How To Get Up Early When Mornings Make You Cry

Admit it. You’ve clicked on articles with titles like “10 Outrageously Successful People Share Their Morning Routines” and “How to Create The Best Morning Routine Ever.” You nod along enthusiastically to the admittedly sage (but often pretty obvious) advice contained within. Stop hitting snooze. Exercise. Eat a healthy breakfast. Meditate. Maybe you even follow that advice for a day or two. But a few days later, you’re back to your terrible morning habits.

You know what? That’s okay. Even the most basic morning routine only consistently works for morning people. And whether you’re a true morning person is determined by your genetics (or, in science class-speak, your sleep chronotype is genetically determined).

The rest of us have to live with snoozing too long and then rushing out the door with mismatched socks and un-ironed clothes. But even if you can’t change your fundamental self, you can optimize your habits to work with your genetics rather than against them.

Here are some key habits to foster that will make your mornings a million times more pleasant:

1. Find ways to prepare the night before.

Spend a portion of every evening preparing absolutely everything you need for the next day. You know you’re going to be awake until at least midnight anyway. Why not check tomorrow’s weather report and choose your outfit during that time?

Consider purchasing a small garment rack to hang your next day’s clothes. The monetary investment and a prominent placement in your bedroom will encourage you to use it. And for those who work out, exercise before dinner. If you shower before bed, you can even steam your clothes by hanging them next to the shower to kill wrinkles, eliminating the need to iron and allowing you to sleep in later.

2. Start your morning with something you love.

Instead of waking up and dreading the moment your feet have to touch the floor, find one quick thing to do every morning that fills you with joy and replaces hitting snooze.

This can vary widely by individual. Check your Instagram feed in bed. Read an inspirational work. Brew a cup of tea and skim the news. Heck, keep a cookie jar on your kitchen counter and enjoy a single cookie. But no matter what, strictly limit yourself to just 10-15 minutes of “joy time”–even if it means setting a timer.

3. Set reminders for your morning brain.

When you’re not a morning person it can be hard to remember to brush your teeth, let alone bring everything you need for the day. Stick reminders on the inside doorknob of your main exit using a Post-it or opaque masking tape and Sharpie with messages such as, “Take leftovers from fridge for lunch” or “Bring laptop to work.”

Your mind can be fuzzy first thing in the morning, so this is a great way to counteract forgetfulness as you head out the door.

4. Work out a more flexible schedule.

Negotiate a later start time with your employer (maybe by pushing back your end time). Not everyone will have such an understanding boss, but if you’re a top performer, you could make the argument about why you would be a more productive and happier employee with a later start.

Get creative about finding an agreement. If you absolutely need to be working by 8 a.m., see if you can work from home until lunch so at least you can avoid the chaos of morning rush hour.

5. Find a job you enjoy getting up for.

If you never feel enthused to go to work, chances are you haven’t found a career that lights you up…yet.

If you haven’t done the real work of exploring different careers, now is the time to start. Visit career websites, download helpful career exploration apps, and invest serious time and effort into this critical area of your life. People make their living doing an astounding range of things, and if you explore in the right places, you’ll find something that speaks to your individual interests and passions. Then getting up in the morning won’t be such a pain.

If you’re a night owl, chances are you’ll never love to get up with the sun, but you can make the process a little easier on your pre-caffeinated brain. It just takes some time developing the right habits for you.

What other tips are there for night owls who need to get up early in the morning? Share in the comments below!

Featured photo credit: Workandapix via pixabay.com

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Why You Should Ditch Email and Chat If You Want to Be More Productive At Work

Email and chat are not good for a modern team to be productive, but not everyone has realised this yet. Here’re the key reasons why emails and chats don’t work so well nowadays.

1. Email communication is inefficient in a team

Do you know that the first ever email was sent by Ray Tomlinson to himself in 1971? It fundamentally changed the way how people communicate and it’s still so simple today that it usually works quite good for a number of things. However, when it comes to team talks and making real plans, it really isn’t that good:

• You have to wait for a reply for don’t know how long.
• You don’t have an overview for everyone’s progress.
• You don’t know if the recipient has actually received your message or not.

So, people started to figure out another way – team chat, and then chat had got popular among teams.

2. Chatting distracts your brain from focusing

Chat is a nice way to talk quickly, but it has one major downsize – you will interrupt whatever recipient is currently doing, and they will interrupt you too. It’s totally fine to have a casual chat with your friends about you guys’ next hang-out details, but it’s no good for team talks.

