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Downtime – Switching Tasks Can Take ALL the Time

We hear all the time that distractions are killing our productivity in today’s hyper-connected world. But what’s the logical takeaway from that? Just turn off the phone for a while? Put headphones on? And what is the actual problem with the distractions?

I have now concluded that it’s not really the “distractions” that are even the problem; it’s the switching of tasks and, more importantly, the time wasted between the two tasks.

For me, I’ve noticed that every single time I “finish” a task (or potentially even when I have some kind of distraction), a process takes over where I go and seek out other distractions.

For example, let’s say I just finished a difficult task. I’ll check it off my list, and then check Facebook quick for notifications, then possibly the news, then my texts, then emails. It’s almost automatic behavior.

If I only did two things all day, this wouldn’t be an issue. But that’s not how it works. I probably switch tasks many dozens of times each day, and so these distractions are huge. That’s a ton of time.

And it can happen even when I’m not switching tasks. If I check texts or whatever, it’s likely I’ll go through the same routine.

So what do I do with this information?

I think the first step is to just work on being hyper-aware of it when it’s happening. I need to overwrite that script and habit, and being aware it’s happening is the first step.

Then, I just need to fight that urge and go right on to the next thing.

When I think of all my most productive days, I remember just plowing through and going right from one task to the next. A common theme is usually that I had a good “to-do” for the day, too.

I think it’s important to make it as easy as possible to go to the next thing in the list. Having a to-do list means that you don’t have to think about what’s coming next, and that means you’ll be way less likely to procrastinate about moving on. So always make that to-do!

But most importantly, I need to constantly be thinking about the distractions and how I can rewrite that script.

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Pragmatism, not Idealism

As someone who probably tends to be overly optimistic, especially when it comes to my ability to do things or general predictions for the future, I think I’ve always had a propensity to focus on idealism. Whenever I’m making decisions, I basically make them assuming that I’m going to be perfect in every relevant category.

Having trouble focusing and getting stuff done consistently? Not a problem! I’ll have the perfectly solved with my elite-level self-control in the near future. Weak in some business-related skill? Not to worry! I’m sure a year from now I’ll have read 100 books on the topic and will be an expert.

Now, I don’t intend to make this a lengthy discussion on the value of optimism. I believe there are myriad ways in which being unrealistically optimistic can help you out. It helps you move forward when things are hard or unlikely to succeed, makes your more likable, and just generally helps out.

But if you define “optimism” as being more positive than can be justified by the evidence, then there are certain areas in which it can be quite pernicious. Self-improvement and self-management, for instance, is quite ineffective if you’re overly optimistic or idealistic.

I think I need to adopt a strategy of strict adherence to a pragmatic policy. If something isn’t working, I need to change it up. If I’m relying on unlimited willpower to get things done, it’s simply not going to happen. At the end of the day we’re still just really smart apes and we have powerful limits on motivation and desires.

Ramit Sethi talks a lot about being “brutally honest” with yourself. You need to look in the mirror and admit when something isn’t working. Beating yourself up for failing at perfection isn’t only pointless, it’s actively counter-productive.

I’m going to fall short, and I’m going to fail. The question is: how can I move forward from that? What is a realistic solution that takes into account the world and myself as we are, and then proposes steps that will produce real value and improvement?

For me, the biggest takeaway from this post (and the thing I’d like to keep in the back of my mind) is to constantly be shifting my mindset towards pragmatic solutions. In everything I do, I need to be honest with myself, fix what’s broken, and avoid the trap of thinking that I’m going to somehow succeed where everyone else (including myself) has failed because I can just power through and git’r’done.

What next?

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These Blogs are the Most Important Thing

It’s been something like six weeks since I last posted. And yet, I’ve already mentioned how I think these are the most important thing when it comes to both my business and, probably, my life. But I haven’t been doing them!

Sure, I could say that I’ve been busy, which is true. I’ve also had other things going on in my personal life that have caused me to be both busier and less productive while working.

But if something is truly “the most important thing,” shouldn’t it come before literally anything else?

The answer is clearly ‘yes’.

Maybe I should revisit why it’s the most important thing. Let’s make a list, shall we?

