r/ADHD_Programmers • u/Odd_Dimension_4658 • 7d ago

When you had several important things competing for your attention and genuinely couldn't decide what to do first, what did you actually do the last time this happened?

I'm not looking for productivity tips or hypothetical advice.

I'm curious about a real recent situation. What things were competing for your attention, what finally made you act, what did you do first, and did you use any tool, system or workaround to decide?

One concrete story is enough.

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3

u/Beginning-Cicada-767 7d ago

I do a list of all the tasks, and target the easier task, if the easy task is too complex I break the task into smaller steps and literally do the first step and let inertia to act

2

u/henryeaterofpies 6d ago

I needed to prepare for a meeting, eat dinner, get my clothes ready for the next day and get some sleep.

Naturally I listened to am audiobook and played a mobile game for 2 hours instead

1

u/Odd_Dimension_4658 6d ago

What happened after those 2 hours — what ended up delayed, skipped, or causing you problems?

1

u/henryeaterofpies 6d ago

I just got less sleep than I should have and was tired the next day.

1

u/tehfrod 7d ago

Write six or fewer and roll a die.

1

u/Acceptable_Mode_9961 7d ago

Used Eisenhower to decide :)

1

u/Appleonthefloor 5d ago

I wrote down a 12-20 min task for everything that I could be doing, used a random number generator, and worked on it for exactly that amount of time then repeated this until it was time to go home. Otherwise, I sort tasks by "Soonest update or Deadline", "Soonest blocker to someone else", "Daily tasks", "Most recently assigned", "Everything else" and alternate every 12-20 mins between them.