The reason I decided to mention MindMeister now is because there’s currently a great promo on their website: 20% off all premium MindMeister upgrades!

This probably means you have to sign up for MindMeister free membership, but with great features like online collaboration (practically live mindmap editing)  and embedding support (you can include online interactive mindmaps into your posts or website pages) I’m sure you will not regret.

Give MindMeister a try and you will never look back!

Two options for you to join MindMeister

Affiliate link

If you sign up as a premium member, I get a month or two of MindMeister membership for free. Just click this banner and follow instructions:

Direct link to MindMeister website

If you have any concerns about clicking the link about or simply don’t want me to benefit from sharing this tool with you, just click the link below – it’s an absolutely affiliate-id free direct link straight to the MindMeister website. Like I said, I’m sure you’ll love this online tool:

MindMeister

Read more in: Problem Solving, Productivity.

Once a wise man asked another man: “Can you keep a secret?” The other man eagerly replied that he could: “Then observe!” said the wise man: “So can I”

Personal self control can make the difference between a life well lived with plans and dreams realized and a sense of regret and waste.

Research stretching back years showed that children as young as four who could exert self discipline by controlling an impulse to have a sweet now so that they could have two sweets later (1) were more likely to have successful happy lives as adults. Self discipline doesn’t just make us successful it makes us happy it seems.

But self discipline isn’t just about the lottery of genetically inherited luck; something we’re either born with or not. We can all learn to control even master our immediate wants and impulses. So how do you do this? How can you purposefully strengthen your self discipline?

Step one: Exercise your discipline muscle

Just think about the language we use to describe self discipline: We talk about it being “strong” or “weak” just like a muscle. And research (2) has found that just like a muscle the more you exercise your self control the stronger it gets.

But it gets better. Exercising will power in one place (such as making ourselves work on our cherished project for a set time every day) will start to strengthen self discipline in other areas such as being able to say no to that tempting social invitation when you’d previously promised your pal you’d sit and listen to their marital problems. . So exercising self discipline specifically can strengthen it generally. But alas self discipline behaves like a muscle in another way too…

Step two: Don’t overdo it!

Exercising all day every day, lifting weights for hours on end won’t make you stronger in fact overtraining will start to weaken and waste your muscles (3)

Likewise people who have a New Years’ Resolution frenzy deciding to exert massive amounts of self discipline all over the place all at once will likely end up feeling less able to exert self control. When we exercise a muscle we deplete it of stored natural sugars (glycogen) and eventually the muscle weakens which means we need to rest. It’s the same with self control. Amazingly when you exert self discipline you actually deplete glycogen stores in your body just as with physical exertion! (4) Its even been found that ensuring your blood sugar levels are stable helps strengthen self discipline. So decide where you want to focus your self control, don’t overdo it all at once and build it up slowly.

Step three Beware of perfectionism

Having to do everything absolutely perfectly may, paradoxically, over use your supplies of will power needlessly making you less fulfilled and effective. Remember exerting self discipline drains glucose levels from the body and the perfectionist feels they have to exert their will and attempt to control everything. Feeling compelled to control all kinds of things that you really don’t need to (such as what other people say or think) is a waste of will power where it could be reserved and focussed on where you really need it. Being to perfectionist can make us give up earlier and stop trying or bothering because of the thinking error that: “If it’s not exactly as I feel it should be then it’s not worth bothering with at all!”

So remind yourself that you are only human and that you can make mistakes and you’ll actually find greater levels of self discipline.

Step four: Strongly imagine the consequences of your actions

The children in the self discipline research who were able to forgo having a marshmallow treat immediately by waiting (and thereby getting two treats!) were able to do this because they used their imaginations constructively. This is a good example of how one of nature’s finest human tools, the imagination, is meant to be used (one way it is commonly misused is through needless worrying) When you need to exert discipline and lead your own impulses really imagine the positive consequences later of being strong now. I use hypnosis with my clients, a very powerful way to access the imagination to strengthen resolve in this way.

Step five: Remind yourself who you are

When we feel like being weak we become trapped in the present (sometimes “living in the moment” isn’t so great) But it’s been found (5) that when we feel like giving into temptation stating to ourselves or even out loud our core values can give us an injection of immediate self discipline. Doing this can snap us out of tunnel vision and illuminate the bigger picture which in turn weakens the impulse. So next time you feel magnetically drawn to those doughnuts you might tell yourself: “Health and the welfare of my body is important to me!” or if someone felt compelled to treat someone else badly they might state to themselves: “Being a decent human being is important to me!” Try it.
And finally I’m reminded of the words of the ancient Roman poet Horace “Rule your mind or it will rule you.”

About Author

Mark Tyrrell regularly exerts self discipline to ensure he produces his prodigious output of articles, downloads and training, including a recent download on self discipline.

References:

1. C. and Mischel, W. (1976). Effects of temptation-inhibiting and task-facilitating plans on self-control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 33 (2), 209-217 DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.33.2.209.
2. See: Gailliot, M.T., Mead, N.L., & Baumeister, R.F. (2008). Self-Regulation, In O.P. John, R.W. Robbins & L.A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of Personality: Theory and Research (pp. 472-491). New York: The Guilford Press.
3. See: Doug McGuff’s excellent book ‘Body by science’ 2009
4. The mind-body response of exerting willpower literally fatigues us (Tice et al., 2007). It depletes physical power, as shown in one study that looked at the effects of mental self-control on physical stamina (Bray et al., 2008). In this study, trying to control one’s thoughts decreased muscular endurance, as measured by performance and EMG activity. The researchers who conducted this study called the effect ‘central fatigue’. This all provides another reason why it might be a good idea to exercise first thing.
5. According to research conducted by Schmeichel and Vohs in 2009.

Read more in: Mastering Habits, Motivation, Productivity.

I’ve been meaning to write about Evernote Web for quite some time now. Being a fan of the original Evernote application and having used it for managing all sorts of personal notes for the past few years, I’m really excited to see that Evernote Web has finally arrived: it now takes only seconds to get started with using one of the most useful online services on the web.

What is Evernote?

Evernote is an information organizer. Coming from the world of standalone applications, it started as a Windows app, but is now available on a number of platforms. The most useful thing about the current Evernote service is that it’s an online repository – so all your information is available instantly on any of the devices – including Apple iPhone.

I’ve waited for a service like this for quite some time. Surely, there’s been quite a few around which allowed you to grab text and images from websites and store it online (I’ve used Google Notebook for a while, for instance), but Evernote brings a very powerful search. One of the most unique features is the image recognition, which means you can scan your to-do notes, business cards or any printed material and Evernote will recognize all the text and help you later find it using the keywords. It all happens automatically, and the quality of image recognition is really impressive.

What I use Evernote for

I like the web clipping functionality – it’s a button on the bookmarks toolbar of my Firefox browser which helps me instantly grab information from whatever page I’m currently on. You select the text (can be images or tables, anything really), then click the Clip to Evernote button and voila – the information piece is in your online Evernote repository.

I really like the way it saves me time with my scribbled notes – previously I had to allocate time to re-type them. It’s much quicker now – I simply make photos of whatever I need to capture and store it online. I haven’t even started using the image recognition feature properly yet – even having my scanned/photographed notes centrally available online is already a productivity boost.

Are you using it yet? Let me know how you find it. This isn’t a paid review (isn’t even a review, really), but a sincere recommendation – check Evernote out if you haven’t done so. There’s only a few apps I truly like, and this one does seem to be one of them.

Let me know, and good luck with staying productive and organized!

See also:

• Evernote Downloads
• Evernote on iPhone
• 7 Ways to Use Evernote – Lifehack.org

Read more in: Productivity.

I’m honoured to be a part of this list, and think that it’s yet another great compilation of the best resources available – go have a look as you never know what gems are waiting for you just a few clicks away.

Thanks, Amy, for letting me know!

Read more in: Productivity.

Just a week after posting my 3 Rules to Fight Procrastination, I have something else for all of you who want to reduce your procrastination to a bare minimum!

My contact from FruitfulTime has just let me know about the launch of their free ebook on procrastination: Stop Procrastion Now.

FruifulTime is a new player on the task management software field, and I’ll be posting my review of their task manager soon enough.

For the time being though, I suggest you head over and download the procrastination book – it explains quite a lot:

• what is procrastination
• common reasons most people procrastinate
• tips to confirm whether you are a procrastinator
• suggestions regarding the kind of a procrastinator you may be
• list of procrastination killers – effective ways to fight procrastination

As a bonus, the book comes with a free 10-day trial version of the FruitfulTime task manager, so you’ll have a chance to give it a try as well.

