The ASB Blog

Productivity for brains that ignore the manual.

Articles on ADHD, focus and routine — written for people who already tried the traditional methods and found out they were not built for their brain.

Productivity6 min readInbox zero is not about email (and never was)The original inbox zero was never about emptying your email. It was about getting the message out of your head — and today the inbox that hurts is chat.November 12, 2026
Productivity6 min readShutdown ritual: why closing the laptop does not close the dayA shutdown ritual tells your brain the workday is over. The evidence behind it is unusually good. What it cannot fix is work that never actually ends.November 9, 2026
Productivity6 min readWeekly review in 15 minutes: three questions and a timerThe sixty-minute weekly review is the first gear to stop turning. I recommend the fifteen-minute version: three questions, a timer, and a fixed slot.November 5, 2026
Productivity6 min readEat the frog: the hardest task first (and who it does not work for)Eating the frog means doing the most postponed task early. For one kind of person it works beautifully. For another, it is a recipe for a lost morning.November 2, 2026
Productivity5 min readThe five-minute rule: negotiate only the start with your brainThe five-minute rule is not about finishing in five minutes. It buys the start — and the permission to stop afterwards is what keeps it working.October 29, 2026
Productivity6 min readThe two-minute rule: two versions of it, and the task that lies about timeThere are two different two-minute rules, by two different authors, and most people blend them. One clears tasks, the other starts habits. Only one breaks.October 26, 2026
Productivity5 min readTimeboxing vs time blocking: the difference nobody explainsTime blocking gives a task a place on the calendar. Timeboxing gives it a ceiling. One answers when; the other, until when — and that is the one you are missing.October 22, 2026
Productivity6 min readParkinson's Law: the short deadline that saves you and the one that traps youParkinson's Law began as a joke about British bureaucracy in 1955 and became dogma. What it gets right, and who a tight deadline freezes instead of helping.October 19, 2026
Productivity5 min readSMART goals: the problem was never the specificSMART describes the destination with the precision of a satnav and puts no petrol in the car. Of the five letters, only one does anything on a Tuesday.October 15, 2026
Productivity6 min readThe 1-3-5 method: a list with a ceiling that survives a bad dayOne big task, three medium, five small. The value of the 1-3-5 method is not in the arithmetic: it is in the ceiling, which gives the day a possible end.October 12, 2026
Productivity6 min readIvy Lee method: six tasks and one orderSix tasks written the night before, numbered, one at a time. The simplest method there is — and for that reason the one that asks most of you.October 8, 2026
Productivity6 min readDeep work: why three hours without distraction is an unfair goalDeep work is a sound idea with an odd yardstick. The three-hour quota was written by someone who controls his calendar, and read by people who do not.October 5, 2026
Productivity6 min readPersonal kanban: why seeing the task changes everything (and where it fails)Personal kanban is three columns and one rule almost everyone skips. It is not there to organise you: it is there so the task stops vanishing when you look away.October 1, 2026
Productivity6 min readBullet journal: why the ugly version works betterThe original bullet journal is fast, ugly and takes thirty seconds a day. What the internet made of it is something else — and that is the one you quit in February.September 28, 2026
Productivity6 min readThe PARA method organises your information, not your attentionPARA, from Tiago Forte, is an excellent filing system sold as a productivity system. It settles where a note lives, not the fact that you forget it exists.September 24, 2026
Productivity5 min readThe GTD method: why the most famous productivity system breaks downGTD is the most influential productivity system ever published and the most abandoned. It assumes intact executive function in the people who have least.September 21, 2026
ADHD3 min readHyperfocus: making it work for you instead of against youSix hours deep in one thing, meals forgotten, is neither a superpower nor a flaw. What is actually known about hyperfocus and how to build a fence around it.September 18, 2026
ADHD6 min readADHD and productivity: why traditional methods keep failing youProductivity systems assume a brain that regulates time and motivation on its own. Here is why they fail with ADHD, and what the research says works instead.September 18, 2026
ADHD3 min readTask paralysis: why you freeze before you startYou want to do it, you know how, and you are still sitting there. What task paralysis actually is, why it is not laziness, and five ways to break it.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readDoes the Pomodoro Technique work? What the science of breaks actually says25 minutes of focus, 5 of rest. The Pomodoro Technique is the most copied productivity method in the world — and the most misapplied. What research supports.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readEisenhower Matrix: how to prioritise when everything feels urgentUrgent and important are not the same thing, but the brain treats them as if they were. The Eisenhower Matrix is the antidote — if you use it the right way.September 18, 2026
ADHD4 min readExecutive function explained without the jargonWorking memory, inhibition, flexibility: what these functions actually do in your day, why they explain the chaos, and where to support them from outside.September 18, 2026
Productivity3 min readExternal brain: the second-brain idea applied to ADHDSecond brain has come to mean a complicated note system. The version that works with ADHD is simpler: get out of your head what your head cannot hold.September 18, 2026
Productivity6 min readHow to build habits without relying on motivationMotivation runs out before the habit forms. What research says about how long it takes, what makes a habit stick and why most of them die in January.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readHow to focus better: the phone on your desk is already costing you attentionYou do not need to pick up your phone for it to distract you: its mere presence reduces your capacity to think. How to focus better at work and while studying.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readHow to stop forgetting things: why you remember at the wrong momentYou set the alarm, it rings, you swipe it away and forget again. The problem is not your memory, it is the moment the cue arrives. What memory science says about it.September 18, 2026
Productivity6 min readHow to stop procrastinating: what actually works (according to research)Procrastination is not laziness or disorganisation: it is mood regulation. Understand why you postpone what matters and what research shows actually helps you stop.September 18, 2026
Productivity6 min readMental load: why you end the day exhausted having done nothingIt is not the work that tires you, it is what you carry while you work: 30 open items in your head. What memory science says about mental load and how to empty it.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readMultitasking: the hidden cost of doing everything at onceNobody does two things at once: the brain switches, and every switch charges time, errors and fatigue. What research shows about multitasking and how to stop.September 18, 2026
Tools3 min readReminders that work when you forget to look at remindersA notification that fires once and vanishes is not a reminder, it is luck. What separates an alert that produces action from noise, and how to calibrate it.September 18, 2026
Productivity3 min readRoutine without rigidity: systems for a brain that gets boredA rigid routine breaks at the first disruption and never comes back. How to build structure that survives bad days, boredom and three weeks of absence.September 18, 2026
ADHD3 min readTime blindness: why "later" never arrivesPeople with ADHD often live in two tenses: now and not-now. What time blindness is, what the research actually measured, and how to give time a body.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readTime blocking: how to plan your week without becoming a hostage to the calendarTime blocking means giving every task a time and a place instead of keeping it on a list. It works — until the first surprise. How to plan a week that survives.September 18, 2026
ADHD4 min readWhy ADHD brains procrastinate (and it is not laziness)ADHD procrastination is not a willpower problem: it is a motivation equation where a distant deadline barely counts. Here is the mechanism and what to do about it.September 18, 2026
Tools3 min readWhy you abandon every productivity app in two weeksIt is not a consistency problem: most task apps demand exactly the functions that are missing. What they quietly ask of you, and what to look for instead.September 18, 2026
Productivity5 min readWhy your to-do list does not work (and how to make one that does)The to-do list is the most used and most abandoned tool in productivity. The fault is rarely discipline: it is what you write on it and when it shows up.September 18, 2026