Our brain can’t really handle switching tasks very well, so when we are trying to get something done and then switch to chat and then try to continue to get something done, we are wasting a lot more time just to get something done. Horrible, isn’t it?

Both email and chat are terrible at leading people to real-life actions – even if you make a decision, it is so hard to keep track of it.

For this reason, a new startup, Teeml is trying to change the way how teams and individuals work.

How Teeml Works

The new startup Teeml is trying to change the way how teams work. It’s not just the way how people talk to each other, but a complete set of tools and ways to really get stuff done.

There are already some interesting free tools available, but Teeml say they’re growing better every day because of customers’ feedback. Here’re some of the tools available:

Wishlist

It’s like combining email and chat, but a “Wishlist” is built in a way that leads to real actions and won’t waste too much time. You will get new wishes only at some specific times during the day, so your brain stays happy and others get their answers. With this tool, members can talk in real-time or come back later. Every wish has a topic and leads to an action.

Meetings

One hour with 10 people takes 10 hours. Think about what those 10 people could do with these 10 hours! As it takes time to get to the meeting room and later switch back to your to-do list, it actually takes even more time. Every meeting should start with topics and lead to real actions in the end. With “Meetings”, you can limit the duration of a meeting and set topics for the meeting easily.

Smart feed

Quick flow of things are happening in your team every second. With “Smart Feed”, you know what is going on around you. It shows you things that most probably interest you and works automatically based on the team’s behaviors.

Promises

Promises are like a to-do list, but instead of a list that’s only available for an individual, it’s public to the team. Team members will make promises – to themselves and the team, and they will commit to their promises to complete the tasks.

You can start to use Teeml individually and invite your team later; or just go all in and try it out together with your team.

Just go to http://teeml.com, enter your email address and you’ll be logged in right away.

Featured photo credit: Picjumbo via picjumbo.com

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6 Ways Poker Can Help Build Your Confidence

Poker today is a global phenomenon and the figures are rising all the time. According to research commissioned by the non-profit PPA (Poker Players Alliance) around 70 million Americans play poker live and/or online – that’s more than 20% of the population. Another 100 million are thought to play the game worldwide.

Why then, is poker so popular? There must be more to poker’s attraction than its showbiz allure. On one thing, enthusiasts of all levels tend to agree: poker can build self-confidence, which might be the single most transferable skill of them all… Here then, are some suggestions as to why this might be so:

Conquer Maths Anxiety!

Maths anxiety, first identified in the 1950s, is the chronic fear of maths. If the prospect of doing maths brings you out in a cold sweat, the chances are that you too suffer from maths anxiety.

Maths anxiety is a fear of numbers. It’s surprisingly common – in the UK for instance, it affects some 16 million people; about a quarter of the population. It’s also surprisingly well-studied psychological condition, with research indicating that the panic induced by having to do math is so intense for some people that sometimes it even activates your brain’s “pain matrix.”

For sufferers, grappling with a maths problem releases stress hormones associated with the fight/flight reflex you could expect from confronting, say, a hungry tiger. Imagine the selfsame response, but provoked by something as banal as having to measure a carpet or decode a phone bill. Relax though, for help may be at hand.

As with any skill, mathematics gets easier, the more of it you do. The trick is to practise without at any point thinking of it as doing maths. And that’s where a game like poker comes in. The very mechanics of the game, the calculation of ever-shifting odds, is maths in motion. It may not feel like it, but during the course of play, your brain is making hundreds of percentage-based computations. At the green felt table, your brain can crunch all those numbers naturally and fearlessly, because it thinks it’s just playing a game.

Know The Measure Of Your Hand

Confidence is, in many ways, tied to competence. As you amass knowledge in a subject, confidence in your abilities grows proportionately. When you first begin to play poker, you’ll be either timid or reckless. But you will certainly not be good. You’ll make beginner’s mistakes. As you get a feel for the game, your play will become more assertive (perhaps overly so). Eventually a player reaches the enlightened state of knowing just what it is they know, and what they have yet to learn. And there’s always something. So, be confident in your abilities, and learn to recognise your limitations. This applies to all walks of life. Unless you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing, in which case…

Learn How To Bluff!

Poor Le Chiffre, betrayed in the ultimate high-stakes game by the shedding of a single ruby tear at a critical moment. Oh, the heavy hand of irony. A fictional playboy villain is hardly representative, but everyone, player or not, has a “tell”, a visual or verbal tic or cue that signals the onset of a sudden anxiety, a spasm of nerves or excitement. Some of these tells fall into what science calls microexpressions – incredibly brief in duration movements of the facial muscles, lasting only 1/25th to 1/15th of a second.

