Five sentence summary
Problems with organizing, focusing, and motivation can all make writing a struggle. By working with our brains rather than against them and understanding what motivates us, we can remove some of the barriers and write with less frustration.
ADHD folks have difficulty writing for a few reasons: motivating ourselves to do boring tasks is an epic battle, organizing our ten million creative and connected thoughts is a marathon unlike any other, and focusing on a single task, idea, or paragraph isn't something our brains are designed to do.
We are motivated by urgency, interest, challenge, and novelty and I find it's helpful to remember this even when motivation isn't my problem. For example, maybe I can organize my thoughts better if I write an outline but work backwards. The challenge of working backwards makes the task more fun while helping me organize myself. Working with my ADHD rather than against it always works better for me. Organizing
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Five sentence summary
Body doubling or using an accountability partner is a great ADHD trick. Support groups, especially for ADHD or neurodivergent folks, can also be a life saver, introducing us to new tricks and perspectives. Here the virtual work and study group options that I know about and feel comfortable recommending.
Support groups for work or school, whether for mentoring or sharing strategies, are crucial for ADHD folks. When the world isn't designed for ADHD folks, we need to rely on each other to share advice and swap stories. Of course, finding a local support group might prove to be a challenge. Not to mention, there's still a significant stigma associated with ADHD, so finding something local might not be what you're looking for.
That's where virtual options can fill the gap. Here the options I know about and feel comfortable recommending. If you know of more, please comment and I will add them! Support groups
For Black women and gender minorities, ADHD Babes offers support groups and sometimes specific working groups. They also have a Discord channel and do body-doubling.
ADHD Hive is worth checking out. They do regular meet ups and they also have multiple groups, like their co-working group and their writers' group. ReASoN (Researchers & Students on Neurodiversity) Network is somewhat newer but they also do regular meetings. This is a research network focused on neurodivergent students, researchers, and staff in higher education. A website should be forthcoming, but right now they're on Twitter at ReASoN_Network. If you're not on Twitter, try contacting [email protected] for more information. Update: They're setting up a Discord channel for members and can include a writing group if there's interest! ADHD Central Student Community has a Discord channel and they do events, body doubling sometimes, etc. They're also on Twitter. ADHD Adult UK has a Discord community that includes a channel for academics, a channel for accountability buddies, and many other channels. It's pretty active! CHADD of San Fernando Valley does a substantial amount of virtual support. They have a weekly virtual work group and and an adult peer support group as well as groups focused on youth. Thank you @petequily on Twitter for sharing all that this group does! Note that some of these groups also run body doubling sessions. Five sentence (or less) summary: Don't just set out to do something; set out to do a tiny part of it and to do it badly. Identifying the absolute lowest possible bar you could set and incrementally raising it will hopefully be humorous and result in some hits of dopamine. There are no hidden expectations here. You're not giving yourself permission to do poorly ("but I really should fold ALL of the laundry"), your goal is to do poorly. We often have trouble getting started on a task, especially if it's boring, has multiple steps, and isn't going to result in an easy dopamine hit. Like most of us, I had a paper to write that I could not possibly have been less interested in. I didn't care about the consequences of not writing the paper, so anxiety as a motivator wasn't going to work. I had scheduled out my time. I knew what I had to do, and nothing.
I. did. not. care. I was reading writing tips from a fiction author, and she recommended writing badly. Yep, you have this huge paper to write, you can't get started, setting a timer for ten minutes and working isn't going well, so write a horrible introduction. Write badly. Your goal is no longer to write "the introduction" or "an introduction," your goal is to literally write "a bad introduction." It's a variation of taking the pressure completely off and just write something, but your honest goal is to write poorly. Why? Takes the pressure off and honestly it is kind-of fun. ADHD folks often need that last part. I've adapted this as the years have gone on to what I'm calling the low bar reverse limbo. |
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