How To Restart Your Day with the Next-Five Reset

Have you ever looked at the clock, realized you’re running eight minutes behind schedule, and suddenly your ADHD brain jumps to: “Ugh. I’m already off track — this whole day’s going to be a disaster!”

On the one hand, we intellectually know it’s just eight minutes… but at the same time, those eight minutes seem like such a big deal. One late start, and the brain suddenly slips into — why do I even bother trying to schedule or make a plan? It’s not like I can stick to it anyway.

If that sounds familiar, you’re in the right place.

Today on episode 311 of the I’m Busy Being Awesome podcast, we’re talking about all-or-nothing thinking, why it shows up so strongly when we’re trying to follow a plan, and how a tiny shift — something I call the “Next-Five Reset” — can help us start fresh at any moment.

Let’s get into it.

Listen to the episode above or stream it on your favorite podcasting app. Prefer to read? No problem! Keep scrolling for a summary of the key takeaways.

In Episode 311 You Will Discover:

How to shift out of all-or-nothing thinking when your ADHD brain says you’ve ruined the day by not perfectly following your schedule
Why time management is extra challenging for ADHD brains and how we can support ourselves through it.
How to use ‘The Next Five’ technique to help you restart your day.

Episode 311: How To Restart Your Day with the Next-Five Reset (Transcript)

Today we’re talking about all-or-nothing thinking and how this shows up around planning, schedules, and following said schedules.

I want to start with a quick story — one that used to happen to me all the time when I was still working in academia.

So, I liked to get to the university early — usually sometime between 7:30 and 8:00am. It was the time of day when things were still quiet, and getting there early on allowed me to get settled and start the day with the schedule I’d carefully planned out the night before.

But if you’ve ever driven East on the Mass Pike toward Boston during morning rush hour… you know how unpredictable it can be.

On more than one occasion, I’d hit traffic, roll in a little later, and not get started until maybe 8:07 or 8:08. And my brain would immediately start spinning out.

“I can’t believe I blew the whole day.”
“What a waste of time.”
“You should have known traffic was going to be bad.”
“Now everything’s off — what’s the point of trying to stick to the plan anymore?”

I can laugh at it now — because seven minutes is… seven minutes.

But at the time? It really felt like the entire day was a wash. Like I’d already failed, and now I had to dig myself out of this huge emotional hole before I could even get started.

That’s the intensity of all-or-nothing thinking.

It wasn’t just a late start. It was a late start on top of a fragile sense of being behind. And in that moment, it didn’t just feel like the plan was off track — it felt like I was off track. Like I had already lost control of the whole day, and worse, that it meant something about me.

If your brain works like mine, it might go straight into:

“Here we go again.”
“Why even bother now?”
“This always happens.”
“Ugh, I’m so bad at this.”

We fall into that all-or-nothing spiral so fast, especially with time, routines, or habits.

For so many of us, these plans aren’t simply tasks on a list. They’re so much more than that. We’ve loaded them up with pressure. They represent our attempt at creating some semblance of control, and they’re wrapped up in a lot of meaning.

Why Time Management & Follow Through Is a Challenge

Let’s talk about what our brains think is really at stake when we fall into that all-or-nothing mindset. When we miss the start of our plan or don’t follow it perfectly, it goes deeper than just time management.

For many of us, not following the plan feels like a reflection of who we are – proof that we’re not doing enough or that we’ll never get it together.

I hear these thoughts often from clients:

“Everyone else seems to manage their time just fine. What’s wrong with me?”
“I was finally doing it ‘right’… and now I’ve ruined it.”
“Why even bother?”

While we may not consciously think these exact words, these underlying stories shape our emotions and reactions. The narrative becomes:

If I don’t do it perfectly, it means something terrible about me.
It means I’m not capable or reliable.
It means I don’t deserve respect or understanding from others.

When this emotional weight gets too heavy, our brain flips the switch from “I’m trying” to “I quit.” Not because we don’t care or we’re lazy, but because the shame of imperfection feels too intense. It feels safer to give up than to risk “failing” again.