Read more in: Productivity.

Procrastination is one of the processes in our lives which you can safely call natural: long before you learn this word in English (or your native language), you’re already procrastinating on a regular basis. You don’t have to learn anything to become a true master of procrastination, but once you acknowledge it as an unwanted gift, it takes great discipline and advanced tactics to successfully fight it.

Today I would like to share with you 3 simple rules. Like many other things, their real power is in their simplicity. It’s very easy to remember these rules, and just as easy to follow. Try them for a few days when approaching any task or project of yours, play by these rules as if they were some kind of a game, and see for yourself how your productivity will improve.

The Clarity Rule

This rule is useful in many contexts. The more you know about something, the more comfortable you are working on it or talking about it.

When you look at procrastination, one of the reasons for it to take (or should I say make?) such a part of your life is your own lack of clarity regarding what things need to be done, how exactly and when.

Most things sound much worse than they really are, but if you just take a few minutes to take a closer look, quite likey you will discover that your next assignment is nothing more than a 5 minute job.

The Clarity Rule states that you should never add a task you don’t fully understand to your list. It is perfectly allright to take notes during meetings and phone calls, but until you confirm what’s expected from you, how much time and other resources of yours will be needed, and when the result has to be produced – don’t add it to your list. Also, refuse to take such pseudo actions from anybody else: unless it’s clear what needs to be done, there is no point adding it to your list – you wont’ be able to act on it anyway.

Those who know and follow The Clarity Rule are not only more productive in their activities, but they are also much better communicators: they set clear goals, give clearly defined tasks, and always ask for relevant information during the conversation, making it clear that unless all required information is present, they would not be able to start working on a task. Everyone who deals with such people quickly learns to appreciate such a clarity of communication, because it saves everyone’s time and helps achieve results quicker and easier.

The 15 Minutes Rule

I told you, these rules are really simple. But trust me and give them a try to see the magic they do.

The 15 Minutes Rule states that every task you’re working on needs to get at least 15 minutes of your full attention. If you’re not sure how long it will take in addition to these 15 minutes – that’s fine. But first, spend 15 minutes honestly trying your best working on the task.

This rule is most useful for tasks you’re not interested in. They’re usually the ones which you know you HAVE to do, but you don’t really WANT to. Give yourself a promise to spend 15 minutes working on such a task, and get rid of all the interruptions and distractions under your control.

For example, you need to prepare a report by next Friday. It may be a week and a half before your deadline, but you need to get started now so that you don’t have to rush things and do everything at the very last minute. You know it’s going to take you hours to do the report, but you don’t really know why – you need some time to look at all the data at your hands, perhaps identify if you can get more data off your colleagues, or even find someone to delegate part of your report. Use 15 minutes for this. Sit down, and get started with your report. If after 15 minutes you’re still not interested, drop the task until the next chance to work on it for 15 minutes. But most likely, in 15 minutes of really focused effort you will have made such a progress that you’ll get motivated enough to continue for another half-an-hour or so.

The logic behind my 15 minute rule is this: when it works, it will get you into the mindset of getting a certain task done. When this rule doesn’t work, it will at least allow you to make progress with tiny 15-minute steps. One way or another, you’re getting closer to your task’s successful completion – and you’re therefore not procrastinating by definition.

The One More Thing Rule

One more thing is the one I like most. This is your chance to be creative when tackling your task, because everytime you’re thinking to yourself that you’ve had enough with your problem and it’s time to drop it and give up, this rule tells you: do one more thing towards completion of your task, and then move on.

This rule does wonders for me: it makes use of the very nature of how things happen in this life, and serves quite often as the last push I need to finally complete the task.

Quite often we feel like we’re exhausted or bored with the task so much that there’s no point even trying to do anything else to get it done. We just want to leave it there and never see it again. Deep down in our thoughts we know, of course, that someday really soon we’ll have to get back to this task and we’ll have to get it done, but we prefer not to allow this kind of thinking to stop us from dropping the task.

The reality though is that if you leave something unfinished it becomes an open loop – something your mind keeps consciously and unconsciously getting back to, something which needs action and thinking time before you can mark it off as completed. Even if you try really hard not to think of such open loop, your mind will respond to your other activities and tasks slower, because some of your thinking power will be wasted on pointless re-runs of the unfinished task you left behind.

The more tasks you leave unfinished, the slower you’ll be able to get ones done. That’s why you should do whatever you can to close each issue and complete each task – thus freeing up your thinking power and memory for working on your new tasks and projects.

What also happens a lot is that we give up just one step away from the success. We may have tried different approaches a thousand times and think it’s enough, but if we force ourselves to try just onces, this may be that one time when things work out. There are numerous success stories of this kind: you’ve got to keep trying, failing, and trying again before you succeed.

The one More Thing rule helps you do just that – give a task the last chance to be completed before you move on and revisit this task once again some other time.

These are my 3 rules to combat procrastination. I obviously have many more tactics and I experiment a lot to achieve best results, but if you’re really stuck and want a easy option to work your way out of procrastination – these are your rules to try. Let me know how it works, and best of luck!

See also:

• 33 Time Management Strategies
• Ryan Whiteside has a great article: 10 Tips for Learning Self Discipline
• Free ebook: Stop Procrastination Now

Read more in: Productivity.

I’ve recently participated in a great Time Management group writing project over at Inspiration Bit.

Today I present you a full list of submitted entries (thanks for compiling it, Vivien!)- there sure is a lot of advice to follow!

1. All For Time and Time For All: The 10 Commandments of Time Management by Simonne
2. Lessons in Time Management by Em Dy
3. Guru Natalie weighs in on Time Management by Natalie
4. 9 Reasons to Wake Up Early by Y.Graf
5. Time Management For Bloggers and Photographers by Brian
6. Manage time by sorting your blog comments in 6 ways by Bes
7. My Troubles With Time Management by Ronald
8. It’s URGENT, Urgent I say… but is it? by Marques
9. Time Management: Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff by Jenny Mcb
10. Time Management – Don’t put Everything off until later by TeaMouse
11. 8 Work At Home Time Management Strategies by Char
12. Time, Time, Time by WG
13. Thoughts On Managing A Precious Resource by Ajay
14. Time Management – tackling K2
15. Time Management Tips for Using Email
16. Stress Can Be Good by Lauren Mari
17. Secrets To Successful Time Management by (yours truly) Gleb Reys
18. 3 simple time management tips by Carey
19. How I manage time between blogging and studies by Shankar
20. Better living through sticky notes by Lisa
21. How I Manage My Time by Keith
22. 6 Essential Time Management Strategies by Randa
23. Time Management: Managing Large Multi-User Projects by Jennifer
24. A Routine Shall Set You Free by Brooke
25. Supercharge Your Job Search by Saving Time by Jacob
26. Time Makes Me Cuckoo by Shelley
27. 11 Time Management Tips – How I manage Work and Blog by Ashish
28. Simple Tips for Managing Time by Pearl
29. Strategies for Effective Time Management by Janie
30. Time management: the un-techniques by Peter
31. dIstressed or dEstressed? by Em Dy
32. Freelancing And Time Management by Tara
33. Internet Is The Devil In Disguise by Vivien

Hope you like the list! The original version of this list also includes comments to each submission, so you should check it out.

Read more in: Productivity.

Starting today, Mondays are Productivity days on Personal Development blog.

Last week, I covered some of the best ways to become a master in time management.

Although there are many more ways to improve your productivity, and many techniques to optimize your approach to dealing with various tasks and projects, there’s one thing that particularly stands out: your ability to stick to your plan.

It makes perfect sense when you recognize the importance of this principle, yet I see people violating this basic law of productivity without even realizing how simple a fix for their situation is.

Plan and review regularly

When you understand the advantages of proper planning, it becomes very easy to find the 5-10 minutes you need to plan your day ahead. Remember the saying: failing to plan is planning to fail! Remember it and never start anything important without taking the time to properly and thoroughly plan it.

Make sure you review your plans regularly. It’s just too easy to get caught up in crunching through little things and forget to stay focused on a bigger picture. That’s where regular reviews can really help.

You see, it’s absolutely normal for you to steer away from your original big plan. There could be many valid reasons for doing so. But unless you regularly review your top priorities, big goals and long-term plans, such discrepancies will escape your attention for just long enough to then suddenly show up when it’s too late to
change anything.

Stick to your own plan!

That’s the most important secret to consistent results.

After all, what would be the point in planning and reviewing your activities if you don’t follow your own action plan? A s you probably remember, one of the reasons for having a system to manage, track and get things done is that you can use it to capture all the plans and tasks, and then trust that the system will help you get the important things done at the right times.

