How To Achieve More Every Day Without Needing To Sacrifice Sleep

4 research backed tips to increase productivity and get more done

Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash

Getting more done everyday doesn’t require losing sleep.

It’s about creating systems that help turn your good intentions into decsivie actions. In this article, I’ll review four tips backed by research to help get boost your day-to-day productivity.

#1 — Prioritize difficult tasks with big rewards

A common line of thinking — and one that I held before reading the research — is that the best way to be productive is to prioritize small tasks that you can get done quicky.

Focusing on the quick, easy tasks is particularly tempting when you’re swamped.

While that will boost your short-term productivity, it can actually reduce your long-term productivity — and the entire point of this mini-series is to start thinking in the long-term. Constantly choosing easier tasks can stunt your growth and hurt your performance over time. It’s like always choosing the easy level in a video game; you’ll have fun, but you won’t really improve your skills.

Research from a 2021 paper titled “Deriving Mental Energy From Task Completion” suggests that tackling your most…