In poker, it is as crucial to successfully conceal your tell as it is to read that of another. If you find your opponent’s tells, you can spot when they’re bluffing. And vice versa. As each round progresses, you are called to check, bet, fold, call or raise, according to standard poker rules. Each of these actions are expected to show what you believe about your hand. Is it good or are you bluffing? What about your opponents?

The ability to spot a tell has a range of applications that go way beyond poker. On any given day you can expect to be lied to from 10 to 200 times, and more than 82% of these lies will slip by undetected, so learning how to spot a lie or a bluff is a useful skill in its own regard. Unconvinced? Just ask Pinocchio – who would have made for a much worse poker player than Le Chiffre.

The Importance Of Eye Contact

Eyes are the proverbial “windows to the soul.” A steady gaze appears to denote frankness and confidence. The key word here is appears.

Failure to maintain eye contact is perceived as weakness, unreliability. Doubtlessly, the other extreme is equally unwelcome – everyone must surely feel the need to blink occasionally. In fact, the average person will blink 6-10 times per minute – less than this is just plain scary, whilst a higher blink rate tends to signal attraction, anxiety or excitement. Or possibly a slipped contact lens. Maintaining good eye contact is a crucial skill – especially for salespeople, managers and pretty much everyone, when it comes to interpersonal relationships.

Dress To Impress?

Professional poker players are often snappy dressers. Picture the archetypal riverboat gambler, suited in linen and silks. Compare this image with a modern-day celebrity player – fashions have changed of course, but still the poker player is, more often than not, impeccably tailored.

His/her image is a projection, the physical manifestation of ‘confidence’ – and in poker, confidence born from skill translates as wealth, to be measured in winnings. A “good” player may dress expensively (not necessarily ostentatiously); it’s part of their bluff, they are dressing to impress. Often, to intimidate. At the same time, you may notice a lot of poker pros do the exact opposite: they choose generic getups. This way, their opponents will possibly underestimate them, which in effect gives them an advantage. There’s also something to be said about comfortable clothes – being physically comfortable allows you to be more efficient in any situation. A 2012 Northwestern University study confirms all this: “enclothed cognition” is the influence that your clothes have on your psychology and mood, and it was proven to make a huge difference.

What can we get out of all this? Simply taking a moment to think about what your attire conveys about your personality is enough to help you make better choices. Let’s not forget, if your clothes make you feel confident, you move in an all-together more attractive manner. Which by happy coincidence makes you appear more confident than perhaps you really are. A virtuous circle.

Sharpen Up Your Conversational Skills

Poker is a social game. Other players are involved. You’ll have to sit near them and everything, there’s really no avoiding it. At semi-regular intervals, you’re going to have to talk to them; unless you’re actually playing a robot, conversation will be exchanged.

You may be the shyest person in the world, a wilting violet in a dark and shadowy corner, but through playing poker, a veritable spotlight will freeze you in its beam each and every round, and you’ll have to learn to deal with it. That’s not bad at all. Even if you choose not to put them to use very often, social skills are very important in life and can make all the difference when you’re trying to land that dream job or even get a date.

There are indeed many social, mental and psychological benefits to playing a simple, enjoyable game like poker. But perhaps the biggest one of all is the card game’s capacity to help you strengthen your self-confidence. So unwind a little, smile, crack a joke as you play; after all, if you play your cards right, you could be sitting at that table for a long time…

References & Sources for Further Reading:

1. mathgoodies.com – Understanding and Overcoming Anxiety
2. impactfactory.com – Use Eye Contact to Create better Relationships
3. phoenixcounsellingnw.co.uk – Building Self Confidence
4. pokerstars.com – Understanding the Rules of Poker
5. careerproinc.com – How to sharpen Your Communication Skills

Featured photo credit: Entrepreneur via entrepreneur.com

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An Interesting Way To Organize Playlists That You’ve Never Imagined

Playlists can be a playful way to connect different genres of music together. A great playlist can help explain a certain cycle of life or a specific mood. Thus, organizing a playlist around a specific mood is a healthy and charming way to sit back and let the music take you away.

Usually, playlists are arranged in line with moods and feature descriptive sounds; common playlists include: sad music, soft hangover artists, discover new music weekly, chill, country and workout music. These playlists are organized neatly and have been that way for awhile, but what if I told you there was a new way to organize playlists that is inventive, fun and associated with different drinks?

It works like this: drinks are associated with different moods, so conveying their moods through music helps kill two birds with one stone. This way of organizing playlists helps the mind easily dissect what exactly it wants to hear by what determining what you want to be drinking. It’s a cute way to let your brain fire neurons and then be entertained by the choice of music coming through your ears.