If you plan for something to be done at a certain time on a particular day, do your best to stick to your own promises. Fight anything and everything which tries to keep you from completing such a task, because the more you defer it, the less trust you will have in thinking this task will ever be done.

It can be very hard to stick to your plan, but this is the single most important thing you can do to ensure you achieve consistent results. Once you get into the habit of following through your own plans no matter what, you will gradually develop a powerful confidence in your own planning routine: once it is planned, it gets done.

There are rare situations when you can’t stay faithful to your plans, but it is your duty to be as protective of your blocked time and made plans as possible.

Follow your own plans closely and make it your personal challenge to keep things this way, and this habit alone will easily double your productivity.

Read more in: Productivity.

Time management is one of the most important aspects of being successful today.

The scale of the information overload is steadily growing, and unless you take proactive measures against the everyday distractions, you’ll soon be buried under the information processing. The number of daily tasks we need to cope with growth year by year as well, which means the pressure is always on to reach higher goals and deliver more results. The average productivity expectations constantly grow. If you were successful and managed your time effectively 10 years ago, it could be not only due to the skill, but also because there wasn’t nearly as much happening around you and expected from you.

The challenges of time management

I can’t say that I’m working in the busiest environment possible, but there are all the classic time management challenges present: urgent tasks, regular interruptions, unplanned events – you name it.

I work in a technical support role with a multinational company. Being among the seniors in my technical team, I only get to look into really challenging problems which are specific to my responsibilities and roles within the organization.

When the phone is ringing, most usually it needs to be picked up. The emails are dropping into my inbox every other minute, and some of them are pretty important and urgent.

Colleagues and customers walk in to ask questions, and it takes time to help them as well.

All these are rather typical challenges most of us experience every working day. It’s very easy to give up and admit that you can’t manage your time, and that you don’t have the physical ability to neither manage the time, nor cope with the load. However, I never considered this as an option. Below you will find my answers as to why.

Know what needs to be done

I think I’ve brought this one up a few times across my other posts. Knowing what your situation is and where you are with all your tasks and projects is vital. Without this knowledge, you cannot be comfortable with managing neither your time nor your responsibilities.

Here’s what I consider to be a comfortable setup:

1. A project and task tracking system - this contains tasks and projects, categorized by areas of my activity. I’ve proved it before – it doesn’t matter what system you use – a paper based or an online one, as long as you have it and use it for tracking all the tasks. You get into the habit of collecting all the tasks in your system, and soon enough you work out a certain feeling of security – if you need to do something, it’s there in your tracking system – which means you’ll get to doing it when the time is right.

2. Priorities – it’s very important to understand how important and/or urgent everything on your list is. People are easily caught in doing one task after another without taking the time to consider the relevance or importance of a particular task. While it is true that many things just have to be done and there is no easy way around them, you’ve got to train yourself to assess every single task before you start working on it. GTD followers would know, that this doesn’t mean you have to consider the importance of a task right before you start working on it. You’ll be much more successful if you go through the whole list of your tasks and set priorities in one go – making decisions about what and when to do next for each task, but not starting any real work just yet.

3. Regular review – this is the most neglected part of many beginners in time management. It’s very easy to start with a tiny to-do list and populate another fancy spreadsheet or update some software with your daily routine, but as your tracking system grows bigger and bigger, you tend to review the whole big list of things less and less, and eventually end up with something wihch isn’t manageable at all. It is therefore vital for your success to regularly (at least weekly) do a full review of all the projects and tasks of yours.

Once these systems and processes are in place, I can be comfortable with taking on new tasks and adding them to the system. At any given time, I know that all the activities and all the actions are covered. They all are collected in one system, so there’s only one place for me to check and review, compare against the calendar and act upon. Once you train yourself to use the same set of tools for managing your time, you will be surprised how it will feel easier and easier to stay productive without any stress.

Most important tasks

It is important to know what to do and when. But there’s more to this than just making progress on something form your to-do list. It’s crucial to ensure that you’re working on the most useful and most important task or project.

I find that identifying my most important tasks for each day helps a lot here. Each morning, I take time to review the list of things for the day. I consider different scenarios and end up with the 3 most important tasks for the day. These are the tasks that will make my day even if I don’t get a chance to accomplish anything else.

In fact, these tasks are so important that even if it takes me a whole day to complete one of them, I will happily work away knowing that’s the best use of my time anyway. Since I use the same system for tracking my personal and work-related tasks, on most days it’s made of work-related stuff, but personal plans make it to the top as well – you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.

The bottom line is that every morning, before I start working, I decide what will be the most valuable outcome of the day, and agree with myself to fully concentrate on these 3 things before doing anything else. Usually this means that by 10-11 o’clock I’m done with my most important tasks. This is a tremendous boost in motivation – I feel like I’ve already made my day, and it’s only the early hours, which means I’ve got plenty of time to work on other things – according to their urgency and importance, of course.

Identifying most important tasks is one of the best habits I’ve acquired in my whole life. It helps me identify the real value and reasoning behind daily tasks, and ensures I work on the most valuable projects. It’s the biggest return of my time investment – I know that I’ll reach the necessary goals no matter what, and only then will move on.

The decision making process for picking the MITs (I’ve learned about this abbreviation from the Most Important Tasks article at Zen Habits) is simple, but the scope for it isn’t really one particular day. As you grow more and more comfortable with the idea of identifying such tasks daily, you need to train yourself to look at a bigger picture.

Instead of deciding what’s important for the day, you look a few days (weeks) back and a few ahead, and see how this is aligned with your overall projects and strategies. This helps you ensure that globally important things are getting higher priorities. Also, if a particular task is taking longer than an hour, and sometimes even longer than a day, it will still be on your list of MITs the following day.

Basically, if it’s urgent and important, you stay at it until its done. It doesn’t mean you can’t switch from it if you have to wait on someone – so don’t be confused by it. When I’m talking about staying on a particular task, I refer to the actual productivity time – when you’re working on the task, fully concentrated and committed. If you’re waiting on someone else – put this task in to a later time slot of the very same day, and get started immediately on the next MIT.

Such an approach works really well. I can’t stress it enough how important it is to identify your most important tasks to constantly feel the sense of accomplishment, and not just making some things done, but completing the tasks that really matter both to you and to others.

Planning and blocking time

In addition to regular planning of tasks, plan for the time you need to work on them. Quite often, we accept a task of working on something because we know it will literally take us only 5 minutes, but we forget to plan the research or preparation time for such a task, which could be hours. We always assume we’ll have this time found and ready before we make the task happen, but that’s the wrong assumption. Plan everything!

Blocking time really helps. I block my time for research and for all the important meetings. I even plan my time for the gym session during my lunch hour. I actually put it in my Outlook calendar, so that everyone looking at my calendar can realize that the chances of meeting with me during these hours are pretty slim. I’m not refusing any meetings automatically, but the blocked time shows everyone that I already have plans for this part of my day, and so I might not necessarily accept their invitation.

I also block out the time to go home. My working day finishes at 5pm, and so I’ve put an hour-long appointment with myself for every day at 17:30pm. I call it @No meetings, please@ – which is there to suggest to my colleagues from Colorado and San Jose that I’m not generally available after this time. I’m prepared to stay a bit later, that’s why it’s half-five and not five, but unless it’s something really important or pre-arranged (I attend a number of weekly/bi-weekly meetings which run into 17:30pm or 6pm), I’m not going to entertain a meeting request this late in the day.

Plan everything, but once the plan is ready, don’t forget to block your time for it.

Make these time blocks as visible as possible. Try and be protective of your time. If it’s for a research, then leave everything else and do the research. Even if you’re working on the MIT, drop it – because it should be aligned with your other priorities like the planned events and research. If someone walks up to you, delegate the task or promise to follow up.

It may be hard for others to understand your seeming unwillingness to help, so please explain your position – if you’re working on something because it’s a planned event – tell so, and promise to get back to the person as soon as you’re finished. Don’t spend your time on anything else but the activity it’s been blocked for. Once your block of time is up, you can follow up with all the calls, emails and other requests, and move on to the next time block.

The idea of blocking time in your calendar might seem aggressive, especially when some people overdo it – you look at a calendar, and there isn’t a single half-an-hour window of spare time in a whole day. But it is important to realize that without blocking your time, you won’t always have this time ready to work on things. If you plan to be working on an important project in the afternoon, block the time for it – cause if you don’t, people will look at your calendar and will thingk you’re free for a chat or for a quick session of problem solving.

Always work on improving your skills

That’s it. I believe these are the time management secrets that make me as successful as I am. Day by day, I work on projects and bring value, I manage my own tasks and help others progress with their activities, I share knowledge and process new information.

