Productivity for the Low-Effort
Can you imagine being someone who completes tasks? No, neither can I. I know people who get their work done, but I’m in a constant struggle between wanting to complete my chores so I can go and have fun, and wanting to have fun immediately without completing my chores. Conundrum for sure. For me, the most interesting part of productivity isn’t what gets done but rather how we get to doing it. The journey of productivity rather than the destination or outcome of the work you’re doing. Also I like to quantify how much time I waste trying to avoid my responsibilities.
The Five-Second Rule
My house is not a Mel Robbins house. Her enormous glasses are always throwing me off. And she has the most podcast-friendly voice I’ve ever heard in my life. Is this internalized misogyny? Probably, but I’m choosing to move past it. When I was in a very weird place (when am I ever not, though?), I would read a ton of self-help books from the library. I would forget to check their ratings on Goodreads and most of the ratings for the 5-second rule book were the same: listen to the 20 minute Ted Talk and you get the exact same effect and save yourself 3 hours of time. The book included case studies in the form of people’s tweets talking about how successfully the 5-second rule worked for them. I didn’t need to read all of those.
The 5-second rule consists of counting down from 5 like you’re a rocket ship, to start any task you don’t want to start. It applies across the board, from getting out of bed in the morning to talking to a random person at the bar. It’s effective, when I remember it’s there. I think it also inspires action in instances where it may benefit you to reflect on your intentions first. The whole point of the rule is to avoid overthinking your way out of doing a task that needs to get done. Beneficial when used in the correct context, insufferably annoying when you’ve haphazardly sent an email too quickly because you wanted to cross something off your list.
A To-Do List
Speaking of lists, to-do lists are pretty self-justifying. It’s more of an organizational tool that keeps me on track than something that will actively make me work on my projects. The ever-expanding to-do list and the items that haven’t been checked off in years don’t motivate me but serve as a helpful reminder of my own incompetence and how long I can avoid doing a task that intimidates or bores me.
The Pomodoro Technique
The Pomodoro technique is so goofy, it makes me laugh. It’s the productivity equivalent of counting down from 3 when you want a kid to stop doing something destructive. Like a much longer 5-second rule. You assign a task for yourself and set a 25-minute timer to complete that task or to at the very least start the task and get as much of it done as you can. Once the timer starts, you have to start. Once it stops, you get a 5 minute break. The point is just to start somewhere and eventually when you get to the 25 minute mark, you’ll find that you’re too deep into work that you won’t want to stop until it’s finished. It tricks you into working much like counting down from 3 tricks my nieces into stopping making fun of me because I forgot the words to Driver’s License.
I don’t love the ratio of work time to fun time, (5 times the work if you’re bad at math like me) but I get the sense that this is what’s needed to complete tasks successfully and on time. 5 minutes for a break is too rushed for me to get to the bathroom, pour another coffee, or to read any good articles online. The heightened sense of urgency is jarring but it has worked for me at least some of the time.
I started using the Pomodoro technique for work tasks to mixed results. The benefits are mostly that it makes starting the work easier. Once the timer starts counting down, my brain already feels like it’s late for something. And the low commitment of working for a digestible 25 minutes helps to make my tasks feel surmountable instead of the impossible mountains I’ve made them out to be. Motivation and discipline can be so tricky.
Where the Pomodoro shines is when I need to do a chore around my house. Mostly, it’s cleaning something that I don’t want to start cleaning. For example, I almost never want to clean my glass vanity. However, it gets dirty fast and it takes just under 25 minutes to clean. I know this because of the Pomodoro technique.
Eating the Frog
Like the Pomodoro technique, the Eating the Frog method is as simple as it is effective. You pick the hardest/longest/task you’re dreading the most the night before or the morning of and then you do that as soon as you wake up and get situated. That’s it. It’s annoying because I almost always know which tasks I’ve been putting off the longest. What task I keep looking at longingly and saying “nahhhhh” to is the frog of the day. Its downsides are that sometimes the frog is actually an insurmountable task that will take all day to do. Or even several days. When this method shines is when I’ve actually accomplished eating the frog at like 11am and then have a full stretch of day ahead of me to go through the more mindless responsibilities I have. I’m motivated to do more even though the day just started. Eat the Frog capitalizes on how much more productive I am in the mornings.
Snowball Method
The Snowball method is the opposite of whatever Eat the Frog is and has never personally worked for me. You’re meant to start with the easiest, quickest task, get her done, and then use that positive momentum forward to get your progressively more complex and time-consuming tasks accomplished. I get why this would work but I find that I get a little too excited at having completed something simple and straightforward, that I give myself infinite grace and accolades in the form of doing nothing for the rest of the day. If I’ve already made my bed and answered three emails, there is little to no incentive for me to clean the cushion covers of the couch at the laundromat or finish my class’ latest assignment.
I don’t love the snowball method but godspeed to those who do.
Habits from the Atomic Habits Book Everyone Talks About
I read a copy of this book because my parents had gotten it for my sister’s boyfriend for Christmas. I think my mom wanted him to quit smoking because it pissed my sister off. They’re no longer together (not because of the smoking but because she asked him to move out of their shared apartment because she preferred living alone) but I kept some of the lessons from his book. Many of the lessons seem insultingly simple like make good habits more enticing and accessible and make bad habits less satisfying and less accessible. This advice is basic. But one of the habits that I have used repeatedly and to great success (lol) is the habit of leaving the chore out so that you’re more likely to do it. I leave my vacuum out for this reason, and I vacuum my apartment almost every day.
I still leave my workout clothes out in a little pile when I want to do an early morning class the next day. I love when I remember to put my bathrobe and slip on shoes in the bathroom so I’ll get inspired to take a shower while I’m brushing my teeth right before bed. All my household items have a place except for the chore items, their place is out. I leave my journals out when I’ve started slacking on writing in them. I have pens everywhere for this reason too. I leave my books on tables and in every purse I have so that I can read them anytime I leave my apartment. I only started saving real money when I automated my expenses to go into savings accounts I couldn’t see. Ease of access and automation is why I’m able to get more done and discovering this has undone years of procrastination.
Telling Your Friends Your Goals
This one is controversial. One, it requires that you regularly speak to your friends about your goals. While I’ve been attempting a season of shutting the fuck up and listening, I will always love to talk about my goals. I tell people what I want to accomplish and why and keep running lists on the Notes app on my phone. Usually I do this on birthdays or holidays or when I’m catching up with a friend I haven’t seen in a while. I love to check in on our goals to see what, if any, progress we’ve made and more importantly, if our goals have changed. Sometimes older goals fizzle out and we replace them with new ones.
Being accountable to others is hell. All my friends are kind enough to not inquire about a job I applied to that I wanted and didn’t even get an interview for. They’ll ask follow-up questions when I bring up the subject of my goals, and I do the same. It hurts to let our loved ones down, but having another person invested in my progress increases the likelihood that I’ll work on something so that we can celebrate our respective wins together, and grieve our failures together too. No matter what, it feels better to share the burden of responsibility, productivity, and goal achievement with someone who you love and care about. The stakes are bigger.