When do we feel fulfilled at the end of the day?
Usually, when we do something we’re proud of. Even when we don’t realize it at first. What I didn’t understand at first is why we don’t do this every day. Why am I not accomplishing what makes me feel like the best version of myself at the end of the day? That’s when I started reading about depth and distractions. Distractions are so common these days that we don’t even notice them. Looking at our phones simultaneously, when we’re working, when we’re waiting in line at the store, when we’re out with our friends, it’s basically a part of who we are. It’s not just our phones though. We tend to give in to a lot of distractions where the usual outcome is not important at all to us. It may be different for a lot of people, but most of us give in to these distractions. But the hard part starts when we become aware of that. The human brain is a muscle, and it needs to be trained, this means we need to train our brain to ignore these distractions and focus on what’s really important. Doing that is a process and it takes time, but the results are worth it. When you eliminate distractions, you open up space for more depth in your everyday life, and depth is good. Most of us are occupied with work or studies. And a lot of us have bigger goals that we wish to achieve in our life. By embracing depth and removing distractions, the road to achieving our goals becomes easier and more pleasant. I am a really ambitious young person, and I have big goals. That is why I started studying productivity and the human brain, so I can get more done in less time. To my surprise, I found out it’s actually possible. Earlier in my life, I was taught that you have to work harder to achieve your goals, but that’s not all. You have to work smarter, and by this, I mean scheduling your work during the day where you can focus intensely on your tasks. By doing this you are fully dedicating your time and attention to a specific task. I could write a whole book about why deep work is better than just completing shallow tasks, but this blog is not about that. This blog is about you, who already believe that deep work is more valuable. Below I will show you some of the things I do in order to eliminate my distractions and be more productive during my day.
Schedule your Day
Every night before I go to sleep, I write down things I know I am going to do the next day. This helps the brain in a lot of ways since it’s both a tracking method for you to see what you’ve done during the day and works as a preparation method for the brain the next day. I usually use google tasks since it’s easier to link with google calendar and I can see exactly what I have planned for the day.
Schedule your Internet Use
Yes, even if your work is closely related to using the internet, it’s not impossible to do so. I work as a Digital Marketer and I manage to schedule my internet use every day. Scheduling your internet use includes your phone as well as the computer you work on. When you schedule your internet use during the day you are helping your brain fight the easiest sources of dopamine you have lying around. And this helps train the brain for more focused work during the day.
Meditate
Each day, after I finish my job, I either go out for a drink with my friends or head back home immediately. The first thing I do when I get home is: remove all technology and sit on my bed for thirty minutes to an hour. It helps me clear my mind a structure my thoughts, I finish my job at 4:30 pm, but I work on different projects, so my working hours are until 8:00 pm. Meditating before jumping into my work helps me relax and gives me the energy to continue without being fatigued.
Manage your energy, not your time
We all have different types of energy at different hours during the day. There are hours when you feel more tired, and there are those when you feel more energized. These types of energy happen because of past tasks you complete. Let’s say you just got back from your job and you want to work on your own projects or you want to spend time doing something you love but you feel tired and then proceed to procrastinate during the whole day because you just “don’t feel like it”. This is where meditation comes in for me. I work on a lot of projects and this drains a lot of my energy, meaning I have to manage it well in order to complete every one of my tasks successfully. Each day before I jump into my projects I meditate and I remove all technological devices for about an hour(as I mentioned). This way I have time to relax my mind and just as a muscle the brain recovers when you rest it and let it relax. By doing that I manage to stay productive during the day without having to pick a fight with myself about how tired I am and how I can’t be productive anymore during the day.
The title of the blog says “Feeling good about yourself at the end of the day”. And what makes me feel good about myself at the end of the day, is seeing how far I’ve come that day and how much closer to my goals I am compared to the beginning of the day.