Hi there. Things have spiraled out of control lately, I don’t have a stable job at the moment and when I do, I mostly work from home.
I urgently need to establish some kind of routine and find a way to follow it. Productivity isn’t even the priority as I do have a good amount of free time. Problem is that I don’t use this boredom effectively at all.
I wanted to know if there are books/guides that could help ADHD people establish routines and how to keep them up. I’m autistic too, which means I greatly benefit from routine.
Thanks for any kind of advice!
I’d say 3 things
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To establish a routine, I had to let go of everything else. Like, the checklist for the whole day was just the routine and it stayed that way for weeks. Sounds like you’re in a good position to do this which is great to hear.
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Shape the environment to enforce a routine.
Alarms are annoying. They can tell you something but not make you want to do it. We can do better. For example in the morning, using a sunlight alarm clock and a space heater will actually make you want to get out of bed. (Use a timer socket with the space heater to have it auto turn on)
- It is incredible how effective this the combination is. You can go to bed at 1am and get up at 5am and still wake up in a decent mood, never pressing snoose, never dealing with a noise-maker. When it’s hot and bright, your whole body just tries to be awake instead of trying to keep you asleep.
Doing the exact opposite night also helps; use the thermostat clock to make it cold and have lights auto-turn off using timer sockets. It’s difficult to keep working when it’s really cold.
I find treating the weekend the same as weekdays is helpful. E.g. don’t take a break on the weekend.
- Then, if you can, get some external enforcement. Ideally this would be something like a class or a short job that requires showing up at the same time each day. It can be as simple as getting a plant that you need to water a bit every day, or a pet. Although be careful with a pet and make sure you can actually take care of them.
Recommended Books:
- Order from Chaos
