Have you ever had the feeling that there was something you had to do but you couldn’t quite put your finger on it?
Whenever you put a project away in a drawer or cupboard, there’s a good chance you’ll forget about it. In short, closed storage/filing systems don’t work for everyone, especially students with ADHD. It’s best to avoid them.
As Abigail Levrini and Frances Prevatt, authors of the brilliant book Succeeding with Adult ADHD, state:
“Because of distractability and forgetfulness, people with ADHD struggle with keeping track of anything that doesn’t jump out at them visually.”
So what’s the alternative?
Keep things in sight and in mind.
Use open storage systems (e.g., open bookshelves or pigeonhole units) and/or clear containers with labels. This way you can easily keep track of all your projects.
Why do open storage systems and clear containers works so well?
Here are five reasons:
1. In one glance, you can see everything you need to do.
2. All of your projects are located in one spot (you can save time not having to run around the house searching for things).
3. You feel more organised and in control of what you need to do each day.
4. There are less barriers to getting started (you pick up a project and away you go).
5. When you’ve finished working on a project, you can put it away so it doesn’t clutter up your study space.
Below is one example of an open storage system:
It’s a pigeonhole unit. It’s nothing fancy but it does the job at storing various projects. The most important projects are located at the top and the least important at the bottom.
Alternatively, you can use simple boxes. In her book, The Creative Habit, dance choreographer Twyla Tharp writes about how she assigns each project to a different box. She states:
“Everyone has his or her own organizational system. Mine is a box, the kind you can buy at Office Depot for transferring files. I start every dance with a box. I write the project name on the box, and as the piece progresses I fill it up with every item that went into the making of the dance. This means notebooks, news clippings, CDs, videotapes of me working alone in my studio, videos of the dancers rehearsing, books and photographs and pieces of art that may have inspired me.”
She goes onto state:
“There are separate boxes for everything I’ve ever done. If you want a glimpse into how I think and work, you could do worse than to start with my boxes.
The box makes me feel organized, that I have my act together even when I don’t know where I’m going yet.
It also represents a commitment. The simple act of writing a project name on the box means I’ve started work.
The box makes me feel connected to a project. It is my soil. I feel this even when I’ve back-burnered a project: I may have put the box away on a shelf, but I know it’s there. The project name on the box in bold black lettering is a constant reminder that I had an idea once and may come back to it very soon.
Most important, though, the box means I never have to worry about forgetting. One of the biggest fears for a creative person is that some brilliant idea will get lost because you didn’t write it down and put it in a safe place. I don’t worry about that because I know where to find it. It’s all in the box…
They’re easy to buy, and they’re cheap…They’re one hundred percent functional; they do exactly what I want them to do: hold stuff. I can write on them to identify their contents… I can move them around… When one box fills up, I can easily unfold and construct another. And when I’m done with the box, I can ship it away out of sight, out of mind, so I can move on to the next project, the next box.”
Where should you put your open storage system?
It’s a good idea to locate your open storage system outside your study space but still close by. If you can see all your projects while you’re working on a particular project, it can lead to life paralysis. You get overwhelmed. And nothing gets done.
But if all your projects (except the one you’re currently working on) are located just out of sight, you can give the current project the full attention it deserves. You can say to yourself, “For the next 25 minutes, this is all my mind needs to focus on”.
Once you’ve finished working on the project for the day, you can file it away and pick up another project easily.
Should you choose clear containers, an open bookshelf or a pigeonhole unit for your open storage system?
This comes down to personal preference and what you think will work best for you.
I considered buying 15 – 20 big boxes from the Reject Shop at $5 a pop. But ultimately decided I would get a lot more mileage out of a pigeonhole. (It also takes up far less space and makes me feel less like someone who would feature on the show Hoarder Next Door.)
Whether you go for clear containers, an open bookshelf or a pigeonhole unit like I have, it doesn’t really matter. What matters most is that all your projects are in one place, you can capture and store items and bits of information for each project, and you can efficiently access what you need.
How do you manage all your schoolwork, projects and assignments? Do you think an open-storage system could work for you?
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I love the feeling.
I think, “Go me! Look at you go!” as I strike the pen through the list item.
