Leveling Up at Work With Adult ADHD: 3 “Fast Brain” Strategies You Can Steal Today

If you have Adult ADHD, learning at work can feel weirdly inconsistent.

You can absorb complex ideas in a flash… and then struggle to get through a basic training, a dense document, or a process update that your job insists is “simple.” It’s not that you aren’t capable. It’s that your brain needs the right conditions to focus, retain, and apply what you’re learning.

In this video, David and Dr. Jim unpack what helps “fast brain” adults learn in the real world. Here are the top three highlights, plus a few ways to use them immediately. If you want the full context, the stories, and the step-by-step examples, the full video is absolutely worth watching.

Watch the full conversation here: [Insert video link or embed]

Takeaway 1: Build urgency on purpose (so you don’t need panic to perform)

A big theme in the conversation is that ADHD brains often don’t “turn on” for learning until something feels urgent. That’s why so many adults with ADHD do their best work right before a deadline and then feel confused about why they couldn’t access that focus earlier.

Dr. Jim shares a practical way to manufacture urgency without waiting for consequences: time your reading.

Instead of trying to read slowly and “be good,” he uses a clock to create a short, energizing challenge. The surprising point is that slower reading can lead to more drifting, more rereading, and less retention for ADHD brains.

Try it at work:

• Time one page so you know your natural fast-focus pace.
• Use your finger to guide your eyes so you read in order instead of jumping around.
• Skim strategically first (headings, first and last sentences), then do a faster pass.

This is one of those ideas that sounds simple on paper, but clicks hard when you hear the reasoning and examples in the video.

Takeaway 2: Treat your environment like a learning tool (phone off, desk clean, one thing visible)

If your brain is already juggling internal noise, external noise matters more than you think.

The conversation gets blunt about distractions, especially phones. Even if you tell yourself, “I’ll just check it in 10 minutes,” part of your brain starts tracking the reward, which makes learning harder right now.

They also talk about visual clutter. If you can close your eyes and list a bunch of objects on your desk, your brain is carrying those items as background tabs. For ADHD, background tabs are not background. They’re competing tasks.

A standout strategy is the “one thing only” approach:

• Put everything unfinished into a box (or out of sight) at the end of the day.
• In the morning, pull out just one item and put it in front of you.
• Work the one thing until it’s done or you hit a planned break point.

The payoff isn’t just productivity. It’s relief. One visible task reduces mental noise, increases follow-through, and makes it easier to feel accomplished instead of scattered.

Takeaway 3: Make learning stick with ADHD-friendly retention (movement, repetition, and memory anchors)

For a lot of adults with ADHD, the problem isn’t understanding. It’s retention.

Movement breaks before boredom hits
Don’t wait until you’re exhausted and your brain labels the task as “painful.” Take short movement breaks while you still feel okay so you come back with energy instead of dread. Even small resets help: stretching, a quick walk, a few squats, water, switching seats in a long meeting.

Repeat-and-add quizzing
Instead of rereading the same section and hoping it sticks, repeat what you know and add one new piece. This protects working memory and builds a chain your brain can actually retrieve later.

Memory anchors (the “room” method)
This is the fun one. You attach a list of things you need to remember to a familiar room (like your kitchen) by placing ridiculous objects in specific locations (football in the fridge, car on the stove, spare tire in the sink). Then you “walk” the room mentally to recall the list forward or backward.

It’s playful, visual, and much more ADHD-friendly than trying to hold abstract items in your head.

A quick tip for watching the full video with an ADHD brain

If “I’ll watch the whole thing later” has been on your to-do list since 2021, try one of these:

• Watch at 1.25x or 1.5x speed.
• Watch in two chunks and stop on purpose.
• Take one note only: “What’s the first thing I’m going to try?”

You don’t need perfect attention to get real value from this conversation.

Watch the full video

These highlights are the headline, but the video is where the strategies come alive through stories, examples, and real-life ADHD work scenarios.

Watch the full conversation here: