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being a founder is incredibly difficult, and 100x harder with ADHD
turns out a lot of really successful founders have it and manage it gracefully
here's an exhaustive list of 9 strategies top founders use to combat ADHD:
exercise, eat & sleep well
obvious stuff, but it comes first for a reason. lots of studies showing how these few things can yield a dramatic improvement in general focus and attention:
- 8 hours of sleep
- balanced (low carb, low sugar, no alcohol) diet
- 10-20 min of high intensity exercise a few times a week
lots of founders use @eightsleep, @ouraring and @Levels to track fitness and nutrition
meditate
just like you need to exercise your body to get stronger, you need to exercise your mind to improve focus.
10 minutes a day of meditation (especially right before you need to focus) is a great way to improve over time.
@Headspace and @calm are good for beginners, but you should switch to non-guided meditation once you get the hang of it - I use @InsightTimer
experience extreme sensations
didn't know what to call this but there are a bunch of more obscure things biohackers have sworn by:
- cold bath/shower
- sauna or steam room
- holotropic breathwork (check out @breathwrk or @op_e__n)
- sensory deprivation tanks
I've met some folks who did retreats where they live in total darkness for several days and had much better focus when they came out... maybe overkill.
use a task manager
everyone has their own favorite systems for tracking tasks and projects, though @todoist seems to be a popular amongst folks with ADHD. the most important thing is just to have one.
a lot of founders use the GTD method for staying on top of the most important tasks.
optimize your enviornment
your brain works best in the morning and worst in the afternoon between 1 and 4pm (especially if you eat too much or a lot of carbs for lunch). I've seen a lot of founders with ADHD prioritize their most mentally challenging work for the mornings then schedule exercise or meetings during the afternoon slump.
changing your environment also tends to help increase focus - I know founders who take cross-country flights or book remote airbnbs to get focused.
adjust your work style
ADHD makes it hard to do a lot of things others may find easy. It's important to lean into your strengths and weaknesses rather than fight them.
@hdubugras from Brex, who has ADHD, said he talks to people when he wants to learn something, since reading is more difficult for him.
do a dopamine diet
anything with variable notifications that you can doom scroll have a terrible impact on our ability to focus:
- social media
- dating apps
- email
- slack
It's like eating junk food for your mind.
a lot of folks have had success deleting these apps (at least for part of the day), putting their phones on focus mode, and other techniques.
maybe TMI for twitter but PMO abstinence also has a growing movement on reddit - I've met a lot of male founders lately who absolutely swear by it.
medicate
probably the worst-kept secret of the Silicon Valley is how pervasive stimulants like aderall and vyvanse are.
they really do work for people with ADHD despite the stigma and side effects.
supplement
there are a few non-prescription supplements that work really well:
- functional mushrooms (lions mane, reishi, cordyceps)
- omega-3 (fish oil)
- l-tyrosine
- alpha GPC
- caffeine + MCT oil (bulletproof coffee)
- dynamine
- teacrine
I've also been hearing about more folks microdosing the "Stamets Stack":
- psilocybin
- niacin
- lions mane
and quite a few founders (especially in the bay area) use LSD regularly
delegate & automate
the most productive founders with ADHD I've met have full work streams centered around automating, outsourcing or delegating their work - specifically the tasks that are NOT important and urgent or that can only be done by them.
- automation - workflow automation tools like zapier can save a lot of time and help you stay organized. new AI tools like ChatGPT are also proving to be incredibly useful for people with ADHD to overcome writers block and get important information out of long emails and documents.
- outsourcing - even for very small tasks, it can be a good idea to leverage platforms like upwork so you can parallelize the work and remove yourself as a potential blocker.
- delegation - if you can afford it, getting an executive assistant can be life changing for people with ADHD. they can manage your email and even help you prioritize and stay on top of your tasks for the week.
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having ADHD does make being a founder a lot harder than it needs to be, but in many areas like creative thinking and problem solving, its actually a huge asset.
I've come to be grateful for having ADHD and having tried most of the techniques above, I'm able to manage it much better.
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whew! that's it!
if you found this helpful feel free to pass it along to someone else who could benefit from it
give me a follow at @thatguybg - will be posting more stuff like this
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