Introducing the Next-Five Reset

You don’t need a perfect restart. Instead, I want to offer a simple reSET. Here is something to keep in mind…

Plans are just guesses. Sometimes, educated guesses. Sometimes we’re throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. But they’re just guesses.

They’re best-case scenarios. They’re hopes written on paper and they are meant to change.

The goal isn’t to follow a plan perfectly. It’s to use it as a guide or a touch point to come back to as often as you need.

The real skill is learning how to adjust. That’s where the power is. Not in perfection — in the pivot, and one of the simplest ways I’ve found to support that pivot is with something I call the Next-Five Reset.

Here’s how it works…

Let’s say you realize you’ve gone off track. You may have been…

Doom-scrolling
Responding to an email from your boss threw you off track
Stuck in traffic and behind on your plans

Whatever is going on for you that has your brain thinking some version of, “Ugh, the day is ruined,” or “I did it again!”

Instead of trying to reclaim the entire day or rewrite the whole plan, I invite you to…

Look at the clock…
Then pick the next five- or ten-minute mark.

For example:

If it’s 3:36, you reset at 3:40.
If it’s 4:01, you reset at 4:05.
It’s it’s super close like 1:59, maybe you jump to 2:05 so you have a few more minutes.

Give yourself that small reset space you need. That’s it.

This allows your brain the gift of both a clear next starting point AND a little white space to feel your feelings — whether that means sighing dramatically and feeling that frustration, or letting the toddler part of your brain have a tantrum that things aren’t going as initially planned.

Let yourself feel the feelings. Give yourself space to process that emotion, whether it’s disappointment, frustration, annoyance, etc. And then, when the clock hits the reset mark — begin again.

Not with a new plan. Not with a full restart. Just the next step from the little reset.

It seems so small, but I’ve found that kind of external anchor – this next five or next ten reset – helps me feel incredibly sturdy and grounded.

It reminds us:

The day is not ruined.
We’re not behind.
Every minute is a fresh start.
We don’t need a perfect plan — we need a path we can rejoin.
Getting off track is part of the track.

If your brain is spinning in that old story, “I blew it,” try gently offering back: “Actually, I just need a reset point. That’s all.”

You can also remind yourself:

“This isn’t failure — this is feedback.”
“I’m learning how to reset — that’s the skill.”
“Nothing’s gone wrong here.”
“Plans are flexible. I’m allowed to adapt.”

These tiny shifts matter. This is how we change the story.

So if you’re listening to this in real-time, take a look at the clock.

What’s your next-five reset? Or your next-ten reset? Pick that moment.
Let it hold space for your humanity, for your current emotions, and your comeback.
And when the clock hits that mark… begin again.

That’s the shift.

FAQ

Why Is All-Or-Nothing Thinking An ADHD Struggle?

This all-or-nothing thinking hits especially hard for ADHD brains due to a few key traits that tend to amplify the pressure.

1. Our Challenge With time

It’s no secret that most of us have difficulty sensing and understanding time — how long something takes, how much time has passed, or how much is left.

So when we think, “I’m seven minutes late starting my plan,” or “I can’t believe I just wasted 30 minutes down the rabbit hole after lunch,” our brain doesn’t register those moments as small segments within many hours of the day.

Instead, it can seem like the whole window of time - or the whole day - is essentially gone.

It’s a total distortion of time — that seems to be so accurate and real.

2. Perfectionism

Add to that perfectionism, which many of us ADHDers navigate. If you’re like me, you've probably used perfectionism as a coping strategy for years before I knew about my diagnosis.

We try to get everything just right to overcompensate for the times things don’t go right. So when the plan goes even slightly off, it doesn’t just seem like a disruption — it seems like failure. Yet another example of us not having things perfectly together.

3. Rejection Sensitivity

Then throw in a little rejection sensitivity — the intense fear of disappointing others or being seen as unreliable, and now it’s not just “I’m behind,” it’s “People are going to think I can’t handle anything.”

4. Cognitive Flexibility

Underlying much of this all-or-nothing, black or white thinking is the ADHD brain’s struggle with cognitive flexibility.