But as good as it feels to cross things off, it’s not really about that. That’s not where the power of lists resides.
The power exists in making the list in the first place. Getting the thoughts out of your head and down on paper.
In his book Keep going: 10 ways to stay creative in good times and bad Austin Kleon states:
“Lists bring order to the chaotic universe. I love making lists. Whenever I need to figure out my life, I make a list. A list gets all your ideas out of your head and clears the mental space so you’re actually able to do something about them.
When I’m overwhelmed, I fall back on the old-fashioned to-do list. I make a big list of everything that needs to get done, I pick the most pressing thing to do, and I do it. Then I cross it off the list and pick another thing to do. Repeat.”
When I’m feeling really under the pump, I’ll go for a walk and scribble out a list while I’m walking.
I’m not sure which activity helps me more – the walking or the list making – but by the time I arrive home from my walk, I always feel less anxious and more in control.
If you haven’t been having much luck with to-do lists, you may have fallen into one of the following common traps:
If you look at your list and it says says things like ‘Mum’s birthday’ or ‘Study’, it’s time to make these list items crispy.
Crispy is a Behaviour Design term created by Stanford university Professor BJ Fogg. When you make a behaviour crispy, you get really clear on the specific behaviour you need to carry out.
Here are some examples I came up with to illustrate the difference between fuzzy and crispy list items:
Fuzzy to-do list item: Mum’s birthday
Crispy to-do list item: Call mum to wish her happy birthday after lunchFuzzy to-do list item: Study
Crispy to-do list item: Open Quizlet study deck and test myself for 5 minutes on the bus
When you ‘crispify’ a list item, you tighten it up. You make it crystal clear for your brain what you need to do next. This in turn makes it much easier for you to get started.
If your list is no longer working for you, feel free to abandon it and create a new one. As Psychiatrist Douglas Puryear says in his book Your life can be better:
“I make lists over and over, all day long. It’s not just about having the list; there is also benefit in making them. Writing down what I need to do is somehow calming and organizing, and therefore motivating. When I write things down, it’s as though I’m on top of them.”
Our brains get bored easily, so try making your list a little bit different every now and then.
Here are some simple ideas on how you can jazz up your next to-do list:
It doesn’t matter what medium or what materials you use to create your to-do list. What matters is that you get everything out of your head and you make each list item crispy.
If your to-do list is causing you to have a mini meltdown, back up. Ask yourself . . .
“Is this list too long? Can I cross a few things off?”
Create a short list from your big list – just three items (post-it notes are good for this). Then put away your long list. When you’ve completed those three items, create a new list of three from your long list.
During times of chaos, lists are your friends. Reach out and use this fabulous tool to lighten your mental load. You don’t need any special skills or talent to do this. Lists are for everyone.
It certainly can be.
If you’re spending hours of your day, dusting, picking up bits of fluff off the carpet and scrubbing floors, then yes. You’ve got a bad case of procrastacleaning.
Put simply, you’re avoiding living.
As professor (and expert on procrastination) Tim Pychyl says:
“Procrastination is an existential issue of not getting on with life itself”.
When I was at university, I had a friend whose parents were hardcore house cleaners. They spent a huge amount of their time cleaning.
Their house had a distinct chemical smell: Pine O Cleen.
Like a hospital surgery room, everything was so neat. So immaculate. So sterile.
The backyard was the same: brick paving as far as the eye could see. No trees. No flowers. No birds. No life.
One day, out of the blue, I received a phone call from my friend. She was really upset. She had just received the terrible news that her mum had late stage cancer.
I remember my friend saying things like, “Mum isn’t ready to die”, “There’s all these things mum still wants to do” and “Mum wanted to go travelling . . . ”. But her mum was now too sick to do anything or go anywhere. She’d missed her chance.
Not long after that phone call, I became friends with a Bohemian family. And oh boy, did they know how to live!
I would go over to this family’s house and we’d do things like pick olives in our muddy gumboots, trample back into the house and sip on cups of tea surrounded by piles of books, academic papers and trinkets gathered from various adventures.
In this Bohemian household, no one cared about mud on the floor or decluttering. What mattered most were projects, ideas, relationships and good food!
So I decided cleaning and organising was a waste of time. I embraced a life of mess and clutter.
