I don’t find doing daily chores fun or interesting. I find doing the dishes, putting things away, taking out the trash, folding laundry and (drumroll) for my all time favorite, cleaning the kitty litter annoying and stupid and lacking reward. I eagerly anticipate  the day that one of my cats  congratulates me on keeping their litter box clean but of course that will never happen. The closest I get to recognition on the littler box condition is when someone visits and says, “Wow, you have two cats and your house doesn’t smell bad at all.”

We all have boring tasks that have to be attended to on a regular basis that we would rather not do  but if we avoid them long enough we might find the producers of the TV show Hoarders, knocking on our door wanting to feature us on the show.

It’s hard to make our brains want to do boring repetitivetasks. I have never said to myself, “Wow I am so psyched to do the dishes, and then when I’m done I get to mop the floor, yay!” The trick is to somehow make these tasks interesting and fun. You also need to be aware of how long things actually take so you can skip the excuse of it will take too long.

Go with the facts. It takes me less than five minutes to unload the dishwasher. I know this for a fact because I have timed this chore but a part of my brain will always tell me, “Don’t do that now, it will take too long.”I wonder how come my brain rarely says,”Don’t play your video game now, it will take too long,”even though my video game is the black hole of time, and a complete time suck.

Here are some strategies for getting chores done.

The ADHD brain craves doing things that are fun and interesting but a large majority of our daily tasks really are boring and stupid yet have to get done. When we come up with ways to make them more interesting and fun it is easier to get them done.

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Kathy Sussell is an ADHD coach who works with teens, college students and adults with ADHD. Kathy helps them with time management, planning and prioritizing, initiating and finishing tasks, organizing paper and objects and other life skills. Kathy is the co-author of, Managing Your ADHD: Tips and Solutions from A-Z. She is the organizer of the ADHD Women’s Meetup Group that meets every month in NYC. For more information visit her website: www.bravolifecoaching.com or email Kathy at kathy@bravolifecoaching.com