Triple A

tl;dr: Don't give yourself the reward after you work, give yourself the reward while you work.

Why the old strategy doesn't work

First, it probably feels illogical to you. "Why would I wait to eat the chocolate when I can just eat it right now???"

Second reason is because it triggers demand avoidance, which is common in ADHD/Autism. Making yourself wait to have the reward boxes you in and turns into a demand, and this feels uncomfortable. And then you associate this discomfort with the task you're trying to do. Not good.

How this strategy works

It's important to note that this only works if you can multitask the reward with the main task. Eat ice cream while you write a paper. Listen to a podcast while you do the dishes. If you can't multitask with it, you may need a different strategy (like body doubling perhaps).

It also works better if the reward is special but not too special. If you like it too much you won't save it as a reward for these tasks. To help with this, find something with a limited quantity. For example, I light a particular scented candle whenever I clean the cat box, which happens to be pretty expensive, so I don't want to waste it.

So we've solved the demand avoidance problem, but there's another reason why this works, and it has to do with the role of dopamine. Dopamine is misunderstood as the "pleasure" chemical, but it's really the "reward" chemical, and it's not only released as a reward, but also in the anticipation of a reward, which is related to how much dopamine was released the last time you did that task.

So this strategy employs what I personally refer to as "dopamine training." When you give yourself something nice while doing a chore, your brain gets dopamine during the chore. It doesn't really know what part of the chore actually triggered the dopamine. If you want to make a habit out of this chore, focus on overloading the dopamine the first time. Eat a LOT of ice cream and don't worry about how many pages of your essay you wrote. You can try harder at that later.

Thank you, with a protracted vowel sound around the 'an', and the same, heightened protracted vowel sound on the 'o' in you, and a quick cut off around the 'u' sound so it doesn't sound sarcastic

Then, often, you pay them a compliment in return, often to the same degree/significance as yours to them

Such as,

'Hey, I like your jumper'

'Thank you! I like yours, too'

Add a 'too' if it is about the same concept, item, inversed onto their person

Or,

'I like that little flop in your hair'

'Thank you. like how you styled yours. The curls are pretty'

Or,

'Hey, I love your artstyle'

Here, we come to a conundrum, as, unless we are in an art class, we may not know (or visibly see, often important) their art, so this is what we say

'Thank you-,'

And then, something about it to clarify, often WHY they might like certain thing

Say,

'I've been working on it. Glad you like it'

Or,

'I've been practicing colour matching'

Or,

'Interesting that you like (*this style here*). It's one that really fascinates me'

Guaranteed to help smooth conversations, improve your image in other people's perspective, and potentially, gain freinds

From years of research

Bonus tip:

If you want to make eye contact and you are struggling, look into the corner of one of their eyes, or pick an eyebrow to look at. Mimics eye contact very well without actually making it. Do not forget to look away briefly, to say, a cheek or the tip of their ear, on average, every thirty seconds, for a duration of less than half a second, before looking back, if you really want to sell it

As an ADHD haver with several additional memory issues, I've had to set up my life in such a way that it's basically impossible to not do important things. Here are some of those things. By the way, you have my full permission to use these even if you have no "reason" to need them, I'm not here to gatekeep.

Only books stay on/around the bed overnight, so when I wake up I don't go straight on my phone

Snoozing my wake up alarm thrice to measure half an hour after waking up (which is when I can use screens)

Using that half hour to get my reading in

Charging my devices under my yoga mat so I have to exercise before using them

Eating the same (healthy) thing for breakfast every morning so there's no need to think about it

Putting medication on top of the chai canister so there's no forgetting it

Lazy ginger shot: 1 heaped teaspoon of ginger out of the jar, a big squirt of bottled lemon juice, a little bit of honey or whatever you prefer, a good amount of turmeric, a tiny spoon of salt, and a couple of cracks of black pepper. Measure with your heart, combine into a shot glass, and follow it up with water to get the ginger fibres out of your mouth. Takes like 2 minutes, basically free if you already use these for cooking, and works the same as any other ginger shot except maybe better because it has more fibre and electrolytes.

