Productivity Tips #15: Focus On That Which Matters Most
I think I’ve realized why it’s so easy to succumb to the whole getting things done, do stuff for the sake of it attitude. We all want to achieve Big Things in life. We want to feel like it’s all worth it and that at the end of the day we’ve achieved something with our time. But what happens if you don’t have that in your life? Rather than looking for that sense of achievement through quality, we try and achieve it through quantity – replacing a handful of big achievement with lots of small, often irrelevant things.
Rethinking How To Fix Bad Habits
Getting things done, being productive, identifying your big goals and doing something about them regularly… it’s all easy and simple compared to habits. We spend all of our time lamenting how we can’t stop snacking on chocolate, we can’t stop smoking or we can’t stop idly browsing pointless websites and pissing our time away. Unlike a simple little activity or project, you can’t put a habit on your to-do list. You can’t write down “Do not do this habit today” and expect to tick it off at the end of the day. You can’t break it down, clarify it or do any other fancy productivity trick. In short breaking habits is a whole different challenge.
Simplifying Your Life: It’s Time For A Reality Check
Simplifying your life is very popular idea nowadays. It’s been popularized, I think, by people like Tim Ferriss of The 4-Hour Work Week who pushes ideas like the 80/20 rule and the low-information diet, and Leo Babauta of Zen Habits in particular. Simplifying your life is good. No, it’s actually great and I believe everybody should have a go at it just to filter out some of the crap in their lives. Modern life is complicated and hectic enough without us blindly letting in and taking on board everything that comes our way.
Ask The Readers: How Did You Learn GTD?
A simple question today that I hope will get some varied responses. How did you learn GTD (or if you use something else, how did you learn that)? The obvious answer will probably be that you just read the book, but that wasn’t the case for me and I suspect it isn’t the case for many of you guys too. I originally came across GTD via several blogs like Lifehack.org and picked up tips from those for a few months before finally purchasing the book. I applied bits and pieces from the book as I needed them so I suppose you can say I never really had a “full” GTD implementation (the original highlights that I took from the book were contexts, next actions and, er… having a big filing system).
Modern Life Sucks: 4 Ways The Status Quo Is Wrong
The more books I read (Brain Rules, Predictably Irrational and Freakonomics to name a few recent ones) and the more I write on this blog, the more I come across ideas and concepts that go against the conventional advice dished out by businesses, schools and the media in general. This is in some ways alarming. Millions of people are born, grow up and lives their lives based on traditional ideas that are sometimes outdated, occasionally misleading and often contradictory to scientific research and logic. Is it any wonder that we are generally less happy, less well off and often in careers we hate nowadays? Below I’ve detailed four concepts where, when it comes to being productive organized and just generally living stress-free, the world has got it badly wrong. Can you think of any others?