Using Micro-Chunks to Manage ADHD

“Until the crack on the sidewalk.”
“Until the lamppost.”
“Until the crosswalk.”
“Until I pass this man walking his dog.”

As a 2:34 marathoner who now averages running 100 miles a week, these are some of the thoughts I have while running to get through each run. I have mental checkpoints of a visual barrier that I need to overcome.

No matter how painful the run is, I can see something in front of me, like a school, a part of a sidewalk, a street crossing, a car that’s passing me. In that moment, I might not be able to get through the rest of the run, but at least I can get to that next checkpoint.

I have coupled this with time-bound checkpoints. I say things in my head like:

“Don’t check the watch until 20 minutes.”
“Don’t check the watch until 10:30.”
“Let’s see how many miles I can run by 11.”

These help me not only get through a certain segment of the run faster, but they help me stay focused on the run. When I don’t have these checkpoints, I notice that my mind can wander a bit — the run can really drag on, not only in terms of pace, but mental engagement with the run.

Of course, there are times I need to think, and my mind really does wander to other parts of my life, but my ADHD brain is usually racing a mile a minute and is capable of holding two thoughts at once — I can think about getting to the crack on the pavement and how to navigate a social gathering where I know no one later in the night.

I break up segments, or chunks, of my day. I have done this for a few years now, but I realized these very small chunks of the next mental checkpoint in running help me live in the moment rather than wait for the next 20 minutes to be over.

Chunking has done wonders as a runner, teacher, and lawyer

Chunking is breaking long activities into manageable, shorter units. When I was a special education teacher in Baltimore for six years, I had to frequently chunk tasks for students who had moderate to severe disabilities.

Sometimes, chunking was in their special education plans (IEPs), and sometimes, chunking a task just meant making more bite-sized reading segments that could keep material digestible and students engaged. There were times when students had to read whole chapters and just gut through a high volume of material.

But there were also times students had to really deeply dive into one to three paragraph excerpts and re-read them numerous times. They would often have to write essays or exit tickets on these important excerpts. When I could tell I would lose students by reading too much at once, I would stop the reading and ask a question to the class to check for understanding — sometimes planned into the lesson, but sometimes impromptu when I could read the needs of the class.

Sometimes I did wonder whether chunking as much as I did in lessons was a disservice to the students. They would have to read whole books and chapters on their own. But the idea was that, without a teacher’s help, students could use the same strategies, including chunking, to tackle large tasks.

With students who had ADHD especially, chunking could be very helpful to keep them engaged. Since ADHD can be so prone to both a lack of focus and hyperfocus, the idea is that these chunks help particularly when struggling with focus, but can be released when hyperfocus kicks in.

I have ADHD too, and struggle to stay focused when I’m not in the zone or when I lack interest. I often break my day into 20–30 minute chunks, which I’ll call macro-chunks. These include thoughts like:

“I won’t check my watch on this run until 7:45.”
“I’ll read this book until 12:30.”
“I’ll write this memo until 9:30.”

I’ve been utilizing macro-chunks for years, and they’ve been greatly helpful. But not all macro-chunks are created equal — there are times I have to cut an activity short late at night because I’m really tired. If I’m really in the zone and enjoying writing a brief as a lawyer, analyzing documents, or engaging in some other discovery-related task as a litigator, I will extend the chunk and sometimes effortlessly work for an hour (or several). They are rough guides rather than strict regimens to stick to.

If I am at a wedding or spending time with my wife, I let go of chunks as a whole and try to be fully present for the people I care about. In maintaining a highly organized daily routine, I am well aware I can lose sight of letting go and living a bit, so I chunk when I need to, and don’t chunk when I don’t.

Outside of running and teaching, I am now an attorney. I went to law school at night for three years while working as a teacher. At the end of my career as a teacher, I was running 80 miles a week, working 40 hours a week, and taking 15 credits in law school.

I completed my training plan, saw dozens of my students graduate, and finished my last semester in law school with a 4.08 GPA. I earned above a 4.0 GPA by getting the highest grade in the class in two classes (A+), which weighs the GPA above a 4.0.

