The Importance of a Buffer

Your time is important.

Whether you work a 9-5 in an office, work a retail job, or you stay at home, your time is a valuable resource.

When you have ADHD, time becomes a little more tricky to handle.

Between time blindness, problems with focus, and difficulty with transitions, time can be a stumbling block in your day.

Whether you like it or not, we only get 24 hours in a day. Many ADHDers try to overfill their day; their expectations much higher than anything reality can produce.

Regardless of how busy your day might be, it’s important to add buffer time into your schedule.

Planning every moment of your day without allowing for buffer time can cause problems later on in your day.

Why should you add buffer time to your schedule?

Distractions happen

No matter what you try to do to eliminate distractions, they still seem to pop up unexpectedly. From an emergency phone call to a co-worker stopping by your desk to chat, there are a million ways you can get pulled away from whatever you’re doing.

Adding buffer time in your schedule allows for these distractions without putting you behind for the day.

Allow for transition time

Having ADHD often means it’s difficult to transition from one task to another. Let’s say you have a meeting at 10:00 AM, but you planned to work right up until the meeting. Not allowing for buffer time to transition out of your work mind and into your meeting mind will probably have you showing up to the meeting a little flustered and possibly unprepared.

Expect the unexpected

Time blindness is a common symptom of ADHD. This means you are less aware of the passing of time or lack the ability to accurately determine how long something will take.

Creating buffer time in your schedule will help you account for those times when projects take longer than you expected them to take.

No matter what kind of day-to-day schedule you’re working with, adding a little bit of a buffer will mean smoother transitions and less times you’re late to your next appointment.

Where can you add some buffer time to your schedule today?

Thank you for your time and attention,

-Nikki