Hey team, we’re back at it for another episode about slowing down, but this time we’re looking at activation energy, which is the idea we’re going to need to have a certain amount of energy available to get started on a task. When we’re getting ready to get to the next thing on our to-do list, sometimes it can feel like it’s just too much, and getting started is really going to be the hardest part.
Activation energy is that minimum threshold for us to get going on that thing, and some days it just isn’t there, and so today, we’re going to be looking at ways that we make getting started a little bit easier.
Before we really get into this episode, I think we really need to look at why we’d even be thinking about activation energy when we’re talking about slowing down. Because on the surface, this seems like we’re talking about doing more. And sure, this has also kind of felt like the case for both the episode on time management and task management. But with activation energy, I think this can be even more important because our energy levels are prime indicators of how we’re doing physically and mentally. Ignoring those indicators is an easy way for us to wind up in burnout.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. As I’ve stated in the previous episodes, while part of slowing down is about doing less, it’s also about doing the right things. Now I don’t want to imply that we’re just being lazy and putting off important work. Rather one of the easiest ways for us to build up the activation energy to get going on a task is urgency. Nearly everyone I’ve talked with ADHD has stories about how they were able to harness their ADHD to get something turned in last minute after procrastinating on it for weeks. The looming deadline got them in gear and got them over the finish line. And we use this as a mark of pride; despite our ADHD, we were still able to finish and turn in some great work. And we use this drive of urgency for a lot of things. Perhaps not always in the extremes of finishing a paper and getting it turned in 5 minutes before it's due, but nonetheless, it’s a very effective driver.
The issue is that using urgency as our primary motivation driver is that not everything is going to be urgent. It isn’t ever going to be urgent that I learn how to play an instrument. It isn’t ever going to be urgent that I spend more time hanging out with my friends.
Or we can end up with things not being urgent until they are really, really urgent.
It’s not urgent for me to take care of my health until, you know, it is really urgent that I’m taking care of my health.
It’s not urgent for me to be spending time with my parents until it is.
And when we’re only motivating ourselves by what’s urgent, it makes it incredibly hard to activate on these things that aren’t urgent. And that’s a big piece of what this episode is about, how can we use tools other than urgency to get ourselves to do the important things in our lives? How can we move away from urgency?
Now, as a counterpoint here, I also want to take a second to talk about all those things we “should” be doing. Because, again, this is an episode about doing less. Or rather, it’s about focusing on doing the things we want to be doing. We want to avoid doing things just because we “should” be doing them, and this is a prime example of what’s going on with our activation energy. One of the reasons that we often find ourselves feeling resistance to doing something is that we don’t believe in the why behind the action.
The word should exists in the land of obligation, duty, and what we imagine is the right thing to do, what it isn’t about what we want to do. This can be a tricky conundrum because if we go with some of the examples of things that aren’t urgent until they are, we can run into shoulding all over ourselves. It’s easy for me to just go, well, I should take care of my health. And the thing is, I really “should” do that. But here’s the thing, when I think about taking care of my health, I do have a compelling why behind it. I want to be able to spend more active time with my kids. I want to go have fun playing frisbee with my friends. I enjoy living an active lifestyle, and to do that, I do need to look after my health.
And that helps move that needle. But we still are dealing with that word should, which is an inherently negative word. It’s about saying what isn’t happening right now; it’s about placing judgment.
So when we are dealing with “shoulds” we want to look at how we can reword those statements. We can go with, “I would like to have a clean house,” or “I will go to the gym after work,” or “I could spend more time doing things for myself.”
But again, and this is important, this isn’t about overloading ourselves with more and more things to do. The reason we are working on changing our vocabulary here is to try and help move our brains away from that sense of obligation that comes with “should.”
We often are already trying to fit too much into our days; instead, we want to use this shift in our language to help us prioritize the things we really want to do. We can use this reframe to help us make choices about what we are going to focus on in the day. We can say, “I always feel energized after having lunch with my friends. I’m going to prioritize seeing them tomorrow.” Instead of our usual “I should spend more time with friends,” mantra we give ourselves.
It’s about finding the why behind what we’re doing and using our language to not guilt ourselves into doing the thing but getting excited about doing it.
Okay, we know what we’re supposed to be doing, and we’ve made the time to make it happen… and yet now we just don’t want to. Maybe we’re just staring at a blank screen. Maybe we staring at a pile of junk in our garage. Maybe it’s just the dishes in the sink or a pile of laundry on our bed. But it doesn’t matter because we just don’t wanna. Well, we kind of want to, but no, we can’t get ourselves to do it. Because most of the stuff that we’re having trouble activating on is stuff we want to be doing on at least some level. Sure, there are going to be the things that we have to do and can’t get ourselves to do, but what’s always so frustrating is when I can’t even get myself to do something that I want to do. Even things that I enjoy doing - just imagine you’re getting ready to to meet up with some friends to see a movie but you can’t seem to get yourself off the couch. You know that if you don’t leave in the next few minutes, you’re going to end up being late, and yet you can’t seem to get your body to make movements that will get you out the door.
