The way you start your morning can quietly sabotage your executive function skills. This post explains why charging your phone outside the bedroom improves focus, emotional regulation, and time management, especially for adults with ADHD or autism.

Improving executive function skills like working memory, self-monitoring, and goal-directed persistence can’t rely on visual reminders alone.  Our brains are designed to stop noticing things that don’t change. This has nothing to do with intelligence. It’s actually incredibly efficient. So today, I’m sharing the reflection questions I’ll be using. My hope is that a few of them resonate with you, help you pause, consider your growth, and close out the year thinking of won

We are great at collecting information. But for many adults with ADHD, who are autistic, or have other executive function challenges, implementation is the hardest part.

According to Dr. Russell Barkley, inhibition is the core executive function skill that every other EF skill depends on. Planning, emotional regulation, task initiation, and self-monitoring can't come online without the ability to pause before acting.

Keep this in mind: You’re not lazy. You're not broken. You don't suck. You haven't found the right systems yet.

But in today’s world, we are asked to do so many things. Doing one thing at a time feels like a waste of time. In reality, trying to multitask only slows us down and makes us more stressed.

It’s nearly impossible to estimate how long something will take for two reasons. First, we fall victim to the planning fallacy–our tendency to underestimate time, cost, and effort, even when past experiences prove otherwise. Then, we forget to consider unpredictable obstacles like

In reflection, I’ve realized how low my confidence and self-esteem were in high school. A large part of that was because I constantly played a mental game I could never win. Every day, it chipped away at my self-esteem.

A dopamine menu is a list of activities that give you a healthy boost of dopamine (that’s the brain chemical that fuels motivation, energy, and focus). It's something I build with my adult executive function coaching clients.

The reason many neurodivergent adults "come alive" and become productive right before a deadline isn’t about laziness or incompetence. It’s tied to gaps in executive function—specifically, task initiation.

Feedback is about a task, not your worth as a person. If you have ADHD or autism, rejection sensitivity can make it feel unbearable. But when you notice it, use a calming strategy, and untangle the story, feedback becomes an opportunity to grow rather than a trigger to spiral After a few failed attempts, I devised a system that offloads the cognitive load of remembering to follow up using the snooze feature.

If you’re autistic or have ADHD, you probably know how precious your mental energy is. And, trying to remember to follow up on important emails only overloads it.  After a few failed attempts, I devised a system that offloads the cognitive load of remembering to follow up using the snooze feature.

Our brains love to catastrophize boring tasks. I was convinced cleaning my van would take two hours. It only took 31 minutes. The question that got me started is the same one that can break your procrastination cycle.

What if bouncing from one system to another, depending on the day, week, or season of life, was the best strategy to improve executive function skills for adults?

After waiting for what felt like 30 minutes, she was finally at the checkout. The line behind her was long and restless. She swiped the card. Declined. Her face got hot. Eyes behind her started to shift. Her heart pounded. Hadn’t she just paid it off? Maybe? Her ADHD brain was spinning, too overstimulated and embarrassed to think clearly. That moment became her turning point. She realized her spending wasn’t just “bad habits.” It was executive dysfunction.

If you're in the cycle of setting big goals but never making serious progress, it’s not because you’re lazy or incapable. It's because the way you’re setting goals doesn’t work with your neurodivergent brain.

And after publishing my 100th post, I hit 1,000 subscribers (woohoo!). But honestly, the real win isn’t the number. It’s what I’ve learned about executive function, consistency, and follow-through.

The task avalanche is all the stuff that you suddenly feel the need to do at the very last minute. It’s always unplanned, stressful, and often makes us late. This experience is incredibly common for neurodivergent adults, especially those with ADHD who face executive function gaps.

But that all changed when I learned about implementation intentions. See, cognitive flexibility is a skill. Implementation intentions are how you build it. Now, I teach this strategy to all of my clients.

Perfectionism looks like a high standard, but it often masks deep fears.