Blog

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    ADHD And Managing Your Clutter

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Organization, Blog

    Is your clutter causing you anxiety and overwhelm because you are worried about what you are missing or because you can’t find what you need when you need it?  Whether it is physical clutter or electronic clutter, as it increases, so does your stress level, right? But right now, because you don’t know how to tackle it, you may be avoiding dealing with it.  Because it seems just too insurmountable.  Is it your email or mail piling up? Stack of papers on your desk/table or electronic documents in the cloud or hard drive, in no particular order. Maybe the clutter is filling your closets, basements, garage, etc.  Clutter can be anywhere and everywhere, whether it is on your computer, in your living space or workspace. …

  • How To Set Boundaries Around Time When You Have ADHD

    ByMarla Cummins Blog

    Boundaries are rules you set to let others know what is okay and what is not okay for you based on your values and priorities. They protect your personal and mental space, including physical, sexual, intellectual or mental, emotional, material or financial, and time boundaries.  For this post, I’ll focus on how to set boundaries around your time. How about you? Do you have a hard time saying no when someone makes a request of you? And then you end up saying yes even when it would have been better to say no. For Adults with ADHD, this is a common challenge and is often one of the barriers to focusing on what is important to you. What if you could say no more often?…

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    ADHD and The Steps  to Following Through on Your Priorities

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Time Management, Blog

    Do you find it hard to decide what to do each day? Maybe you get overwhelmed trying to prioritize. So you’re never quite sure if you are doing what is most important to you.  No doubt, prioritizing is a challenge for ADHD adults. I know it can feel impossible sometimes. After all, everything seems important. And it all needs to be done right now, if not yesterday. But since we all have a limited amount of time and can’t do everything, we have to prioritize. That is, we need to choose among many options of what to work on now. And we need to choose what to ignore, at least for the time being. We need to tell ourselves, I’m doing this and not that. …

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    Break Free from ADHD Task Paralysis with These 6 Proven Tips

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Follow-Through, Blog

    You look at or think about a task. You tell yourself it is important to do. But you just can’t get started. You feel paralyzed – frozen. You may or may not know why. And the paralysis gets worse the more you avoid it, right?  The primary reason is fear. That is, there is something about the task that frightens you. It may feel as though a lion is chasing you. At least, that is how your body interprets the fear. Maybe the “lion” is your fear of failure, appearing incompetent, or not living up to your perfectionist tendencies.  Whatever the origin of the fear, when this happens, your prefrontal cortex, which is command central for your executive functioning, goes offline. And your amygdala, your…

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    Why Virtual Coworking Is the New Super Tool for ADHD Adults

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Tools & Strategies, Blog

    The idea of coworking is not new for ADHD adults. Though you may have heard it referred to as body doubling and, perhaps, thought of it as something done in person. Now, of course, that has changed, as coworking/body doubling is done as often in virtual spaces. And that is a definite boon for ADHD adults for reasons I’ll explore in a bit. It seems that, since I first started writing about body doubling for ADHD adults in 2013, it has become much more popular in the last few years. Maybe that’s because it took an upswing in the early days of Covid, a time when people were craving connection, as well as support in being productive while at home with all the competing distractions. …

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    The Top 10 Tips ADHD Adults Need To Have Better Focus Every Day

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Tools & Strategies, Blog

    Sometimes I know the challenge for you may be starting. Then there are other times when you start, sort of. But just can’t seem to find the traction you need to focus and attend the way you want. There are all sorts of ways your ADHD may be contributing to this challenge. Knowing how your ADHD symptoms affect your ability to focus and attend will help you choose the right strategies to follow through with what’s important to you. It’s Your ADHD Brain Wiring One of the first keys to unraveling this conundrum is to understand your unique brain wiring.   I like to think of the ADHD brain as a stimulus-seeking heat missile. In fact, attention deficit is a misnomer. Because it’s not that you…

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    4 Ways to Boost You Energy When You Have ADHD

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Treatment Options, Blog

    When you saw the title of this article, perhaps you thought you’d learn more about what ADHD adults can do to manage their energy throughout each day, like eating, sleeping, etc. No doubt, these day-to-day efforts are important! But to be productive and manage your ADHD symptoms, you’ll need to take a longer view. To do this, you’ll need to consider the four dimensions of energy – physical, mental, emotional, and human spirit. But, like many ADHD adults, you may be primarily focused on trying to work faster and focus better — not be distracted. Have your efforts paid off? If not, I’m not surprised. After all, your time and willpower are limited. You only have so much time in the day, right? And your…

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    You Can Start Prioritizing Better Now by Taking These 4 Steps

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Tools & Strategies, Blog

    (originally published February 23, 2016, updated April 14, 2023 Do you find it hard to prioritize what you should be working on at any given moment and wonder why it is so hard for you to make these decisions? If you do, you’re not alone. Like other ADHD adults, you may find this hard for two common reasons. One is that it may often feel as though everything on your plate is equally important. It may also feel as though it all needs to be done now, if not yesterday. Of course, this makes it hard to choose what to do each day and contributes to your feelings of overwhelming stress. One of the ways you can turn this around is by learning how to…

  • Ready to Stop Being Reactive and Be More Intentional? Here’s How.

    ByMarla Cummins Blog

    (originally published March 11, 2018, updated March 10, 2023 ) What first comes to mind when you think of ADHD and mindfulness? Like many, you might first envision needing to sit still, meditating for long periods of time. And conclude that there’s no way you can do that. Maybe not. But mindfulness is so much more than just meditation.  And one of the most effective yet overlooked strategies ADHD adults need to operate effectively. That is, incorporating more mindfulness into your daily practice can help you be more often in alignment with your values and goals.  My best guess is it is often overlooked because it can be more difficult for ADHD adults to practice mindfulness for reasons I’ll cover below. But I think it’s worth the extra effort. Maybe that’s obvious since I’m writing this post….

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    Part 3 – How ADHD Adults Keep Conversations From Going Horribly Wrong

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Communication, Blog

    (originally published November 10, 2017, updated January 12, 2023 )  Communicating well in everyday run-of-the-mill conversations can be difficult for ADHD adults. I wrote about this in the two previous articles, ADHD Adults Communicate Better Using These 7 Listening Tips and 5 Strategies You Need to Use to Be Better Understood in Conversations. But you will need a different skill set to handle crucial conversations. These are conversations where the stakes are high, opinions vary, and emotions run strong, according to authors Joseph Grenny et al. of  Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High. The authors also note that: Our natural tendencies in moments that seem threatening lean toward fight or flight rather than listen and speak. This can be especially true for ADHD adults for reasons I will explore in…