How our lives turn out depends on what we do each individual day of our lives. Our daily routine is what makes up our weeks, months and years and it is an integral part of who we are and what we do.
If we want to be someone who is productive and gets things done, we need to have productive daily routines.
Productivity needs to be embedded in the systems of our everyday lives, rather than something that we simply have as a far-off goal.
Here are 3 easy and practical things that you can do to increase the overall productivity of your daily routine and so, in turn, increase the productivity of your life in general.
Get up earlier
It might not be a fun one to start with, but the easiest way to give yourself much more time in the day is to get up as early as you physically can.
It is really important to get your 6-8 hours of healthy sleep each night, so don’t sacrifice this for an early morning rise. Instead, get to bed earlier and wake earlier.
If you get up every day just an hour or two earlier than you normally do, by the end of the first week of doing this you will find yourself with so much extra time to get things done. It really is a head start in the day and you will that you have accomplished so much before other people have even gotten up yet.
If you look at lots of different types of professional and successful people out there, they will all tell you that they get up as early as 5 am.
6 am or 7 am will do, however, if that is what works better for you.
Plan downtime
When we are focusing on being productive we need to remember that this doesn’t come as a reason to get rid of all of our rest and downtime.
In order to be productive, we need to rest.
Our brains need time to restore themselves as do our bodies. So if you want a productive and efficient daily routine, you need to plan times for downtime within this schedule. If you do it in advance, with clear cut times and boundaries, you have a much better chance of sticking to the overall balance you need and not going too far in either direction.
Plan your breaks ahead of time and you will find yourself much more focused and much less stressed overall.
Use a timer
We can’t be productive all day and we can’t have periods of high-intensity concentration all day. The best thing we can do is set ourselves a timer for productivity and when it ends, we rest or we move on to a less intense task.
So, if we are writing, let’s set a timer for 1 hour and write intensely in that time. No notifications, no distractions. After that, let’s set a timer for 15 minutes for proofreading and admin. After that, 15 minutes to decompress, go to the bathroom and make a cup of tea. This would be the best way to optimise a 1.5 hour period of work time.
Do this repeatedly throughout the day and you will find that you are not only productive, but you are also relaxed and focused.
This daily routine over time will lead to much more general life success and satisfaction.
