Dear Meli,

I have been trying to be more focused lately. I work at home as my own boss, and I’ve had a long history of procrastination. I’m tired of it, but it’s also a habit that I’m finding hard to break. It’s weird, because I really want to be more focused. But there must be some part of me that doesn’t want to be, because every time I start to be more productive, I quickly find myself back to putting things off again. I have a spiritual practice, and this helps to some degree, but not enough. Do you have any tips for me?

Fighting for Focus

Dear Fighting,

I’m sorry to hear about your struggles with this. I’m also sorry I can totally relate!

Spiritual practice is very helpful, I agree. But let me share with you my favorite approach.

You know how before you go away on a trip, you get so much accomplished? Especially those final days before leaving? Right?

I love the practice of approaching every day (to a milder degree) as if I’m about to leave town. One of the key reasons we’re so productive in these times is because we’ve got more of an end-time. Because of that, we have more willingness to fine-tune our list of priorities and more motivation to stay on track.

So pretend you’re about to leave town. Approach the day’s activities in a similar manner.

Like this:

1) Make a list of the top things you feel you want to get done in your day. You can do this for a week, or even a month. But it’s imperative that you end up with a list just for the day! That is what we do before leaving town!

2) Prioritize this list. Briefly think upon each item. What if it didn’t happen today?

3) Whittle down your day’s activities list until you have just three items on your list. If this seems extremely challenging, that’s telling you something. Perhaps part of your lack of focus is thinking of too many things as your higher priorities. This can be overwhelming. When I do this, it’s almost as if I can feel my brain go into tilt mode. When playing a pinball machine, tilt mode makes the whole game stop! So stay the course and land on three things only.

4) Prioritize which thing is the highest priority, and then the second-most and final activities. List them – written is by far the best for this!

5) Put this list somewhere where you can see it all day!

6) Do item number one. Do not allow yourself to touch any aspects of items two or three until item one is complete! (The only exception is if you have one step and then have to wait until you tackle the next step. If you send an email, for instance, and need a reply before you can take your next step, move to item two while you wait. But the minute you get that email, back to number one you go!) Warning: This step – one item at a time – is the key to this approach! This is what separates our pre-travel productivity from our normal days! Don’t skip this step!

7) Once you have finished your highest priority item, acknowledge yourself. Stand up and do a little dance. Anything. Even just a little, “Hey, you. Well-done! Look what you just did!,” is helpful.

8) Move on to item two with the same focus you had when doing item one. Don’t skip to item three until complete with two!

9) When your item two is complete, acknowledge yourself again, perhaps in a different way.

10) Tackle item three.

If you want to supercharge your productivity with this approach, I highly recommend not having your phone nearby when you’re working. Or at least have it set so you don’t get notifications or interruptions for blocks of time.

Also: Stay off all social media during your work hours! If you set our own schedule, all the more reason to have boundaries like this. Otherwise, it’s easy to find yourself at the end of the day and wonder what the heck you did all day! Social media rabbit hole. No good for productivity!

Try this approach and let me know if it helps. I know there are many tips and tools out there for increasing productivity. Heck, there are books and programs galore. But the approach I describe here works the best for me of all I’ve tried.

Now go kick some butt and get sh** done!

Ah.

P.S. Don’t do this too many days in a row. Remember to give yourself days of rest and play! And get plenty of sleep! Otherwise, you’ll just whittle away your own stamina, instead of your list of things to accomplish. With that in mind, you can get even more done on the accomplishment-days!

Enjoy!

Blessings and Love to you in all you do!

In Joy,

Melissa

What is your experience with procrastination? Share your comments below!

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