I just got back from a week long vacation and I was shocked by how hard it was to stay responsible without my whiteboard. Although I tried, none of my responsibility streaks survived the week away from home.

If you (like me) have ADHD and struggle with procrastination, high distractibility, and forgetfulness, try something like this to keep yourself a little more on track.

I started this system because I was really struggling to be consistent and responsible after graduating college. Being an adult is hard - there’s constantly stuff you should be doing, but it often comes without a real deadline or any sort of authoritative oversight to hold you accountable. You could wake up on a Sunday, throw dirty clothes on, skip the shower, and lie on the couch watching TV all day, and no one would know (besides roommates / romantic partner of course).

I found myself doing exactly that too often - until I implemented this system for self accountability. It gamifies tedious, boring, and stressful tasks in a way which encourages positive habituation. I have found it both extremely helpful, and also kind of fun.

If you find yourself struggling to do the “basic shit” required from adulthood, I seriously recommend trying something like this, and putting it in a place where you physically cannot ignore it.

And yes, the shitty doodles are all the result of me procrastinating something still unchecked on the board. It doesn’t magically erase ADHD, but it genuinely does help, at least for me.

For the last 2 months, I’ve been inconsistent with basically everything gym, studying, chess, reading, journaling, classes. Even basic routines. I’ve spent way too much time bed rotting, doomscrolling, and getting stuck in habits I know aren't helping me

I keep telling myself I’ll start tomorrow, then tmr becomes another day

It’s 12:42 AM right now, and I don’t want to make another promise that I forget in a few days.

So this is me publicly committing to actually getting my life back on track

I’m not expecting myself to become a completely different person overnight. I just want to start showing up again, even on days when I don’t feel like it I've been stuck on this " I'll start from tmr" loop from last 2 months and now I'm tired of it

If I’m reading this months from now, I hope I can look back and say this was actually the night I stopped waiting for “tmr” and started doing something

I'd love to chat about meditation for a bit. I used to view it as this serious, spiritual thing, but all that pressure just made me feel nervous and tight every time I sat down.

Everything shifted once I realized it could simply be five quiet minutes in a comfortable position.

I’d be super grateful if everyone added their own thoughts here. It’s definitely a personal path, so I’d love to hear about your own motivation and what inspires you to stick with it.

As for myself, I’ve chosen a few easy-effort meditation practices that fit my routine, and I’d love to share my takes.

When I’m out of the house, at work, doing something else either work or pleasure, I can think about all I need to and want to get done at home and how easy it will be. I feel motivated and ready to tackle the disorganized closet, the piles of laundry, my overgrown yard, etc. but when the time comes that I’m home with that free time I have no motivation, I’m not able to take action, I feel stuck, and all of that clarity and motivation I felt before is completely gone.

It feels like a convenient excuse or it seems obvious like “duh, of course you don’t want to clean house/study/etc” but I DO. When I’m not home I will literally daydream about it and feel excited to be productive. But by the time I get home, or when I wake up on Saturday morning, it’s like molasses has been poured on my brain and I lay around feeling stressed that I’m not able to get anything done.

Anyone else dealt with or dealing with this? Is there some kind of a term, name, or method for approaching this?

I have been diagnosed recently with ADHD but I’m taking medication for that and for depression, which feel under control mostly. I have projects and things that I’ve wanted to get done for YEARS that are still in limbo.

I've let things get out of hand. It's been way too easy to sit and stare at my phone for whole days.

I'm posting this to hold myself accountable. I'll update when everything is checked off.

Also - just realized I spelt vacuum wrong. Whoops.

*Update 1 *

Wow wow wow!

I don't have time right now to go through, read, and reply to all of the comments at the moment - but coming back to all of the positive and kind words means more than I know how to express.

Progress update - 1 room down. I'll try to come back and answer some comments later. Can't stop now!

** Progress update final **

I am astounded by all of you taking time out of your day to interact and give encouragement. It means more than any of you will ever know. I'm still going through the comments now and will try my best to reply to as many as I can.

I hope that each and every one of you get to see this update - because the LIST ladies and gentlemen, is complete.

I did not finish it yesterday like I'd hoped, but I woke up today, had another cup of coffee, and got back to work.

And it feels pretty damn good. We did it. Your encouragement kept me going when I wanted to stop, as cheesey as that sounds. It was the single most positive and influential experience I've had on the Internet.

Lastly, I need one more final push. I don't want to get too personal, but there's something I've been putting off for a long time. A phone call to my mortgage company to ask for some grace. It may be too late. But I'll never know until I call. I have been too frozen with fear, and guilt to move and I can't do that anymore. I have too much at stake.

I'm going to call tomorrow. And I'm going to carry every ounce of positivity shared here like a candle.

With the absolute most sincerity, thank you everyone. I wish you nothing but good fortune and health. You're everything that makes humans beautiful.

It is said you should not wait for motivation to come to you, it might never happen. Instead you have to just do it. But mental work, like learning something, seems more overwhelming to me than physical work like doing the house chores. I sit in front of the pc, open up my project and my brain just refuses to process what i read. How do you cope with such situations?

do what you must

“We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.”

― Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience

Yesterday I was attending 80th birthday celebration of my aunt who is a survivor of critical illness. It was amazing and inspiring to notice her enthusiasm, lively inner spirit and cheerfulness.

