How 5 minutes a day can change your productivity
Everyone has the same 24 hours. Its a fact…
Many people have the misconception that the amount of hours they put into a project will directly equal a better outcome. This could not be any further from the truth. It is rather how those precous hours are being spent. The intensity of focus has a big impact on your efficiency.
Work accomplished = time spent * intensity of focus.
This formula implies to maximise your focus in order to minimise your time spent working. One way to approach this is through short high-intensive bursts of work. Usually those bursts should be done during the morning hours. During the morning there are usually fewer distractions and your focus batteries are also at full charge.
How long should a burst take? Well that depends on you! However, generally speaking no more than one hour straight. Studies have shown that about an hour into high intensity work, the focus lets up. This is the time to take a break. A real break, that does not include instagram or any other social media. During this break your brain need to recharge and if you keep it busy it would harm your focus intensity for the next burst.
Choosing the right location for those your high intensive burst is also crucial. Your bed, or your home should not be your go to place for those bursts. Look for locations which are only devoted to work. Doing so will make it easier for you to immediately get focused, as you subconsciously get into a focus state of mind as soon as you enter the location.
How to manage your day
Great time management skills takes time and a lot of practice. WRONG! The only thing you need to manage your time like a boss is a calendar and a piece of paper. That’s it!
Your calendar can either be physical or digital. It doesn’t really matter. The only thing that matters is that you schedule in all the things that you want to accomplish. But, be aware that you definitely should not overload your day with too many tasks. However, your calendar definitely should include the most important tasks. A great scale of importance of a task is the impact that the task will have once its done.
Your list is the place where you gather all the things which come into your mind during the day, which you need to remember. Yet again, it does not matter if you do it digitally or physically. During your day you should not waste any energy on keeping things in your mind. Once they come up, write them down immediately and then you can forget about them.
Example
It is 7:30 a.m. your alarm goes off. Slowly but surely, you get up and do your typical morning routine. Once you’re ready to start your day (8:30 a.m.) you sit down on a table and take out your list and calendar. First, you check the list of all the things you had to remember from the day before. Now that you figured out what you need to do, you take a look at your calendar. It should look empty at first, but now that you have prioritiesed your tasks, you can start filling up your calendar. Of course you schedule all the difficult task, which require a lot of focus, in the morning. Now it is 8:35 a.m. and you’re DONE! Have a nice and productive day.
