Dopamine menu: what it is, and a shorter one
Quiet Wall ·
A dopamine menu is a list of things to reach for instead of the phone. Where the idea comes from, how to write one, and the item most menus leave out.
What a dopamine menu is
A dopamine menu is a written list of things you enjoy, laid out like a restaurant menu, to pick from when you would otherwise reach for the phone. Choosing from a list is easier than thinking of something in the moment, when the phone is the easiest thing to think of.
Despite the name, it is not a way of managing dopamine. It is a list. The name is a nickname for things that feel good.
Where the idea comes from
The idea comes from the ADHD coach Eric Tivers, and reached a wide audience in 2020 through a video on Jessica McCabe's How to ADHD channel in which he appears and calls it a dopa-menu. It spread again on social media around 2023, and has been covered since by The Conversation and CNN.
It started in ADHD communities, but the problem it answers is everyone's: a free minute, and a phone in reach.
How a menu is laid out
Most versions sort the list into courses, roughly like this:
- starters: quick things, a few minutes long, such as a song, a stretch, a glass of water, a look out of the window
- mains: longer things that take some attention, such as a walk, cooking or a hobby
- sides: things that make a dull task easier, such as music while washing up
- desserts: things you enjoy but tend to overdo, such as a series or a game; on the menu, but not what you order first
- specials: rare things worth planning, such as a concert or a day out
How to write your own
- write down things you actually enjoy, not things you think you should enjoy
- keep the starters short enough to do in five minutes, because that is the size of most gaps
- put the menu somewhere you will see it at the moment you would pick up the phone
- cross off what never gets ordered, and add what does
The item most menus leave out
Nothing. Every course on a dopamine menu is still something to do, and that is fine for most of the day. But one starter is worth adding to any menu: ten minutes with nothing in them at all. No phone, no music, nothing to look at. It is the only item that leaves the gap as a gap instead of filling it with something better.
Quiet Wall is that item on a timer. A reminder arrives, the phone goes across the room, and you look at a blank wall until a sound brings you back.
If you have ADHD
The menu is a tool for the moments in between, not a treatment. If ADHD is getting in the way of ordinary days, a doctor is the right person to talk to, and nothing on a list replaces that.
What is a dopamine menu?
A written list of things you enjoy, sorted like a restaurant menu, to pick from when you would otherwise reach for the phone.
What should be on a dopamine menu?
Things you actually like and can do quickly: a walk, a song, a cup of tea, a call. It helps to include one item that is nothing at all.
Read on
- How to do nothing, on purpose — Doing nothing is harder than it sounds. What it means to do it on purpose, where the idea comes from, and how to start with ten minutes and a wall.