Linen as a first layer, especially in summer

Using an app like Acloset so I don't have to empty my entire wardrobe every time I want to choose an outfit

Outfit repeating (shhhh it's fine I promise)

Don't put it down, put it away. Don't put it down, put it away. DON'T PUT IT DOWN, PUT IT AWAY. If you're holding something, never put it on a random surface, that's where things go to die.

Tiny rubbish bins wherever you hang out

Cleaning kit full of all the stuff I need to clean so when the mood strikes me, I'm not wasting precious motivation finding supplies

Time blocking

A container at the top of the stairs and at the bottom for things that go on the other floor AND as soon as something's put in it I move it to a super impossible to ignore place (like in the middle of the 5th step)

Putting on a song and seeing how much of an area I can clean before the song ends (for a bigger area put your laundry on and see how much you can get done before it's finished)

Putting my themed moodboards for each part of my life in the place I need to see them

Watching something themed around the topic I'm studying while I wait for my Ritalin to kick in so I'm in the mood to interact with that topic (if you don't take ADHD medication I'd recommend you do this anyway, it makes you so much more productive and it's more enjoyable)

Listening to lectures at 1.75 speed with the transcript printed out in front of me so I can highlight and take notes

Supercook is a free website where you put down everything you have in your kitchen and it'll tell you what to make with what you have - keep it updated and you're fine

Having a list of about 30 easy dinners so I can just pick some for the week ahead, then copy-paste the ingredients and cross reference with my inventory on Supercook to make a grocery list

Doing my groceries online, more specifically adding things to the cart whenever I run out of them instead of trying to remember what I'm missing all at once

ELECTRIC PRESSURE COOKER I love this thing so much it's unreal

Having a scented candle and mood lighting that means it's time to shower

Watching videos in the shower, even if I can't hear them

After washing my hair and using leave in, I put it up in a T shirt so it doesn't get all over my face when I'm washing my body

Shower chair in case I get tired, bored, dizzy, or need to put my leg up to wash it

I don't like flipping between pages when journalling so having only a year in pixels page to fill out (+ my time blocking notebook but that's another thing)

Electric toothbrush with a timer, water flosser, my whole toothbrushing thing is as streamlined as possible because I hate doing it

your body isn't stupid. it doesnt do any habit that doesnt fill some kind of need. so you cant remove a habit without replacing it. that leaves you with a gap in your needs. so:

you want to drink less soda? well, drink more water/tea for hydration and get yourself some kind of candy to replace the joy you get from the sweetness.

you want to distance yourself from a friend? interact more often with the other people in your life for your social needs.

you want to play less video games? get yourself some card or board games for the mental challenge, and if the fast reaction time is important to you, get yourself a timed puzzle game.

you want to bite your fingernails less? get yourself some chewelry to keep your mouth occupied for the stim, and bring a nail file with you if you bite your nails for texture reasons.

you want to remove a toxic person who gossips from your life? well, interact more with others, but also consider engaging in (safe) kinds of drama, to appeal the way they added excitement.

look into what needs are satisfied when you do things, because the same habit can satisfy different needs for different people. but also consider what other effects they have on you, and if their might be better ways to satisfy those needs.

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need To Know About Taxes

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about How to Increase Your Income

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Retirement and How to Retire

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Credit and Credit Cards

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Investing for Beginners

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about How to Pay off Debt

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need To Know About Living Independently for the First Time

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Repairing Our Busted-Ass World

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Self-Care

MASTERPOST: Everything You Need to Know about Getting a Job, Raise, or Promotion

Chicken broth is a miracle ingredient. In almost any dish that requires water, chicken broth will make it taste better. Not everything obvi, but stuff like pastaroni, mashed potatoes, ramen, etc., golden ingredient.

