Danielle Ralston explains why ADHD planning works better in days, not weeks. Short timelines trigger follow-through, while body-doubling and social accountability combat executive dysfunction. She uses her own messy office and upcoming photo shoots as deadlines to finally declutter.
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Good morning, everyone. Going live all the places as normal, trying to get it all set up. I think it's working. So good morning, everyone. Today is Monday, July 14th, right? July 14th. July 14th. I am so excited to be here today, and we're talking about future planning equaling success, especially when you're ADHD. And this is, I think— well, somebody will have to correct me if I'm wrong. It may be just a uniquely ADHD thing. I don't think this is part of my autism. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe just an ADHD thing. I don't know. Uh, but when you future plan for something, you're more likely to success— have success. Except for don't do like, one month from now I have company coming over, because you'll procrastinate until you end up in a panic, hyperfocus panic mode, and then we're creating burnout and cortisol and all of the bad things for us. So when I say future planning, I mean in in two hours I am going to somebody's going to drop by. So I have two hours to get things done, or in thirty minutes I'm going to drop by, or somebody somebody's going to stop by, or I can get this reward when I get XYZ done. So future planning for reward. Well, not all rewards work, but a larger reward or future planning for embarrassment helps. Having somebody come by your house if your house is a disaster. So having one of those smaller things in short increments, not like I said, not 2 months out, not 1 month out, not even a week out, but today this is going to happen. So I planned something. My office is a complete and total disaster. I don't work in there super often anymore because my pain level is bad. So I tend to work from my bed, which is where I am right now. But I want to start working in my office a little more. I'm starting a new treatment today that I'm very hopeful for. And my office is such a disaster and I have to get it clean. Now, me knowing that, me wanting to work in my office, me knowing it has to get clean, it's never going to get clean. Total honesty here. I did a video a couple weeks ago about my executive dysfunction and how much of a disaster my office is because of my executive dysfunction, and it's still not clean. I know it needs to be clean. It's bad. I cannot get the motivation up. I have tried to even do a body doubling session to get it done, and then I get distracted by by work stuff or other things, and I don't get it done. So how am I gonna do it? And we live 1,000 miles away from pretty much everybody we know, so nobody's gonna stop by. So it's not something I have to do. And heck, even having my brother come stay for a week, who I hadn't physically seen in like 20 years, 15 years, I still didn't get my office clean. So how do I get it clean? I joined an influencer marketing small— I'm a micro influencer, small package— so that I have to do tons of photographs in my office And I have to do them by Monday, and all of this stuff is going to arrive to organization stuff for my office and all of that this week. So now I have to get my office clean. So what can you future plan thirty minutes from now, an hour from now, two or three days from now? No more than a couple days that will make you get something done. What will help you get something done? Who can you invite over? What major reward can you get? And I can't use any of these cool new and. There were some really, really cute gadgets and office decorations and stuff that I cannot unpack out of the boxes until my office is clean. So how are you going to create success for yourself this week? Just some little future planning tips. And this works with so many different things. So if you have questions, you want to apply this, and I am going to be doing some extra decluttering, uh, body doubling this week too to help me get this done. So how
