
Ask HN: Advice for Dealing with Crippling Procrastination? - d33lio
Hi HN,<p>I&#x27;m a person who&#x27;s tried WFH or remote work in the past and quickly realized that it was very much not for me.  My ADHD takes over and even with stimulants makes the inertia required to start work or get over the anxiety of encountering something that will fuck me over seemingly overwhelming.<p>For some reason, in an office a lot of this goes away.  Once I can get started, I don&#x27;t really have issues.<p>The first four months of quarantine was honestly fine, I&#x27;m not super social so that simply was not a negative factor for me.<p>However, the past few weeks have been crippling.  To the point where I&#x27;m lucky to get 2-3 hours of work done on any given day.  The rest of the time I&#x27;m distracted, packed with anxiety or sleeping.<p>I&#x27;m generally a very regimented person, as it&#x27;s one of the more effective ways I&#x27;ve found to deal with my ADHD &#x2F; focus issues.<p>I consider myself to be a relatively infragile and durable person both physically and mentally but I&#x27;m incredibly scared where this path is going to lead with my current innability to pull my shit together.<p>Do any other HN&#x27;ers with ADHD or a quickly declining level of productivity (but not necessarily mental state - yes I&#x27;m otherwise stable) have any advice or tips?<p>I&#x27;m scared I won&#x27;t be able to hit deadlines or keep my job within a few months.
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brudgers
A bit of perspective. After four surprisingly good months, you’re having a bit
more trouble is probably down to normal variation because that’s about the
only direction you could go from a local optimum. It takes a little time to
refill an empty tank. Nothing unusual or unnatural or unexpected about it. And
these are crazy stressful days despite starting to feel normal. It’s ok to
give yourself credit for what you did and be kind enough to yourself to let
off the gas some. Good luck.

~~~
afarrell
OP, I would encourage you to interpret "be kind to yourself" may also mean "be
confident in recognizing that you have an unmet need, and forgive yourself for
the lapses which this has led to, and persist in seeking a way to understand
and meet that need."

I say this as someone who reached out for help with when I was at MIT and been
told, "It's fine. Everyone struggles. You're doing okay." It remember being
just utterly crushed to hear that I was expected to suffer like that.

OP, this situation is hard but debuggable and you are worth it.

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muzani
I've been there.

Procrastination is often a response to fear or guilt. Studies have shown that
people who feel guilty tend to indulge in bad habits more. Forgiving yourself
is often far better than reprimanding yourself. (Maximum Willpower, Dr. K.
McGonigal, 2012)

"...the inertia required to start work..." This is a key point. Try to
minimize the energy needed to start, or better yet, make it natural to start.
The book Atomic Habits has some good solutions, but the most effective trick
for me is to try to get in just 2 mins of work every hour, which usually
snowballs to working a full hour. You might also look into changing your
environment; old environments mean old habits. Try working at a different
time, using a different keyboard or chair, drinking a different drink before
work.

I noticed that the commuting period also helps a lot with focus. Even when the
brain is idle, it's still at full activity. It could well be that your brain
doesn't have enough idle time. You could try allocating an hour or two to
"meditation", which might simply be taking a walk, watching music videos,
staring at the ceiling.

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chives_yo
I don't have ADHD, but since I started WFH I've been having ups and downs in
terms of productivity, including a period of a few weeks where I was getting
about 2-3 hours of work done per day at most like you describe. I don't know
details about what your situation is like, but here's what I did that helps me
at least most of the time.

I have my desk/office in a a room that was a storage room/unused office. I
ended up removing anything from that room that I found myself doing instead of
work: keep my phone in another room, delete bookmarks to blogs/news sites,
move my stack of unread books into a different room, etc. Basically I got to a
point where if I was sitting in that room, there was nothing to do _but_ work.

The other thing I did was start framing tasks in terms of "doing this will
make my life easier tomorrow" rather than thinking about later deadlines or
the "big picture" of the project. E.g. "I can't get myself to audit all of
these documents today, but if I set up the spreadsheet template it will make
my life easier tomorrow." Sometimes when I start something like that I find it
leads naturally into doing the actual task, but sometimes not. In those
situations, as others have mentioned, it's important to have some self-
compassion and try not get caught up in feelings of guilt. I started using an
app called Woebot that can help with this. When you tell it you are
depressed/anxious/guilty, it helps you look for ways to reframe those thoughts
to be more productive.

Also, I have heard of studies that say the average employee is productive for
3-4 hours a day. Consider if you are actually getting less done or if your
productive hours are just distributed differently. In an office where you get
interrupted regularly it might be more evenly distributed throughout the day
compared to if you have the opportunity at home to burn through those hours
all in one chunk.

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bluejoeco
I'm on a similar place. My productivity has still not fully recovered, but at
least my sense of guilt and stress around procrastination is gone - and that
itself was a big detribution my attention span when it comes to being
generally productive. So that's a tricky one - practice self-compassion and
mindfulness.

