1. Sleep 8+ Hours a Night
You CANNOT perform at the highest levels when you’re deprived of sleep. Unless you happen to be like Dwayne Johnson and have exceptionally low sleep requirements, you need to get, at a bare minimum, 8 hours of sleep per night.
I used to sleep 6 hours or less and try to power through my days. It sucked and I never accomplished what I wanted to. Eventually, I realized the importance of sleep and gave myself permission to get as much sleep as I needed. When I did this, even if I didn’t wake up as early, my days were more productive than the days where I woke up early and suffered through sleep deprivation.
Get some rest. Take care of your body and it will return the favor.
2. Strategically Take Time Off
You cannot succeed, in the long run, without intentionally taking time off to recharge your batteries and replenish your energy. You need breaks, vacations, and time off so that your brain can process new information and think more clearly.
Time off will give you unique insights into the problems you are facing and the solutions to those problems. It will help you restore your energy, motivation, and enthusiasm for your craft and prevent you from burning out.
Take at least 2 days COMPLETELY off every 7–10 days (do a “digital detox” and removing all electronics from your life on these days).
Take one week off every quarter and try to get a solid 2–3 weeks vacation every year.
It will have a bigger positive impact than you can imagine.
3. Make Your Bed
Making your bed takes 2 minutes. But it’s a small activity that requires discipline because there’s no real reason to do it. Sure, it allows you to accomplish one task before you get your day started. It’s not like making your bed will increase your income, make you more productive, or increase your sex appeal. It’s the ultimate exercise in futility but you should still do it.
Making your bed first thing in the morning puts you into a disciplined and productive state immediately when you start your day.
It’s also a powerful motivation to stay awake instead of crawling into the warm sheet.
4. Quit Complaining
Complaining is like cancer in your soul. You have a lot to be thankful for.
But every time you complain, you tell yourself that your life sucks and that things aren’t the way that they should be (even when they’re great).
So quit complaining. It’s like a poison that distracts you from the good and makes you focus on everything that is wrong. It makes other people like you less, makes you miss opportunities, and distracts you from living an amazing life.
Buy a rubber band and put it on your right wrist.
If you find yourself complaining throughout the day, move it to your left wrist.
Your goal is to make it 30 days with that rubber band staying on your right hand.
5. Express Daily Gratitude and Forgiveness
Take time to express daily gratitude and self-forgiveness every day.
Just pull out a pen and a sheet of paper and spend at least 5 minutes writing about the things you’re grateful for and really feel the gratitude in your soul.
Next, spend a few minutes consciously forgiving yourself for being an imperfect person.
Maybe you procrastinated on an important project, got angry at your spouse, skipped the gym, or some other “terrible” thing.
It’s ok, write it out and forgive yourself for it while committing to do better next time.
No one is perfect and it’s important that you keep this in mind and forgive yourself when you screw up.
6. Execute Ideas as Fast As You Can
Success loves speed.
You can spend 20 years thinking and trying to find the perfect idea without ever taking action or you can try 20 different ideas, fail at 19 of them, and then succeed wildly with the last one.
Execute ideas as quickly as possible by taking fast imperfect actions and pivoting when you receive new information.
Money and success love speed. So give it to them.
7. Forget About “Time Management” and Focus on This…
People often ask about time management tactics and techniques but the thing is TIME MANAGEMENT DOESN’T WORK!
It doesn’t matter how much time you have to complete a task if you don’t have the energy and focus to get it done right. Don't spend too much effort in managing your time and not enough effort in managing your energy levels.
Make a change.
- Sleep 8+ hours a night
- Go to the gym daily
- Take 90minutes breaks in the middle of the day to ride my bike on the beach and eat an acai bowl
- Start meditating
- Eat cleaner diet
- And use supplements intelligently to boost my performance
This simple shift will allow you to more than triple my productive output per hour.
When you start taking better care of your body you'll have more energy to focus for longer and be able to complete a week’s worth of tasks in an afternoon.
Most people underestimate the importance of energy and overestimate the importance of time. If you want to be as productive as possible then forget all about time management. Instead, focus on having the energy levels required to effectively use that time to its fullest.
Get great sleep, lift weights 3x a week, take frequent breaks throughout the day, eat a clean diet of real food, make time for meditation, and use whatever supplements you need to feel and perform your best.
This one tactic is better than 100 time management techniques combined.
These are my 7 habits for improving your performance and transforming your life.
Let me know what you think in the comments below.
Nice
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