The time I have to do all these things is always the same. The only thing that improves constantly is my ability to manage it.

Read more in: Productivity.

I must say it: Mark has done a great job, and came up t is a great way to track all your habits. Although I use very similar approach myself, but with the habit list it’s going to be even more fun!

So far, the downloadable PDF version of the habit list is only available to his regular RSS readers, but the link will be given out to everyone else in the coming days.

If you were looking for something to help you stay focused and raise your own awareness of your habits – search no more! Go to Productivity501, subscribe to the feed, and download the habit list already!

Read more in: Productivity.

Every one of us has a number of tools whch make us most productive. I don’t like complex productivity solutions, and that’s why my productivity tools are really simple. In this short post, I will tell you about the first three tools which I use every day.

Trash bin

You have no idea how invaluable my trash bin (it’s a Greenstar Recycled Paper Box actually) proves to be every single day!

Being a UNIX Systems Administrator, I don’t have this much paperwork to do, but there’s still something to get rid of almost every hour.

Quickly reviewing each piece of information has been one of the best habits I’ve worked out over the past few years – it takes only a few seconds to decide whether something should be filed or trashed right away.

I used to keep plenty of papers around just because I thought I might have some use for them at a later time. For instance, I would keep a leaflet from some shop I would find in a morning newspaper. I would keep a print-out of a 50-page research document just because I needed to read an important 2-page section of it. I would keep drafts of minutes from all the meeting I attended in the past few months. I would keep a magazine because there could be something interesting in it, although nothing was obviously useful. All such things would be done just in case.

Be ruthless to paper clutter. These days, I always question a particular piece of information for its immediate usefulness. If I don’t have a need for it, I won’t even print it out. If I have it printed out, and know exactly when and I how I’ll use it, I will file it. If I don’t know neither when nor how it will be used, I simply take note of the original (electronic) location of the document, and bin the paper copy.

All newspapers and magazines are scanned in 10-15 minutes first thing in the morning, and unless a particular article attracts me (there’s usually one or two), the printed edition goes straight to the trash.

At first, I had typical fears that I might have thrown something really important out, but nothing like this happened in more than 2 years, so I guess this makes such an approach rather safe.

Lever Arch File

A second most useful thing I have on my desk to make my day most productive is a standard A4 arch file I use for immediate filing.

Any reference which I may need in the coming few weeks is stored there.

Like in the case with trash box, every piece of paper goes through a confirmation of its purpose. If I can’t think of a reason why something needs to be kept around, it either gets filed in a longer term storage (filing system in one of the drawers of my table), or gets thrown away.

Most of items get properly filed, but I also use the top section of this folder as a temporary storage. If I’m working on something and it’s time to go home, I usually don’t file it, but simply put the sheets of paper on top of the filed content in the folder. This way, it’s easily accessible in the morning, and it doesn’t have to lay around and clutter my desk until I get a chance to process it.

Whiteboard

I absolutely love the whiteboard in my corner. It’s clean and shiny most of the time, because I don’t like using it for long term project and task management.

But I use it every time I have to plan a solution to a problem or simply organize any other thinking process of mine.

It always helps being able to draw a simple mind map quickly and leave it on for a day or two, looking at it and making changes every now and then. Once I’m happy enough with the solution, I will take notes of it and will turn ideas into actionable items in my tasks tracking application. If there’s nothing else I plan to gain from having something on my whiteboard, I wipe all the drawings off it.

That’s it – like I said, my tools are really simple, but they help me get through the day in the most effective manner. I like these tools so much that I have the same setup arranged at home – filing, trash bin and a whiteboard. It also helps to keep similar environments – makes me feel comfortable while working.

Read more in: Productivity.

This must be one of the most popular reasons causing people to feel frustrated. Many of us don’t seem to have enough hours in the day to cope with important tasks, and this leaves the illusion of us not having any time to relax and enjoy life neither.

It doesn’t have to be this way though, and you can find time for everything you want.

As with any other aspect of your happiness, there are quite a few common mistakes and wrong suppositions, which I will list here for you to work on. Not all of them may be true for your situation, but acting on any of them is bound to make you feel much happier about your productivity and time management skills.

One thing you want to understand about being productive and managing your time successfully is this: it is always your choice how productive you will be.

Time is a limited resource, and managing it means having to make decisions and compromise. There are no magic tricks or secrets to having all the time you want for doing something. The art of being productive is about knowing how badly you want to do something, and finding ways to accommodate it by prioritizing other things you have on your plate.

Being happy with your time is about maintaining the balance. We all know the basic principles of being productive, but if you are 100% efficient, you are left with no time for joy. So staying happy means striking a balance between getting things done and taking time for yourself and your family.

Only through finding the right balance and getting better and maintaining it can you be truly happy.

Too many things to do every day? Do your planning!

Consider planning exactly how you’re going to spend your time. Do it in the evening, and outline as much of the plan for the next day as you can. The point of this exercise is in seeing what you will need to have done the following day.

Just adding this bit of clarity to your situation will make a huge difference. Make such a plan every evening, and it will help you make easier decisions when you’re working through the list the following day.

Will this make you absolutely happy? No. Will your list look scary on some days? Probably, yes. But you have to make planning part of your day, because knowing exactly where you are is always better than guessing. Even if your list is massive, you can use it as a progress indicator as you go through tasks and tick them off. You may not get through the whole list on a particular day, but you’ll see and know exactly how much you’ve done. And this will make you proud and help you relax.

Everything is important and urgent. Prioritize!

I know, there are days when things seem exactly like this – very important and absolutely urgent. You start one thing, then drop it unfinished and start another one, and eventually end up working late ours and still not feeling like you made any difference at all as you go home.

Is there a way out of this? Sure there is. Prioritize!

Make a to-do list and pick the most important things for you to do on a given day. It can be hard to justify taking time for such an exercise when there seem to be far more important things to work on, but this is the only way you can break free – so just trust me and do it.

Take 15 minutes of your time, write every single task down, and decide which 3 of these are the most important for today. Don’t think about urgency for the moment, just consider which 3 tasks will make your day if you complete them. These are the tasks for you to work on.

Leave the rest aside, and start working through the 3 most important tasks, one by one. No interruptions, no multitasking – focus on each task and stay at it until it’s completed.

Once you’ve completed the 3 most important tasks, you will feel much better and may even find yourself doing a few more things on the same day just to reinforce this positive feeling.

Learn to enjoy this feeling of having accomplished your daily goals! As you make prioritizing your daily routine, you will get better and better at goal setting. No matter how busy you seem to be, always take time to plan and pick the 3 tasks which make all the difference. Do not do anything else until you finish them.

Goal setting: be ahead of the time

To make your life even easier, prioritize your tasks every evening. Whenever you plan your following day’s work, identify the most important tasks, filter out things which will not matter to you if they’re not completed at all, and factor in how urgent everything (anything) is going to be.

Does it get any better? It does! Once you master this, you can start planning a whole week ahead and bring it your awareness to a whole new level: most things, when planned properly, never even get to become urgent!

If you understand how important the task is and have a clear picture of other things you need to accomplish on the same day or week, you can prioritize and block the time for each task. This means lower priority tasks will be pushed to some other day, leaving you plenty of time to complete the things which are really important.

Identify time wasters and reclaim your time

Try identifying what’s eating most of your time. Remember: we all have the same 24 hours available to sleep, plan, work, relax and be happy. If you don’t have enough time, that can’t be helped by getting more time somewhere. 24 hours is all you get, sorry.

Instead of looking for more time, find ways of reclaiming the time you already use doing other things! Take notes of how you spend hours at work and at home, and you will quickly see what can be reclaimed back.

Most people can easily free up 3 to 5 hours a day this way! That’s like an extra day and a half each time for you to do something that you will really enjoy or something that’s really important.

You already know the typical time wasters: watching TV, browsing websites, checking and replying to your emails, chatting on a phone or using an instant messenger.

If you pay attention, you will see that most of these things are non-essential to your success. They’re rarely work-related, and can be so counter-productive that in certain companies such activities are prohibited completely.

You are the master of your time

What’s important for you to realize if you want to be happy is this: you are the master of your time. You can free up a lot of it by giving up or limiting counter-productive activities, but unless you have a good reason for doing so, it will not make you happy. In fact, that’s a quite common problem for many people new to time management: they read an article or two, decide to give something up and end up feeling miserable because they don’t use the reclaimed time. They clearly see the things they had to give up, but don’t see any positive gain from the spare time.