  1. It focuses my mind and efforts on productivity, growth, and improvement.
  2. It reminds me of past goals, thoughts, methods, and efforts which helps those things contribute more to improvement.
  3. It’s about the only time and place where I really work through difficult problems in a clear, productive, and concrete way, and then holds me accountable to my conclusions.
  4. It clears up what I need to be focusing my time and efforts on in order to achieve my goals.
  5. It makes me more productive, even in the short term (such as that day).

It seems to me that without this, I’m simply going day-to-day, performing routine tasks as they come up without any guidance or thought. Honestly, I suspect that’s how the vast majority of people live their lives.

But I don’t want to do that! I’m still young, and any investments I make in self-improvement now will pay off over the course of the majority of a lifetime. It’s more important that I do them now than ever.

It really is critical that I do this regularly. Even to the point where I can be neglecting other responsibilities and projects to do it. If it is the most important thing, then it needs to come first, or else everything else ultimately suffers.

And realistically, it’s not very hard or all that time-consuming, and it makes me feel better to do it. So there’s no reason not to!

 

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Second Most Important Thing?

Recently I posted in this blog about the “most important thing” being these blog posts, where I have some reflection and determine all of the things I need to improve. It’s still quite possibly the most important thing I do every day.

But in the past, I had always considered the “most important thing” to be self-improvement through education and learning. Mostly it has taken the form of reading books on a variety of topics.

Is that, then, the second most important thing? For now, I’m going to say yes! Things like, focusing on improving the business are important too, but none of them are as far-reaching and critical to my long-term success as improving myself through learning.

Reading has given me a huge list of improvements, both short-term and long-term. In the short-term, I feel empowered and capable. Learning something new makes me excited to try new things and general sense that I’m improving and my situation is going to constantly improve.

And long-term, it’s basically everything. I makes me more effective. It improves my decision making. It helps me focus on what’s important and ignore the rest. It literally makes me better at everything. Knowledge is power, as they say.

These are all things that will serve me well for my entire lifetime. The more knowledge I can acquire while I’m still young, the more valuable it will be over the course of my life. Just like making an investment early. Exactly like that, actually.

I need to redouble my efforts to constantly improve myself. Whether that means reading books, taking courses (online and off), trying and improving in new things, learning a language, or even just meeting new people and hearing their thoughts. It’s absolutely critical.

Without that learning, it’s easy for things to feel stagnant. Like nothing is going to improve, and that I’m not getting better at anything. I think one of the most important things in life, in terms of feeling fulfilled, is to always be improving. And I need to do that.

Lately I’ve maybe not been as focused on it as I should have been. I’ve gotten carried off in different directions with work, and I’ve been spending more time on other, unrelated activities in my spare time. I’ve even got a handful of books I’ve only partially finished! I need to finish those up.

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The Power of Setting Attainable Goals — Proven by Video Games

Personally, I have a habit of setting extremely high goals for myself, that may or may not be realistic. Shoot for the stars, and all that.

But lately, I’ve come to see the value in setting things that are much more attainable. And I realized it because of video games.

Somewhat recently I started playing this game called “7 Days to Die”. Picture Minecraft, but a bit more elaborate, and with zombies for good measure.

Ostensibly, you and your friends are preparing supplies, shelter, and weapons so that you can survive a zombie horde every 7 nights. Sound intense? It can be!

So how do most people play this game?

In my experience, most people find some useful specialty, and generally contribute to what the group needs. One person might collect wood and then build an elaborate structure for us to defend ourselves; complete with a spiked moat and arrow slits.

Another might spend his time gathering supplies and equipment for building better weapons. From simple wooden bows to rocket launchers, this person makes sure you have the firepower to take those zombies out.

And what have I busied myself with?

I’m digging an extensive network of mines.

Specifically, I’ve spent most of the time improving my mining skills so I can do it faster. I’m working on building a mine, deep underground, that reaches all the way to a nearby town.

So what is the value of this town? Nothing. It’s already been raided. There are no supplies left there, and really no reason to even go there.

Mining is extremely monotonous. Picture swinging a pickax in front of you, over and over again, in a dark pit underground, for hours at a time in a straight line. The biggest variability is that sometimes you might run in to some iron ore instead of solid rock. But the concept is still the same.

And yet, I can’t wait to get back on and play every week! While I’m doing it, I’m excited.

So why is it that I’m excited to do something monotonous, that provides no real value to myself or others, and just generally seems like a waste of time?

