ADHD Strategies: The traffic light strategy for beating task inertia

If you’ve ever struggled with ADHD, depression, or executive dysfunction, you’ll know that once you stop, it can be incredibly hard to start again. You might find yourself waiting for motivation to strike. But that’s the trap!

Motivation is unreliable. It’s like a shy cat: the more you chase it, the more it hides. It rarely shows up when you need it most. Instead of waiting for motivation, what if you focused on momentum instead?

That’s the idea behind the Traffic Light Strategy. A way to keep yourself moving even when your energy or focus is running on empty.

The Core Idea: Swap Your M’s

Stop waiting for motivation. Start building momentum. Momentum doesn’t require perfect energy or clarity, just a small, manageable action that keeps you in motion. Because once you’re moving, even slowly, it’s far easier to stay in motion.

The Traffic Light Strategy

Think of your energy or motivation on any given day as a traffic light:

• 🟢 Green – You’re focused, energised, and capable of handling more complex tasks.

• 🟠 Orange – You’re okay, but not at full capacity. You can manage small or simplified tasks.

• 🔴 Red – You’re running on fumes. The goal is just to maintain the tiniest bit of forward motion — to avoid a full stop.

The trick is to match your tasks to your current “light”, rather than pushing yourself beyond what’s possible.

Here are some examples:

🍽 Eating

• Green day: Cook a meal from scratch.

• Orange day: Throw together something easy like eggs on toast, soup, or a pre-planned quick meal.

• Red day: Order in or heat up something pre-made.

💪 Exercise

• Green day: Go to the gym or do your full workout.

• Orange day: Take a walk around the block.

• Red day: Try bed yoga (yes, it exists!) or stretch while watching TV.

🧹 Cleaning

• Green day: Do a proper clean or declutter.

• Orange day: Tidy one area. Maybe just the dishes or your desk.

• Red day: Move one thing from where it doesn’t belong to where it does.

🎓 Study or Work

• Green day: Deep work session or focus block.

• Orange day: Review notes, reply to emails, or organise your task list.

• Red day: Open your laptop and look at your notes, even if you don’t do much else.

By scaling tasks like this, you keep the habit of doing without relying on motivation to carry you.

Why It Works, and not just for ADHD

This approach takes away the guilt and self-criticism that often come with “not doing enough.” Instead of feeling like you’ve failed because you didn’t hit 100%, you can recognise that you kept momentum, and that’s what really matters.

When motivation finally does show up, you’re not starting from zero; you’re already moving.

So next time you feel stuck, don’t wait for motivation to turn up. Check your “traffic light,” choose a task that matches your energy, and just take the next small step.

Elizabeth Talbot

Clinical Psychologist

B Psych (Hons), M Psych (Clin), MAPS

Elizabeth Talbot is a Clinical Psychologist and the Principal Psychologist at Clinical Therapy. Whilst Elizabeth enjoys her clinical work, she is also a lover of behavioural science and has a keen research interest in the psychology of decision making, moral reasoning, cognitive biases, magical thinking, and conspiratorial beliefs.

Content note: Unless otherwise labelled, all blog posts are intended as discussion pieces, and are not academic texts. Articles pertaining to research or making an academic argument will be labelled as such and include supporting evidence/references. All examples (including client names) are fictitious, to illustrate a point, and are not based on actual clients.