In last couple weeks I’ve noticed a growing frustration with my productivity system and the little progress that I’ve been making at work. Things began to pile up and although no deadlines were missed I was not happy with the way things were going.

Obviously, I was looking who’s at fault and it appears that it was me (surprise). There are many reasons for this dissatisfaction and things didn’t move the way I wanted. One can be the fact that the tasks that I had to do were not that interesting. I had no incentive to make the effort and complete them except that regardless of when and how I would have to do them anyway.

In order to overcome this I jumped on the internet and visited many of my favourite sites for words of inspiration, understanding and hopefully solutions.

I’ve found many fixes but they are not easy. Well, they are easy in way they work but it takes some time and effort to see the results. This can be painful (mentally) and not less frustrating than the uncompleted tasks (and I wanted result now!). I’ve spend some time doing the research and there were three things that really clicked with me. Now, they appear so obvious solution that it’s almost embarrassing to admit that I didn’t use them earlier.
It seems like we are bound to understand things in own time. Anyway here are the three lessons.

Daily planning

This comes as classic time management technique. Basically at the end of the day I spend 15-30 minutes to plan my most important actions and projects for the next day. Although it’s seems like a simple solution completing this on a daily basis requires some will power. It also requires you to focus on the stuff that you "have" to do or you have committed to do. In some cases this may not be an easy thing to look at especially if you’re not a fan of your work.                

Observations
Slight improvement in the number of tasks completed.
Definite surge in effectiveness of work. I can shape most of the day in a way I want.
Less stress and pressure form the fact that you have not completed anything meaningful.
Little more frustration with interruptions – this is slight contradiction to the above but interruption put stop to carefully laid plans. In most cases you need to "defend" your self form others and their requests until your happy with the progress of the day.

Focus

Deliberately focus on a single task/action and try to avoid interruptions. Try to firewall from all possible distractions and don’t allow yourself to look at other things until the task at hand is finished. In many cases this was surprisingly easy but there are time when it’s really difficult especially if the task is boring and feels like a total loss of time.

Observations
Noticed greater ease in completing tasks which were mundane and boring – didn’t work every time though.
Deliberate practice – "hold on there" type of thing – is necessary to switch off mind and internal voice that’s distracting you.
Time really flies when you get into the right zone

Breaks

My brain works in cycles, yours probably too. So it has a peak performance time and a down time. As deliberate practice to focus on single thing consumes quite a lot of brain power. To keep the brain in good condition you need to take breaks. What I noticed is that you need to take breaks even more when your are under pressure. As you push your brain further and further they return less and less but if you give them a break just for 5min it makes things a lot easier. I go to grab a cup of water, stretch etc.

Observations 
Regular breaks (every 1h preferably) worked wonders for brain allowing to reset and refresh.
After each break it’s easier to maintain good quality focus time.

All three work well for me as I gradually work my way through the day. Even though I’ve been practising these lessons for a while now sometimes it’s difficult to remember to take break or not got carried away by some random unexpected tasks.

Here are some references that helped me learn the lessons and move forward.

1. Matt Cornell time management classics.
2. Zen Habits and the book “Power of Now”
3. Breaks via ezinearticles.com

Do you have any lessons you have learned recently? Please share them in the comments.

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