Is There a Perfect Planner for ADHD?
If you have ADHD, you’ve probably been on the perfect planner quest more than once. You're NOT alone!
We're looking for that one magical tool that will finally help us stay on top of our time, responsibilities, and life in general.
Maybe you've bought a new beautiful planner full of hope, used it for a few weeks, and then forgot about it. You probably decided that the planner didn’t work, or worse- that you couldn't make it work.
Let’s just clear this up now: you’re not broken, and it’s neither was your planner.
The issue isn’t whether or not you have the right planner—it's whether you’re using a full time system that works with your brain.
Let’s break that down.
Part 1: Collection – What a Planner Actually Does
Planners and calendars are often treated like the whole solution—but they’re not.
They're just one piece of the puzzle. Their main function? Collecting information. A calendar, planner, or even a dump list helps you store:
- Appointments
- Responsibilities
- Tasks and reminders
- Time-sensitive info
- Goals and ideas
Your brain is not meant to be your storage space! It’s for thinking, creating, planning—not remembering everything.
So yes, you do need an external system for storing all of this, but that system has to go beyond “just write it down.”
Prioritizing Is a Skill—And Skills Can Be Strengthened
One of the reasons planners often “fail” for ADHD brains is because prioritizing isn’t easy for us. Everything feels equally urgent—and it can be so overwhelming that we can't even start.
This is where many ADHD folks get stuck: we dump our thoughts into a list (yay!) but then when we try to use that 3-page-long list as our daily to-do list we shut down.
If you use your things to do list this way, you're OVERWHELMING yourself with that list.
By looking at much more than you can possibly get done in a day, you're asking your brain to:
- Visually scan a ton of information
- Sequence it
- Judge the time things will take
- Filter for urgency and importance
- Regulate emotional overwhelm that comes with looking at TOO MUCH AT ONCE
That’s a lot of executive functioning all at once—and it burns you out.
Part 2: Retrieval – How TO RETRIEVE and USE What You've Collected
In this piece of your time system, you're retrieving and applying all of the info you've collected.
Most people with ADHD don’t have a solid plan for what to do with the info once it's in their planner or calendar.
That’s how we end up driving to soccer practice without the snacks we were supposed to bring, showing up for a meeting without our notes, or forgetting our doctor's appointment all together.
Here’s one way (but not the only way) to retrieve and apply the tasks you "collect" to your day to day life:
- Weekly Review: Every Sunday evening, look ahead to the coming week. What big energy days are coming? What time commitments do you have? What prep can you do in advance? What projects need intentional time blocks?
- Daily Review (Morning & Evening):
- In the morning, check only today’s plan (to avoid overwhelm).
- In the evening, glance ahead at tomorrow to mentally walk through it and prep anything that might make your day smoother- put those soccer snacks in the car, your notes for the meeting in your backpack, consider the times you'll need to leave if you're driving somewhere, etc.).
You’re planning with your future self in mind. You're not just writing down tasks—you’re considering how you can actually show up for what you've planned with ease and without scrambling.
Part 3: Monitoring – What About Those “Boomerang” Tasks?
Some tasks don’t belong on a day’s to-do list, but they still need to be tracked. Let’s say you file an insurance claim and expect to hear back in 6 weeks.
That’s what I call a boomerang task—you’ve done your part, but now you're waiting for it to come back to you.
Here’s how I handle it:
- Set a calendar reminder for 6 weeks from now that says “Follow up on insurance claim.”
- If I’ve heard back, I dismiss it. If I haven’t, I follow up.
That way, I don't need to carry that reminder in my head for 6 weeks. That's inefficient and exhausting (and I'm all about managing my ENERGY).
I only follow up when needed, so I don’t drain my brain trying to remember if I need to.
Habits Can Help You Use Your Time System
Habits take energy and effort to build, so be picky about where you invest that energy!
I recommend saving your habit-building effort for habits on how to your time system—like checking your planner, reviewing your day, and doing weekly reviews. This ONE habit will have a HUGE impact on your life.
ADHD-Friendly Planning Systems Are Flexible
One more thing: if you’re someone who gets bored of a planner or changes systems often—that’s okay. You don’t have to stick to one tool forever- you can (and even need to ) switch things up.
The key to doing that without dropping the ball is knowing the core components that every system must have:
- A way to collect information
- A way to retrieve and apply it
- A way to monitor important long-term or delayed tasks
As long as those three things are happening, the tools you use can change. Flexibility is the system!
Final Thoughts: What’s the Perfect Planner for ADHD?
There isn’t one. Not really.
But there is a system that works for your brain—and once you understand that, you can stop blaming yourself and start building strategies that actually stick.
If you want to dive deeper, check out my Overwhelm Flow Sheet to help you work your dump list in a different way, or take a look at my group coaching program—where we take all these tools and apply them in real life.
Thanks for reading. You’ve got this—and I’m here to help if you need more!
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