Cognitive flexibility is one of the executive functions our brain uses to shift gears, see multiple perspectives, and adjust to new information or unexpected changes. It’s the ability to say, “Okay, this didn’t go as planned — what else is possible?”

However, for ADHD brains, that kind of flexible thinking doesn’t always come easily, especially in the moment, when emotions are high or shame is creeping in.

So instead of seeing “the plan is a little off, but we can adjust,” our brain jumps to “this plan is ruined, so now the whole day is ruined.”

It’s easy to lose sight of the nuance. It becomes black or white. Success or failure. All or nothing.

So when you think about our often tense relationship with time, our pressure of perfectionism, the fear of judgment, and challenges with cognitive flexibility, you get a perfect storm for all-or-nothing thinking.

If you’ve been caught in this spiral, that makes total sense. There are so many reasons why our brain slips into this pattern.

What Happens When We “Fall Off Track”

What actually happens after we go off track? When plans don't go as we initially thought?

Well… a lot. We might...

Completely shut down. We buffer with something familiar — maybe it’s scrolling, maybe it’s shopping, maybe it’s disappearing into a video game.
Procrastiwork or we try to “fix it” by remaking the plan. Over and over. I used to do this all the time. I’d spend more energy rewriting the schedule than I ever spent trying to follow it — just to feel like I was doing something to get back in control.
Throw our hands in the air with an “I'm done” energy. We tell ourselves, “Forget this. I do better when I just wing it anyway,” and we try to pretend we didn’t care that much about the plan in the first place.

But deep down? Most of us do care. Otherwise, we wouldn't feel so disregulated in the first place when we initially went off the plan. The truth is, we made that plan with hope. We made it to try and help ourselves.

So when that plan falls apart— even just a couple of minutes— and all-or-nothing thinking sneaks in, it hurts. I've heard from so many ADHD brains who say it feels like they're letting themselves down.

That thought often brings on the full range of emotions:

Shame.
Frustration.
Annoyance.
Helplessness.
That desperate, urgent feeling of “I have to fix this immediately or everything will fall apart.”

It’s not just that the plan got derailed. It’s that our brain tells us we’ve failed. That we can’t trust ourselves. And that story — the one that says we blew it, again — is what often sends us into a full-on spiral.

This is where that all-or-nothing mindset really digs in. Because once the spiral starts, we tend to believe that the onlyway to feel better is to have a perfect “restart.”

Tomorrow.
Monday.
Next month.
Next planner.
Next version of ourselves who finally gets it right.

Next Steps

We’re not aiming for a perfect day, but practicing the art of starting again.

Next time your brain tries to tell you the day is ruined…

Pause.
Take a breath.
Look at the clock.
And remember: you can reset at the next five-minute or 10-minute mark. Not because you “have to get back on track,” But because you can.

You get to keep showing up — not perfectly, but with flexibility. Not with shame, but with choice.

👉 Want to take these concepts further and apply them to your life? Learn more about how we can work together with my small group coaching program, “We’re Busy Being Awesome,” and one-on-one coaching.

✨ Learn my simple step-by-step approach to locking in a routine and making it stick, be sure to check out my free course, the ADHD Routine Revamp.

I’ll talk with you soon.

Links From The Podcast

Learn more about private coaching
Learn more about We’re Busy Being Awesome
Get the top 10 tips to work with your ADHD brain (free ebook!)
Discover my favorite ADHD resources
Get the I’m Busy Being Awesome Planning System
Get the I’m Busy Being Awesome Podcast Roadmap
Take my free course, ADHD Routine Revamp

Paula Engebretson - ADHD Coach and Pdacster

About Paula Engebretson

ADHD COACH | PODCASTER

I spent the first 31 years of my life thinking I just needed to “try harder” while dealing with crushing self-doubt, perfectionism, and imposter syndrome. Then I was diagnosed with ADHD.

Finally understanding the missing puzzle piece, I discovered how to work with my brain, build upon my strengths, and take back control of my life.

Now I help others with ADHD do the same. Learn more.