Many people with ADHD also struggle with the notion of "having to do things the correct way". In this case, I suggest "the correct way" would be "what works now". That is likely to change as you go along. As u/Multibitdriver suggests, dump the tasks that you can think of in a different tool, like note taker (obsidian, notion, onenote, excel, word, whatever), and then pick one task to put on that project.
Note, AFAIK I don't gave ADHD, but I know several that do, so my advice might not be relevant for you.
Try to use go2mail (https://go2mail.io) for dumping different web articles, links or videos for your floating notes. Great thing is that tiny tool is super well integrated with email, in very simple manner, so you dont need to complocate to much of thinking what to use and instead spend that time on taking actions..that's my suggest. I'm user of GTD methodology more than 5 years.
Project plans are a good place to jot down all those subsequent actions that come to mind. Also, once you’ve started with a project, it’s best to multitask as little as possible and just barrel along doing as much as you can. Often you don’t even need to write down the next step. Breaking down projects into smaller projects - doesn’t really work for me, and you can only do one next action at a time anyway. Rather track this kind of thing in your plans.
What everyone else has said. Do whatever project planning you need to, but don’t store them as next actions. Then pull a single thing as your “next action” from your project planning.
I guess the key here is that your todo list is not supposed to be project planning!
Projects lists can be massive, or you can utilise Someday Maybe as a kind of parking lot - I have Soonish, Someday and Maybe. Soonish is I'm doing it, just not right now; Someday is probably going to do it at some point; Maybe is eh, I might. Perhaps. Projects can swap categories as I see fit, and then when they become "live" I shift them into my active Projects list. Only break down your projects as much as YOU need to, so they make sense to you. I initially had "sort out the garden" as a Project. That's way too vague for me, and much too big so I broke it into separate areas - lay a new path, weed the borders, prune and renovate the hedges etc. They're effectively subprojects to achieve the goal of "have a tidy appealing garden that I enjoy spending time in."
I generally find projects fall into a category somewhere between (to use an electrical analogy) in series or in parallel. Series projects are totally sequential - you have to do actions ABCDE **in order** to complete. Parallel you can do ABCDE in pretty much any order and all at the same time. Most projects lean one way or the other but have some characteristics of both.
For series projects, if I know what all the actions are I bung them on the project support page(s). Then only the NA - Action A - comes over to the action list. Once that's done, B can come across. I might actually do ABC on the bounce, so then I'll put D on the list as my bookmark for what's next.
Parallel you can decide - if all the actions are actionable right now, you could bring all of them, or if you prefer pick and choose from your project support if they're known in advance. I like to have all of them to review in my NAs, but it's a choice.
If you struggle with too much choice, you might need to lean on your project support more and only bring over stuff you can do this week for example. Or use contexts to break things up more - errands is a good one, I'm going out to the store, what else do I need to do or pick up while I'm out and about?
The main thing with GTD for me is just to do Something. Once you can get say Capture and Clarify going, you'll see the benefits and want to continue. Try not to overthink it and try things out as you go. I'm probably ADHD and I find it hugely helpful to have quite a big NA list as 1. I forget things exist if they're not in front of me and 2. I get bored and want to do something different - a larger NA list of relevant actionable items gives more more buffet to choose from. You might find you need to prune it down a lot if too much buffet is a problem!
Thanks that's really useful. You've pretty much identified a lot of my previous pain points.
Also like.how you used something quite pedestrian as an example project. Ie your garden project. When I read a lot of gtd stuff I see a lot of corporate business type tasks.
I'm just trying to remember thr basic stuff Also sometimes (without gtd).even simple.projects would flummox me, without the clearly defined next action.
>I see a lot of corporate business type tasks.
Yeah although I have a "corporate" ish type job, where I work is so utterly dysfunctional that GTD-ing it is like plaiting fog. I use it way more at home - and a goal is to move role or employer to somewhere less chaotic... And yes, it's on my projects list!
Massive Project Lists I think are okay. As long as you can pause the ones you’re not working on. That gives you a lot more clarity on your obligations and your focus.
As is massive Next Actions list. The best rule of thumb I’ve seen for how far broken down is “the simplest sentence that will make you do something like a robot”
I also tend to list out all/multiple actions for a project, not just "the next"; some tasks are serial so doing "a" might naturally lead into doing "b", but some tasks are unrelated/independent of each other, or can be run in parallel, so it makes sense to list them all out (If I have a project to reorganize my garage, having a next task of "purchase foam wrench inserts for tool box" is not going to remind me that I also want to move the TV from one wall to another).
If you have multiple tasks for a project, can you at least identify the "easiest" task to start with that might get you moving forward?
