Your focus companion can be a person, a pet or a playlist
Anything that makes you feel accompanied can help you settle.
The short version: try one today
- Work near a pet or a housemate.
- Use ambient café or rain sounds.
- Try a live stream of someone working.
Nobody around to work with? Priori has body doubling sessions built in. (We make it. It's free to download.)
Some days there is nobody to call. Your flatmates are out, your study friend has a shift, and the quiet in your room is so loud that you check your phone just to hear something. An ADHD focus companion fills that gap, and it does not have to be a person.
Anything that makes you feel accompanied can help you settle. A sleeping cat. Rain sounds. A stranger on a screen working through her own reading list. The bar is lower than you think.
Why feeling accompanied helps
Lots of people with ADHD find total silence and total solitude oddly hard to work in. One common explanation is that an under-stimulated brain goes looking for input, and if the task does not supply it, your phone will. A steady, gentle presence in the background is thought to take the edge off that search.
It is the same idea as parallel play, where two people do separate things side by side. The research here is still early, so treat all of this as an experiment. You are looking for whatever makes sitting down feel less lonely.
People and pets
A housemate cooking in the next room counts. So does one watching something with headphones in while you answer emails on the sofa. You do not need to announce a focus session. Just move your laptop to where the life is.
Pets are excellent at this. A cat asleep on the bed or a dog snoring under the desk is calm, present and has no opinions about your essay. Some people find their breathing slows down just from having an animal nearby.
They are also chaos agents. If the cat is walking across your keyboard or the dog needs out, that is a break, and you can take it as one. Settle them first and start once they are dozing.
Sound as company
Ambient sound gives a room the feeling of other people without the people. Café noise, rain, a train carriage, a crackling fire. Search any of these and you will find hours of it for free.
- Pick sounds without words. Lyrics and conversation compete with reading and writing.
- Keep the volume low, closer to a background hum than a soundtrack.
- Use the same sound each time for the same kind of task. After a while, hearing it becomes a cue that work is starting.
- If you share a wall with a noisy flatmate, steady rain through headphones also covers the sound of her phone calls.
If sound makes you jittery instead of calm, switch it off. Some ADHD brains want more input and some want less, and yours may change depending on the day or how well you slept.
Matching an ADHD focus companion to the task
A live stream or video of someone working is the closest thing to a person when no person is free. You see them at a desk, turning pages, and something in you copies it. Study with me videos work on this principle. Choose one with a plain setup and no talking, and put it on a second screen or your propped-up phone.
Watch out for streams with a busy live chat. Reading strangers' messages is not studying, however studious it feels. Hide the chat or pick a recording.
Different tasks suit different company. For heavy reading, try a silent stream or rain. For replying to texts and rent emails, a housemate in the room is plenty. For folding laundry, anything goes, including the loudest playlist you own.
A companion gets you settled. It will not do the task, and on some days nothing settles you. If you have tried the cat, the rain and the stream and you are still stuck, the task is probably too big or too vague. Cut it down to one small step and try again with company.
Quick questions
Can a pet help with ADHD focus?
Many people say a calm pet nearby helps them feel accompanied and settle into a task. It depends on the animal and the moment, so it works best once your pet is fed, exercised and resting.
What sounds are best for focusing with ADHD?
There is no single best sound, and research is still early. Many people prefer steady background sounds without words, such as rain or café noise, at a low volume. Try a few and keep whichever one makes it easier for you to stay put.