Tim Ferris & Mo Gawdat taught me how to be a zen productivity master
I have a lot that I want to get done, I always do, I'm forever daydreaming away about all the things I wish I could do. I convince myself that one day in the future there'll be this epic, heroic version of myself who's an absolute boss at getting things done and, that has generally just about been enough to help me sleep at night. My head and heart are in the right place, Rome wasn't built in a day, well done Tom *pats own back* you'll get there one day.
At the start of this year, I set myself four broad goals, one of which was to 'get shit done' in response to my all too obvious and recurring weakness of procrastination. It's set me off on quite a journey this past four months where I've been continually reviewing and iterating on my productivity methods and results almost every week. What have I discovered so far? I've discovered that I'm really not very productive, I'm very easily distracted, I get overwhelmed with high task volume and spend way too much time organising my to do's in order to deal with the overwhelm rather than actioning them.
I turned to David Allen's 'Getting Things Done' methodology to bring a trusted system to my workflow once and for all. Its been pretty awesome, but it turns out a trusted system to follow doesn't equal actual productivity. I still float around the day in and out of procrastination, and generally, always end the day having not got much done. I know exactly what I haven't got done, and what I need to do thanks to GTD, however, I seem to find myself constantly topping up the GTD inbox at a 10x rate vs ticking off completions.
So now with a new project insight, I turned to the trusty ol' Mr Ferris to give me some insight, what follows is the breakdown of his advice from the podcast I listened to* tailored for me with an additional sprinkle of some close matching behaviour I learned from a podcast with Mo Gawdat* over the weekend.
Do not think in terms of efficiency (doing lots of things quickly). Think efficacy.. doing the right things.
"Hard work doesn't solve impotent goals and unclear priorities, it magnifies them."
- Each morning wake up early and sit down with a hot drink, a pen, and paper giving yourself at least an hour before you need to be at your computer.
- Go through Mo Gawdat's "listen to Becky" exercise, and at the end of the process try to identify the top 3-5 things/issues/tasks causing the most angst or discomfort. Most important usually means most uncomfortable; those things that you keep punting down the to-do list day after day, usually because they involve some type of exposure, rejection, or conflict.
- Of each of these, ask yourself; if this were the only thing I accomplished today would I be satisfied with my day? And also, will accomplishing this be a force multiplier and remove/ease other to-dos? If yes.. proceed.
- Now set aside your most productive time slot for the day to accomplishing ONE OF THESE THINGS ONLY. Make sure it's a single block of time, cobbling together a bit of time here and there does not work! You can't afford the distraction as you need to get into a flow state.
What you do is more important than how you do it, and doing something well does not make it important.
Being busy is a form of laziness; lazy thinking and indiscriminate action.
Being busy is often a guise for avoiding the few critically important but uncomfortable actions.
- If you get distracted or begin to procrastinate.. don't freak out. Much like meditation just gently bring yourself back to the task.
- If you have 10 important things to do in a day, its highly likely nothing will get done that day.
- If you can manage to resist your impulsive behaviours and focus on a task for two hours you're seriously in the top top 5% of performers. (You could track how you do and work on training your ability here).
“The moment that you feel that, just possibly, you’re walking down the street naked, exposing too much of your heart and your mind and what exists on the inside, showing too much of yourself. That’s the moment you may be starting to get it right.”
That's it.. just four steps each morning and ensuring you spend your limited focused resource on doing the right thing. A single right thing each day. I can handle this, and it will likely exponentially increase my external productivity and professional progress. Mainly as I am such a regular "busy" offender.
How to optimise my day to coincide with my 6 daily states.
When thinking about how to add this single undistracted, focused period of time into my day it got me thinking about the different states I go through each day, and how I might be able to further optimise my days to work with those states. I came up with the following:
In order of productivity:
1. Flow*edited* state
This is using that finite resource of productive focus that I intend to use as above to complete one important task each day.
Best planned into a specific slot in my diary where there will be no distractions, turn of messengers, aeroplane mode on the phone, and close down the email window.
2. Process state
This is pretty much the rest of the day where I'm neither in a flow or in a state of procrastination/relaxation. It's a state where I'm semi focused and can get through multiple tasks that do not require much creative thinking.
This GTD prime time and is best approached in Sprints of 20 - 40 minutes with short breaks in between and is also a good time to use the standing desk.
3. Monkey State
So this is the familiar impulsive procrastinating state I often find myself in throughout the day. I can be daydreaming about all sorts of things, talking endlessly with someone, surfing the internet, thinking about food, women, booze & fags etc. Basically, anything but work and it usually rears its head when I am trying to get things done.
The task here is to recognise and then train the monkey brain. Give it some controlled time and space to run wild for a while until it wears itself out and you can get back to work.
4. Robot state
This is essentially the state of mind that is carrying out daily habits. Exercise, shower, brushing teeth, preparing food, daily/weekly PPP etc. It's crucial to get important repeatable tasks that you want to build on gradually out of the processing state and into the Robot state.
5. Joy state
This is dedicated time to switch off from all work and to-dos to consciously enjoy an activity. It could be socializing, reading, painting, playing the guitar etc.
6. Passive state
I had to add this state in as it's essentially a guilty pleasure for me.. it's the veg state. Switch the brain off, and watch Netflix or something like that.
Lastly, as I will be focusing on how to make the best of, and how to extend my flow state I thought I'd try to list some regular actions/environments that make achieving a focused state easier.
Getting into flow..
- Headphones (even if silent and just numbing one of my senses to promote concentration)
- Flip the sand timer or twist the Pomodoro just start
- Turn off all distractions (phone, email, messengers etc.)
- Electronic or classical music playlists
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