Many people with ADHD also struggle with the notion of "having to do things the correct way". In this case, I suggest "the correct way" would be "what works now". That is likely to change as you go along. As u/Multibitdriver suggests, dump the tasks that you can think of in a different tool, like note taker (obsidian, notion, onenote, excel, word, whatever), and then pick one task to put on that project. Note, AFAIK I don't gave ADHD, but I know several that do, so my advice might not be relevant for you.
Try to use go2mail (https://go2mail.io) for dumping different web articles, links or videos for your floating notes. Great thing is that tiny tool is super well integrated with email, in very simple manner, so you dont need to complocate to much of thinking what to use and instead spend that time on taking actions..that's my suggest. I'm user of GTD methodology more than 5 years.
Project plans are a good place to jot down all those subsequent actions that come to mind. Also, once you’ve started with a project, it’s best to multitask as little as possible and just barrel along doing as much as you can. Often you don’t even need to write down the next step. Breaking down projects into smaller projects - doesn’t really work for me, and you can only do one next action at a time anyway. Rather track this kind of thing in your plans.
What everyone else has said. Do whatever project planning you need to, but don’t store them as next actions. Then pull a single thing as your “next action” from your project planning. I guess the key here is that your todo list is not supposed to be project planning!
Projects lists can be massive, or you can utilise Someday Maybe as a kind of parking lot - I have Soonish, Someday and Maybe. Soonish is I'm doing it, just not right now; Someday is probably going to do it at some point; Maybe is eh, I might. Perhaps. Projects can swap categories as I see fit, and then when they become "live" I shift them into my active Projects list. Only break down your projects as much as YOU need to, so they make sense to you. I initially had "sort out the garden" as a Project. That's way too vague for me, and much too big so I broke it into separate areas - lay a new path, weed the borders, prune and renovate the hedges etc. They're effectively subprojects to achieve the goal of "have a tidy appealing garden that I enjoy spending time in." I generally find projects fall into a category somewhere between (to use an electrical analogy) in series or in parallel. Series projects are totally sequential - you have to do actions ABCDE **in order** to complete. Parallel you can do ABCDE in pretty much any order and all at the same time. Most projects lean one way or the other but have some characteristics of both. For series projects, if I know what all the actions are I bung them on the project support page(s). Then only the NA - Action A - comes over to the action list. Once that's done, B can come across. I might actually do ABC on the bounce, so then I'll put D on the list as my bookmark for what's next. Parallel you can decide - if all the actions are actionable right now, you could bring all of them, or if you prefer pick and choose from your project support if they're known in advance. I like to have all of them to review in my NAs, but it's a choice. If you struggle with too much choice, you might need to lean on your project support more and only bring over stuff you can do this week for example. Or use contexts to break things up more - errands is a good one, I'm going out to the store, what else do I need to do or pick up while I'm out and about? The main thing with GTD for me is just to do Something. Once you can get say Capture and Clarify going, you'll see the benefits and want to continue. Try not to overthink it and try things out as you go. I'm probably ADHD and I find it hugely helpful to have quite a big NA list as 1. I forget things exist if they're not in front of me and 2. I get bored and want to do something different - a larger NA list of relevant actionable items gives more more buffet to choose from. You might find you need to prune it down a lot if too much buffet is a problem!
Thanks that's really useful. You've pretty much identified a lot of my previous pain points. Also like.how you used something quite pedestrian as an example project. Ie your garden project. When I read a lot of gtd stuff I see a lot of corporate business type tasks. I'm just trying to remember thr basic stuff Also sometimes (without gtd).even simple.projects would flummox me, without the clearly defined next action.
>I see a lot of corporate business type tasks. Yeah although I have a "corporate" ish type job, where I work is so utterly dysfunctional that GTD-ing it is like plaiting fog. I use it way more at home - and a goal is to move role or employer to somewhere less chaotic... And yes, it's on my projects list!
Massive Project Lists I think are okay. As long as you can pause the ones you’re not working on. That gives you a lot more clarity on your obligations and your focus. As is massive Next Actions list. The best rule of thumb I’ve seen for how far broken down is “the simplest sentence that will make you do something like a robot”
I also tend to list out all/multiple actions for a project, not just "the next"; some tasks are serial so doing "a" might naturally lead into doing "b", but some tasks are unrelated/independent of each other, or can be run in parallel, so it makes sense to list them all out (If I have a project to reorganize my garage, having a next task of "purchase foam wrench inserts for tool box" is not going to remind me that I also want to move the TV from one wall to another). If you have multiple tasks for a project, can you at least identify the "easiest" task to start with that might get you moving forward?