Another week of the experiment down. It’s going better than I expected and really interesting to see how the things combine together and compound. Looking forward to the weeks ahead.
My focus since I had a busy week ahead with University was on things that were either easy to test or boosted my productivity – I tried to pick as many as I could that overlapped.
I tested five additional things this week, on top of the habits I continued from last week:
1. Plan + Review Week
2. Notebook – write everything down.
3. Daily Mantras
4. Cold Showers
5. Working with No Charger
1) Plan and Review Week.
Despite how often I have read about the benefits, I have never really tested this – but last Sunday, I sat down and mapped out my entire week, slotting everything into my Google Calendar.
Noah’s system incorporates using categories (which I borrowed from my goals) to create a list of all that needs to be done and scheduled them in.
Simply by doing this, I was able to automate everything that I wanted to get done and my time management was easily broken down.
2) Notebook – write everything down:
Suprisingly, this was a habit that I previously did through out High School but completely abandoned it once I entered University. I’m definitely glad that I picked it back up again.
It’s honestly such a simple yet effective way to capture everything – obligations, ideas, reminders, to-do’s. For some reason, anytime I try to use my phone to do this I am nowhere near as effective as when I use a physical notebook.
Easy to implement – just keep a notebook or sheet of paper with you, and write down everything you don’t want to get – with a great ROI.
3) Daily Mantras:
Technically these are also part of his Maker Morning routine but I omitted them in favour of just rereading my goals each morning.
They’ve been recommended a few times across his other videos, however, so I took them more seriously. I wasn’t creative enough to come up with my own, so adapted the following ones from Stoicism:
I just swapped the yours with my, and added an I will at the beginning. Working so far!
4) Cold Showers
This is another habit that I previously kept but lost over time.
It’s as simple to start as switching your shower to cold for the last 10 seconds – then build up a tolerance for a longer time and colder water, until you can go for the whole shower.
The health benefits of Cold Showers are well documented and often recommended – but the most immediate is that it’s a test of willpower and discipline.
If you can force yourself through a cold shower, you can force yourself through most other tasks you encounter that day.
5) Working with No Charger.
This tactic applied to working without a charger on your laptop – but I found it effective I have switched to charging my phone overnight and not going near a charger for the rest of the day.
It’s pretty self-explanatory, charge your device and then go work without access to the charger. Limit yourself to that one charge – and you’ll realise how easy it is to become hyper-focused on the task.
Easy way to align your priorities (and prevent wasting time on your phone).
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I was quite impressed with how such seemingly simple things boosted my overall productivity.
Planning on keeping every single thing that I tested this week, and using them to help me leverage the other strategies, tactics and tools that I plan on using.
Zachariah Lewis 