I ADORE Johnny’s seasoning salt. Most of the time I use it in place of regular salt. To get the umami that salt can bring to a dish, I prefer to use MSG. I use Accent. Yes, you’ve probably been told how bad MSG is, that is a racist incorrect statement. It is not bad for you, and it is fabulous.

Garlic and onion powder will add great flavor to almost anything you make. I add it to almost any dish (savory) as a base for seasonings.

Acidity in cooking is really important. If your food feels lacking in something, try adding it. I like lemon juice, lime juice, and vinegar (I’m partial to rice vinegar because I make a lot of ramen).

With stuff like instant pancake mix (like Bisquick), adding a splash of vanilla and butter in place of oil makes a HUGE difference in flavor and texture. Absolutely fucking addictive.

You’ve heard it a million times, but air fryers are fantastic. They are not overhyped, and I use mine ALL the time. Especially in summer. Our place doesn’t have AC and using the oven is a death sentence. Meatballs fry up nice, reheating leftover fast food—like fries! They become edible again! It can make toast (we do not have a toaster lol). I’ve cooked whole ass chicken breasts in it (I usually add chicken broth in the bottom for moisture, and seasoning. Even better, use that seasoned broth for a side!) my air fryer is Dash, it’s cheap, it’s great, and their customer service is TOP NOTCH. We broke ours and they straight up gave us a brand new one for free when I sent them a photo.

If you feel the need to boil stuff like chicken, chicken broth. Do not use water. I beg of you. Season it.

Other seasonings that I absolutely adore—basil, chives, nutmeg (super good to use a pinch in savory dishes for a little extra flavor!), chili powder, cayenne (these two have different flavors), ground mustard, ground ginger, sage, thyme, rosemary, paprika, and I LOVE white pepper, very complex flavor. Adds a lot to a dish.

For baked goods, I also love to do butter in place of oil. A favorite that people love that I make is Dr. Pepper brownies (partner’s work loves to beg me to make them at least every few months). Boxed brownie mix, replace oil with butter, splash of vanilla, and Dr. pepper in place water.

Vanilla will add a lot to any baked dish (sweet), genuinely. There’s such a thing called Mexican vanilla blend. Real vanilla, mixed with imitation. Great flavor and SO much cheaper than plain vanilla. Straight up, I like it better. I buy Molina Mexican Vanilla Blend. They sell it at Walmart and the bottle is massive.

Another tool of mine that I LOVE is my immersion blender. While it’s absolutely not a necessary tool, it’s great in place of a regular blender AND you can use it in stuff like soups, sauces, etc. I made refried beans with it from canned beans a bit ago when I forgot to add them to our shopping list. It was great!

Frozen veggies are a life saver, especially when you’re pinching pennies. We buy them a lot and they’re great! I love using our air fryer for them—helps keep them not mushy, but our oven works great too. They’re so much cheaper, and if you have ADHD like me, they won’t rot in the back of your fridge.

Juice is great for those of you who either can’t afford fruit or have the ADHD issue mentioned above. Maybe both! We get a lot of our fruit intake from it. Apple, cranberry, tart cherry, pomegranate all great. We recently found an apple juice by treetop that uses three types of apples and it’s SO GOOD. Actually the best apple juice I’ve ever had.

If you have to go non-dairy, whether for vegan or health reasons, I LOVE oat milk. Best non-dairy milk available. Hands down. For butter, country crock makes non-dairy butter (two types—olive oil and avocado (we prefer the second)). For cheese, Daiya is great, bettergoods makes some solid shreds, and we love follow your heart for American slices. For cream cheese, I like violife. I wasn’t a big fan of it by itself, but it’s an awesome sub for recipes. Chao slices are good for like a Gouda-ish taste. Nutritional yeast can also add a cheesy flavor to dishes. Daiya also makes a cheese sauce that’s not bad! It takes a little getting used to, but it’s good. For taco night, I add a can of Rotel and BOOM vegan queso. Tofu—yes, I know that sounds weird—makes a really good base for ricotta. I missed lasagna, found a recipe on Pinterest, and can confirm.