It’s fun being a slob up to a point. But then life becomes really hard work. Much too hard for a slob to handle. For example:
• You waste time running around the house looking for things (e.g. your car keys and assignment sheets)
• You buy things you don’t need (you forgot you already have the item or something similar)
• You feel mentally chaotic being surrounded by piles of work and clutter
• It’s much harder to focus on one thing at a time
• You lose track of all the things you need to do
• You feel like you don’t have enough time to do everything (because you don’t have a clear mental picture of what needs to be done)
I soon realised I had to strike a balance between the hardcore cleaners and the Bohemian family. When I started working on my PhD, I knew it was time to break my slobby, pack rat habits and get organised to complete this big project.
I didn’t want to spend hours of my precious life energy cleaning. And as a poor student, I didn’t have the money to hire a cleaner.
So I embraced the power of The Tiny Tidy.
A Tiny Tidy is an intense three-minute tidy-up session. It delivers quick results and leaves you feeling more optimistic about your life.
In his excellent book Tiny Habits BJ Fogg explains how to execute the strategy as follow:
“Go to the messiest room in your house (or the worst corner of your office), set a timer for three minutes, and tidy up. After every errant paper you throw away, celebrate. After every toy you toss back into its cubbyhole – you get the idea. Say, “Good for me!” and “Wow. That looks much better.” And do a fist pump. Or whatever works for you. Celebrate each tiny success even if you don’t feel it authentically, because as soon as that timer goes off, I want you to stop and tune into what you are feeling.
I predict that your mood will be lighter … You will be more optimistic about your day and your tasks ahead. You may be surprised at how quickly you’ve shifted your perspective. I guarantee that you will look around and feel a sense of success. You’ll see that you made your life better in just three minutes.”
The celebration part of the Tiny Tidy is essential. Don’t bypass it. Every item you deal with must be followed with a “Woohoo!”, fist pump or celebratory dance move. This is what helps wire in the new habit of doing the Tiny Tidy sessions.
I have found doing a Tiny Tidy session once a day keeps chaos at bay. As Marian Petre and Gordon Rugg state in the The Unwritten Rules of PhD Research:
“Tidying and filing, if you do them in manageable doses can be very soothing activities and can give you a feeling of control.”
Life is short and there’s lots of stuff to do and explore. Who wants to spend all their time cleaning?
Famous artist Margaret Olley was well known for her cluttered, messy house. And she had a great philosophy when it came to cleaning. She said:
“I’ve never liked housework. I get by doing little chores when I feel like them, in between paintings. Who wants to chase dust all their life? You can spend your whole lifetime cleaning the house . . .”
Her advice was simple:
“If the house looks dirty, buy another bunch of flowers”.
My advice is save your money. Don’t buy any flowers (pick some from the garden and put them in a jar) and try a Tiny Tidy in between study/work sessions.
It’s a good idea to do a couple of Tiny Tidy sessions over the weekend so you can start the week with some kind of order.
Trust me, three minutes here and there adds up. Before you know it, you’ll be looking at a very different work/living space and feeling way more in control.
So whatever it is you want to do in life, go do it. Remember, life is for living (not for cleaning).
Being disorganised can create inner turmoil, stress and confusion. If you can’t find basic items (e.g. your textbooks or assignment sheet) you run the risk of giving up before you even get started.
Lists help us to stay on track. They give us an idea of what our day should look like.
Find yourself faffing around and distracted? Just revisit your list (“Oh yeah, that’s right. I need to be working on that English essay!”).
If your list gets messy and confusing, don’t be afraid to abandon it and create a new one.
As Dr Douglas Puryear states in his book Your life can be better:
“I make lists over and over, all day long. It’s not just about having the list; there is also benefit in making them. Writing down what I need to do is somehow calming and organizing, and therefore motivating. When I write things down, it’s as though I’m on top of them”.
Dr Gabor Mate states in his book Scattered that the physical space you occupy can help to either harmonise or disorganise your mind. If you neglect to honour your physical environment, you neglect to honour yourself.
Do your best to keep mess and clutter under control. You’re not aiming for perfect stock photo tidy or perfect hotel bed tidy. You just want to eliminate anything that could potentially derail you when you study.
