18 May 2012

Don’t Be So Busy

hamster on a wheel

It's a strange phenomena you see every day: people will compete to show how busy they are. It's like they attach a sense of significance to being busy. How many times have you answered the question "How is work/business?" with "really busy" or "flat out" as if that were the end goal? Isn't the end goal to spend LESS time working? Don't you want to spend more of your time doing things you love, like hanging out with friends & family, travelling the world or sipping long island iced teas on … [Read more...]

Use The Action Machine to Focus

hourglass

There's a great tool I've used for years to force myself to focus on one thing at a time: the Action Machine by Derek Franklin. I choose my one to three things to get done that day (see this post for more on that) then set the order of the focus blocks. A "focus block" is simply a block of time focussed on only one thing. Experiment with how long works for you. I work best with 50 minute focus blocks, so my timer is set to: 1 x 50 minute focus block 1 x 10 minute relax block 1 x 50 … [Read more...]