1. Don’t round up when allotting time.
Every minute should be maximized during your day. Productive people value their time and rarely waste it.
This sounds scary, but it’s more simple than it may seem.
*Take this one with a grain of salt. Rest is necessary in order to be productive.
For example, many people would say okay, it’s 3:02. I’ll start my work at 3:30. This illogical roundup, to start your work at an hour or a half-hour, is illogical and a tendency of procrastinators.
But, time isn’t a structure that we have to abide by. Make time work to your advantage. Start your work now, if you have the energy.
Use all your minutes, and find yourself craving out so much extra time in the day.
Finish earlier, and before you know it, you’ll have accomplished all your major tasks at the beginning of the day, leaving the rest for rest, or getting started early on tomorrow’s work.
This way, you lighten your load and your stress. Keep this habit rolling, and soon you’ll be in a highly productive workflow with extra time for hobbies, side projects, etc.
This same principle also goes towards any long-term projects you have. Work on it for a mere 20 minutes a day. Fill in all the minutes with daily habits that lead you to greater goals.
20 minutes a day is nothing. Over time, it’ll become something great.
2. Problems are puzzles
Actively changing your mindset in life is probably the most important way you can start taking small, but impactful steps towards being a more productive, happy human.
I pretended to be eager to do work, eager to learn and solve problems. Until one day, I actually found myself enjoying work.
One of the most important things is changing the way in which you view adversities.
Problems I came across while working on independent homework, especially in more challenging classes like Calculus or Physics class, I began viewing as fun puzzles to solve. This enhanced my critical thinking and creative thinking skills immensely.
But you can apply this same strategy towards life as well. You will never stop having problems, or road bumps in life.
But the good news is: most adversities have some form of solution. It just takes a little bit of analyzing, pinpointing, and methodical action.
This also will help you fight your procrastination. Oftentimes, procrastination is a subconscious fear of failure, not laziness. Being eager to problem solve, learn, and embrace mistakes will make the biggest impact on your productivity.