You can feel it happening. Your body is moving as if you’re trudging through quicksand. Your mind is sluggish and slow. And your to-do list just keeps growing. You’re in a slump, and it’s beyond time to address your productivity problem.
Productivity slumps happen to the best of us. What’s most important is noticing the problem and deciding to commit to finding practical solutions to solve it. If you’re ready to begin your productivity journey, check out these five simple tips and begin your transformation.
1. Start With Quality Sleep
It may feel odd to pursue productivity by first lying down, but don’t skimp on sleep. Sleep allows your body and brain to recharge and reset. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends adults get at least seven hours of sleep each night. Review your schedule and back up seven hours from your ideal wake-up time.
Prep your sleep space to be conducive to your seven hours of rest. Block out light, keep the temperature around 68 degrees, and add white noise if you need it. Aromatherapy can also add a sense of calm to your evening routine. Soothing lavender or chamomile aromas can get you in the mood for restorative slumber.
Upgrade to silk for both your bedding and pajamas. Silk helps maintain an ideal body temperature for sleep and eliminates distracting tangles as you shift in your bed. Think of the variables that cause you issues and make a plan to eliminate them. When you set the stage for restorative sleep, you set yourself up for next-day productivity.
2. Commit to Single-Tasking
Notifications, texts, calls, and pop-ins — all are constant draws for your time and attention. With the myriad of responsibilities on your plate, you probably turn to multitasking to get it all done. At first, it seems like layering work is effective. But then you make your first mistake.
When you try to do multiple things at once, you relinquish the opportunity to do any one thing well. Our brains aren’t designed to do deep, high-quality work on several things at once. Instead, commit to single-tasking, or the art of focusing on one thing at a time.
Your new initiative will be challenging at first. This change will be especially hard if you’ve been a multitasker for a large part of your life. Stay the course and give yourself grace as you make this adjustment.
3. Rein in Digital Distractions
Phones and other digital devices are practically essential tools for daily life. But they’re designed to stimulate your brain into engaging with them constantly. With each ding or ring, your brain gets a dopamine rush. Your natural sense of curiosity forces your hand and, before you know it, you’ve spent 20 minutes on TikTok.
Change your digital habits by making a few simple adjustments. First, commit to avoiding your phone first thing when you wake up. Opening Pandora’s box puts you on a less productive path for the morning. Instead, focus on implementing your morning routine. Exchange your email or social media check-in with a whole-body stretch or mindfulness session.
Turn off distracting notifications and instead vow to check your phone only at certain times. Update your VIP contacts to have a unique sound for texts. This way, you can tell the difference between a text from your partner and a sale alert from your favorite store. The less you pick up your phone, the less tempted you will be to dive into a digital rabbit hole.
4. Use Time Blocks to Force Focus
With a to-do list as long as yours, it’s no wonder productivity is a challenge. Take the aforementioned single-tasking tip to the next level with time blocks.
Break up your day into discrete chunks of time to help you achieve your goals. At home, this may be establishing set blocks for cleaning, cooking, or preparing for the day. You’ll free up time for family and fun when you assign time for the essentials.
At work, block time first for strategic projects and deep work. Set appointments later in the day for mundane tasks like tackling email.
Plan to review your inbox in two 30-minute blocks: one before lunch and another at the end of the day. Using this approach, you’ll avoid getting sucked into email as soon as you get to your office. Rest assured that if something is truly urgent, colleagues will reach out to you through other means.
5. Log Your Achievements and Plot Tomorrow’s Goals
There’s nothing quite like crossing something off of your to-do list. Make reviewing your day’s achievements a priority before you clock out. Review what you completed, made progress on, and need to move to tomorrow’s task list.
This assessment can give you a much-needed feeling of accomplishment, even after the most hectic of days. Adopting this practice will also keep your projects up-to-date, as you prioritize reviewing your status regularly.
Before you leave your office or sign off to relax for the evening, identify your goals for tomorrow. This will instill a sense of optimism in you for tomorrow’s work and provide clarity when the sun rises. Don’t spend the first hour or so of your day figuring out what you need to do. Instead, begin with a fresh task list and plenty of energy.
Use this process in your work and personal life, and you’ll have less stress and more productivity as the weeks pass. Soon this approach will be effortless. Reviewing and planning your day will simply become a part of who you are, operating at your highest, most productive, self.
Becoming a Productivity Master
Harnessing your productivity superpower is tough. It requires focus and commitment to push aside your lower self in favor of achieving your goals. Once you’ve gotten a taste of how incredible your productive self can be, though, there’s no turning back.
To keep your momentum going, log what approaches work best for you and your lifestyle. Start each day with intention and remind yourself of what actions you’re taking that help you. Don’t lose focus on what got you here.
When your peers start to ask what you’ve been doing differently, be sure to share your most effective techniques with them. If you’re all working at your highest level, just imagine what you can achieve together.
