year to be on track to achieve my five-year goal, so that I’m on track to achieve my someday goal?”

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•  Then substitute “five-year” with “one-year,” “monthly,” “weekly,” “daily,” all the way to “right now.”  

He argues that we cannot skip any of these steps because each phrase keeps us emotionally connected to that bigger goal, rather than menial feel-good tasks that take us off course. Avoiding this necessary technique is “why most people never get close to their goals. They haven’t connected today to all the tomorrows it will take to get there. “
 
"Time Blocking"
 
So now that we know precisely what that ONE Thing is, how do we commit to it amidst competing distractions? We use time blocking. We block off sufficient time on our calendars to devote to the ONE Thing. Everything else needs to happen around this time block.
 
To make blocks work, we need to “get in the mindset that they can’t be moved.” First, we block out free time since we cannot sustain arduous effort without rest. Then we block off four hours to devote to the ONE Thing. He used the popular 10,000-hour theory to create his calculation of four daily hours. (For those who have not started decluttering because it is far too intimidating, try starting much smaller. Even fifteen or five minutes of decluttering a day is better than no minutes, and the fear of starting with just fifteen minutes is much smaller than four hours!)
 
There are a series of moves we can make to protect our time blocks:

• Create a “bunker” to limit distractions. Make sure to have food and anything else needed. Only leave for bathroom breaks and do not stop to chat because that can lead to outside demands on time.

 

• Shut down internet browsers, email, and phone alerts. I have noticed email becoming increasingly “helpful” in the last few years. Does your email provider display a helpful red dot or flashing signal to alert you of new messages on the open browser tab? If you are not willing to shut down your browser, at least minimize it to avoid the temptation of reading emails that might be more enjoyable than the task at hand.

 

• If others are present, we need to tell them about our time blocks so they will (hopefully) not interrupt during that time.

 
We need to have the mindset of mastery to stick to time blocks. This essentially means “becoming your best,” which is a life-long process. When the ONE Thing becomes this important, we are more likely to commit. Additionally, we cannot stop when we reach the current limits of ability. We should use the Focusing Question to determine what we need to learn or what we need to do differently to achieve big goals.  
 
"Four Thieves"
 
Last but not least, we need to beware of the four “thieves” that can take us off track:

• “Inability to say “no”: we have to be able to say no to requests that take us off course.

 

• “Fear of chaos”: As he explains, “Your time block can feel like a submersible, where the deeper you commit to your ONE Thing, the more the pressure mounts for you to come up for air and address everything you’ve put on hold.” . . . “When you strive for greatness, chaos is guaranteed to show up.” . . . “It’s important for you to accept this instead of fighting it.”

 

• “poor health habits”: we need to avoid mismanagement of energy by eating right, starting our days right, exercising, planning each morning for that ONE Thing, and estimating how long it will take to complete. After lunch, we can then turn our attention to other matters because we finished the ONE Thing.

 

• “Environment that doesn’t support your goals”: we need to avoid environments that are rife with distractions and can pull us off course as we head to our time blocking “bunker.” Clear any sounds and sights that are distracting.

 
"A Life without Regrets"
 
In summation, he argues that the best way to live a "life without regrets" is to strive towards those lofty goals. To do that, we must always focus energy and time on that One Thing that will help us get there.
 
So how about it? How many tasks are on your to-do list today: are there too many to realistically complete? Are you setting yourself up to feel like a ping-pong ball in a match between Olympic athletes? Give the Focusing Question a try. You might end your day feeling great instead of exhausted because doing the ONE Thing helped you get that much closer to your most important goals.