Because I have a goal that’s attainable.

I want to dig a mine all the way to that town. It’s far away, and it takes a long time. But it’s 100% doable as long as I put the time in.

Over time I level up in mining, and my friends build better equipment for me to mine with, so there is also the feeling of accelerated progress. But either way, I’m positive that I will reach this town. There is nothing to stop me!

Somehow that feeling of an impending accomplishment, no matter how trivial (or in this case, pointless), fuels my resolve to complete it and makes me happy to go along with it.

But then that makes me wonder… Do I just like doing things that are easy? Is it just the guarantee of success, given enough time? Or is it just a welcome respite from the poorly delineated progress that’s made each day in the world of knowledge work, where most of the time, I don’t know if I’m really getting closer to my goal, or if I’ll ever reach it.

I don’t think it’s simply that I like easy things. Besides the evidence in my own life, there’s a mountain of evidence that achieving things that are difficult is much more rewarding than achieving things that are easy. So that can’t be it.

I think it might just be that it feels good to take a break for a change. To have a clearly defined goal where the path to getting there is completely known.

In most knowledge work, there are a thousand ways to go about trying to achieve a goal. And unfortunately, you have no way of knowing for sure which ways will work and which won’t until you’ve tried them.

As an analogy, let’s say that you’re at the bottom of a hill, and you want to get to the top and see the view. A simple goal, akin to my mine-digging goal, would be a situation where there is a staircase that goes straight and right up to the top of this hill.

You can see the whole staircase, it’s just as steep at the bottom as it is at the top, and there are no obstacles. You would know exactly what it takes to get to the top, and you can be confident that if you just keep going, you’ll get there.

But most of what I do for a living (and probably most people), is nothing like that. Instead, picture the same scenario, but it’s more like a maze. You are standing at the bottom, and there are 100 different entrances. Some of them lead to the top. Some don’t. Some have untold hardships you’ll endure, and some might not. The point is, you don’t know which is which!

In this scenario, you can still aim high, and try to get to the top. But there is so much uncertainty, that you really don’t know what it’s going to take to get there. You don’t know the right way, and you don’t know what you’re going to face along the way.

Now, in real situations, you can grow your experience and knowledge, and start minimizing the uncertainty. That would certainly help.

In a lot of cultures and even modern psychology, there is this concept of chaos and order, and balance between them is the key. If you get too comfortable and set easy goals for yourself, there is far too much order. You don’t learn and you don’t develop as a person.

But if your goals are too lofty, and the path there too vague, you’re dealing with complete chaos. You have no knowledge of the route you need to take to get there, and that can be debilitating.

So instead, what they argue, is that you need to find that balance, where you’re out of your comfort zone, you’re achieving something difficult, but you come equipped with enough competence to stand a fighting chance of getting through.

My research has led me to believe that what leads to lasting meaning and value in our lives is actually the balance of these two concepts, and not the end result.

In other words, you should choose goals that are difficult but achievable, but it’s not even the achievement of the goals that will ultimately fulfill you. It’s getting there.

 

As a random side-note here that isn’t totally necessary to the understanding of what I’m trying to get across: I think jigsaw puzzles are a good stand-in for my video game.

I never quite understood the appeal of them. The work is somewhat mindless, the process is pretty much the same every time, and it’s something where, if you spend enough time on it, you’re virtually guaranteed to finish it.

Sounds a lot like my goal to build a mine, huh?

I know some say the like the high of finding a place for everything (from chaos to order… sound familiar?), but I think there’s an element of what I’ve been discussing here as well. There’s a comfort in knowing that your goal is something you can accomplish. Maybe it’s just self-empowering, maybe it’s just a desperate need to get something done.

I don’t have all of the answers, I just thought it was somewhat relevant.

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Time to Write Every Day

I’m thinking that I should start writing here, literally every day, for at least ten minutes.

My initial thought was, “how valuable is thinking about my own business towards its future success?” And I think the answer is, perhaps clearly, ‘extremely valuable’.

And yet, how often do I actually do it? I have lots of little thoughts here or there, but it’s almost never organized, and often no action comes from it anyway.

I think it would benefit me hugely to just organize my thoughts on a regular basis here. I’d like to outline just some of the ways that I think it will help.

