DAY 24 : 5 BEST PRODUCTIVITY TIPS FROM MY ARSENAL

Reinvent Yourself

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Re-Invent Yourself

7 min readJul 11, 2017

Hey Re-inventors!

This DAY 24 of the 30 DAYS OF DOING THINGS THAT I WAS ‘GONNA’ DO series

Let’s dive into today’s post where I give you the best ways to be more efficient from my productivity arsenal

All I do, through this medium blog, is help you all better the quality of your life and make progress in every area of your life.

That being said, we know that time is the ultimate equalizer. It all boils down to time and everything we do is based on how we think of our time. Anything that saves us time is the best thing and thus companies like Uber and Amazon have succeeded because people not only buy products or rides, they buy time.

As of 2017, there are end number of people who have online businesses and are freelancing and doing stuff that wasn’t considered feasible as few years ago. People are working more than ever and have all the facilities to save them time.

But even now, are we really utilizing the time we have? People love complaining about the fact that they have less time. But you know what, time will always seem less.

The truth is that people never utilize time efficiently even in the age when everything you want is at your fingertips which is much better than our ancestors.

For example, to interact with one person you would have to send them a letter or go to their place but then many people had the telephone and then Facebook and then Whatsapp came to do all that. But what happened was, that instead of using these things to facilitate communication, they started using these things as a distraction.

And so no matter what all services we get, we always find a way to distract ourselves, to kill time, and that’s human nature, even I have done it.

So let’s find out how we can really overcome this and move ahead by being productive:

1. Get up an hour earlier:

After reading this, you may not want to go further in the article and that’s okay; not everyone is able to increase their productivity. This is the hardest part for most people, even the people who naturally are a morning person, like me.

But think of it this way, everyone has 24 hours. Whether it’s Warren Buffet, Bill Gates or you. You cannot change that. But what you can do is audit yourself. If you cannot find the space in the day to do some things that need to be done, just wake up an hour earlier.

If you don’t find time to exercise, the morning is the perfect time to do it. You can also plan the day, get into the right mindset and prepare yourself mentally to take on the day. By doing this you will find yourself more calm instead of rushing through the day by sleeping till the last possible moment.

One thing to remember is that you need to know your limits. Don’t go and start sleeping 4 hours after reading this article. If you can’t cut more hours then it means that you have already adopted this tip. Although everyone requires different amounts of sleep, on a larger note, do not sleep less than 6 hours.

P.S. Don’t worry, rest of the tips are easier than this!

2. De- Clutter:

I have written a whole article on this topic and you can actually declutter your life while reading this article. So grab a notepad and go Declutter your life.

3. Before doing any task, visualise it:

For me momentum is a big thing, I like to keep on going and going. But I also understand myself and my emotional needs. Sometimes this just cannot happen. If I go wild and jump from one task to another I quickly lose my focus.

So what I like to do is before doing any task I visualize myself doing it and completely convince myself that this will be the best use of my time right now.

So if I have to code, I imagine myself coding and solving various problems. When I have to write, I imagine myself sitting at my desk with my laptop, completely focussed and with no disturbance.

When I go to the gym, before every exercise I close my eyes for 10 seconds to imagine myself completing that exercise and gathering all the power in me to do that set.

You will find that by doing this you will procrastinate less and will be able to do your work more efficiently.

4. Realize that your friends and family may be a sudden distraction:

Phone calls from your friends to talk about random shit, requests from family members who ask you to do a favor, going to meet your friend for “just 5 minutes” (that turns out to be 30 minutes), replying to someone’s e-mail for 2 minutes etc are tasks that may act as a sudden distractions.

Now do not get me wrong here. Your family is important and you should always be there for them. But you also have to honor your commitments and your schedule and things that you have planned to do.

I understand that the more close a person is to you, the harder it is to deny their request but you need to communicate and tell the truth somehow. If you don’t, you risk the completion of your tasks and become a “nice” person who just spends their day responding to other people’s request.

5. Prioritise the things that will move the needle ahead:

Many a times, we prioritise the easy stuff. You look at your list and then you start doing the small stuff thinking that you will gain some traction and then you can go on to the bigger stuff. But the truth is, that the more you go ahead into your day, the more difficult it is to do those huge and important tasks. You do not have unlimited energy and unlimited willpower. You have to deploy your energy to things that will contribute most to your results.

Doing one or two huge tasks in a day will make you feel more productive than doing 10 small things. Also, I tend to save those small tasks so that I can work upon them later when I am tired or to do them during my commute. This way you can utilize tiny bits of time that are lost here and there.

ONE EXTRA TIP:

Break the pattern:

Sitting at the same desk everyday or drinking the same beverage everyday may get you bored. If possible, go and work in the coffee shops or if you work from home then you have unlimited options.

In my room, I work on the sofa, on my desk, on my sister’s desk on my bed on the floor, below the table and what not! This was just one room. I can work at so many places if I explore my whole house!

If you work in sunlight every morning then try working in the dark or vice versa. Just find ways to break the pattern! I do it everyday and you can try it too!

Coming on to why I started this series,

MY DAY

5:30 : Wake up
5:35 : Work
7:05 to 7:25 : Help everyone(Mom, Dad, Sister) leave for work and shool
7:25 to 10:10 : Work
10:15 : Work
11:10 : 11:25 : Take a shower
12:30 to 12:45 : Break
12:45 to 1:35 : Work
1:35 : Lunch
2:00 : Work
3:45 : Gym
5:40 : Back from the gym
6:00 : Work
6:30 : Shower
6:45 : Work
9:00 : Dinner
9:57 : Sleep

My day may not be the kind of day that everyone likes. There is nothing “Fun” for other people to see here. It’s just the day of a kid who’s trying to suck the juice out of every second. But at least, someone who is reading this can see that I am working to achieve something and not living the leisure life like most of my friends are.

So this was DAY 24. Hope you guys liked it!