We all have habits and behaviors that get in the way of being productive. Earlier in the week I wrote about getting back to GTD basics though to achieve that involves facing up to some of the hurdles in your path that caused you to neglect those basics in the first place. On Wednesday I revisited the vertical map. One of the reasons I dropped the ball with it in the past was because I got overly fussy about making sure everything connected up. I sometimes have to overcome the need to over-analyze everything and make it all just right.
One other odd little quirk of mine is that if I have a lot of time on my hands I actually become less efficient. On a workday, I’m typically on top form, working my way through what I need to do with this blog, my writing and around the home despite the lack of time. However, when it comes to the weekend and I have all day to myself, I suppose the pressure to make the most of it actually gets in the way.
These are some of my productivity hurdles, now it’s over to you guys. What are your hurdles? What causes you to grind to a halt? When you need to get things done, what makes it all twice as hard? I look foward to reading your responses!
January 9, 2009 at 06:07PM
I also stumble when I have lots of time on my hands. I was fine a couple of years ago when I was working in the evenings as that put a definitive time constraint on my days. Right now, my biggest hurdles are getting back into the flow after the holidays (I’ve had two weeks off) and also getting started on challenging projects, or those for which I know that criticism is inevitable. I’m a grad student and almost all my work is up for some form of criticism!
January 9, 2009 at 06:40PM
I’m easily distracted, so I find that if I work for too long without a physical walkaround break I end up surfing the web and finding something pseudo-useful to look at. Later I feel as if I’ve been working hard and being highly productive, when in fact a lot of my time has been spent on stuff unrelated to my big goals. To counter this I force myself to take thirty minute breaks where I get up and make a cup of tea or just walk around for a bit. It helps get me thinking again, and puts me back on track.
January 9, 2009 at 07:34PM
My common productivity hurdles include a negative mental attitude inspires ongoing inaction, lack of goal envisioning which prevents the imagination of the desired future, lack of understanding of my own self-worth: listening to the opinions of others, not maintaining a positive mental voice means excessive and unwarranted self-criticism, not rebounding after a defeat, forgetting to count my blessings daily, not building on strengths, not building self-confidence and not being progressive which helps to make old feelings and habits difficult to change.
January 9, 2009 at 08:39PM
Good comments, thanks all. That’s a powerful list, Rob.
Geri, some of the problems I have with holidays – and I guess this times into my own hurdle of having too much time – is it messes up my routine. But if I’m laying back on a sun lounger it suddenly stops being an issue…
Sounds like you have an healthy setup there Ian. Breaks are very useful, that’s why I split up all my work into small, bitesize chunks. It means I can take a nice breather between each workload.