It’s that time of year again where I feel like I need a kick in the pants. My kids are back in school and it feels like I have a glut of time available. It feels like I should be knocking things off my todo list left and right.
But I’m not. I’m tired and I’m not getting things done. And it’s frustrating because it feels like now that I have this time, I’m wasting it. It feels like if I take this time for rest that I’m going to look back later and regret that I didn’t push myself harder. But rest is important even when it feels like I don’t have time for it.
Rest can feel like a foreign concept when your brain’s always on the go. It can feel like trying to sit on a treadmill that’s still running.
In this episode, we’re going to explore why our ADHD brains find rest so uncomfortable and how we can use pacing to finally make it part of our day. We're going to explore why our brains resist rest and how we can try and work in those much-needed breaks without feeling guilty.
Let’s start by discussing why taking time for rest can be such a challenge with ADHD. I hit some of the bigger themes in the introduction, but I feel like it’s still worth exploring a bit deeper.
The first thing we’ve got to remember is how our brain craves stimulation. This can be an issue when we’re trying to slow down and recharge because many of those activities that we think are going to get us the best rest aren’t particularly stimulating. Often, we’re running what feels like an endless loop of hyperactivity and mental restlessness, so when we do try to get in that rest, those thoughts are just amplified. When we’re in this cycle of constant stimulation, doing nothing can feel uncomfortable.
If I’m trying to lay down for a nap, I’ll often be unable to just lay there and let myself get into rest mode. This can be both physical and mental, as I’m oscillating between needing to find a more comfortable position and being unable to slow my brain down enough and I end up with a feeling that I just want to get out of bed.
Another piece of this can also come from the all-or-nothing thinking that if we’re not being productive, that we’re just wasting our time and we don’t have time for rest. Instead of giving myself permission to rest, I’ll push myself harder—even when I’m mentally and physically drained.
Of course, we are also dealing with executive dysfunction. With ADHD, planning and prioritizing can be incredibly difficult, and that includes making sure that we include rest in our priorities and plans, not to mention the fact that when I feel that brain fog, it means that my executive function is even worse than usual.
To be sure, these are very real issues, but it can also feel like we’re making mountains out of molehills here. I mean, why can’t I just push through? It can feel incredibly hard to prioritize rest when I have other things that need to happen. Even while I’ve been working on this piece, I’ve found myself fighting between trying to keep working and dealing with the fact that I’ve been exhausted all week.
As I mentioned, my first reaction is that I should just push through. That despite the fact that I may not have gotten the best sleep, it’s just that I have so many things on my plate and so I can’t take that time to rest. I need to get stuff done.
But that attitude is precisely why I’m feeling this way. It’s because I’m already pushing myself too hard. Gah. Even writing this, I hate it. I don’t want to have to take the breaks. I want to get stuff done.
Okay. Deep breath.
With the understanding that the frenetic pace I’m trying to maintain isn’t working, I can look at my pacing—specifically, how I can tweak what I’m already doing to work at a more sustainable pace. It’s about being intentional with my work and building in those breaks to create a better balance between my actions and recovery.
My current pacing doesn’t take that recovery piece into consideration. I was recently working on planning out my day, and the immediate red flag that popped up was the fact that I had no white space on my calendar. In my glorious wisdom, I believed that I would go from task to task with no transitions, no need for beaks, and no time that I would get distracted.
Not that great of a plan. But I was loathe to take anything off. I was sure that I’d find time. I mean, I’m not exactly sure where I thought I’d find that time—well, I do know. Again, in my infinite wisdom, the idea was that I could take breaks when I was extra efficient and finish tasks early. And again, this was not a great plan. The worst part was I knew going in that I should adjust things, but alas, I thought, well, maybe this time I’d not only exceed expectations but that, in fact, I had solved ADHD.
Side note: I did not, in fact, solve ADHD.
Back to pacing and how we can work on building it into our schedules.
As I mentioned earlier, my schedule was missing white space, time when I’m not scheduled to do anything. This can be hard to leave in our calendar. It can feel like it is just going to end up as wasted time. It’s not. It’s there for transitions, for when we need to take a break, and also for when stuff comes up. We don’t want to be fully planning out our days and having to rearrange that schedule every time something comes up.
By building in that white space and pacing out our day, we can build in our work period and schedule our breaks. I want to step back and mention that the white space isn’t the only time that we should be taking breaks. That’s just for when we need a bit of extra time; we should also schedule time for breaks.
