4 Traps That Kill Your Time and Happiness

Things I learned during the quarantine that I never heard anywhere before…

We all love to be productive.

It doesn’t matter where you work or what you do, we all are consistently seeking ways to increase the amount of work we do in a day. When we get it right, it’s so fulfilling. But most of the days we keep falling back to that deep pit we try to avoid. So, why are we so bad at being productive?

From finding the motivation to keep our concentration until the end is a tough task. It used to be the same for me, for years. But like anybody, I didn’t question my ways. Because I was so sure that my ways are good and I’m only failing because of the wrong implementation of those and laziness by my side.

I was so sure that my ways are good and I’m only failing because of the wrong implementation and laziness by my side

But this (never-ending) quarantine life gave me time to think back, analyze, and experiment with my tried and tested methods. I thought of sharing a few things I learned, so you don’t have to go through it again. I’m not going to tell you everything about being productive, as you might have already have read thousands of articles on them. But these are the things that I rarely come across.

The more we do, the more we are Productive, Right?

Wrong…. This is a concept we all hold dear to. So when planning our day, we fill our diary page or calendar app with several tasks to complete in the next day. “Even though I completely wasted today, I’m going to pull myself together and finish these tomorrow”. But you know how this usually goes.

But that page-full task list did wrong to you than any good. What it actually did was to pressurize yourself. When you start working on the next day, you bear that heavy list in your mind. That stress keeps drags you back because you fear you might not be able to finish what you have planned yesterday. Then usually we end up finishing only half or even less than that of work we have assigned for the day.

Because I also never seem to tick all the boxes of that task list on any given day, I switched plans. I reduced my work ethic by half and experimented for 2 weeks.

“Focus on being productive instead of busy”

That did wonders for me. I was more relaxed during my work and always able to finish up my work even before the time I allocated for them. Some days I had even more than 2 hours left. So what has changed?

I think that the task list was holding me back. Since I set me a more realistic and achievable target, it kept me relaxed during work and my motivation was high as I was always on top of my work.

So don’t fill your task sheet with many entries. Keep it short and only focus on accomplishing things that matter.

Afternoon naps are bad

Remember that sleepy afternoon you kept working when your brain was begging for a little nap. But still, you kept sipping that coffee and washing your face to get rid of it.

Most of us try to avoid afternoon naps because of the widespread concept that afternoon naps are bad. Do they?

Not if you do it right. I, for one, tried to stay away from them as long as I could remember. But in those 2 weeks, I got 20 minutes naps whenever I felt sleepy in the afternoon.

An afternoon nap is refreshing, if you do it right!

That small nap helped me a lot to recharge my mind again. Even though you may feel like 20 minutes is too short, try it. The trick is to not sleep more than that or at least not more than a half-an-hour. If that goes beyond that borders, it will be bad for your health, and rather than feeling re-charged, you’ll feel guilty for wasting your time.

And remember not to sleep after 3 pm as it will reduce your sleep quality at night. A good night’s sleep is also much more important than we think.

Take a Break When You are Tired

You have 24 hours a day. If you sleep 8 at max, you have 16 hours left to do anything you want. And when you plan your day, always add pre-planned breaks between your work times.

If you take breaks when you are tired, starting out again is pretty tough. It’s because you stopped after fed-up of work and also that break is somewhat less enjoyable as you subconsciously have the idea that part of your work is left to do. When you go for pre-planned breaks, you usually stop work before you get fed up and you are not thinking about remaining work as you have already added that break as a part of your routine.

This trick helped me significantly to work my way through the day without losing motivation and having guilty feelings about having a bit long break.

The thing with pre-planned breaks is that, you stop work before you get fed up and you can enjoy it more as it is a part of your routine.

And never think that time you give for a peaceful meal, workout, meditation or even one of your hobbies is a waste. They recharge your mind more than anything, which will help you more to get work done.

Do Something Fun in the Morning to Get You Going

We all are used to take look at our phones as soon as we awake. Then might watch a YouTube video or browse through the Facebook feed to get off your sleepiness. I know I did it more than I like to admit.

What I thought was doing those things would get me to a good state of mind that will help me in starting the day’s work. But what happened was my brain was too lazy to do something boring like studying after doing procrastination early in the morning.

What I tried was to get up at 5.30, wash my face, and start exercising for about 15–30 minutes. So even before I knew it, I already have a great start to the day. Well, it didn’t go well every day. I am not used to be an early bird so the first few days were like killing myself. But after a few failures along the way, it started to grow on me after about 2–3 weeks. Then on I didn’t look back.

But I’m definitely not asking you to wake up early as science has debunked that ‘early morning birds’ theory. (But if you can it has its’ own benefits too) If you are a night owl, you are still well tended to become productive. The trick is to avoid those fun activities before you do any work. You can give them as a reward for yourself when you finish a task on your list, which will provide you with extra motivation.

And finally, try to finish your most daunting tasks in the morning or first few hours of your schedule. Your mind is fresh, the brain is working after a good break, so you will do it better.

We have planted several myths in our minds about being productive. Those things can make you feel like a failure if you aren’t able to live up to them. Then we try to adhere to them for productivity’s sake, rather than for the sake of accomplishing something you care about. So enjoy your work, manage your expectations, and don’t blame your self if you fall short. Try again the next day with more realistic targets and in the long term, you will be more productive than ever…..