So what’s going on here because it isn’t exactly a lack of motivation - a lot of the time, these are things that we want to be doing. While it feels like we know what we should be doing, we find ourselves not doing that thing. And that’s a key point here and that’s how we’re viewing what our next step is.
Because we go okay, up next is doing the dishes. And in our heads, the next step is just going and doing the dishes. Like this is not a multistep project that needs to be broken down into component parts. Except. Well. Yeah, when we’re finding it impossible to get ourselves moving, then it is. And I know we’re just looking at doing the dishes; what other steps are there?
So first, let’s try and drop the judgment about this. It’s not helping. Sure, we “should” be able to just do it, but we’ve already gone over “should” a little bit ago. So let’s drop the should and look at what’s actually happening.
We’re stuck not doing the thing that we either want to have happen or needs to happen. So we’re stuck on the couch and want to go do the dishes? Well, I think our next step has to be getting ourself off that couch. Again, we’re staying out of judgment here, but how our we going to get ourselves up?
Now, I find this simple reframe one of the most helpful steps here. If I change, I need to get ready to go into, well, I need to stand up. That makes the whole process so much easier because often, yeah, I can get myself to stand up. And if that’s too hard maybe I’ll just flop my arms, or wiggle my toes - create the small movement and use that as inertia into bigger movements.
Or here’s another issue, the reason I’m stuck is cause I’m just scrolling on my phone, and I don’t want to stop. Just throw your phone across the room. I mean, not hard; we’re not trying to break the thing, but toss it out of your reach. Put it on the floor and slide it away. Bonus points for making a noise while throwing it - yeet!
But the point of all this to we’re trying to do the bare minimum to get ourselves moving in a different direction. And I do want to be clear that this isn’t about forsaking rest, we still need to time to relax and recover, this about getting ourselves out of that ADHD paralysis.
If you are literally too tired to do these things, then you do need to take a break. You do need that rest. Let yourself rest when you need it.
Once we get ourselves moving, it can be a lot easier to then start activating on these other tasks that we need to do, but if we are still finding resistance, there are other things that we can do.
Again, we can work on moving ourselves towards smaller goals. If doing all the dishes is too much, maybe do 5 or maybe just unload the dishwasher. If we can give ourselves smaller milestones and break things up, that can help lower our activation cost. Often I’ll look at the dishwasher and go, well, I’ll just stick the cups in cause that’s easy. And that is often enough to get me to fill things up the rest of the way because after the cups are in, well, I’m not filling the whole thing up anymore.
We can also think about chunking up our work day like this as well. When I’m writing it can be intimidating to think about sitting down and doing something like writing for 3 hours straight. Instead, when I’m sitting down to work on my writing I’ll set a timer for say 45 minutes and have a planned break where I’ll get up and do something else for 5 minutes and then come back and set up another chunk of writing. On days where I’m not feeling up 45 minutes I’ll go with lower increments. Knowing that I’m not just going to write until my eyes bleed makes it a lot easier for me to get started.
And what can really help here is accountability, because I imagine many of you are going, “well, if I get up for a break and do something else I’m never going to be coming back.” And that’s a fair assessment - we have to be reasonable with what we’re personally going to do.
For me, it means that I’m doing a lot of my writing in the ADHD reWired Adult Studyhall rooms over Zoom. Just having a group of people I’m stating my intentions to is a great way for me to follow through with those intentions.
But accountability can also come from other sources, like having an accountability buddy that you check in with throughout the day or having someone like a coach.
Another way we can help get ourselves moving is by making things more fun - listen to some music or a podcast. Or maybe set a timer and see how much you can get done. One of the things that has been surprisingly helpful for me is using sound effects as a small win for completing tasks. I have a big button on my desk that plays air horns that I can push whenever I finish something, like sending an email. It seems like a complete screwball idea that pushing this button would actually make the task more fun, but it is surprisingly effect. I just go “email sent” and play my airhorns - it’s dumb, but I love it.
And again again again, it’s important that we’re extending compassion to ourselves here. Sometimes despite everything we’re not going to have the activation energy to get started on something and in those case it’s important that we’re not pushing ourselves into burnout just so we can get a little more done. Even getting started on working on the last parts of this episode I found myself just staring at the screen. While I could have simply tried to push through, I knew a better answer for me to go take a walk and regroup myself.
We’re not always going to be able to get everything done, but that’s okay. We just have to take it one step at a time and really, we need to listen to ourselves and give our brains and body the healing they need so that we can do our best work.
