Do you live your life haphazardly? Do you bounce from one thing to another with no plan in mind?

It seems that those of us with ADHD tend to do that – wandering from one thing to the next and then wondering at the end of the day why we didn’t accomplish more.

That certainly feels like the way I’m living lately. It isn’t a good feeling.

So how can we go from living haphazardly to living purposefully?

Well, we have to do something that we don’t always like.

We have to add some structure to our lives.

Oh, and then we actually have to follow the rules and color inside the lines.

I know.

But it’s better that way. Really.

So my suggestion is to start slow and add one new (good) habit at a time.

Since paying the bills on time is a pretty important thing, I’m starting with that. I have as many as I can on auto-pay, but we have a few utility companies here in Indiana who don’t realize it’s the 21st century, so some are still being paid the old fashioned way.

Since I also have to manage any paperwork that my dad might have, I decided to designate a day for paperwork. Now that doesn’t mean it will take all day to do it (thank goodness) but designating a specific day makes it more likely that it will get done in a timely manner.

For me, that’s Mondays.

You can do this will other things too. Start by taking a look at what’s bothering you most or not getting done often enough, then decide on a day when you will do it, no matter what. And let me note – just in case – this means a certain day each week, not some magical one day out of your whole life. Yeah, you do have to do housework over and over and over again.

If you’ve got a number of things that really need some attention, another idea is to take one day of the week and just do them. Don’t get carried away, though. I wouldn’t plan for more than three different things, tops.

For instance, Monday is also my running errands and appointments day. This works because I don’t always have an appointment to go to, but when I have to make one, I know to do it on a Monday. And for me, errands are things other than grocery shopping.

So come on… what can you schedule to get done this week?