8 Habits of People Who Are Consistently Productive
Have you ever sat down at the end of a long day only to look back and realize you got hardly anything done?
There might have been a lot of movement and busyness, but somehow you’ve got zero to show for it…
String enough of those days together and it’s easy to fall behind and off track.
Next thing you know you’re in a rut, wondering why another week (or more) has passed and somehow you’re not any closer to reaching your goals.
I’ve been there.
It’s a shitty feeling.
Thankfully, I’ve found a few key insights that have helped me to take more control of my days and, as a result, consistently get stuff done.
Don’t get me wrong, my intention is not to give you the impression that I adhere perfectly to these habits one hundred percent of the time.
I still have laughably unproductive workdays — my ongoing goal is to make them less frequent.
I’ve noticed that the more I practice the following habits, the more I get done, and the more accomplished I feel at the end of each day.
1. Eat clean.
I don’t know about you, but when I slack with my diet my ambition to do anything of any merit declines fast.
My brain doesn’t want to do a damn thing. Which is oddly convenient because neither does my body.
The solution, of course, is to eat only healthy foods and fuel your body with proper nutrition.
I know everyone has a different definition of what’s “healthy.”
Ask fifty people what it means to eat clean and you’ll likely get fifty different answers.
This is a deep rabbit hole and definitely beyond the scope of this article.
So instead of conclusively telling you what the optimal human diet consists of, I would just encourage you to do your research, test what makes sense to you, use good judgment, and listen to your body.
2. Build your belief systems.
Working toward a lofty goal usually requires a lot of physical and mental energy.
I don’t think that would come as a surprise to most people.
But the intelligence that guides our physiology is not stupid. It isn’t going to let us dump a ton of vital life force into just any fruitless endeavor.
If the benefit is not clear, it’s going to be almost impossible to find the motivation.
We gotta know that the juice will be worth the squeeze.
As Tony Robbins often says:
“All human behavior is belief-driven.”
Invest in building your belief systems by:
- Reading books
- Listening to podcasts
- Growing your skillset
- Learning about your industry
- Examining case studies
- Finding inspiration in the success of others
This will reinforce belief in what you’re doing.
It’ll also build belief in yourself.
When you truly believe that you are capable and that your actions will produce the desired result, putting in the work becomes a natural byproduct.
3. Begin the day intentionally.
There are mornings that I scroll through Facebook or Instagram before I even roll out of bed.
I don’t get shit done on those days.
In the words of Jim Rohn…
“Either you run the day or the day runs you.”
I’ve had enough days run me into the ground to learn he is right.
Something that has helped me to get my days started on the right foot is having a morning routine.
A morning routine is a set of simple habits that will get you into the rhythm of the day.
This is what works for me:
- Wake up early — Getting up even one hour earlier adds seven hours, the equivalent of almost an entire workday, to your week.
- Don’t get on your phone — You just opened your eyes, don’t let the media or your inbox determine the direction or tone of your day.
- Make your bed — I’m not going to lie, this sounded trivial to me at first. But accomplishing this simple task first thing in the morning really does set the pace for the rest of the day.
- Meditate — One major factor in being productive is the ability to be present. Daily meditation and practicing mindfulness has helped me to focus, and I’ve found myself less susceptible to distraction.
- Shower, brush your teeth, and get dressed — Yeah working from home means freedom, but hygiene is still important. It also makes me feel like less of a hermit to pretend I’m getting ready to go somewhere.
- Review your schedule — I used to “plan” my day in real-time, as it’s happening. This didn’t work very well. On the other hand, having a schedule made in advance frees up mental bandwidth to get stuff done instead of trying to figure out what to do. More on that in a moment.
Is this the “best” morning routine?
Who knows…
The point is to create one that works for you.
4. Learn to implement.
I love reading and learning.
It blows my mind that we can open a book or click on a blog post and immediately have access to knowledge and experience that may have taken a lifetime for the author to accumulate.
There is, however, a catch.
Spend too much time consuming the work of others and you’ll have no time to create a masterpiece yourself.
When I first got into personal development and trying to better myself, I would read book after book on any topic that interested me.
I felt like I was learning a ton, but my life was not changing at the same exponential rate.
The problem was that I had fallen into the trap of learning for the sake of learning, not for the sake of doing.
I like the distinction Tim Ferris makes on the subject. I’m paraphrasing here, but he says that there are essentially two types of information:
- Just in case — Recreational and largely a waste of time. The information may be valuable but because it is not used it is not relevant.
- Just in time — Directly relates to what you’re currently working on. Learning in order to implement immediately.
