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Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Treatment and medication
A forty five minute block asks you to get settled in one place and then somehow carry that into the afternoon, and the carrying is exactly what tends not to happen. Hanging a brief pause on things you already do, before you open the laptop, at the front door, after the prayer, keeps the practice close to the moments it might change. It also stands a far better chance of surviving a bad week.
This explains how treatments work. Never start, stop or change a medication because of something you read here.
So keep up the prayer, give the prescribed alms, and seek refuge in God (Quran 22:78). The pattern is small returns spread through the day, which is also how a habit of noticing gets built.
الحج
وَجَٰهِدُواْ فِي ٱللَّهِ حَقَّ جِهَادِهِۦۚ هُوَ ٱجۡتَبَىٰكُمۡ وَمَا جَعَلَ عَلَيۡكُمۡ فِي ٱلدِّينِ مِنۡ حَرَجࣲۚ مِّلَّةَ أَبِيكُمۡ إِبۡرَٰهِيمَۚ هُوَ سَمَّىٰكُمُ ٱلۡمُسۡلِمِينَ مِن قَبۡلُ وَفِي هَٰذَا لِيَكُونَ ٱلرَّسُولُ شَهِيدًا عَلَيۡكُمۡ وَتَكُونُواْ شُهَدَآءَ عَلَى ٱلنَّاسِۚ فَأَقِيمُواْ ٱلصَّلَوٰةَ وَءَاتُواْ ٱلزَّكَوٰةَ وَٱعۡتَصِمُواْ بِٱللَّهِ هُوَ مَوۡلَىٰكُمۡۖ فَنِعۡمَ ٱلۡمَوۡلَىٰ وَنِعۡمَ ٱلنَّصِيرُ
Strive hard for God as is His due: He has chosen you and placed no hardship in your religion, the faith of your forefather Abraham. God has called you Muslims––both in the past and in this [message]––so that the Messenger can bear witness about you and so that you can bear witness about other people. So keep up the prayer, give the prescribed alms, and seek refuge in God: He is your protector––an excellent protector and an excellent helper
Qur’an 22:78read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A multicentre single blind randomised trial tested mindfulness based cognitive therapy added to treatment as usual in adults with ADHD, against treatment as usual on its own. So the format actually tested was a structured course rather than the scattered version described here, and the comparison was with usual care rather than another active therapy. It gives decent ground for trying mindfulness and very little for arguing about how it should be spaced.
Janssen L, Kan CC, Carpentier PJ, Sizoo B, Hepark S, Schellekens MPJ, Donders ART, Buitelaar JK, Speckens AEM. (2019). Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy v. treatment as usual in adults with ADHD: a multicentre, single-blind, randomised controlled trial.. Psychological medicine doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
A practice kept inside your day is still there when the day goes wrong.
The trouble now is not that nothing works. It is that the things which work are spread unevenly, and whether a family gets any of them depends heavily on where they happen to live.
People who are sleeping properly, eating properly and moving a bit tend to want each other more. The unglamorous parts of life management run closer to the bedroom than either of you might expect.
The diet evidence has drifted away from cutting particular things out and towards eating decently overall. That is easier on everyone at the table.