{ "presentation": "complete-card", "format_version": 3, "overview": "A dopamine menu is a personal list of enjoyable activities to choose from when a break or a change of pace would help. It gives you ready options, without promising that every choice will improve your mood or motivation.", "overview_sources": "Mayo Clinic · 2025", "overview_source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-mayo" ], "sections": [ { "role": "explanation", "title": "Building and using a dopamine menu", "items": [ { "label": "Organize enjoyable options by the kind of break they fit.", "text": "A notebook or phone note can hold music, reading, cooking, a creative hobby or time with a friend. The menu names help organize those choices: appetizers are brief activities such as making tea; entrées take longer, such as a hobby; sides accompany something else, such as music while working. Desserts, including scrolling, can absorb more time than intended, while specials are occasional plans such as a concert. Interests and available energy shape the entries.", "source": "UBC Science · 2025", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-ubc" ] }, { "label": "Choose for the break you have.", "text": "A song, a short walk or petting an animal can provide a brief change of activity. When the purpose is a work break, an optional timer can mark when to return; the menu itself is not the work schedule.", "source": "Mayo Clinic · 2025", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-mayo" ] } ], "layout": "prose" }, { "role": "benefits", "title": "Potential benefits", "items": [ { "label": "Less deciding in the moment.", "text": "Having appealing options written down may make choosing a break easier when inventing an activity feels like another task.", "source": "UBC Science · 2025", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-ubc" ] }, { "label": "A change of pace when work feels stuck.", "text": "An enjoyable pause may make returning to a difficult task feel more approachable. This is the aim described in the guidance, not a guaranteed result.", "source": "Mayo Clinic · 2025", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-mayo" ] } ] }, { "role": "cautions", "title": "Good to know", "items": [ { "label": "Keep the list optional.", "text": "There is no need to finish every category or copy someone else's hobbies. A menu offers choices; turning every entry into an obligation changes its purpose.", "source": "UBC Science · 2025", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-ubc" ] }, { "label": "The name is not a dopamine test or reset.", "text": "The list cannot tell you whether you have a chemical deficiency. Dopamine helps with reward and motivation, but avoiding enjoyable activities does not replenish an emptied supply. A menu is not a way to reset dopamine.", "source": "Harvard Health · 2020", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-harvard" ] } ] }, { "role": "community", "title": "From community discussion", "items": [ { "label": "Making use of an unexpected free hour.", "text": "A parent in r/adhdwomen said rare time alone could disappear into indecision and scrolling. Their menu helped them pick an activity they already loved. The same poster also described days when they returned to scrolling; the list was reusable, not a perfect routine.", "source": "Community · Reddit/r/adhdwomen", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-reddit-free-hour" ] }, { "label": "Small menus take several forms.", "text": "Accounts describe easy, medium and stretch columns with roughly 3–7 choices each, or just six lines: three easy and three medium. Some spent 10–20 minutes on a first draft. Tea, a shower, a walk and texting a friend appear as examples; these are personal formats, not required amounts.", "source": "Community", "provenance": "preserved-community-record" }, { "label": "Enjoyment can be online or off.", "text": "Commenters named pets, cooking and singing alongside Duolingo lessons and helpful Reddit replies. Another described enjoying a Reddit streak while regretting being awake on the phone after midnight. Their accounts distinguish a chosen pleasure from time spent online that they later wished they had used differently.", "source": "Community · Reddit/r/adhdwomen", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-reddit-activities" ] }, { "label": "A small pleasure sometimes helped with the next step.", "text": "People describe feeling tired and restless after a long scroll, then finding that making tea made another activity feel possible. Others reported less back-and-forth between the phone and their list.", "source": "Community", "provenance": "preserved-community-record" }, { "label": "A menu can start to feel like rules.", "text": "One poster enjoyed designing a restaurant-style menu with numerical targets, then found those targets made it unappealing to follow. A different commenter said they made a menu and forgot it existed.", "source": "Community · Reddit/r/adhdwomen", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-reddit-rules" ] }, { "label": "Visibility matters more than buying a template.", "text": "Accounts mention fridge or desk paper, a notes app, and a lock-screen photo; a three-line phone list was one backup when paper disappeared. Some left scrolling off the menu or kept it as a limited fallback. Others decorated a file they never reopened.", "source": "Community", "provenance": "preserved-community-record" }, { "label": "Office options need to fit the actual office.", "text": "A desk worker said outdoor walks were unavailable and podcasts had become background noise. A reply suggested a paper crossword, drawing or looking through an art book; that commenter said a five-minute break before work sometimes helped. The original poster did not report trying those suggestions.", "source": "Community · Reddit/r/adhdwomen", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-reddit-work" ] }, { "label": "Timers and tiny starts are optional additions.", "text": "Some accounts use a 10–25-minute timer for one activity. Others include a two-minute start, such as opening a document or putting on shoes, or a booked body-doubling call with someone present while work begins. People use these additions for breaks or getting started; none is required for leisure.", "source": "Community", "provenance": "preserved-community-record" }, { "label": "Having hobby materials ready can make a choice usable.", "text": "An International Bipolar Foundation blogger kept a complete cross-stitch kit in a bag inside their backpack, ready for spare moments. This was their personal adaptation of the How to ADHD menu discussed with Eric Tivers: reduce the setup between seeing an option and doing it.", "source": "Community · International Bipolar Foundation blog", "source_ids": [ "self15b4-dopamine-menu-ibpf-kit" ] }, { "label": "Changing a few entries can be enough.", "text": "Accounts describe noticing after a few days or a week which choices were enjoyable. A move, job change or season could prompt replacements; some kept one card for a year and changed only a couple of lines. They tracked what they used, not a dopamine score.", "source": "Community", "provenance": "preserved-community-record" } ], "groups": [ { "title": "Choosing something enjoyable in an ordinary day", "item_indices": [ 0, 1, 2, 3 ] }, { "title": "Making options visible and usable", "item_indices": [ 5, 6, 8 ] }, { "title": "Keeping the menu flexible", "item_indices": [ 4, 7, 9 ] } ] } ], "related": [ "phone-limits", "planned-rest", "hands-busy", "two-minute-start", "body-doubling", "visual-timer" ] }