Pacing can also help challenge our all-or-nothing thinking about how we’re using our time. Now, I’m not going to say that once we start scheduling more break time into our day that we’re just going to automatically stop feeling guilty about taking breaks, but it helps. It helps to know that I’m not slacking off or being lazy; instead, I’m following my plan. I mean, those things are whole other can of worms anyway. But this does help me reframe the idea that my rest time is just as important as my working time.
And it isn’t just about adding the white space into our calendar that will help with this process. We can use tools like timers, planners, and other productivity apps to help ease off some of the burdens to our executive function. Using a tool like the Pomodoro method, where you work for something like 20 minutes and then take a 5-minute break, can be a great way to enforce taking breaks—although, honestly, from experience and what I’ve heard from others is that they tend to get more out of the method with more extended work periods and breaks so maybe something more along the lines of 45 minutes of focused work with a 15-minute break. Don’t be afraid to experiment with those time frames to see what works for you.
Regardless of how we’re getting ourselves to take breaks and rest, we still have to address the fact that often, these breaks don’t feel refreshing. Those naps I try to take where I’m up 5 minutes later because I can’t get myself to relax don’t feel like they’re doing much to help me feel any more rested. And I’d say the biggest part of the problem is that I’m often just not doing something stimulating enough to keep me engaged in the activity, even if that activity is supposed to be resting.
So we’re going to do two things here. First, we’re going to work on coming up with a list of activities that we find restful, and then we’re going to work on jazzing them up so that they give us the stimulation we need without going overboard.
Let’s take the example of napping. While I love the idea of just lying down and drifting off, that typically doesn’t happen for me. Even when I’m dead tired during the day, I struggle to actually take a nap. But what can help is having something like an audiobook to listen to while I’m lying down. Now, an important thing to understand about napping is that you can still get many of the benefits of a nap without sleeping. The important part is letting yourself lie still with your eyes closed and letting your brain rest. This is also why when I’m lying down without that small stimulation, I’m not getting the rest I want—my brain isn’t going into lower power mode; it’s going into overdrive. This low level of stimulation allows me to relax better than if I didn’t have it.
So, I do need to have something, like an audiobook or maybe a guided meditation. Another option here could be just listening to music or a sleep podcast.
But let’s also come up with some other ideas for some restful activities that we can do because it can also be hard to come up with ideas at the moment, especially if you’re tired and dealing with brain fog. So it can be incredibly beneficial to have a list that you’ve prepared ahead of time that you can pursue when you need it and go, “Oh yeah, it would feel nice to take a bath or do some reading.”
Our list here can include watching TV, listening to music, doing a puzzle, talking with a friend, doodling, reading, or maybe even something like a short walk or some stretching. Rest isn’t only about sleeping. It is about doing the things that will recharge you. It's about giving yourself permission to pause, reset, and not be productive… although we could also argue that rest is its own kind of productivity.
To help round out that list above, we can also include meditation, yoga, breathing exercises, listening to podcasts, having a snack, taking a bath, having a coffee or tea, playing with your pet, journaling, visualization, and really anything that makes you feel better after having gone through the practice.
While it can be difficult to build in time for rest, be it because of restlessness, difficulty with transitions, all-or-nothing thinking, or executive function challenges, it is still important that we don’t just try to sweep the idea away. By pacing your day, you can balance activity and rest, smoothing out those transitions and making rest feel like a natural part of your routine. It’s important to remember that productivity itself is not a virtue. And I’m not trying to say that productivity is bad; it’s just not something that we need to put on a pedestal and make the end all be all of how we’re valuing ourselves. You are more than what you produce and so it’s important to give yourself the grace to take some time to rest.
This Episode's Top Tips
It’s important to recognize that rest can feel uncomfortable because we aren’t getting enough stimulation in our restful activities. To solve for this we can seek ways to add low levels of stimulation so that we can better recover during our relaxation time.
We need to build white space into our calendars and schedule intentional downtime in our day to allow for rest, transitions, and unexpected events.
Coming up with ideas in the moment can be hard so prepare a go-to list of activities like reading, stretching, or listening to podcasts to help you relax when needed.
If we can shift our mindset to see rest as part of your productivity routine, it can help us reframe it into something that will better help recharge and avoid burnout without the guilt.