There is something I hear quite often in my work with adults with ADHD.
“I know what I need to do.”
Sometimes they even know why it matters. They want to do it. They may have been thinking about it for hours, or sometimes days.
Yet they still haven’t started.
And this can be incredibly frustrating, because when you know what needs to be done, it seems reasonable to think that the next step should simply be doing it.
But what I have noticed through my work is that sometimes the difficulty isn’t actually the doing.
Sometimes the difficulty is everything that needs to happen between knowing and being able to start.
When knowing what to do is not enough.
An adult might know they need to write a report, reply to an email, organise paperwork or make an appointment.
The task itself may not even be particularly difficult.
But knowing what needs to be done doesn’t necessarily mean the brain knows how to get into it.
Where do I begin?
What should I do first?
How do I organise all these thoughts?
Which part is most important?
What if I don’t do it properly?
This is where executive functions can become part of the picture.
We use our executive functions to organise thoughts, plan, prioritise, hold information in mind, manage emotions, move our attention and get ourselves started.
So something that looks like one simple task from the outside may actually require several invisible processes before the person can even begin.
Someone else sees, “Write the report.”
The person sitting in front of it may be trying to work out how to organise ten different thoughts before they can write the first sentence.
This is why “just start” doesn’t always help.
Sometimes the person isn’t refusing to take the first step.
They can’t quite find where the first step is.
There can be another layer underneath it.
Something else I notice with adults is what happens when they have been sitting with the task for a while.
The internal conversation starts.
“Why haven’t I done this yet?”
“I’ve wasted so much time.”
“I should have finished this by now.”
“Why can everyone else just get on with things?”
“Come on, just do it.”
Now they are no longer only trying to manage the task.
They are also trying to manage the overwhelm, frustration and the story they are telling themselves about why they haven’t done it.
And I think this part is often missed.
From the outside, the person may appear to be doing nothing.
Inside, they may have been doing a great deal.
Thinking. Negotiating with themselves. Trying to organise. Getting distracted. Coming back. Feeling overwhelmed. Worrying about the consequences. Trying again.
All of that requires energy.
The task hasn’t even started, yet the person may already be tired.
Eventually, they may walk away, pick up their phone, find another job to do or tell themselves they will come back to it later.
We may call that procrastination.
But sometimes I wonder whether what we are seeing is the end of a much longer internal struggle that nobody else witnessed.
Wanting something doesn’t always make starting simple
This is another misunderstanding that can become quite painful for people with ADHD.
We tend to think that if something is important enough, we will naturally do it.
If I care, I will act.
If I want it badly enough, I will make it happen.
But wanting and doing are not always such a simple transaction, particularly for a divergent brain.
ADHD can involve differences in executive functioning, emotional regulation, motivation and reward processes, as well as how time is experienced and managed. All of these can influence how easily someone is able to move from intention into action.
So someone can genuinely want something and still struggle to begin.
They can care deeply and still procrastinate.
They can understand the consequences and still remain stuck.
Unfortunately, when this happens repeatedly, the person may stop questioning the process and start questioning themselves.
“If I really cared, wouldn’t I have done it?”
“Maybe I’m just lazy.”
“Why am I like this?”
This is where I think we need a different question.
Rather than asking:
“Why can’t I make myself do this?”
perhaps we can become curious about:
“What is getting in between my intention and my ability to start?”
That is a very different conversation.
And then there is the child.
For a child with ADHD, I think this experience can be even more confusing.
An adult may eventually be able to tell me, “I know what I need to do, but I can’t organise my thoughts enough to start.”
A child usually doesn’t have that language yet.
They may not know that they are struggling with planning, working memory, emotional regulation or time perception.
They know that something feels hard.
So instead, we see the behaviour.
They get up from the table.
They start talking.
They look for something else.
They become silly.
They argue.
Some become upset or angry.
Others close off.
And sometimes they remain beautifully unaware of the passing time until somebody points it out.
Then suddenly there is urgency.
“You need to leave in five minutes.”
“This is due tomorrow.”
“Everyone is waiting for you.”
And now they move.
For some children, urgency seems to help activate what wasn’t accessible before. But urgency can also bring stress, guilt or shame with it.
This is where the adult and child experiences begin to differ in an important way.
An adult may arrive in coaching carrying years of stories about themselves.
“I’ve always been disorganised.”
“I never finish anything.”
“I leave everything until the last minute.”
“I should be able to manage this by now.”
The child may not have written that story yet.
They may be confused about why something that seems easy for everybody else feels so difficult for them.
And that gives us, as adults, a valuable window.
Before the child decides:
“I am lazy.”
“I am bad at school.”
“I never get anything right.”
We have an opportunity to help them ask something else:
“Something is making this hard. What could it be?”
For me, that is an important shift.
We are no longer only looking at the behaviour. We are becoming curious about what is underneath it.
“I can’t start” may actually be useful information
There isn’t one reason an ADHD brain may struggle to start.
For one person, the task is too vague.
For another, there are too many steps.
Someone else may know what to do but can’t organise their thoughts.
Another person may already be emotionally overwhelmed.
The task may feel too far away to create any sense of urgency. It may be repetitive or offer very little immediate reward. The person may be mentally exhausted.
And sometimes several of these things are happening together.
This is why I don’t think “I can’t start” should always be treated as the problem.
Sometimes it is information.
It tells us to look underneath.
What exactly is making the starting difficult?
Do I know the first step?
Is the task too big in my head?
Do I need to get my thoughts out of my head and onto paper?
Am I overwhelmed?
Do I need somebody beside me to help me find the beginning?
Do I need movement, a break or something that helps me regulate before I ask my brain to plan?
There isn’t one strategy that will work for every person with ADHD because the barrier isn’t always in the same place.
And perhaps that is the penny-dropping moment.
Maybe the question was never “Why can’t I just do it?”
If you have spent years knowing what you need to do but not understanding why you couldn’t consistently make yourself do it, I hope there is some comfort in understanding this differently.
Not as an excuse for what hasn’t happened.
But as an explanation that gives us somewhere to begin.
There are many invisible processes sitting between wanting and doing: planning, organising, regulating emotions, holding information, sensing time, prioritising and eventually initiating.
Sometimes the difficulty isn’t a lack of wanting.
Sometimes we haven’t yet understood where the barrier is.
And once we can see that, something changes.
Instead of fighting ourselves, we can become curious about ourselves.
Instead of asking a child, “Why aren’t you doing it?” we can wonder, “What is making it difficult for you to get started?”
And instead of an adult spending another day telling themselves they should try harder, perhaps the question becomes:
“What does my brain need to help me take the first step?”
For me, awareness is not the end of the work.
But it can be the beginning of a very different relationship with ourselves.
Sometimes, once we understand the barrier, we can finally begin building the bridge.
About ADHD Coach WA
ADHD Coach WA provides ADHD and executive function coaching for adults, teenagers and families in Perth and online. My work focuses on helping people understand their individual executive function challenges and develop practical strategies that work with their brain and their everyday life.