Bonus Episode 19: Runway Week – Part 5 – Start Your New Year Right by doing this FIRST if you have ADHD – Takeoff!

Runway Week, Part Five: Take Off With the Triple T

We’re wrapping up Runway Week, our start-the-new-year-right series. A quick recap of where we’ve been: setting your focus, setting intentions through a yearly list, establishing a realistic baseline for even your hardest days, and rethinking your schedule to work with you instead of against you. Now it’s time to actually take off, and to keep going once the initial excitement of a new year wears off. That’s where the triple T comes in: timers, time, and teammates.

Timers, two different ways

First, set recurring phone alarms as reminders, and label them so when they go off, you know exactly what they’re for, “do your baseline work,” “have you done your one-and-done today,” or simply “you time.” On an iPhone, there’s a label field right when you’re setting the alarm, use it. Second, when you’re trying to actually start something, set a fifteen-minute timer and race against it. When it goes off, instead of stopping, hit reset and keep going. You’ll often find yourself resetting that timer five or six times without realizing it, suddenly you’ve worked for an hour and a half when you only committed to fifteen minutes.

Time itself needs a mindset shift

ADHD brains struggle to accurately estimate how long something will take, and we tend to assume difficult tasks will take forever, which becomes its own reason not to start. Ironically, the same brains also underestimate how long something urgent will actually take when we’re trying to rush out the door. When you’re staring down a dreaded task and telling yourself you don’t have time to do it, reframe it: you don’t have to land the plane, you just have to take off. You’re not committing to finishing in one sitting, unless it’s something time-sensitive like food. You can start, stop when a timer ends, walk away even mid-chaos, and come back later. Baseline tasks almost always take far less time than we’ve built up in our heads. Try telling yourself “I have time to start,” set a five or fifteen minute timer, and see where you land. You’ll often find the momentum carries you further than expected, or discover the task was genuinely shorter than the two hours you’d dreaded.

Teammates make the difference

Accountability doesn’t require a whole system, one person who understands your brain is enough. Agree with a friend that you’ll text each time you complete something on your list that day, and let them check in if they haven’t heard from you, or celebrate with you when you have. A friend who knows and understands you will also extend grace when you need it, while still being willing to give you a nudge when that’s what actually helps. One caution: avoid making your spouse this person, it tends to create a policing dynamic that isn’t good for the relationship. A group of like-minded people works well here too, if you don’t already have a person for this, look for a community built around exactly this kind of mutual accountability.

Your practical, actionable step

Set one labeled recurring alarm today for a task you keep meaning to get to, and when you sit down to start it, use a fifteen-minute timer, resetting it if you’re still in the zone when it goes off. Then find one person willing to be your accountability teammate this week, someone you can text the moment something gets done.

Until next time, continue to choose joy.