So if you want to be happy, start with finding your own reasons for doing or not doing something with your time. If you can’t think of a better way to spend your evening than watching a TV – perhaps you’ve yet to see a bigger picture. Until you have a good idea of what to do with your spare time once you have it, there is no point in even trying to free it up.

The only way to be happy about your productivity and time is this: have immediate and long-term goals. Identify and review them regularly, and have your daily activities properly aligned.

If a particular task consumes a sizeable chunk of your time, and you can’t align it with any of your daily or long-term goals – you’ve got a potential time-wasting candidate to get rid of.

Stay conscious about everything you do. Acknowledge your progress and your time spend towards reaching your goals – that’s the time best spent. Fight activities which don’t bring you any closer to your goals – but only if you are prepared to sacrifice them for a quicker attainment of a certain goal. If you don’t have a goal worth sacrificing some activity – then don’t fight it, keep doing what you do until a worthy goal arrives. You’ll know when it does.

Read more in: Motivation, Productivity.

Last Thursday and Friday I was on a training called Breakthrough Project Management.

It was an on-site training, and Barry Flicker spent two days sharing his approaches to make project management straight-forward and most effective.

I greatly enjoyed the course, and will form a series of posts on project management in the nearest future, but for now I just want to mark this event and recommend you Barry as an excellent mentor with quite a unique training course.

I liked the way Barry presented common project management challenges, and the team games we had played were created in such a way that they perfectly highlighted the most usual problems you’re bound to see in any project.

One lesson learned once and for all is this: communication plays the most important part in any project.

It is vital that roles and common rules of working on a project are communicated out. Goals and tasks need to be clearly defined and presented to the core team of a project. Metrics and checkpoints are to be defined and explained to everyone as well. Only if every member of the core team communicates relevant information effectively, does a project stand chance to be a success.

Playing games helped us see how lack of communication may make even the most talented and proactive people on the team seem to be useless and irrelevant to the success of a project, and it is truly amazing how simpler things really are if you make sure all the assumptions made during the project planning are communicated to others members of the team.

Barry Flicker had been teaching this course for almost 20 years, and that’s why every slide of his presentation is filled with deep meaning and though provoking pointers. If you ever get a chance to attend the Breakthrough Project Management, I strongly recommend you do.

That’s all I wanted to share with you for now, stay tuned for more! Until then – good luck with your project planning!

Read more in: Problem Solving, Productivity.

I’m really excited to confirm that the wait is over, and Personal Development Forums are open to everyone!

Please have a look around and be sure to register to join and start new conversations!

A good place to start will probably be the Introductions section – this is where you can introduce yourself and your blog to the rest of our community. And if you have been waiting for a chance to suggest a new feature for this website – there’s never been a better time! Just visit the Ideas & Suggestions section or start any conversation you like in General discussions.

I hope to see you all there, and strongly believe we will benefit in many ways by bringing our communicating to this new level.

Thanks for your help and support, and welcome!

Read more in: Motivation, Personal Development, Productivity.

The more I talk to people, the more I’m shocked to see how many of them, being incredibly good at what they do and sometimes even talented, give up on all their plans and dreams simply because of the seeming complexity of following through.

It’s time to grow up

I remember to have exactly the same attitude back in junior school. If something could not be done within a few hours time, it was considered to be impossible.

Rarely any of my accomplishments were impressive even to myself, because they were the few ones which got through the filtering and testing of being possible. As you can guess, all the possible things were not just possible, but simply trivial. No matter how successful I would be in accomplishing such goals, results wouldn’t be impressive simply because the challenges were not big ones to begin with.

Since then I’ve obviously moved on. I grew up and acquired different beliefs on my way, particularly the ones which directly benefit my success with tasks and projects of any size.

If you still find yourself trying to break free from the position I was in before, it is time for you to grow up and learn the amazing inner power you have.

Essentials of being successful

Long ago, I’ve realized that it’s absolutely crucial to learn tackling things little by little. To start with analysis and planning, and not with reviewing possible obstacles.

I’ve learned to look at every task as if it’s as easy to accomplish as any of the ones I’ve had before. And with the practice I’ve had over the past 10 years or so, it sure proved to be possible to reach my goals most of the times.

I finally understood that what really matters is your attitude, your confidence and your motivation in a context of a certain task.

The task itself, along with any possible obstacles on your way of accomplishing it, represents only a small portion of the whole project. Once you agree with yourself, that a particular task means only so much in your estimations, and that you can easily overweight it with your experience and confidence, any task will seem and feel easier to accomplish.

How to master any project

There is a number of rules everyone can benefit from. Most of them are really simple, and the reason for this is this: you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to become successful in your life! Just follow a few simple steps, stay motivated, be persistent – and you will learn to tackle any task and master any project!

Below are some of the most favourite principles of mine, I use them every day and they’ve helped me tremendously over the years.

Key principles to manage any task:

1. Analyze the task and make a plan

It is important to do this in the same order I give you: analyze, then plan – not the other way around! :)

When I was just getting started with my career, I’ve had numerous scenarios which worked out okay in the end, but would be an absolute success if they had been first analyzed and only then thoroughly planned.

There are many benefits in taking your time to look at your task and analyze it before planning:

• making sure you understand the task
  Sometimes just re-reading the email you got from your boss helps you identify a number of points which have to be discussed and agreed upon.
• solution could be closer that it seemed
  Indeed, many tasks sound awfully complicated, yet when you take a couple minutes to read through, you find out that out of a two-page project plan you personally have only a small number of straightforward tasks to do.

2. Don’t make things more complicated than they are

Never start your planning with making false suppositions about any stages of the project. Planning is not a stage for guessing how good or bad a particular realization step is.

Your goal is to end up with a project plan – even in the name itself it suggests that you need a plan to accomplish the task, and not a list of reasons why there is absolutely no way for you to do reach your goals.

Don’t try to be smart or original. There will be time for this later. For now, just come up with a really simple plan. Define your project goals, and build a chain of events which will have to happen before every goal is going to be met. You can always expand your plan and add more details, but it is important to maintain your focus.

The way you do planning is that you start with something simple, and then add details. You start with the beginning of the project, with the realization stage, and with the completion of the project. Then you expand this list by adding various project goals and specifying tasks necessary to achieve particular goals.

3. Plan your project one step at a time, little by little

As with many things, once your initial planning is done, you need to get your project started. Identify some simple steps and start following up.

Do one thing at a time, and take particular care in focusing on how a particular completed task fits into the overall picture and brings you closer to the project completion. If something doesn’t seem right – it probably isn’t. Look at the task again just in case it has to be rearranged.

Remember: with many projects, you can’t build a thorough plan without doing the initial analysis and some related work. This means that if your project plan doesn’t seem perfect, you simply need to work more on it – there’s no reason to pronounce the plan wrong and start afresh.

4. Review your progress regularly

It is one of the most important things in project management, so get into the habit of reviewing your progress regularly and thoroughly.

Some people are just afraid to review a project. They have this unexplained fear which stops them every time they should be making a review. They find dozens of valid reasons to review the project some other time, and usually end up approaching the deadline, finally going through a rather nervous review, and realizing it is impossible to meet the deadline and it’s unfortunately too late to do anything about it.

Make sure you never act like this. If there is as much as a hint of you not willing to review any part of your project – drop everything else immediately. Stop anything project-related you’ve been working on and ask yourself: is there a reason for me to fear the review?

Fear is nothing but a signal to be cautious. It’s not a sign of an inescapable project failure or anything. It’s just a sign your mind gives you that there is something vague or unknown you have to concentrate on. You have to identify the unknowns and make sure you answer all the related questions.

When you have all the answers to all the questions related to your project, you’ll feel much more confident. Like I said, it is important to be able to see the whole picture. You don’t have to know every little detail about accomplishing a particular goal of your project, because just having a rough idea of how you would tackle the task is going to be helpful enough.

Changing your project plan

Review your project, and make changes to the plan accordingly. Don’t think of any changes as if it’s your fault!.

Changes are good! They are the details, the additional information you need to bring into the project to make sure it’s going to be a success.

Now, if you have to change something, and there are valid reasons to do so, it’s best to flag it early and act on it. After all, even valid reasons to change something in the project will seem irritating when it’s too late to act on them.

It’s always better to ask and answer any possible questions, clear up any ambiguities and finalize any decisions – no matter what state of the project it is.

Positive attitude is the key

I could’ve ended my post right here, but I want to remind you once more that your attitude is the key to your success!

There are no impossible tasks, there is only lack of analysis and planning.

There are no unexplained fears, there are only people not paying enough attention.

