I know this forum hasn't been very busy since its inception, but having recently come to rely on LB kind of heavily, I thought I'd post some of my experiences and strategies.

I have ADD, as well as some anxiety-based issues. I do suffer from that classic paradox of "knowing" what I should be doing (intellectually) but, in the moment, not "feeling" like doing it-- and suffering with making many small, in-the-moment decisions that do not add up to anything like what I want for myself.

I stumbled upon part of a solution last year, which was that when something occured to me to do (for example, "oh, I need to do laundry"), instead of doing it then, I would set myself an appointment to do it the next day. This was a surprisingly effective approach.

This discovery allowed me to finally reconcile my "thinking" (that is, my abstract, high-level, out-of-the-moment, intellectual thought processes-- which are really good) with my minute-to-minute behavior (which is often not great at all). It seems that, when actually
confronted with something to do, in the moment, I have an emotional reaction to it, not based upon what my longer-term goals or desires are, but some other emotionally-affected unproductive thing in place.

Through my method of "structured procrastination" I, in a sense, was "splitting the difference": the emotional "I don't wanna!" part of me was rewarded by not having to do something in the moment in exchange for the understanding that it would be done in the near term, and the longer-term thinking part of me was rewarded with accomplishing the task, in exchange for allowing the emotional part to put it off temporarily.

This was my first breakthrough in finding ways around my emotional shortcomings, to leverage my intellect against problems that are traditionally solved emotionally (even if we don't usually think of our approach as emotional-- it's in-the-moment, and visceral).

The "tomorrow appointment" approach only works so well and for so long and, most importantly, it's really reliant on, at first, noticing something needing to be done and then making the commitment to do it. Obviously, for someone with ADD, it's really easy to be oblivious to the little things that don't need constant attention, but do need routine attention. I find that I can keep up with things that need constant attention, but anything that requires attention less-frequently than, say, every three days-- forget it!

Here's where we get into Life Balance. I had made many attempts over the years to "get organized" using a variety of planning/scheduling products. It was very easy to get them to represent what I needed to do, but none of them could ever hold up to how (and if) I get them done. I happened upon Life Balance as a bundled piece of software with a new Palm-based phone.

At first, it seemed intriguing, but I didn't really "get it"-- I've seen To Do lists before, but what's with a pie chart?

I think I fiddled with it a bit and then put it aside, like I've done so many times before with countless products, but after a few weeks, the idea started growing in my head of "how I can use a piece of software to manage my life" and it dawned on me that Life Balance would support what I was really trying to do.

Here're some things I recognize about myself (some good, some bad):

* I'm terrible at maintaining relationships with people. I seem to be able to manage one relationship at a time-- if I have a girlfriend, I ignore my friends. If I have a good friend, I ignore other friends. If I have no girlfriend, and no good friend around, I ignore everyone. Even people I know like, or even love, me, if I don't have contact with them for a few days, I begin to feel that they don't like me anymore. I am unfortunately very good at "out of sight, out of mind."

* When I "don't know what to do with myself"-- either not knowing what to do next, or feeling so overwhelmed with things to do that I don't know where to start, I will distract myself by spending hours playing videogames or, worse, drinking a lot, just so I don't have to think about what's getting away from me.

* I have no ability to establish routines or habits. I have never been able to establish or stick to a routine of any kind.

* Related to that, I have never been consistent with keeping up with things that happen routinely (things I know I have to do every week, every month, every six months, etc.). I can tell you how often anything in my life is supposed to happen, but rarely when the last time it happened was, nor when I'm supposed to do it again.

* I am adept at ignoring the things which usually trigger someone to respond with action. It's very easy for me not to notice I'm running out of clean socks, that the kitchen floor is filthy, that my hair has gotten too long, etc., etc.

* I understand well (intellectually) the need to take care of myself, but I never think of it.

* For life, I have very decent, well-reasoned goals and a good ability to plan, intellectually.

* Like most folks with ADD, I'm very creative, but have stigmatized my creativity somewhat by my childhood experiences (for example, being punished by a teacher for drawing pictures when I should have been doing classwork).

* I have a very powerful intellectual understanding of that fact that, frequently, I will not (emotionally) want to do something, but have the full knowledge that if I do it, I will be very glad I did afterwards. This is a strange hurdle for me, because I run up against it very frequently and no matter how well I know it, I still feel this way.

After some false starts with a good approach to using Life Balance, I've gotten into a bit of a groove using a particular system. I'm not prescribing it for anyone, but if you recognize yourself in me, adapt this approach as needed. I'm also not fully fluent in the intricacies of Life Balance's scoring and balancing system, so there may be better ways to achieve what I'm trying to-- if you know, please share.

I set up five general areas of my personal life. I have a work life, too, but I didn't want to dilute my personal life balance-- besides, they're like parallel lives, anyway.

