Most Actionable Subtask (or, How I Fold Laundry)

03 Feb 2022 . category: . Comments

I don’t like folding laundry. There, I said it.

I recognize this isn’t particualrly revelatory. Most people don’t like folding laundry. It’s tiresome, it’s tedious, and when you have ADD like I do, folding the laundry for a family of four quickly feels like an insurmountable problem. Don’t ask me how, but I swear there’s a couple hundred onesies in that laundry basket. Laundry used to take me forever to fold simply because I found the size of the task daunting and it took a ton of effort to stay focused and fold/sort onesies, socks, pants, shirts, etc. for four different people.

Then I learned about radix sort. The radix sort is fascinating because it’s a non-comparitive sort. That is to say, unlike bubble or insertion sort, a radix sort algorithm never needs to compare two values directly. Instead, it sorts the data into buckets, starting with the least significant digit and ending with the most significant digit. The cool thing about radix sort is that at any given point, you’re considering a subset of the problem. Additionally, because it’s non-comparative, you only need to consider one item at a time.

This is an important facet of folks with ADD. Large problems drive us to distraction. Without a plan of attack our brains try to take us someplace else, where the thinking comes easier. When I’m grappling with a large problem, it can sometimes feel like I’m walking my dog while he’s tugging at his leash, barking at something across the street. I’m able to make progress, but it takes so much effort just to stay the course. A winning strategy for me is to identify the most actionable subtask in a huge project.

Let’s say that I’m trying to get my car ready for a long trip. Here’s how the conversation might play out.

Vishal: We need to get the car ready for the roadtrip. 
Vishal's Brain: Nah, that's a lot. Hey, let's think about Encanto instead. *singing* We don't talk about Bruno...
V: Seriously. What do we need to get ready for the roadtrip?
VB: Fiiine. Well, we need to deal with the tires, the fluids, gas, the interior, the trunk...
V: Ok, which of those things is the easiest to work on first?
VB: Well, your tires are pretty new and they just got rotated.
V: Groovy. What do I need to do then?
VB: Check the tire pressure and inflate tires. There's a gauge in the car and your compressor is in the garage.

As I keep attacking the most actionable thing I can think of, something funny happens. I build up momentum. One task completed, turns into three, then ten, then we’re done! And then we can go back to…um, not talking about Bruno.

The most actionable subtask strategy works great for laundry too!

1. Split the clothes into 2 piles: adults and kids. Put the bigger pile (it’s always the kids’ clothes) back into the basket.
2. Split the pile into clothes for each person. Put the bigger pile aside.
3. Sort the pile into articles of clothing, then fold them.
4. Repeat step 3 for the bigger pile from step 2.
5. Repeat steps 2-4 for the bigger pile from step 1.

This approach can seem inefficient because of how many passes I need to make (my wife finds it mystifying). It also can take up a ton of space, because you end up with multiple piles pretty quickly. But, it seems to work for me, because splitting the clothes into piles makes the work in front of me smaller. And as I get more people’s clothes sorted and folded, I feel more ready to tackle the bigger piles that come my way. It’s a little bit silly, and I can’t say it’s for everyone, but this scheme makes it way easier for me to do my family’s laundry.

Part of living with ADD is realizing that your brain behaves in specific ways, and accepting that. I knew for years that I was glacially slow at folding laundry, and it’d be a point of frustration for me. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t just learn to fold the laundry one item at a time the way others do. I ultimately needed to realize that I didn’t need to fold the laundry like everyone else–I just needed to fold the laundry. Breaking down a task into teeny tiny subtasks and picking the most actionable one is a great way to get your focus up, get some wins, and earn a sense of accomplishment–all things that ADDers like me can’t take for granted.

Vishal Kotcherlakota is a reformed sysadmin, who writes code and will talk incessantly about DevOps to anyone who will listen. All views expressed here are his and not those of his employers.