Other random tips that have helped me, in the past:

\- List out a gradient of actions you could take to make your employer more
aware of your current mental performance. From the most direct approach to the
most subtle one, as in: pointing out you are taking action to reduce the
amount of work you are going to push to get done in a sprint, or bringing up
the topic to HR, what's best for your own situation - and take action.

\- Taking even the shortest walk around your block helps a lot feeding your
senses with something other than your monitor.

\- Within your regimented schedule, force yourself to read a novel or watch a
lengthy engaging tv show and allow yourself to get immersed within it - to
separate a little the need for novel information and give it to the brain when
it expects it. In other words, taking control of dopamine release in your
brain and optimize it to fit the media you enjoy the most, will decrease your
need of novelty which often distracts us when we need the focus.

It's good to reach out - so even if you can't find a satisfactory answer here.
Keep looking!

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dangoljames
I don't have ADHD, but I have struggled with motivation from time to time,
especially when confronted with tasks that I have little confidence I'll
complete successfully.

That said, I'll move along, taking you at your word that you're resilient and
eager for good advice:

\- get off the couch and get busy. don't beat yourself up when you sit back
down, just don't over-indulge in idleness.

\- I strongly recommend getting excessive on the first go. wear yourself out.
then get some sleep. sleep until you wake up.

\- the idea is, wring the anxiety out of your work and make the work second
nature. you sound plenty capable (or at least confident you are, and that is
usually sufficient).

\- disconnect from the negative ideation through reinforcement by taking
positive action.

I know it wont be easy or so simple as I have made it sound, but I think you
can do it and I don't even know you.

Best of Luck.

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hackermailman
If you can afford it rent a tiny office and go there everyday, sub-leases
galore right now being permitted by cities. I also can't effectively work at
home mainly because I hated being there all day and night. My mini office
works out to $150/mth after I write off most off the lease and is 6 blocks
from my home so I walk there everyday.

Find an accountant wherever you live and ask them how much your
country/state/province allows you to write off a lease

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aminozuur
When I have an idea to do something that I really love, my brain ignores
everything else until the thing is done.

I'm not sure what it is specifically that you are procrastinating, but if it's
a sideproject; perhaps you can think of something else. Or outsource the parts
you keep procrastinating.

If it's tasks for your regular job, perhaps discuss this with your manager to
see if you can work on things you like more.

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afarrell
One thing that I started doing recently has been to spend the first hour of
every morning outside under a big leafy tree.

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ImpressiveWebs
This is a bit of a self plug, but I do a weekly newsletter called Tech
Productivity that features articles and tools on being more productive:

[https://techproductivity.co/](https://techproductivity.co/)

I find tons of good articles on procrastination and similar subjects. I don’t
recall any specific examples now, but you can view all previous issues
starting here:

[https://mailchi.mp/techproductivity/78](https://mailchi.mp/techproductivity/78)

Just change the number in the URL (77, 76, etc) to view previous issues. I’m
sure you’ll find lots of good articles and maybe a tool or two that can help
you out. Hope that helps!

------
afarrell
Hi! Fellow ADHDer here. Inattentive subtype.

I'd need to know your specific brain better. What I really _should_ do is
listen to you and really dive deep into the habit patterns you get into. (As
I'm trying to get my brain to shut up about, thats what real engineering is.)
But it is hard to do that over an internet forum and I lack the time. So
instead I'm just going to barf solutions at you.

0\. Top priority is to fix the sleep and exercise schedule. Everything else
flows from that.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snAhsXyO3Ck](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snAhsXyO3Ck)

1\. See if you can get a standing desk and a stationary bike. I took the
handlebars off mine so it could fit underneath the desk. It lets me cycle
while programming which makes it easier to be tired at night.

If your brain hates shopping, then just go with these links:

[https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/skarsta-desk-sit-stand-
white-s5...](https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/skarsta-desk-sit-stand-
white-s59324818/) [https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ultrasport-Trainer-Sensors-
Backrest...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ultrasport-Trainer-Sensors-Backrest-
Foldable/dp/B07658P8PF)

2\. Double down on automated testing. Write scaffolding tests even if the
company wouldn't need them and you delete them before pushing. You are worth
it.

3\. Buy the actual book on the Pomodoro technique and take notes on it.

[https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pomodoro-Technique-Acclaimed-
Time-M...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pomodoro-Technique-Acclaimed-Time-
Management-Transformed/dp/1524760706/ref=asc_df_1524760706/)

4\. Get some dotted paper and nice mechanical pencils to take notes:
[https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005IAZXUO/ref=ppx_yo_dt...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005IAZXUO/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1)

5\. ADHDers need external words. Find a podcast you can use to replace the
narrative that plays in your head. (Hell, if you find yourself getting into
thought spirals of being really hard on yourself and unable to forgive
yourself for distraction, you may want to go full Matthew 4:4)

6\. Create a calendar event called "silent coding" at work and invite people
to join. Humans need camaraderie.

7\. Read this: [https://medium.com/@josebrowne/on-coding-ego-and-
attention-3...](https://medium.com/@josebrowne/on-coding-ego-and-
attention-367cf902639a)