The areas are:

Life Maintenance-- Generally, the things I need to do to take care of me- the physical being, the living things around me (my dogs), the things I own and am financially responsible for.

Relationships-- How I relate to other people in the world.

Environmental Improvements & Maintenance-- Includes the routine housecleaning (by room and subtask within, for easy management), and any household projects I have to get done with, like cleaning out the garage.

Creative-- Things I should be doing to support my creative urges. Things to give me permission to goof off, somewhat.

Consumer-- A kind of novel thing for Life Balance I think-- things I should avoid doing, or do in only infrequent or moderated amounts.

Nearly every item in my tree is set up as "Routinely", with an appropriate frequency and lead time. At present, anything that is one-time will lead to a maintenance task upon completion. A key point is that I resisted the urge that so many people have when populating a new piece of software-- put in every little thing you do. I kept my tasks to things I know I need to do, things I know I need to ~not~ do, or things that happen with less than constant frequency that I simply can't track.

In my Life Maintenance area:
I have Pet Care, which reminds me to walk the dogs (not something I do routinely, because we have a yard, but it gets me out with them), as well as to make an appointment for them with the groomer every four weeks.

I have Self Care, which reminds me to get haircuts about every four weeks, as well as a daily item to "avoid drinking" (this allows me to credit myself for each day I don't drink)-- the jury is still out as to its efficacy. :) I would like for it (and things like it to be at the top of the list when I haven't been avoiding them).

I have an ongoing Reducing Stuff project. I tend to be a packrat and have come to the realization that I simply own entirely too much stuff that is of no value to me, so I have set up tasks to sell specific things, discard other generalized groups of things and maintain some currency in things I would ignore (for example, "Throw-out old socks, buy new ones" every four months).

I have a Finances task, which is meant to remind me to pay particular bills on schedule, to make sure I'm keeping track of my finances, as well as a front-end project to get my finances into shape first. I was lucky I even got my taxes paid this year.

In my Relationships area:
I have three general categories: Romantic, Personal and Generally Being Social.

Under Romantic, this is where I list things that pertain to maintaning any potential dating activities (right now, sadly, very empty). This is key, though, in maintaining just the right amount of distance.

Under Personal (which is where LB has really been paying off for me), I have a laundry list of phone calls to specific people, each with a particular frequency. When one of these pops up, I make that call, even if I think I have nothing to say. This tiny effort on my part has already gone a long way to broadening and strengthening my social circle and has lead to other success in the following area:

Generally Being Social, a kind of catch-all that reminds me to get out in the world, even if I don't have a specific place to be for any other reason, or plans with any specific person. I will tend to be a homebody and a recluse without any outside pressure. This reminds me to get out to places where other people are, even if I don't interact with them. The benefit is subtle but remarkable. What I was referring to above is that those "out of the blue" touch-base calls have lead to several "Hey, what are you doing for dinner?" or "I'm on my way downtown. Wanna come?" invites, which help fulfill this need nicely.

The Environmental Improvements and Maintenance Area is my response to the fact that I like to live in a clean and neat environment, but I very rarely do the things I need to do to have one.

This area includes my cleaning chores, broken down into things that can be accomplished in 20 minutes or so, along with their frequency. So rather than going four months before I have a breakdown and devote a day to cleaning (with mixed results), I do several individual cleaning chores each week. So far, so good, and I'm not overwhelmed.

In my Creative section, I have tasks to remind me to contribute to some of my favorite outlets (websites or magazines), as well as to attend a regular voice acting class I have (my only datebook based item in my whole tree).

The Consumer section is the novelty here, and it's still in Beta. ;) It contains the activities I would ordinarily use to distract myself from accomplishing other things when I was feeling overwhelmed. These are the places where I would typically run and hide. So, rather than not including them in my Life Balance, I thought I would put them in, but make it difficult for them to reach the top of the list.

I'm still tweaking the balance, but the key is that I've devoted only a tiny sliver to my "Consumer" area, meaning that tasks like "Watch TV" and "Play Videogames" are never very high on the list and, in theory, would only ever become so if I was doing really, really well at keeping on top of everything else. It's a work in progress, but so far, so good.

I have given a lot of "pie" to my life and environment maintenance tasks, because they are the things most-neglected in life, and then slightly less to relationships (it turns out, it doesn't take much effort to keep relationships going-- it just takes ~some~!).

Creative has even less right now, because I still have to get my life in order before I can feel good about being creative. And then, consumer, has the above-mentioned sliver.

Using Life Balance in this way has gone a long way toward circumventing ADD as an obstacle to maintaining and achieving in my life. I may provide an update some time down the road if all
goes well.

As a side note, I also discovered Audible.com (coincidentally, as bundled software with another cell phone), which has allowed me to "read" great and helpful books I would never have a hope of getting even 1/4 through in print.

Take care and good luck!