96: Thursday Thoughts – Anchor Your ADHD Overwhelm

Anchor Your Overwhelm

One word keeps surfacing over and over from people in this community: overwhelmed. Overwhelmed by the clutter, overwhelmed not knowing where to start, overwhelmed trying to build routines that stick. Here’s an idea worth trying, and if it doesn’t work for you, that’s not failure, that’s just useful information about what doesn’t fit your brain.

The if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie trap

Brains like ours tend to start a task with the best of intentions, carry something to a new space to put it away, then get pulled into something else there, then something else after that, until three hours later you realize you’ve been working the whole time but have nothing visible to show for it. That gap between real effort and visible result is exhausting.

Find your natural anchor point

Instead of forcing an artificial new routine onto your brain, notice where you already find yourself automatically and repeatedly throughout the day. Maybe it’s the bathroom sink while brushing your teeth, the coffee pot each morning, the edge of your bed the moment you wake up, or the couch in the living room. Whatever spot you naturally land in over and over, that’s your anchor. Start there, not because it’s the “right” place to begin, but because it’s already where you are.

Work outward without losing the tether

Once you’re anchored, ask what’s within reach. If you’re standing at your bed, that might mean simply making it. If there’s a pile of laundry on the floor nearby, pick it up too. The next time you’re there, maybe you make the bed, deal with the laundry, and grab three things off the nightstand. Picture a boat on its anchor, it isn’t perfectly still, it drifts a little on its chain, but it never strays far from the point it’s tethered to. Let your circle widen gradually each time you return, without cutting the tether to where you started.

Watching the daisy chain build

At the coffee pot, maybe day one you clear the counter around the machine while your coffee brews. Day two, the counter looks better already so you also unload a few dishes. Day three, you notice it’s all coming together a little more easily each time. In the living room, maybe it starts with fluffing the pillows, then the coffee table gets cleared, then the surrounding shelf. It’s not about starting in the same spot and moving a fixed direction every time, it’s about having a reliable point to return to and measure progress against.

Continuity over consistency

This doesn’t need to happen daily or even weekly. Don’t attach a rigid schedule to it that sets you up to feel like a failure for missing a day. This is continuity, not consistency, showing up at your anchor when you think of it, however often that ends up being, and trusting that the space around it keeps getting lighter each time you return.

Your practical, actionable step

Pick the spot you already find yourself in most often, without changing your habits at all, and the next time you’re there, do one small thing to improve just that spot. Come back to it again whenever you naturally land there, and let the circle widen a little more each time.

Until next time, continue to choose joy.