I hope my article taught you something new today. Go out there and give some of your tasks or projects a try. If you have some projects where you had failed before – that’s even better! Make it a shiny success this time around, and prove once more to yourself and everyone else: if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything!

Read more in: Productivity.

Those of you who are just getting started with GTD, might find some of the suggested alternatives easier to live by.

And another good article for you to read is by Dave Cheong. He answers a reader’s question and explains How To Limit Time On Good Distractions:

For me, I find that my time is often scarce and I have to make conscious decisions on how to spend them. Most of the time it is about opportunity costs – that is, what am I giving up by choosing to spend my time doing X instead of Y. The most important thing here is to make decisions consciously. Don’t let things happen without your control – if that happens you only open yourself to disappointments.

Related Articles:

• Saturday Links - 30/09/2006
• Saturday Links - 23/09/2006
• Books on Personal Development Store

Read more in: Personal Development, Productivity.

Here are the main advantages of using your mobile phone for voice recording:

Taking notes as quickly as you can talk

This is probably the strongest advantage to using voice notes. Even when you speak relatively slow, you can easily fit 120-150 words in a 3-minute recording. Talk a little bit faster, and you can record even more information.

In many cases, your ideas and thoughts will have a rather vague form. It would be impossible to find time and write all of them down, while with voice recording you can do it quite easily.

Another extreme with taking notes is when your ideas are brief and short, and it can take you forever to find a pen and a piece of paper only to write down just a few words. With voice recordings it’s not a problem at all – just push the button and say it out loud.

The luxury of taking notes freely and easily

I’ve already mentioned that I use a paper pocket notebook to take notes when I’m in my car. I naturally can’t take notes when I’m driving, so while having notebook at hand somehow improves my chances of keeping all the good ideas noted, it is still limited to only the short windows of my parking stops. With voice recording I’ve finally got the freedom I was looking for: I push a button and talk. If I want to take another voice note, I repeat the same. Once I’m at home or at work, I can take all the time I need to process all the notes taken during my day.

Many phones support voice commands, which makes your voice notes taking even easier. Just push a button on your phone or your Bluetooth, say the voice command out loud, and your phone will be ready to take your notes. You will not believe how much difference voice notes will make!

Enjoy the quality of your notes going up

This is another great advantage you’ll automatically gain by using voice recording to take your notes: the quality of your notes will go up, simply because you won’t have to be in a hurry to jot something down before the street lights color changes and the traffic resumes. Instead, you’re going to get your ideas noted in full detail, so that there is no need to decypher something you scribbled in a hurry and can’t work out at all just a few minutes later.

Store your voice notes permanently

A 3-minute voice note will probably take around 300kb of memory, which means they’re perfect for long-term storage on your hard drive or CD. You can also send your voice notes over email, because the file size is pleasantly small.

I transfer my voice notes to my laptop. I do it twice a day, and initially give recordings names to match the date, like: 18-09-2006. If there are few notes taken in one day, I add some number to the file name.

Whenever I process my notes, I rename the files to also include a very short description of the note. I use the same line to describe the text note in my information manager software, so that I can easily match the voice and text notes if I ever need.

You can process your notes whenever you have time for them. Some of them are long-term or distant ideas and goals, and so you can just add the description at the time of your daily notes transfer to your PC, and listen to them to produce the text note at some later time.

Transfer voice notes to your PC in minutes

Most phones come with Bluetooth support these days, and so it will literally take you less than a minute to transfer all your recordings for the day to your PC. I don’t use anything fancy just yet – just the very standard File Transfer option of your Bluetooth will do. Once voice notes are copied into the folder on my PC, I can start processing them. Not sure about the full list of options for listening to your notes, but Apple’s QuickTime serves the purpose just fine.

That’s all I have for you today. Let me know if you find this way of taking notes useful, and be sure to let me know if you use an even better note taking solution!

Read more in: Productivity.

I found most of items on his list to match nicely my own way of organizing the working day, and so I would like to comment on some of them and urge you to read Dave’s article in full:

Write out a daily task list and plan your day.

I find having a plan for the day one of the most useful ways to make sure everything is under control. It doesn’t have to be a to-do list, just a list of high-level tasks or goals would do just fine – the idea here is to maintain your focus, and to stay conscious about how much you’ve done and still have to do for the day.

Do not check personal email in the morning.

I’ve agreed on 3 times of the day when I’ll check my personal email or read other blogs through my Google Reader account. The times are: 9:30, 11:30 and 15:30. Since I start my working day at 8am, I’ve got plenty of time to work through the most important issues for the day.

Set your IM status. If you use Instant Messenger, when you don’t want to be disturbed, make use of the status and set yourself as being away or busy. Your friends and colleagues will honour that. They can either send you an email or look you up later when you aren’t as busy.

For about 3 years now, I’m not using IM at work at all. There are rare cases when I need to discuss something with my family or friends, and I will log into my IM account for an hour or so, but I don’t use it regularly anymore. In fact, I rarely start my IM even at home. Most of my communications are now done via email or VOIP.

Fill up a water bottle.

I always have a tall glass with water on my desk. It’s very handy to have it within a reach of my arm, and I never have to stop working in the middle of some task just to go and drink water.

Bring your lunch and have it at your desk.

It’s a habit I got from my previous job – I always bring my lunch with me, and enjoy my lunch while reading a newspaper or some blog article printed out.

Clean up your desk.

An excellent advice! You will not believe how having a tidy desk will help you be more organized and productive! I never let anything irrelevant stay on my desks, and I enjoy having a minimum of things which could possibly distract me.

Change your mindset and make work fun.

It’s always nice to have a laugh. Sometimes me and my colleagues just stop for a quick chat to smile, laugh and swap some funny stories. The four of us in our adjacent cubicles are very sensitive to the work tension – so we all know simultaneously when it’s time for a quick break. Sometimes we go to the canteen to grab another cup of tea or coffee, and we go together simply because this way we can talk.

The article is definitely worth a look, so if you liked the ways of staying focused I’ve highlighted above, go on and read the full post here: 18 Ways to Stay Focused at Work.

Related Articles:

• Reclaim Your Time!
• Boost Your Productivity: Use Action Shelving!

Read more in: Productivity.

It gets more and more attention, so I expect the ratings to promote really the best sites to the top of the list. It’s useful and interesting right now, and I’m sure it will be even more useful in the future.

Related Articles:

• Use Google As Your Writing Assistant
• LookOut - Extremely Fast Search for Outlook
• 5 Steps of My To-Do Lists Revolution

Read more in: Lifehacks, Personal Development, Productivity.

I know I’ve had quite a few of such ideas lost forever, before I had finally decided to never let any of them go. After all, if there is only one brilliant idea I get in many years, I simply can’t afford losing the chance to be proud and successful it gives me!

What are the main reasons you let ideas go away?

For me, these reasons were the following:

• Not being able to write an idea down
  Your circumstances could be different, but for me this was the most limiting factor.Very often, I would list to some music while driving to and from work. Certain compositions might trigger a sudden sparkle of ideas in my mind, and I would usually feel really excited about it. Still, by the time I would arrive at the destination, walk up to my desk and get a moment to type, I would forget the idea and only the residual joy of having a bright idea would stay with me for a few minutes more.

  This is when I get both upset and irritated. Especially if I don’t remember anything about my idea at all. Somehow it would make it feel as if I let the greatest chance of my life go away. The thing is, if I can remember at least some part of the idea, it may be a relieve to realise it wasn’t such a great idea anyway. But when I don’t remember anything, it is very upsetting.

  I’ve narrowed this problem down to not being able to write my ideas down when I was driving my car. By the time I would enter my office, the idea would be lost. Quick change of the environment around you is bound to distract you from whatever it is you were thinking.

  So in situations like this, even a simple trick can make dramatic difference.

  For me it was getting the cheapest kind of a paper notepad with pencil, and putting them into the plastic door pocket in my car. Now, whenever I get a really good idea, I can always write it down if I’m parked, or if I’m not, I know that I won’t have to leave my car and risk forgetting the idea.

  I also make an effort to concentrate on the idea even more. Turn off the music, and start developing the idea – adding more possible features to it and looking for possible ways to make the idea even a greater one will help you remember it better. When I finally arrive, I don’t leave my car until the idea is written down. And if it needs be, I can always tear one of the notepad pages to take the important note with me and then put the task into my electronic ideas repository.