The best part is drinks can convey different moods for different people and the playlists will not be the same. For example, a playlist entitled ‘Red Wine’ will probably be a nice relaxing playlist to associate with time spent before bed time, or it can be utilized as chilled out music to have in the background when your girlfriend or boyfriend is over and you’re chatting about life.

A playlist entitled “Energy Drink” will be the songs that you use to pump yourself up, maybe even to replace the old “Workout” playlist. When you organize your playlists correctly, everything will start sounding better and will make your mood more relaxed.

For me, I would have a playlist entitled “Chocolate Milk” that would be used to comfort me in dark times. I use Nesquik chocolate powder and mix it with milk as my own sort of remedy to calm my nerves during troubling times, especially if I cannot sleep, have a sleep paralysis episode, or right before work/after bed. In many situations, this playlist would work as the comforting songs that make me feel OK with life, whether it be that Sheryl Crow song or that Henrietta song, they all work together, In short, the playlist would be a great thing to utilize — preferably on shuffle — to just let music captivate me the way music is meant to do.

“Scotch” would be a playlist of heavier songs that give me a good mind buzz and makes my hair stand on edge listening to them, almost correlating with how it tastes to have scotch sliding down my throat and taking over my blood. Here, I would utilize more of my hardcore bands, such as Every Time I Die, Cancer Bats and Grizzly Knows No Remorse.

It continues on and on, but this idea for playlists really lets your mind playfully associate moods with drinks and songs with your mental state. Your mental state will playfully choose what to listen to, so try it out for yourself and organize a few playlists. See what music start doing for you.

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How To Celebrate Small Wins To Achieve Big Goals

We all want to be successful in our goals and it’s these goals that puts meaning into our lives – gives us something to strive for and to help better ourselves. But have you ever tried to reach a big goal with giving up as the end? Have you started working towards your goal but over time felt that it’s just too high a mountain to climb – how are you ever going to reach the top? Have you ever experienced the feeling that you’ve spent so long trying to achieve your goal but felt you’ve got nowhere with it?

If this is you then you’re not alone. As humans, we are built to naturally see the problems and easily punish ourselves for bad behaviour. Poor performances are quickly condemned in our minds and guilt can rise to the surface. Our mindsets can bring us down when we feel we’ve failed and this usually results in giving up on dreams and goals.

So what is the secret to achieving these goals? Successful people make huge achievements all the time so how do they do it? What makes them so different?

Perspective and Mindset

Many people may put the success of others down to luck or a natural talent that allows them to excel at what they want to achieve. Yes, this can be the case but most of the time it is down to a particular mindset and way of looking at their goals as a whole.

Take Thomas Edison, the American businessman who invented the lightbulb. It took Edison almost 10,000 attempts to create a lightbulb – that’s a huge amount of ‘failures’ before finally finding success. But in response to his repeated failures he said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

In other words, he took his failures and turned them into successes because his perspective was focused on achieving rather than failing. It’s quite clear he had a mindset and positive perspective that allowed him to celebrate those small steps and see them as achievements.

As I mentioned earlier, it’s very easy for us to put ourselves down for small mistakes and failures. What about our small successes? Well the irony of this is that although we easily feel negative about failing, we almost never celebrate our successes either and this is where the magic lies.

Celebrate Small Wins

The key to success is realising that our big goals aren’t going to happen overnight, in the next week or maybe even the next year but this is okay. We tend to focus on the end goals rather than the small and significant steps we take to get us to that goal.

This is why it’s important to acknowledge and celebrate small wins. The problem with not doing this is we end up diminishing our motivation and motivation is what keeps us on the right path and gives us the strength to soldier on to the top of the mountain.

Demotivation usually comes because we are unsure of how far we are to our goals. We sometimes blindly believe that the goal is still so far away when it could actually be just around the corner – something we will never know if we give up.

It’s therefore important to make sure you celebrate your small goals along the way. Acknowledging these sparks the reward circuitry of our brains and releases chemicals that gives us the feeling of pride, giving us the feel-good and happiness factor and makes us want to go further towards our next achievement.

Appreciation is Key

Appreciation can sometimes be played down in life and we tend to forget to appreciate what we’ve done and what we have. Appreciating our small wins and the small steps we take can be the difference between failing and succeeding. Lack of appreciation and gratefulness can lead us down the slippery slope of not being able to see the importance of our small successes. Celebrating the small stuff is us acknowledging that we are well on our way to achievement – in fact we are achieving all the time and it’s a myth that we are only successful once we’ve reached that elusive goal.