I feel like I’m constantly tidying up. Things will be tidy and then a day later, it’s back to chaos. I think, “Ugh. Why do I even bother?”
But Dr Gabor Mate believes that this doesn’t matter. He states:
“The effort itself, in the long term, has an organizing effect on the mind.”
Feeling overwhelmed by a big project? Relax. You don’t need to do it all at once.
Dr Gabor Mate states:
“The ADD brain is overwhelmed by a multipartite task. She does not know where to turn, the all-or-nothing mindset demands that everything be done at once. Nothing needs to be done at once. The best plan, I find, is not to insist that any one task be finished all at once, but to impose a strict time limit in which to work. When the appointed time period is over, stop.”
So set a timer for 10-15 minutes and make a start on that project you’ve been avoiding. Remember, the key is to focus on process, not finished product.
You have a limited amount of attentional resources. Every time you make a decision, you use up some of those mental resources. So what happens is your attentional resources get depleted as the day goes on.
You can avoid wasting your precious mental resources and streamline your day by establishing routines and habits. You can read more about establishing different routines here.
Have you ever underestimated the amount of time an assignment would take to do?
Enter the yearly planner.
The beauty of a yearly planner is you can see how many days you have between now and when the piece of work is due.
Picture this: you look at your planner and see that you’ve got less than 2 weeks to go before an important exam. This is what you need to propel you into action. You realise, “I don’t have all the time in the world to do this. I better get started, even if it’s something small”.
In short, a yearly planner can break the tendency we all have to procrastinate.
Finished working on a project? It’s easy to just leave it in a heap on the table. But it’s best practice to force yourself to put it away. Here’s why …
When you leave projects out, they can get jumbled into one big heap. That big heap becomes mentally overwhelming. You’re not quite sure what projects are in there.
So what do you do? You just ignore it. The problem is the pile of projects keeps growing and before you know it, everything feels out of control!
So once you are done, take a minute to make a note of what your next action is on the project, then pick your stuff up and pop it away (note: I recommend using an open storage system like this one).
It takes less than a minute to put your things away but it can save you hours of time down the track!
Are there certain jobs you need to do over and over again? For these jobs, you need checklists. I have checklists for the items that I need for the following situations:
I file all these checklists away in one central location. Before I leave the house, I find the checklist I need and I do a quick scan to see if I’ve missed anything. I’m amazed how often there’s an item I’ve forgotten to pack. But I don’t beat myself up about it. I grab the item and go!
If you wake up late and have to pack your bag in a hurry, you’re more likely to not look at your checklist and subsequently, you’ll forget something important
Having everything packed for the next day gives you a sense of being in control. It also gives your subconscious time to think about whether you’ve forgotten anything.
I know what you’re thinking, “Ugh. Goal setting!” But goal setting is one seriously misunderstood technique.
All a goal is is something you want to do. Why set goals? Because they motivate you. They focus your mind on what you need to do.
To help you set weekly and daily goals, here are some good questions to ask:
If you set 20+ goals for the day and only achieve 3 of them, you’ll feel discouraged. You won’t want to start on the next task or stick to it. But if you set 5 goals and manage to knock off 4 of them, you’ll feel like you’re making progress.
As Dr Douglas Puryear states:
“Life feels better and goes better when you’re achieving your goals.”
There are so many things that can derail you from doing your most important work. But having reminders in your environment can help you stay on track.
For example, I have a whiteboard in my office and I write my most important goals down with coloured pens. I also use post-it notes and a program called Complice to help me stay focused.
When it comes to making your reminders, make sure you change them every few days. Why? Because your brain will get bored and start to tune out. So keep your brain stimulated by using different colours, changing the wording and drawing funny pictures.
I realise there is a lot of information here. It’s easy to find this blog post overwhelming and think, “It’s all too hard!” and do nothing. But remember, you don’t have to do all of the things I’m suggesting. Just start with one or two things. Master those. And then pick another. Before you know it, you’ll be feeling more organised and in control than ever before.
Dr Jane Genovese delivers interactive sessions on learning to learn, combating procrastination, exam preparation, how to focus in the age of distraction, habit formation and much, much more!
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