• Not seeing the value of the idea
  This is another very common reason for discarding some really great ideas. Remember: if you have identified a particular flow of thinking as a separate idea, you need to make a note of it.Some ideas are never meant to be easy-to-understand. They’re just not as obvious as some other ideas of yours. This doesn’t mean they’re wrong or useless. All it really means is that you have to save such ideas and review them in a few days (weeks) time. By that time, you’ll likely to have thought up and written down many more ideas, and who knows what meaning and value the original idea would have then!
• Letting an idea go because you think it is stupid
  However small or worthless it may seem, you have to write your idea down and give it a proper thought at a later time.I’ve found it most useful to write down anything which comes up when I’m thinking on a particular subject, and later (usually in the evening) I spend 10-15 minutes just to scan through all the notes and use the most appealing ideas.
• Not being able to identify the use for an idea
  Your idea doesn’t have to be immediately useful or applicable piece of knowledge!Just write it down now, and analyze it later. You’ll thank yourself many times for doing so.

  It is very common that the best ideas come unexpected, and seem irrelevant to the topic you’re trying to think of. That’s okay! Take the note, and you can classify the idea later!

Write your every idea down

Get into the habit of writing your ideas down. Make it one of your first steps towards a really successful life. Never let your ideas go, because:

• this way, you will never feel like you’ve lost the greatest opportunityThere is nothing worse than feeling regret for the rest of your life simply because you haven’t written some idea down. It could be a silly one, too – but it’s the fact that you don’t know this for sure that will make feel like you’ve lost something
• making notes of every idea will greatly improve your chances for success
  
  Not all the ideas have to be successful. Think about it: all it will take to make you successful is just one great idea.Many inventors came up with hundreds of absolutely useless ideas. They invented stuff which made no sense even to themselves, let alone others. Yet, they meticulously documented every experiment of theirs, every tiny detail and though they had. They kept trying, until one day all the pieces came together, and great discoveries and inventions were made.
• you will become more organized
  Making notes of every idea will get you into a habit of reviewing all the ideas quickly and spotting good ideas right away. This will allow you to immediately pay more attention to them, without having to come back later with a proper analysis.

For all the ideas you come up with, there’s a rule of thumb: save them. Write them down, and even if you never feel like analyzing these idea, that’s okay. Someday you’ll read one of them accidentally while looking for some other useful information, and you’ll be shocked at how much sense it will make to you.

Learn the habit of writing every idea down. It could be a short phrase or even a word, but if it inspired or interested you for even a second, write it down immediately. This way, you will never let an idea go, and who knows, maybe one of your ideas will be the greatest discovery of tomorrow?

Read more in: Productivity.

And what I find very useful now to ensure new articles get written and posted regularly is this: I simply plan for the time I’m going to spend working on the articles. Only the best of us can just sit down for half-an-hour a day and provide brilliantly witty content which then gets popular among the people. But for others, and I’m one of them, writing a new article isn’t as easy. There has to be some research carried out, some books read and some blogs (re)visited.

I usually write a few paragraphs of text on a given topic and then sit back to simply think them over just once more. It’s very unusual for me to go back through my text and spend extra time reading it all again, fixing typos and changing sentences. I’m usually more like “do it once – forget till the next time”. So if I’m writing an article, I’m so thrilled with the ideas I’m talking about and sharing with readers, that I simply know that there is no way and no point for me to re-read my paragraphs – I will not be willing to change a single sentence.

Yes, there is a price to pay for this. Sometimes I have to spend an extra minute or two on a particular sentence, simply because somewhere deep inside of me I feel that the sentence isn’t going to serve the purpose I have for it. And so I keep trying various forms and words, until the sentence looks exactly like it should. But if I accepted it and moved on, I’m very unlikely to come back to it and edit it.

I don’t suppose this approach is the best one, but it had worked for me so far, and so I’m happy.

When you agree with yourself on a particular time in your day which you’re going to spend on writing your articles, you’re effectively making all your plans much more real. As with many things, agreeing on something means some kind of commitment. And once you’re committed to something, you’re much more likely to follow through simply because now you know: not only were you going to work on articles, but you have just made a promise to do so, you’ve committed yourself.

Another positive side of having a certain time designated to writing for your blog is that if you book this time for your own use, and finally agree with everyone else not to interfere, you’ll end up having this time all to yourself.

Even if you think you ran out of ideas, you still have time left to continue your work. You’ve committed to working on articles, and so if you’re not writing – start planning new ones. Work on the titles, think of new post series, or simply read some of your old articles one again!

I think I’ve learned it from Steve Pavlina’s pages, that you’re going to be much more productive if you allocate substantial amounts of time to every particular task and tackle tasks one by one. While in many cases you can multitask, I believe you really should do concentrate and refrain from doing anything else when writing.

In his Do It Now article, Steve explains why it is very important for you not to get distracted during your working on something hours. Once your focus is lost, it will take you at least 15 minutes to regain it. Because of this, it’s better to have 45-60 minutes allocated to any task- if you don’t get distracted, you’re going to have enough time to write a sketch for a serious article or even complete a simple post. And if you have been distracted, you’re still going to have enough time to regain your focus and finish the work.

Read more in: Productivity.

Today I’d like to talk about some of the incredibly simple tips I use daily for creative writing. Now that I think about it, these tip are good for any kind of writing, really.

In any kind of activity, you have to find the state of mind where you’re not only committed, but also fully focused on your task. With writing, it’s very important to feel comfortable. Lots of factors will affect your level of comfort, and in this article I’d like to share the factors I found most important for myself. Hopefully, they will help you get more productive too.

• Clean and tidy workplace
  As simple as this factor looks, it’s one of the most important ones for you. If you’re working in your home office, make sure your desk is as clean as possible. It should also be free from any unnecessary objects. Tidying your desk before you start any work is going to pay off, so never hesitate to spend a minute or two doing this before you start working. Put books on shelves and paper notes into paper trays (I’ve got 3 trays for GTD, so when in doubt I just put the miscellaneous paper notes into the “In” tray).
• Quietness or comfortable music background
  It’s highly arguable whether you should leave any music playing at all, so you’ll have to find what works for you best yourself. I’m definitely seeing improvements when I switch from songs to instrumental compositions – when you stop hearing words you concentrate on your task much easier. Find what’s most comfortable for you. I find it best to switch working environment – one day I’ll try writing an article or two in our bedroom, with no music at all. On another day, I’ll listen to some instrumental music while working in my home office. On yet another day I could enjoy the softness of a leather sofa in our living room and listen to some music with my iPod. See what works for you.
• 45 minutes of time
  This is something I’ve started doing only recently myself. Plan for your creativity time. Put it in your calendar and make arrangements with your family that you’re going to have at least 45 minutes of uninterrupted time to yourself and your thinking and writing.I can’t stress enough the dramatic difference this simple tip will make! When you have nothing else planned for the time and you’re not distracted with other tasks, your productivity level increases and you get into the creative state which makes writing a much easier task.

  Don’t forget to get rid of your mobile. I leave it in another room and ask my wife to answer all the call while I’m writing.

• Go full-screen
  If you have gone as far as booking the time for your writing, you might as well take it just one step further: close all the programs running on your PC, so that you don’t get distracted by your instant messenger program or an incoming email. You can close practically everything, but pay special attention to those applications with built-in notifications – you don’t want any of their reminders popping up while you’re writing.Go full-screen in your favourite text editor, and get rid of all the toolbars. Try and make it all configured so that there’s only your text and nothing else on your screen.

  You can go full-screen in MS Word or Writer from OpenOffice, and few tweaks and settings will help you get a very comfortable full-screen mode. Make sure you go away from the classical “white background-black text” color scheme, as it’s not the most relaxing one possible. Find your combination, if your editor is flexible enough. If it is not, then simply go for ANYTHING different – like white text on blue background in MS Word – feels MUCH better for your eyes.

  Here are the things I’ve done in my MS Word to minimize distractions:

  1. changed the color scheme to “white text on blue background” (Tools–>Options menu, General tab)
  2. got rid of rulers (View->Ruler option)
  3. changed the scale to “page width”
  4. switched to a full screen (View->Full screen)

  After all these steps, there’s only a blue page for your wonderfully white text lines, plus a tiny yet terribly annoying “Full screen” toolbar. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a way to completely get rid of it; no matter what I did, it would try and get docked to one of the side panels. So if you know a workaround for this – I would really appreciate it if you told me!

Try applying these tips for a few days, and I’m sure you will see your writing productivity, concentration and even creativity levels go up! And as always, if there are any writing productivity tips you feel like sharing, please let me know!

Related Articles:

• Boost Your Productivity: Use Action Shelving!

Read more in: Productivity.

Cherish your concentration

In anything you do, your success heavily depends on how  focused and concentrated you are.  It takes a lot of effort on your part to maintain the focus while processing pages and tables of information, and you probably know yourself the frustration you experience when suddenly distracted or interrupted in the middle of such a task. You grow frustrated because you know it will take you some time to get back into the focused state.