1. Focus

It will help me focus on what’s important, and also to keep any pressing tasks or goals top-of-mind. By thinking about these things every single day, and in an organized manner, they will be more likely to actually stick and have an impact on my actions.

2. Time Analysis

I’ll be able to analyze what I’ve been spending time on and what has actually contributed to my success. If none of the things I did contribute much to my actual goals, I’ll have to ask myself why I’m doing them.

3. Organization and Clarity of Thoughts

By writing things out, I am clarifying my thinking and organization my plans and analysis. Once it’s on paper it will help me think about it more. Since there are a million things I could be doing at any given point, it’s nice to narrow that down.

4. Improved Writing and Communication

Simply by writing every day, I’ll get better at it. Better writing is useful virtually everywhere, so this can only help. It is likely to even improve in-person communication I think.

5. Last-Minute Blog Posts

It’s likely that there will be value in some of these musings to others beyond myself. In a pinch, I can always revise one and make it a blog post!

6. Goal and Progress Tracking

I’ll be able to go back and read previous entries and see where I was at. This could help me see where I’m stuck, and also to track how I’ve come along on priorities and goals.

7. Posterity

This could be a great collection of writings at some point. Maybe I’ll want to look back at it for myself, maybe I’ll want to make some kind of compilation. Who knows!

8. Conscious Effort Towards Business Thinking

This is a concrete step I can take to spending more time thinking about my business and how I can improve. It could start a chain reaction of improved business planning.

 

Thought of the Day – Not Spending Time on Most Important Activities

We’ve all heard the Pareto Principal, also known as the 80/20 rule. But what if you’ve identified your 20 but don’t actually focus on them anyway?

Right now, I have work extending out for months on my waiting list. I need to find additional help to handle that. It’s like we’re ready to grow, I just need more help.

In one of my recent posts, I talk about how I need to change what activities I’m involved with in the business, and pursuing that will certainly give me more time to find that help. So I would say that concentrating on delegating and removing responsibilities from myself is certainly part of the 20, and an overall process to simplify my business and establish processes is critical for scaling as well.

But not everything I’m doing right now has anything to do with that. For instance, I’m spending a fair amount of time preparing for an event I’m hosting along with Kari Switala and others.

From a business perspective, what is the purpose of this event? Almost exclusively marketing. Getting new clients.

And is that a priority right now? No. Not at all. In fact we have too many!

I obviously can’t back out now since I made the commitment. Plus it’s coming up soon, so I would never do that anyway. But I think it’s important to recognize that it isn’t furthering my goals a whole lot.

The real issue is that it’s a short term marketing effort, which is specifically what I don’t need right now. Long term efforts such as BNI and blogging/SEO for my own website are still important, because I need to keep growing well into the future.

But the short term ones, I should be saying no to until I actually need them. There are way better ways to spend my time.

How Should I Spend My Time?

I thought I would sketch out a rough outline of how I think I actually should be spending my time, because I should be putting conscious effort in to that. Note that I attempted to include emails relating to these things in their respective categories

Long Term Time Spend Goal (6 Months)

20% Working on business, developing processes
20% Working with employees, hiring initiatives, training
15% Sales, Proposals, etc
15% BNI
10% Project Management
5% Admin Work (Billing, Invoices, Deposits, Accounting, Etc)
5% Writing Blog Posts / SEO for myself
9% Other
<1% Actually doing work on client sites

Short Term Time Spend Goal (6 Months)

15% Working on business, developing processes
10% Working with employees, hiring initiatives, training
10% Sales, Proposals, etc
15% BNI
15% Project Management
5% Admin Work (Billing, Invoices, Deposits, Accounting, Etc)
5% Writing Blog Posts / SEO for myself
10% Other
15% Actually doing work on client sites

Where I Think I Am Now

1% Working on business, developing processes
1% Working with employees, hiring initiatives, training
15% Sales, Proposals, etc
18% BNI
18% Project Management
10% Admin Work (Billing, Invoices, Deposits, Accounting, Etc)
2% Writing Blog Posts / SEO for myself
15% Other (Things like this upcoming event)
20% Actually doing work on client sites

There’s a lot to think about when looking at those numbers! The two most important long-term tasks (most likely), are ones I spend a combined 2% of my time on now. That’s terrible! I definitely need to work on that.

I think it might also be time to read “The One Thing” again, as it really goes over all of this, and is fantastic.