Another good thing for non-dairy—you know how many recipes call for cream soups? God it’s frustrating when you don’t eat dairy. But hey! I have a thing for that. There’s a person who made a substitution recipe that’s great! https://www.recipesthatcrock.com/cream-soup-substitute-recipes/

That’s all I got for now, I hope this helps someone. I taught myself to cook, and I absolutely adore doing it. I like sprucing up packaged stuff a lot, because I’m disabled and hoo boy making stuff from scratch is hard. I love it, but that’s a lot of spoons.

I've seen a few of these posts going around, but there are a few tips that I haven't seen on any of them, so I'm making my own.

Meal prep. Meal prep meal prep meal prep. Cooking your own food is a fantastic way to save money, but ain't NOBODY got time to do that every day. Find a recipe you like, make enough to last you through the week. I usually cook two dishes over the weekend so I can alternate foods for lunch and dinner. My mainstays are beef stews, chicken breasts with an assortment of sauces, pork chops ditto, and tilapia. Some of these are more expensive than others, but all of them will keep for a week in the fridge and many of them can be cooked in one pot or pan (less washing, yay!).

Keep rice on hand. Rice goes with almost any entree and is great for making your food go further when you're on a budget or just miscalculated how much protein you had on hand.

Keep some food in the freezer (I like pre-made casseroles). There will be weeks where you miscalculate your meal prepping. There will be weeks where you have a Dread Plague and cannot cook. Being able to thaw food out and just have it to eat will save your bacon. Always replace it once you've used it though!

Regardless of how often you get sick, keep a Cold Survival Kit in your pantry. This consists of two or three cans of the soup of your choice, copious quantities of Vitamin C, a couple of bottles of Gatorade, saltine crackers, and ginger tea. (Ginger tea is MAGIC for nausea. If you can't get anything down, smell a teabag and/or the tea while it's steeping. Take a sip of the tea once it's steeped and hold it in your mouth. YES, it works that well. Add some honey to the tea to make it more palatable and give you a bit of energy.) Like the freezer food, you will need this at some point and you will need it badly. Also like the freezer food, replace it when you use it.

you want to distance yourself from that friend and interact less frequently? get closer with other friends, and talk with them more.

you want to drink less gatorade/soda? start drinking more water or tea.

you want to play less video games? play more card or board games.

you want to eat less junk food? cook more home meals or go to better restaurants where you can.

Bras last longer if you let them air dry. Don’t put them in the dryer.

If you have a problem with frizzy hair, don’t dry your hair with a towel. It makes the frizzies worse. (I recently read an article that said to use a t-shirt? I brush mine out and let it air dry.)

Whites wash best in hot water. Everything else can be in cold - save on your electricity bill.

You can kill 99.9% of germs in a sponge by putting it in the dishwasher for a cycle or by microwaving it for 2 min (be sure to make the sponge damp before microwaving and to put a cup half full of water in with it and please DO NOT squeeze the sponge until it has cooled off)

Airing out your room/house and letting sunlight in every so often can decrease the number of household pests like silverfish and ants.

Black underwear is best during your period as stains are less likely to be visible.

To save money, put aside 10% of each paycheck into a savings account. It’ll add up.

Unless your hair has something on/in it (like grease or mud or something), using conditioner first can actually be the better choice. The conditioner holds in the good oils that help you hair look sleek and beautiful, which shampoo would otherwise wash away.

Speaking of shampoo - if you have long hair, washing just the bits that touch your scalp is generally enough. The rest of your hair gets cleaned with just the run off from your scalp.

If you put a tampon in and it’s uncomfortable/you can feel it, you didn’t do it quite right. A properly placed tampon is virtually unnoticeable by the wearer.