It is important to realise though, that concentration isn’t simply a state of mind and a result of your interest in the subject, but it is also your ability to isolate the task you’re working on from all the rest. Concentration is getting into a state where you pay attention only to things important for accomplishing a given task.

Just think about it: when you’re trying to concentrate on something, what do you experience? Usually you keep thinking about the subject and focusing on the task until all the other things and subjects around you and in your mind start slowly fading away.  And when the right balance is reached and your brain finally finds the level of background thinking noise acceptably low, you see and feel yourself fit for the process – you feel focused and concentrated on just the task you need to be working on, you feel organized and motivated.

Get rid of distractions

The more productive you become in any aspect of your life, the more you will notice that there is a direct correlation between your levels of commitment and focus on a task and how successfull your accomplishments are. And ultimately this brings you to realising once again how vital it is to get rid of distractions before approaching any given task.

For example, do you find it much easier to work when your workplace is nice and tidy? When you have only the essential tools on your desk, and none of your post-it notes or books or pencils scattered all over it?

This is because by tidying your desk you’re effectively getting rid of distractions. You’re physically removing all the things which can distract you even by accident, and by doing this you’re limiting your concentration options to only subjects you’ll be working on.

I have worked out a habit of tidying my workplace every week. It happens so naturally and quickly, that I really don’t mind doing it. Instead, every time I do it, I just feel how much easier it makes any task I will be working on, how much clearer my vision of the positive outcome will be, and all this motivates me a lot.

Action shelving: remove the complexity

Do you ever think about why we like using shelves for storing things? We have many reasons for doing so, but among the most obvious and important ones are:

The same principles work in many other areas, including the one I’m talking about right now.

Action shelving is how I call an organizing approach which makes sure you split any activity or complex task of yours into flat levels of simple and easy to follow steps. Action shelving ensures that no action on your list has any unknown implementation steps.

The idea is really simple: it is in human nature to be afraid of anything unknown. Although it is possible to train yourself overcome such fears and even work out a positive approach to everything unknown, it requires a lot of effort on your part and there is no way to guarantee the positive outcome in such a training.

With complex projects, the fear of unknown implementation steps slows you down. You may not necessarily notice it, but unknown things in your plan affect the way you think about the project and the way you plan tackling it. As long as there is at least one absolutely unknown step in your plan, any task will seem much bigger than it really is.

Just remember now, how often did you have tasks which seemed scarily complicated  at the beginning, and then somehow turned out to be ridiculously trivial to accomplish? This is simply because some elements of these tasks were unknown to you at the beginning of the project, and slowed you down. Once you had progressed enough with other steps of the task to learn more details about the unknown part, you realised how simple this part is, and quickly got it sorted.

Action shelving is thus a proactive approach of asking necessary questions about various parts of any complex task to ensure the simplicity of every step you put down on your implementation plan.

You should apply action shelving few times during any project: right at the very beginning, to ensure a quick and powerful start; somewhere in the middle of the project, to ensure you’re still moving in the right direction and to also get a clear vision of what your next actions should be; and at the very end of implementing a project – to effectively build a flat and easy-to-follow structure of the outcomes and goals of the project. Not only will this help you concentrate better on each of the goals, but it will also make it easier to see when you reach a particular goal.

Related Articles:

• Know Your Goals
• 5 Steps of My To-Do Lists Revolution
• How To Stay Motivated

Read more in: Productivity.

It’s now been just over a week, and I already see that this experiment was a success:

1. Discipline
   I’m now reading my e-mails only at 9:30, 12:30 and 15:30. There are no exceptions, and there wasn’t a single day when I failed to accomplish anything planned for the day due to a postponed e-mail session.
2. Productivity
   I definitely gained productivity – and it clearly shows in my daily planner, cause I’m constantly getting more and more things done on any given day.
   I also enjoy larger periods of time when I’m fully focused and concentrated on a particular task or just read some documentation. Until recently, all these things were quite possible, but required an additional effort on my part. Why try harder, if the same amount of things can be done in a smarter and relaxed way? ;)
3. Joy
   I’m definitely enjoying myself more, firstly because of the successfull experiment I’m going through, and secondly because I’ve actually managed to reclaim time just like I was going to.
4. Better organization of my day
   Not only I’m learning to align all the e-mail related activities to the designated times, but I’ve also learned to use these times as planning tools. In the morning, I can decide on a pattern for the day, for instane, read e-mail at 9:30 and immediately after this get something done. Some things may not necessarily have been dealt with in time if they were not attached to some simple action like reading e-mails.

That’s about it for the moment. I’m sure I’ll write a summary article on this experiment few weeks later, but even now I can see it’s been one of the best ideas I’ve chosen to follow through.

Related Articles:

• Reclaim Your Time!

Read more in: Productivity.

Find out what activities require a regular commitment

This is the first step towards reclaiming your time. You’ve got to find out what is it that you’re required to do on a regular basis. Some things, you will be surprised enough to find out, are not required to be done at all, yet you’re following a habitual pattern and do them anyway.

Like with so many things, the Pareto Principle can be applied to finding the time parasites as I call them. In context of the search for things which regularly take up your time, you will most likely realise that 20% of your tasks would be consuming (wasting, if you take a closer look at some of them) 80% of your time. This means that if you find only a few of the major offenders, you’ll be able to reclaim a substantial amount of your time by changing very little – like consciously fighting one of your bad habits, etc.

For example, I haven’t been entirely happy about my e-mail processing habits. Not only have I got a habit of replying to almost every e-mail very quickly, but I’ve also gotten into the terrible pattern of checking my e-mail almost every 10 minutes. A quick research has shown that I’m by no means alone with such e-mail problems – Dave Lorenzo has recently been reporting his progress in fighting e-mail patterns in his Making The Most Out of E-mail article.

Now, it doesn’t really take you this long to check your e-mail, it could be done in just a few seconds. But the real damage is done not through wasting my time, but through distraction from other activities. If I’m working on some task, like writing a document or  reading through some technical manual, or simply working on some problem, it is best solved with my full attention.

And every now and then there are these moments when it’s slightly harder to maintain your focus – I could be stuck with a problem not seeing what to do next, or I could be taking some time to analyze the command output I’m seeing on the screen – it could be anything, really. But during these moments it’s very easy to get distracted, cause you’re in some kind of suspended mode – not very focused at all. It is during these moment that you can be tempted to switch the task and do something else “for a change”. Now, please don’t mix these moments of weakness with powerful and conscious multitasking – it’s very different.

Now, what happens is that I start checking my e-mail, and even if there’s nothing new there, I’m still going to be distracted enough that it’s going to take me some time to fully focus on the original task again. And that’s the real damage I’m talking about.

Make a decision to reclaim your time

Once you’ve come up with the list of things you think are taking too much of your time, it’s time to build a strategy. You need to make a decision to stop spending more than a certain amount of your time for a certain activity. If you want to make it easier, write your decision down somewhere – when written, it automatically becomes a very powerful commitment, and it will help you stay conscious and focused when fighting your habits or behavioural patterns.

In my case, I’ve decided to change my e-mail patterns completely. Instead of constantly checking my various e-mail boxes, I’m now checking my e-mail only few times during a day, and plan e-mail-related activities to happen during the designated periods of time only. I’ve made a decision to do so, and I’m documenting all my attempts to break the old pattern and adopt a new.

Generally, you want to find as many ways to optimize your time, as possible. One great idea I’ve got from Peter Kua in his Triple Your Free Time article, for instance, is that you have to make free time a goal, and plan for it!

Sometimes this will involve giving bad habits up, in other cases this will be a radical change in your approach to a certain task, and obviously this will require more  discipline from you. Steve Pavlina did a great job sharing his thoughts on this in his Do It Now article, which I consider to be one of his most influential posts.

Stick to the plan. Enjoy your results!

It’s been a couple days for me fighting my e-mail patterns, and I must say I’m thrilled with both the general feelings and the results I have. It wasn’t hard at all to wait for the agreed times of the day to read and write e-mails. Once you have a plan, it’s easier to see that it’s not really so hard to follow through.

Secondly, it was great to see that nothing critical went wrong because I’ve changed the pattern. This confirmed that my plan was reasonable, and reassured me of the positive change I’m fighting for.

What’s left now is to make sure I stick to the plan and confirm the new pattern to be the only way of processing e-mails. Once I’ve done this, in just few weeks times, I’ll be able to move onto a next time consuming task to optimize or even get rid of.

I encourage you try the same: reclaim your time now, and you’ll be amazed how easy it is!

Read more in: Productivity.