AI That Works With Your ADHD, Not Against It
Four setups with no entry fee, from someone whose attention does what it likes. Three prompts, one habit, honest limits.
I have ADHD, and a drawer’s worth of dead productivity systems to prove it. The bullet journal with nine beautiful pages and 200 blank ones. The app with the streaks, which died on day eleven and took my self-esteem with it.
They didn’t fail because I wasn’t trying. Each charged an entry fee before it would help: open the app, remember the system, pick a category, protect the streak. The hard part was never the task, it was the three seconds before it, and anything that adds steps to those three seconds is already dead.
A chat window has no entry fee. You type the mess as it sits in your head. These four have survived contact with my actual brain.
1. Someone in the room with you
Things get done when somebody else is just… there. A friend on the sofa while you sort the paperwork. This is that, in a chat you leave open.
Nick this one:
You're sitting with me while I do a job I've been putting off, like a friend on the sofa who's there but isn't helping. The job: [e.g. "the shoebox of receipts for last year's tax return"].
How this works:
1. Ask me what the very first physical action is, then wait until I say I've started.
2. I'll message you when I finish a bit or when I wander off. If I go quiet, ask "what's happening now?"
3. When I wander, don't lecture. Point me cheerfully back to where I was.
4. If I'm stuck, ask what the next two-minute piece is. Don't solve it for me.
5. When I say done, be pleased with me and tell me in two lines what I got through.
6. Then give me a short version of this prompt I can save and re-run next time.
Rules: two lines maximum per reply. Warm, not gushing. Never tell me the task is easy. No pep talks, no productivity advice, no suggesting a better system.
Ask me up to three questions before we start.The bit that surprises people: the replies aren’t the point. Having somebody to report to is what makes the job feel real. On the phone, voice mode makes it eerily like having a mate in the kitchen while you clear it.
2. The first two minutes
For the wall between you and starting. The opening move only, so small there’s nothing left to argue with.
Save this one somewhere you can reach in five seconds:
You're getting me over the wall between me and starting. The task: [e.g. "the car insurance renewal that's been open in a tab since March"]. Starting is the problem, not doing.
Give me:
1. The first two minutes only, as literal physical actions. "Stand up, get the shoebox off the shelf, put it on the table, open it."
2. Nothing else. No plan, no steps one to ten, no explaining why it matters. I know why, that's why it hurts.
3. Then stop. When I come back and say done, give me the next two minutes the same way.
4. Keep going in two-minute pieces until I say I've got momentum.
Rules: physical actions only, nothing that needs a decision. Never say "just" or "simply", and don't tell me it'll only take a minute.
Only ask me something first if you genuinely can't picture the opening action without it.Why “then stop” is the important line. A full plan hands you straight back the thing you were avoiding. “Sort out the car insurance” was three weeks of dread. The first two minutes turned out to be “find last year’s email, open it, screenshot the price”. Doable standing up, and starting was the entire war.
3. The dump
When the static gets loud, pour it into one chat and let something else sort it.
Nick this one:
You're sorting the noise in my head. I'm about to dump it in one go, out of order, some of it not even sentences. Don't ask me to tidy it first.
Here it is: [e.g. "school shoes, that email to Dawn, is the MOT due??, cancel the trial before it charges, mum's birthday, the thing I said I'd send Priya, and I feel behind on everything"]
Sort it into:
1. Today, closest deadline first.
2. This week.
3. Some day, no guilt attached.
4. Not tasks at all, just worries. Say plainly when something belongs here.
5. Then give me lists 1 and 2 as a document I can download, nothing else in it.
Rules: don't add tasks I didn't mention, don't turn worries into action plans, don't tell me I've got a lot on. If something's too vague to sort, ask rather than guess.
Ask me anything you need to know first.The sneaky-powerful bit is number 4. Half of what’s clogging things up isn’t a task, and seeing it labelled “worry, not task” lets go of it in a way no to-do list has. Longer version: Turn A Messy Brain Into A Plan.
4. One chat, not twelve
No prompt, just a habit.
- Start a chat today and name it something dull. Mine is called “brain”.
- Go back to that one for the dumps and check-ins. New chats are for standalone jobs only.
- Go to Settings, then the memory option, and check memory and searching past chats are both on. Memory is on by default for most accounts these days, so this is usually just a look.
Twelve half-finished chats, none findable at 9pm, is the classic. One named chat means there’s exactly one place a thought can go.
What this can’t do
Said with love: this is scaffolding. It’s no substitute for the real support in your life, and some days none of it will stick.
That’s allowed. Nothing here keeps score, and the entry fee is still zero whenever you wander back. For days when even two minutes is too many: The AI Setup That Works When Your Brain Won’t.
If you do nothing else: save the two-minute prompt somewhere you can reach fast. It earns its keep the first time the wall goes up.
That’s four low doors, built by hand. The Claude Kickstart sets the lot up in one go, pointed at your actual work, five real jobs off your plate. £47, one weekend.