I’m sure you have one main burning question, and you have every right to ask it:

"Why No Brainer?" There’s a million other to do list apps!!

If you’re going to give us your hard earned time and possibly money, we have no right to avoid giving you an answer, and it better be a competent one. So we’re going to tell you.

Our (well, my, at least for now) Background

I, the founder of No Brainer, have struggled with ADHD as long as I remember.

I’ll try to keep this brief (and other blog posts brief as well) because those of us with ADHD tend to lack the attention span of a neurotypical person.

Long story short, ADHD:

1. Caused me to struggle academically. I mean, I could do it, but it felt like bashing my brain into a wall to get anything done. Things were easy intellectually, yet somehow took back-breaking energy to complete.
2. Is part of what caused me to be tired for 10 years of my life.
3. Gave me a socially awkward personality (which I appreciate more now), but at the time caused social isolation which compounded on itself. (Being late to social events didn’t help).

flowchart LR;  
A((Socially \n Awkward))-->B((Social \n Isolation));  %%Circle
B-->C((Lack of Social \n Skills Practice));  
C-->D((Unusual Social \n Coping Mechanisms \n To Compensate));
D-->A

4. Caused me to try and drop many hobbies. What a waste.
5. Caused people to think I didn’t understand the value of hard work, and that instead I was being maliciously lazy (and I can’t blame them).
6. Caused a seemingly unshakeable fear of failure out of the fear of looking inadequate in front of others (see above flowchart), paralyzing me from taking action on what I knew I needed to.

flowchart LR;  
A((Fear of Failure))-->B((Lack of Action));  %%Circle
B-->C((Creation of \n Incompetence\n from lack\n of practice));  
C-->D((Incompetent \n Actions));
D-->A

7. Caused near constant embarrassment of my past self. Every time I was socially awkward, every time I made a silly mistake, every time I was embarrassed because I was late or dropped the ball on something in my professional life, gets replayed over and over.

Now, I use the word "caused" very loosely here. At the end of the day, my actions are my responsibility. But I had good intent. A lot of us do. We didn’t mean to be incompetent. Who would desire that?

So, if I had good intent, why did I fail? Is it because I’m actually the antagonist? Is it because I’m stupid? It it because I’m emotionally weak? Is it because I’m eternally incompetent?

The unfortunate (and fortunate) truth about reality is intent is not all that matters. Unfortunate because it punishes people with good hearts who simply can’t perform as well as their mind and noble intent would like, but fortunate because it creates real competence in individuals who can handle it, who (hopefully) lift up the rest of the world with their contributions.

IF YOU TAKE AWAY NOTHING ELSE FROM THIS BLOG, READ THIS…

*Your purpose, your job, and what will help you the most is to get to a place in your life where it is fortunate that you need more than good intentions to survive and thrive. You live in a world that is near-indifferent to good intentions either way, so you may as well make it useful to you. This is where we will fight with you, and for you, tooth and nail to get you there. (Energetic, Epic, Intense Rock Music Plays*)

"You Still Haven’t Told Me How, Dude."

Alright. Here’s how. There’s some theory woven into this, so bear with us. KEEP READING, WHILE YOU HAVE THE ENERGY.

We abide by the rule that in order to support a sophisticated accomplishment, you need to support the less complex, more core accomplishments under it. For instance, if you’re going to go to the North Pole, you first need to support a healthy body (to survive the cold), a large wallet (so you can take time off work and buy the necessary gear) , a sharp mind with survival training (so you can be decisive in the face of stress), and a good team. Let’s take a more detailed look at what is most likely needed to go to the North Pole (successfully). Note: the graph is not exhaustive. Please don’t go to the North pole unless you’re, you know… a professional.

flowchart LR;
    subgraph Level 4
    4A & 4B & 4C & 4D & 4E & 4F
    end
    subgraph Level 3
    direction TB
    3A & 3B & 3C & 3D
    end
    subgraph Level 2
    2A & 2B & 2C & 2D
    end
    subgraph Level 1
    1A
    end
4A(Strength\n Training) & 4B(Cardio)-->3A; 
4C(Self\n Control) & 4D(Good\n Groceries) & 4E(Afford\n Organic\n Food) -->3B; 4F(Social\n Skills)-->3C & 3D
4C-->3A

3A(Fit Bod) & 3B(Nutrition)-->2A & 2B
3D(Friends) & 3C(Professional\n Networking)-->2C 
3D-->2B
3C-->2D

2A(Healthy\n Body)-->1A
2B(Healthy\n Mind)-->1A
2C(Good\n Team)-->1A
2D(Good\n Finances)-->1A

1A(NORTH\n POLE)

We will call this a functional support chart.

To understand the needs of ADHD, we need to go deeper…

Let’s switch to the example of taking out the trash.

flowchart LR;
    subgraph Level 4
    4A & 4B & 4C & 4D & 4E
    end
    subgraph Level 3
    direction TB
    3A & 3B & 3C & 3D
    end
    subgraph Level 2
    2A & 2B & 2C & 2D & 2E & 2F & 2G
    end
    subgraph Level 1
    1A
    end
4A(Strength\n Training) & 4B(Cardio)-->3A; 
4C(Self\n Control) & 4D(Good\n Groceries) & 4E(Afford\n Organic\n Food) -->3B; 
4C-->3A

3A(Fit Bod) & 3B(Trash\n Made it\n From Room)
3D(Time to\n Organize) & 3C(Organizing\n Skills)
3D-->2B
3C-->2D & 2C & 2E
3B-->2A
3A-->2A

2A(Strong\n Arms)-->1A
2B(Time\n Available)-->1A
2C(Trash\n Can\n Near)-->1A
2D(Bags in\n Kitchen)-->1A
2E(Dumpster\n Near)-->1A
2F(Energy\n Available)-->1A
2G(Trash\n Can\n Full)-->1A

1A(Taking\n Out the\n Trash)

In this example, we see that taking out trash is quite the ordeal. Plenty of previous steps are required for support of this one task. When someone has ADHD, even the most basic of tasks can seem this consciously complex. (I didn’t even have the attention span to finish this chart, but you get the gist).

**Our goal is to support from the "left" to the "right" side with our app. We find the most core issues that need supporting first (ones that support the most other obligations) and then work our way into more niche items.

Let’s be Realistic…

We know we can’t ask you to cut all eating out expenses without giving you a diet plan that works with your energy and time.
We know that we can’t ask you to work out when we haven’t even helped you move obstacles to working out out of the way.
We know that we can’t ask you to make monetary investments in items that will help you function without first helping you function without them.

So We Won’t.

Instead, we will slowly (but not so slowly that you get bored) give you easy tasks that work up to more complex tasks. Like a video game. Which people with ADHD tend to love. You’re about to level up.

We will go from "Gerber Baby Food Tasks" to "Batman Tasks" (easy, but broadly supportive to difficult & specific). At times you will do our tasks so easily it will feel like breathing, other times they will feel painful, but… it’ll be the good kind of pain, such as removing a sword from your leg. Read: Eustress vs Distress.

We must all suffer from one of two pains: The pain of discipline or the pain of regret.

• Jim Rohn

We will present these tasks to you in a form called "The Mountain". Read up on this if you want to see more on how it will work. We practice what we preach, and any employee here is encouraged to complete The Mountain and let us know what they learned along the way.

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