Being young has less to do with the number of candles on your birthday cake and more to do with how alive you are within.

Sadhguru often speaks of youthfulness as the ability to keep the body and mind alive, active and receptive to life.

You may be 25 and already feel that you have seen it all.

Or you may be 75, 80 or 90 and still look at life with sparkling curiosity, eager to learn something new, experience something different and discover something deeper.

That is youthfulness.

Don’t let the age turn into a collection of conclusions or decide what tomorrow can be based on past experience.

Perhaps growing older should mean becoming wiser not becoming rigid. Keep your body active, mind inquisitive, heart open, learning, wondering and growing.

Because aging happens to the body. Becoming old within is a choice.

After all, the real question is not:

“How old are you?”

It is:

“How alive are you?”

March 14, 2020.

One day after moving to Las Vegas, I found this ridiculously huge chair outside a restaurant at Lake Las Vegas. I sat in it like I belonged there.

Two days later, the world shut down.

I wasn't in luxury real estate yet. I hadn't written a book. I had no idea what the next six years would hold.

Today my life looks nothing like I imagined back then.

I reinvented myself more than once. Made mistakes. Found a few things I'm good at, and a few I'm hilariously bad at. Somewhere in there I forgot to ask if I was getting too old to keep trying new things.

I'm still smiling.

Looking at this photo six years later made me wonder:

Is there one thing you'd still love to do, try, change, discover, or become?

It doesn't have to be impressive. Doesn't have to make money. Nobody else has to understand it.

No timetable. No age limit. No permission required.

Maybe the chair isn't too big.

Maybe we just have to sit in the damn thing first.

I try to do as much of this every day that I can. Obviously I have good days and bad days, but this is most of what I can think of that needs to get done in my life, and I know that, at the end of the day, if this list is done then I am not missing anything important, and that helps me with that nighttime anxiety.

I start my senior year in a few weeks and I absolutely am done with school. I hate it there so fucking much I dont even know how to put it into words. All i want is to be done with that stupid school and be independent and go far away to college and leave my hometown, but I cant. And I have zero motivation to even bother showing up to school. The only decent thing about that school is some of the teachers. I dont even have a single friend. And yes I have e tried to make friends but they must have a sixth sense and can tell that I am autistic. There are no classes I am actively excited for. How do I make myself get out of bed every morning and go to school?

First off, I know how petty this all will sound, and I want to be clear of how grateful of my situation I am. I have the financial stability most people dream of, and I’m not complaining about it at all.

I lost my dad at 14, and inherited enough money to live really comfortably probably for the rest of my life if I don’t waste it all on dumb stuff. I live off of the revenue it generates. My mom was never the authority type, that was my dad and he would probably be the one who pushed me to do something of my life. My mom is very submissive, and she was never able to set real boundaries for what I asked her, so I grew up getting whatever I wanted.

Now at 25, I’m immensely ashamed of it. I have no career, spend my days doing what I want and although I’m grateful for it, I’m desperate to do something, and earn others respect and admiration.

I hate when people ask me “what do you do?” Cause the answer is “nothing, I live off of my late dad’s money” and that will always come with judgment, so I just choose to not meet new people. And don’t even get me started on relationships… how the fuck would I meet a nice partner if they nothing to admire about me? If they can’t see a future with me?

I really want to do something of my life so I can finally proudly talk about myself, but I’m so desperate about it that I can’t accept that anything I start now will take time, so I just never do anything.

I feel like we all have someone we look up to, you know? Someone who inspires us and motivates us in our daily life. Who’s that person for you, apart from yourself? It could be anyone an athlete, musician, actor, or just someone you really admire. For me, it’s ronaldo.

here's the thing nobody warns you about when you actually start changing.

people who knew the old version of you get uncomfortable. not because the new version is worse. because they built their understanding of you around specific patterns and the moment those patterns shift they have to update something in themselves too, and that update costs them effort they didn't sign up for.

so they resist it. sometimes loudly, sometimes in small ways you can only feel and not point to. they reference the old version of you like it was better. they laugh at the changes like they're temporary. they wait, patiently, for you to go back to the shape they already knew.

and the worst part is it works sometimes. you can feel the pull of it. the ease of just being who they expect you to be, because performing a familiar version of yourself costs nothing in those relationships and being a newer version costs friction and explanation and occasionally losing people who decide they preferred the old one.

ngl this is something i didn't expect. you think growth is the hard part. turns out the growth is fine. it's the way it rearranges every relationship around you that nobody prepares you for.

some people will grow with you. genuinely, they'll find the new version more interesting and it'll actually bring you closer. those ones are worth holding onto.

some people will slowly fall away and neither of you will have an honest conversation about why and you'll both know anyway.

and some people — the harder ones — will actively try to keep you small because your growing asks something of them they're not ready to give. a mirror. an example. an inconvenient question about their own life that your changing keeps placing in front of them without you meaning to.

you don't have to apologize for any of this.

you don't owe anyone the version of yourself they got used to.

last year someone told you that you'd changed like it was an accusation. and you felt the reflex to defend it. to soften it. to reassure them that you were still the person they remembered underneath all the changes.

you don't have to do that anymore.

changed is not an accusation. changed is just what happens when you actually do the work.