So yes, learn every day.
Just make sure you’re investing your time in learning the right stuff and putting it into practice.
5. Prioritize most important work.
Not all actions are created equally.
With any project or assignment, it’s easy to do a lot without getting anything done.
Some refer to this as busywork.
It might feel like you’re working hard, but if you’re working hard on the wrong things then none of it matters.
Pareto’s law suggests that 80% of the results come from 20% of the effort, and this theory has proven to be quite accurate.
The interesting thing is the opposite is also true.
The other 20% of the results come from 80% of the efforts.
Does it make sense to focus your energy on the 80% of your work that will only produce 20% of your results?
Nah, I don’t think so.
“Work smarter, not harder.”
I’ve found it helpful to sit down at the end of each day and plan my most important work for the next day.
What are the top three most important tasks that will make the biggest difference in moving me toward my goals?
I enter these items into my calendar app for the following day.
This helps me avoid the time-wasting “hmm what should I work on today?” question.
When you wake up in the morning with clearly defined objectives, all of your energy can go toward getting them done rather than figuring out what to do.
6. Remove distraction.
We live in a world that is clambering for our attention.
Every day millions of dollars are dumped into Facebook and Google ads.
It’s estimated that, across all channels and platforms, more than 560 billion dollars are spent on advertising around the globe every year.
Think about it, why are advertisers willing to fork out such ridiculous amounts of money to buy your attention?
It’s because they know how valuable it is.
When it’s time to work:
- Do not multitask — If you’re listening to an audiobook while you’re doing the dishes, that’s cool. But when it comes to creative or detailed work, it requires exclusive focus.
- Stay off social media — Unless you live under a rock you already know how big of a time vacuum social media can be.
- Phone on airplane mode — There’s nothing worse than getting into the flow only to be interrupted by a random notification or phone call. Putting your phone on airplane mode during productive time solves this problem.
- No music — I know some people can listen to music while they work. I’m not one of those people. But if you can jam tunes and still get shit done then forget I mentioned this one.
Your attention is valuable. Don’t just give it away.
7. Work in chunks.
Have you ever done planks?
Yeah, the one where you’re stretched out, on your elbows, holding yourself up off the floor by contracting your abdominal muscles.
Most people set their stopwatch for a couple-ish minutes, get into position, and challenge themselves to hold the plank until the timer goes off.
I don’t know about you, but if I know much time is left on the clock it’s a lot easier to push through and give my best all the way to the end.
For me, the same has proven to be true for working on business stuff, scheduling sales calls, creating content, writing emails, editing articles, and pretty much everything else that I would otherwise procrastinate on.
In his book, The Compound Effect, Darren Hardy refers to this habit of chunking productive time as a power hour.
It essentially means setting a start time and an end time, typically 60–90 minutes long, and going all-in for that span of time.
No distractions.
Just deep, focused work.
When the time is up, take a break. Go outside, grab some food, and let your mind relax.
Then go into your next power hour.
By clearly defining when it’s time to work and when it’s time to relax, you’ll find it to be much easier to do each effectively.
8. Focus on the process, not the result.
Something that took me way too long to learn is that when you’re building something from scratch, especially in the beginning, it’s going to require a lot of hard work with no reward.
The Fresh Prince said it this way:
“You don’t set out to build a wall. You don’t say ‘I’m going to build the biggest, baddest, greatest wall that’s ever been built.’ You don’t start there. You say, ‘I’m going to lay this brick as perfectly as a brick can be laid.’ You do that every single day. And soon you have a wall.”
— Will Smith
I’ve realized that if my only metric for success is whether or not I’ve achieved the end goal, it means I’m focusing too much on things that are entirely or at least partially outside of my control.
What is in my control?
The process.
Take this blog for example:
I can’t control whether or not people will like my writing, but I can control how much time and energy I’m willing to invest in becoming better at the craft.
I can’t control how many readers visit my blog, but I can control how much content I am willing to produce.
I can’t control which articles will be popular and which ones will be left to collect digital dust, but I can control how much effort I’m willing to put into finding out what my readers want from me.
By focusing on the process, the actionable steps you can take, it’ll put you in control of whether or not each day is a success.
Final thoughts
Being productive isn’t a superhuman gift from the gods.
As it turns out, there are methods and tactics available to all of us mortals that we can utilize to make better use of our time.
I hope this article helps you to get more done and maybe even stress a little less.
I’m curious, what would you add to this list?
Do you have some productivity hacks of your own that you’d be willing to share?
Don’t hold out on me, let’s hear ’em!
