How to succeed without being overwhelmed. This involves improving your focus, emotional intelligence and physical sustainability.
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“He who knows most grieves most for wasted time” – Dante
One of the things I talk about most often here on nickchatrath.com is time management (check out my three part series for some of my favourite tips.) We all have the same amount of time in each day, yet the decisions we make about how to use it can be the difference between productivity and chaos.
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Personal technology has the potential to make us more productive than ever before. I’m convinced that wearables can supercharge your personal performance, and we’re only at the beginning of figuring out what these new devices and apps are going to mean for us.
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So much in life is a matter of timing. A good joke can be ruined with a mis-timed punchline, helpful feedback can be rejected if delivered at the wrong moment, and a top-quality steak can go from delicious to inedible in a matter of seconds.
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These days we’re surrounded by screens. Whether it’s our laptops, our tablets, or our phones, we’re looking at screens for huge proportions of our day. And they’re no longer exclusively used at work, having come to dominate our leisure time as well.
None of that will come as a surprise. However, did you know that these screens are usually tinted blue? And that research has shown time and time again that blue light stops us from getting a good night’s sleep?
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“One may walk over the highest mountain one step at a time.” – John Wanamaker (1838-1922), U.S. Postmaster General
On nickchatrath.com I talk about many ways in which you can maximise performance in different areas of your life – diet, fitness, performance, sleep, purpose, mindset and more. If you’ve made a decision to work on your performance, then well done!
But here’s a tip – don’t try and do it all at once. As John Wanamaker reminds us in the quote above, great things are possible, but only if you take one step after another.
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Consider these five individuals – in each case, they excel in one area and need to improve in another:
I have met each of these people. They all have one thing in common: Though successful in some ways, they all veiled their greatness by excelling in at least one intelligence and falling short in another.
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The previous posts in this series contained the first two steps that will help you make the most of every minute, whether at work, home or elsewhere. Those steps were:
1) List the 4-6 most important things you need to get done the next day, and allocate timings to the tasks
2) Plan and prioritise the day itself
The final step is the most practical of them all:
Gordon MacDonald , “Not everything that cries the loudest is the most urgent thing. Just because an email comes in asking again for a meeting next week, doesn’t mean you have to answer it now.”
In the first post in this series, I shared step number one in making the most of every minute: List the six most important things you need to get done the next day, and allocate timings to them.
This step was revolutionary in turning my productivity around. But on its own, it is not enough. That’s where step 2 comes in:
“What would happen if 80% of your effort was focused on high-results-producing activities? … All it takes is pigheaded discipline and determination.” — Chet Holmes
There are two types of people: those who write lists, and those who don’t write lists.
Two years ago, I smugly thought that I managed my time very effectively because I wrote lists. Very long lists. And that was my problem — my lists were so long that each time I had a few minutes spare I would cherry pick tasks that were quick, easy, or cried the loudest.
But as Gordon MacDonald puts it, “Not everything that cries the loudest is the most urgent thing. Just because an email comes in asking again for a meeting next week, doesn’t mean you have to answer it now.”
I was regularly falling foul of this. How can we attend to what is truly important, on a daily basis?
Our baby daughter was waking every 2-3 hours – what else would you expect from a one-month old? – and I had agreed to do all the night feeds allowing Tan, my wife, to sleep through. Looking back, maybe this wasn’t the best weekend to test a wearable! But, then again, this is real life and wearables are useless if they cannot withstand the challenges of reality. So how would the multi-functional MooV Now track my sleep in such a disturbed night? I was eager to find out and if you are too read on…