Apply deodorant/antiperspirant a couple hours in advance of when you need it. This gives the product the chance to block your sweat glands. Using deodorant just before going somewhere where you’ll sweat (this means walking outside for people in high humidity places) results in your sweat washing the deodorant off and starkly limiting its usefulness.

After running the dryer, use the dryer sheet from that load to brush out the lint catch - it gets everything off in a fraction of the time it’ll take you to get it clean with your bare hands. Paper towels also work well.

Wash your face everyday, or as often as possible. Forget which brand of cleanser is best. Just washing your face everyday will guarantee you clearer skin. And do you best not to pop pimples, as tempting as the urge may be.

- Get mesh laundry bags for delicate clothing items

- Any garments with high spandex content (like leggings, sports bras, athleisure in general) get structurally compromised by high temperatures. Spandex is literally rubber, and rubber gets brittle when not treated properly. Use only low temperatures on the dryer for these, to avoid shapeless leggings, etc.

- Ik people like to ignore them, but care labels are there for a reason. At the very least, heed the drying instructions on the label. If it says “hang dry”, then hang dry. This prevents damage to garments prone to shrinkage, pill-ing, melting, etc. So, just separate those ones to hang up, after the wash

- If you live in a small apartment, like me, you can buy a cheap, 2nd spring-tension shower curtain rod off of Amazon to put in ur shower to get extra hang-drying space.

- Many cheap/fast-fashion dark denim jeans & darkly dyed Cotten garments are def a dye-bleed risk for the first few washings (to be safe, be cautious of dye bleeding in any fast-fashion garment that isn’t made from polyester or nylon, the first time you wash them)

I keep seeing posts about adulting tips and some talk about cooking rice. What they don’t talk about is that you’re supposed to wash it first.

I repeat, WASH YOUR RICE.

It’ll help remove the extra starch that makes it sticky and gritty when you cook it. It also gets rid of debris and bugs and anything that might’ve gotten mixed in it.

All you have to do is add water, use your hand to mix the rice in the water and then carefully pour the water out. Not the rice, just the water. Add water again and repeat the process until the water is clear enough and then you can cook your rice how you want to.

Ive gotten this one as a request. Back at it again. Personally I’ll say that my hair is very fine and very straight, I do know people with curly hair may have a more complex way of taking care of their hair. But regardless the basic idea stands.

I myself don’t have that many encounters regarding my childhood and hair. I do remember being 12 and having a small section of my hair become matted. I was able to solve it out, but it shouldn’t have happened in the first place! I was a kid.

Those are my general tips I could think of from the top of my head.

It’s important that you brush your hair once a day. You can deffo do it more than once. But doing so at least once is important as your hair can become matted if you don’t.

If your hair ever does get matted, know that there are special salons trained in de-matting hair. You don’t have to go at it with scissors.

As per washing your hair, different people have different ways to go about it. The rule of thumb is to wash it if it becomes greasy, or if it smells. If you don’t have a feel for it, or no one ever taught you, Try washing your hair every other day. See if that feels good- if not, try to understand what is a ratio that works better.

If you had to go alone and hadn’t had an adult teach you this, it’s worth noting that when you go to the barber, or the hair salon, it’s considered good practice to come in with your hair washed and detangled before your meeting. In some places it’s considered common courtesy to tip. Depends on where you live.

You can always do a lot of learning online when it comes to styling your hair, don’t be shy to search for tips. This also extends to special hair products, or tips and tricks when it comes to certain hair types. Do not be embarrassed. You deserve to learn and nurture yourself with love!

One thing I think children of neglect aren’t aware of are the vast options that exist of anything really. When you’re busy surviving, and no adult is there to show you how to take care of yourself. You often reduce your world to a world of survivalism. In reality, your hair is a sign of beauty (in many cultures), it’s a way of self expression, but most importantly it’s a part of you that deserves to be nourished and loved. It takes time to readjust to a world of living when all you’re used to is surviving.