How I created a to-do list to survive life with ADHD
And why it gave me peace of mind
Happy Sunday and welcome back to my blog!
If it is your first time here: Welcome! This is my Psycurious page where I write weekly about curious Psychology and ADHD topics, aimed at helping myself and others! I learn something new every week and invite you to learn with me ❤
Today, I want to talk about how hard it can be to simply manage life (constant upkeep, maintenance, and repetitive chores) if you don’t have the right tools.
I’m sure this isn’t an exclusive struggle for those with ADHD, but my brain can often get overwhelmed with to-do lists and plans because I feel like I’m always forgetting something or somehow not doing enough.
My brain sees my productivity on an accumulative scale, in which I have to do a certain number of things to feel as if I did “enough” that day. But this scale is highly subjective and depends on my mood, energy levels, and other plans I had that day.
This inconsistency can be exhausting, often leaving me with a feeling of not being enough…for me.
So I decided to make an objective, reasonable, and achievable list of things I need to get done to know that my bases are covered and that I’ve done enough. This list gives me an understanding of where I stand with myself, which gives me a clear understanding of how many other things I can or should take on that day or that week.
I don’t have a name for it yet, but I’m certain that as I work on it and fine-tune this habit over time, the perfect name will show itself to me.
Checklist for life (working title)
The checklist for life is an exhaustive list of re-occurring chores I need to do to survive.
If you’ve ever worked in retail or food service, it is exactly like your closing or opening checklist: a list of things you need to do every day, every week, or every month; but now instead of keeping someone’s business profitable, you are keeping yourself alive and well.
For me, this includes things like personal hygiene, household chores, grocery lists, and bill payments.
It may sound silly to include personal hygiene on this list, but not only does my brain get free dopamine when I check off a box for brushing my hair, but it also feels terrific to know that all of my bases are covered. Also, yes sometimes I do need a reminder to wash off my makeup after a long day of work, sue me.
The checklist for life doesn't cover work, friendly obligations, or any one-time things that need to get done, but it covers your bases so you feel more empowered when taking on the other things life throws at you.
Organizing the checklist for life
For this checklist to work and for my brain to be happy, it needs to be organized into categories and scheduled on specific days.
The categories and items in them would vary from person to person, but I decided to split mine up into:
- Items that need to be done
2. How often they need to be done.
So I have 4 sheets in my Google Docs, each responsible for frequency of action:
- Daily actions
- Weekly actions
- Bi-weekly actions
- Monthly actions
Then each sheet gets split up into areas of activity:
- Personal (Hygiene, fitness, bill payments, etc.,)
- Bedroom (things that need to be done in that room)
- Bathroom
- Kitchen
- Living room
As you can see, while the categories stay, they’re not always complete. I haven’t yet thought of a personal activity I need to do bi-weekly, but if I do I’ll already have a framework for it.
Scheduling things to do
The daily checklist gets done every day, that’s simple, but what about the other ones?
I set arbitrary dates for all the other ones, like the things I need to get done every week are looked at every Monday, while the bi-weekly ones are scheduled for every other Friday. The things I need to get done once a month are arbitrarily scheduled on the 22nd of every month.
The days I picked don’t matter until I set them in place. Once they are chosen I have to stick to them which takes off plenty of pressure.
As you can see, now I have lists of things that need to be done and I know exactly when I am going to do them. Planning these checklists out once can help anyone with their chores and general stress levels.
That’s all for this week! Thank you for reading as always!
Proceed with curiosity ❤
