ADHD-ADD Tips


30
Aug 10

Deals On Organization Tools for ADD ADHD

I usually don’t do a lot with deals or online coupons here on ADDessories. There are a lot of deal websites and coupon websites out there that do it better, mostly because they do it 24/7. However, this time I am making an exception, because there are Target stores everywhere, and because the planning and organizing tools that they have right now are so cheap that they are a good way to test out what kind of ADD tools and ADHD organization resources might work best for you.

I’m making a big assumption here that most Targets, or at least most Super Targets have a similar layout and structure to the ones here in Denver, Colorado. If not, you might have to look around the aisles a little bit or see if they have the same deals online or maybe if there are some Target coupon codes online that you can use to get the same kind of value.

Near the entrance of our Target stores, there is a dollar area. The items in this little section are rotated in and out fairly regularly and typically cost $1 or $2.50 depending upon the item. Either way, that is a good deal for a little white board, cork board tiles, or notebooks. Don’t get me wrong this is not high quality office supply store type stuff. These are cheapo, made in China, the cheapest way possible items. However, they will work for a little while and that gives ADDers an opportunity to try them out.

Have you ever wondered if a good ADD organization tip would be to put a white board in every room of your house, or if it would be a great way for people with ADHD to remember things to have a little corkboard tile section by the front door, backdoor, and the door to your bedroom and office? It can be an expensive experiment to see if that works for you if you are shelling out $15 per whiteboard. But, with these cheap whiteboards and dry erase calendars at Target, you could put one in every room of a 10 bedroom house for less than $30. That’s a good way to try out some ideas.

Check out your local Target or pop over to Target.com and see if you can get rock bottom priced dry erase boards, dry-erase calendars, and more to help improve your organization skills and manage your ADD better without new medications or anything chemical for a change.

- Everyone have a nice– “Hey, is that something interesting over there?”   :)


18
Jul 10

Best ADD Tip Ever – The Only ADHD Advice You Need *

best-add-tip-adhd-secret Are you ready for the best ADD tip for overcoming ADHD symptoms? It is surprisingly easy, and once you see how this powerful attention deficit disorder tip can be for managing ADHD at work or school, you’ll want to use it all the time.

Is there a catch?

Well, did you see that asterisks up there? That means that there is a catch.

Overcoming Distraction to Get Work Done and Be Most Productive

The key concern when it comes to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is how constant distraction can be overcome in order to be more productive at school, more productive at work, and more productive at home. All the other ADD symptoms are sort of secondary. If ADDers could just get a handle on increasing productivity in the face of ADD, everything else would be a little easier to manage. (If you were as productive as you are capable of at work and around the house, do you think it would matter as much that you occasionally tune out or interrupt your spouse during conversations?)

To become more productive and improve your standing at work or improve your grades at school, the person with ADD need only do just one little thing: keep working.

See, I told you there was a catch.

However, hear me out. For those of us with ADD, the symptom of distractibility is one that keeps us from focusing properly on important tasks. When a major report is due the next day, we find ourselves intrigued by something else entirely. When this happens, there are only two choices. One choice involves using all of the ADHD tips and ADD tools that one can muster to overcome one’s natural tendency to have attention wander from the important tasks at hand, to those of lesser importance, or even no importance at all. The second choice involves just going with the flow, or allowing the mind’s attention to wander as it sees fit.

* The Catch: (That asterisks does indeed mean that there is a catch. Typically, it means a footnote, which is where some company uses really small fonts to explain how they are going to screw you over, and therefore cover themselves legally by “disclosing” the information that you need to realize that the whole thing is a scam. Here on Addessories, we have no reason to trick our fellow ADDers, so this explanatory asterisk is in full-size font type.) The catch is that in order to follow the path of least resistance and give into your mind’s typical urges to find ever more interesting things to focus on, you have to keep working longer than you would if you went the other route.

How much longer?

That is the essence of the catch. You have to keep working until you have finished that important task. That major report, or that semester-long project that you just started and is due tomorrow, must be finished before you stop working, whether that takes four hours or thirty-four hours. You’ll find that you are happier along the way, but the destination will end up being much further away than it should have.

Whether or not this is a good ADD trick for you depends entirely on whether you are the type of person with ADD who finds the journey more important than the destination, or whether you are the type of person with ADHD who finds crossing the finish line the most satisfying.

Which one are you?


2
Jun 10

ADHD Time Management Tips Microsoft Outlook

outlook-time-management-snooze When it comes to managing the symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD or ADD, nothing is quite as frustrating as doing everything right and putting the effort into using all of the organizational tools, electronic organizers, and ADHD planners available to you only to have them not work for your ADD mind for some reason.

One of the most useful computer tools for ADHD available in most office environments without having to go through the trouble of getting new software or utilities installed on your work computer is Microsoft Outlook. Using Outlook can be one of the good ADHD tips.

In some way, MS Outlook is an ADDer’s worst nightmare. There are so many buttons, icons, and features, not to mention tons of functionality from other programs just a few clicks away, that one can easily get distracted and end up spending 45 minutes configuring your Google Gmail email account to synchronize with your Microsoft Outlook email client when you should be working on that presentation that is due in two hours.

On the other hand, all of those planners, calendars, task managers, and to-do lists can be wonderful for the adult with ADHD when used properly. In order to make these computerized organization tools work for ADHD you have to know how to get the most out of each of the different settings and functions. For example, tasks are great, but if you never click the tasks section, you will never see the list. Furthermore, if you don’t always input your tasks on the task list, then important tasks will slip by unnoticed.

I’ll be covering some of the great ways to use Outlook to organize your schedule and tasks more efficiently for ADD people. However, for today, I just wanted to convey one very important ADHD trick for people who use Outlook to help them stay organized.

Use Outlook Pop-Up Reminders To Improve ADHD Scheduling

The number one problem with any planner, calendar, or organizer used by adults with ADHD, or teens or kids with ADD for that matter, is remembering to actually use it and look at it. Too many of us have written everything down somewhere only to forget to ever look at what we wrote down. The reminder feature of MS Outlook helps prevent this problem.

By setting a reminder on your scheduled events, you get a right in your face, can’t ignore it, pop-up when your event is coming up. The default reminder goes off 15 minutes before the event starts. You ADDers already know where this is going. You read the reminder, and that is good. Then you click the Dismiss button and go back to what you were doing for “just a few more minutes.” Next thing you know, you are twenty minutes late for that meeting that you just got the reminder for.

To avoid this problem, don’t click dismiss. Click Snooze. That way, the reminder will come up again in five minutes. Do this even if you are planning to start the new even right away. There is no harm in a reminder window popping up and staying open on your computer screen while you are away working on your new task. You can just click Dismiss when you return. On the other hand, there can be a lot of harm if what you meant to happen when you clicked the Dismiss button didn’t actually end up happening as is so often the case.

Try it. Spend a week clicking Snooze and not clicking Dismiss until it pops back up and interrupts you working on your new task. You’ll be surprised at just how much this improves your time organization.