I could only do all of this by maintaining this highly organized, chunked schedule where I optimized almost every moment of the day and did my readings on weekends. It was exhausting, and I needed to plan well in advance and ensure I was getting plenty of sleep to keep up.

That was a year ago, and now I am just trying to balance my marriage, friendships, practicing as a lawyer, and running. Since April, I have been averaging 100 miles a week in my attempt to run a 2:25 marathon.

I know that not every run can be the most mentally engaging. Some are going to feel a lot worse than others. There are some runs I can easily run 6:30 miles for north of 15 miles. There are others I will struggle to run 10-minute miles for 6–7 miles. Each one is fundamentally different, and I can expect to feel a certain way but not actually feel that way.

The dopamine rush of micro-chunks

I will call these very short-term, mental checkpoints “micro-chunks,” and they are a bit different than the bigger chunks of 20–30 minute increments.

Micro-chunks help not only in running, but in life generally. When I’m writing or reading, it can be “until the next sentence” or “until the end of this paragraph.” Of course I don’t actually think those words, or the words can’t come into my brain, but I do have my eyes set on getting to the end of the next sentence when reading the book.

Now, I find that time flies a bit more, but I do wonder whether this type of approach that’s so hyperfocused on the moment makes me too focused and perhaps doesn’t let me zone out at times for the big picture. Focusing so much on the next lamppost might make me lose sight of long-term needs in my training plan, like when I need to strength train or stretch.

The micro-chunk helps with task initiation when it’s really hard for me. Finishing each micro-chunk releases a small amount of dopamine as a small win to propel me into the next one.

But there are certain constraints: the micro-chunks cannot be too short or too long. I cannot have each micro-chunk mental checkpoint on a run be two squares on a sidewalk — otherwise, it will take less than a second to complete that chunk. I also cannot have it be too long. There have been times I aimed my next checkpoint almost 300 meters down the road, at a far-away traffic light. That was ineffective because having the micro-chunk be attainable more than a minute later didn’t make it the most motivating or focus-inducing goal in that moment.

I’m still trying to find the sweet spot, but my answer might lie in running on the treadmill: 6 seconds. I make mental checkpoints every 6 seconds on the treadmill. I read 4:30, 4:36, 4:42, 4:48 to get through the second half of the fifth minute. Although I try my best to not look at the treadmill display, 5–10 minutes I almost always do, given the lack of visual stimulation when running on the treadmill. There are now screens that simulate visually appealing destinations, like various places in Italy or Sydney, Australia. I can look at various checkpoints in those destinations, if possible.

I know people hate running on the treadmill and hate every second of it. I am someone who can handle the monotony of running on the treadmill for 20 miles or upwards of three hours. I have even run a marathon on the treadmill, and yes, even then, I broke up the run into short mental intervals (although not 6-second intervals at the time).

It doesn’t change the physical sensation of how hard the run is or how tired I am, but it does impact my belief that I can get to the next minute or 10 minutes of the run. It helps make a big, daunting task into a million small ones (and maybe too many small ones).

. . .

It can be tiring to think this way sometimes, so it’s important for me to zoom out and see the ultimate goals and big picture instead of only the task given at the moment. There are times I have to scan and skim a reading instead of getting super deep in the details.

I have found that what works for running as an endurance sport works well for most other things in my life, like studying for exams or tackling long-term projects. However, micro-chunking is not a failsafe for everything, and running is an activity of putting one foot in front of the other rather than multifaceted activities of doing a lot at once.

Regardless, I will continue to experiment with micro-chunks. They have helped me stay more focused when reading material I don’t find interesting or engaging. I could sometimes read a page or two of a book, then realize I had no clue what I just read. With micro-chunking to the next sentence or paragraph, that doesn’t happen so much anymore.

I don’t think micro-chunking is a panacea to conquer life and become the most productive and effective version of myself. I just know they make each moment of the day a bit more manageable and less overwhelming.

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This post was previously published on Invisible Illness.

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