I’ve got ADHD. My brain gets bored easily. And who could blame it? Until the side business takes off, I have to shovel metaphorical crap to pay for all that caffene and Ritalin. Don’t get me wrong, I like my job as a programmer. But at the end of the day I’d rather be inventing businesses than code-jockeying.

Inevitably even at jobs we love, our brains will get fatigued and our minds will wander. Such is life. I’ve experimented with a fun feature of the Mac that helps me wake it up a bit.

OSX for the Mac can change your desktop wallpaper to a different photo every minute, 5 minutes, or another interval you select. By supplying vivid, rich photos you can  use color and animation to help avoid falling asleep at the wheel.

Before you try this out, be warned that it could potentially have the opposite effect. Try it for a few days. If you find that this distracts you, drop it.

Steps:

  1. Go to http://interfacelift.com or a similar site. Download 10 or so pics that you find stimulating.
  2. On your Mac, go to System Preferences -> Desktop & Screen Saver -> Desktop tab.
  3. On the left, choose the directory you downloaded your images to.
  4. Check the “Change Picture” Checkbox and select how often you want the background to change. I set it to “Every minute,” but if this distracts you, try “Every 5 minutes” or longer.

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