Wednesday, October 05, 2011
A Master Plan for Taking Control of Your Life
The Energy Project: Here's the problem we face, every day of our lives. Nearly everything that generates enduring value requires effort, focus, and even some discomfort along the way. At the same time, we're deeply wired to avoid pain, which the body reads as mortally dangerous, and to move toward pleasure, the more immediate the better. We're also exposed to more temptation than ever. The world is literally at our fingertips, a few keystrokes away. It's forever beckoning us, like the Sirens singing to Odysseus, who lashed himself to the mast of his ship to resist their call. The sirens sing to us, too: Have the dessert. Skip the workout. Put off the hard work. Surf the web. Check your email. Indulge your whims. Settle for the easy way out.
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6 comments:
I find point 3 really fascinating. Reflecting back over my first couple of projects, the few bumps i have encountered were rooted back to impulsive decisions and quick manufacturing of the project. Taking five minutes to sit down, evaulate the idea, run through how it should be accomplished, and then proceeding will almost always save you time and frustration in the long run. Great point sir! - Shedding light on that aspect of managing my daily life will help me a lot.
I thought the most interesting point on the list was the consideration of "switching time". We always think that multi tasking, if you are "good at it", is more efficient. But I guess you take 25% longer to do everything at once than to do each one individually. And I will definitely keep in mind that 90min tip. I will turn off my phone and email, and really work on one single task and make sure to take a 90min break. Get a snack maybe. I'm glad I ran by this article tonight in particular. I wish I had the option of getting 7 hours of sleep a night. Since we're in class for 7.5 hours and have crew for 4 hours, in order to get 7 hours of sleep you'd only have another 5.5 hours for the rest of your day. Including traveling, eating, getting dressed, and homework! Even if you cut out getting dressed and eating, you would have enough time for 7 hours of sleep. Maybe with the other tips in this article you can get you're work done in enough time.
I found all of these point truly valuable- usually all of my productivity, organization, productivity, fitness, are intertwined and successful only with a healthy balance and regulation of all these things. I took one step in particular mind- doing work in small, fast spurts, and setting aside break times in between those powerful working sessions. I find myself many a times being so overwhelmed by work that I set aside large chunks of time to attack a huge project- ending up accomplishing little to nothing in the process of being so intimidated. The sleeping is a good tip too, but almost an unreachable one- I wish I did have 7 hours to sleep.. for now I'm taking any amount that I can get!
What a fantastic synthesis of every piece of "productivity advice" I've ever gotten! I thought the most interesting bits were not multitasking, which is something that I cannot do (to the point where sometimes I need to work with ear plugs in and my wifi turned off), and the 90 minute intervals, which is something I've actually never heard about before, but makes a lot of sense.
Like many of the people who have commented on this article before me, the idea of a 90-minute work cycle seems worth a try. I always try to give myself breaks, but I probably don't break often enough and when I do take break, it's probably too long for this reason. Taking regular, timed-out breaks seems like a great way to recharge. Another point that resonated very specifically to me was the point about taking time to reflect. I often feel so rushed that I make rash decisions, and there are definitely times when I would have received great benefit from taking the time to think things through. I have great respect for this author. They made reasonable, useful suggestions and didn't make me feel like I was living my life wrong, but just gave me the idea that I could be doing simple things to live a more healthy and productive lifestyle.
What an efficient compilation of most of the advice I’ve received over the years from parents, teachers and anyone else concerned with my well being. Of course the one piece of information that I resonated with the most was number 7 --- getting seven hours of sleep each night. Since I’ve been at school, sleep has shifted from being a necessity to a luxury, and I find myself daydreaming about getting enough sleep. I think that this suggestion should be at the top of the list actually. Because without enough sleep, you have a more difficult time putting all the other recommendations into practice. As a tribute to the author of this article and all of those who have given me the same advice, I will being practicing suggestion number one. I will instill the automatic behavior of reading this article every night before I try to get seven hours of sleep.
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