Creating Successful Habits

Successful habits equal success. We all know creating and changing habits can be hard as our minds find it difficult to adapt to new routines but acknowledging and celebrating the small wins are how you help yourself establish the habits you need and to keep you going. Our brains need reinforcement so allowing yourself to be rewarded will develop an ‘addiction to progress’ that will cause your brain to want to carry on to the next steps.

Acknowledge the Importance of the Present Moment

So what is the secret to a successful habit? It’s all about understanding the importance of the present moment. We tend to take the present moment for granted – it seems insignificant and we believe the little things we do in the moment aren’t changing us.

You must invest in the small things over a long period of time and understand that you only have the moment you are in and although these moments seem insignificant when determining whether you succeed or fail at something, it is the combination of moments over time that achieve the big things.

For example, say you want to learn a whole new subject. Reading 10 pages of a book today on this new subject will not significantly raise your knowledge and maybe not even 10 pages tomorrow and 10 pages the next day. However, it’s the combination of all these moments of reading 10 pages a day that will eventually allow you to fully learn the new subject. In other words, reading those 10 pages a day may seem insignificant in the moment but they are all important in the steps towards achieving your goal.

5 Tips On Achieving Success

With all this in mind, it is the small steps we take that need to be acknowledged and appreciated for what they are. Motivation is a huge factor of whether or not we succeed and being able to reward ourselves and celebrate small wins is the key.

1. Break down large goals into smaller goals – You don’t want to focus on the bigger picture as tempting as that can be. Make sure you create small, achievable goals that will allow you to see your progress more clearly.
2. Reward yourself with achieving small goals – Think about what you enjoy the most and do this each time you complete a step. This cold be anything from treating yourself to your favourite coffee, chocolate or even a trip somewhere. Having something to look forward to trains the brain into creating motivation.
3. Don’t put pressure on yourself – Putting a deadline on your goals can lead to potential feelings of failure. Be relaxed with your time limits and this will increase your happiness and motivation.
4. Track your progress – Writing down or tracking your progress will remind you of how far you’ve come in achieving your goal. Sometimes we can give up because we are unaware of how close we are to success and forget how much we’ve done. Write down all the small wins – seeing them written down can even be a reward in itself!
5. Change your perspective – Sometimes when we focus too much on the end goal, it can seem too far away to get to. Try thinking of it, not as climbing a huge mountain, but descending one with perhaps a few nice restaurants (rewards) to stop off at and relax on the way down – this way you can visualise getting there a lot easier!

Featured photo credit: unsplash.com via pexels.com

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10 Car Hacks to Make Your Life Easier

As someone who drives a lot, you have probably noticed that there are all kinds of little problems that can crop up, from having a cluttered and messy vehicle to windows that fog up all the time to the need for toilet paper in an emergency.

So, with this in mind, we have compiled a list of 10 great car hacks that will make your life a lot easier when you are on the road, whether you are driving a junker or the best luxury SUV.

1. Keep Your Steering Wheel Cool

Instead of touching a hot steering wheel that has been in the sun, when exiting your vehicle, turn the wheel 180 degrees. That way, the part you normally touch will be shaded and not as hot when you want to start driving again.

2. Prevent Windows from Fogging

You need to have good visibility, and that doesn’t happen when the windows are fogged. To prevent this, cut a potato in half, and rub it on the inside of your vehicle windows.

3. Ask for Directions

When you are lost, the best places to ask for directions are at fast food restaurants. There will likely always be someone there who can tell you where you need to be, and how to get there. Gas stations and convenience stores are other great places to get directions, and they often sell road maps.

4. Use Dryer Sheets

Instead of spending money on car air fresheners, simply use dryer sheets that you already have. Just place an open box of dryer sheets in the car, and they will keep the air smelling fresh and clean. You can also stick dryer sheets into the vents for a few minutes to really get the scent throughout the vehicle.

5. Use Shower Organizers

Driving with kids can be an adventure, and often, a messy adventure for you to clean. One way to keep the back seat more organized is to hang shower organizers on the back of the front seats. Then, use the pockets for baby wipes, bottles, diapers, games, and more. Shoe organizers can also be used for this.

6. Make a Phone Holder

If your vehicle didn’t come with a built-in mobile phone holder, you can easily make one with an elastic band. Simply slip the elastic between the slats of one of the vents, and then wrap it around the phone. Now, you have a hands-free phone system without having to spend any extra money.

7. Carry an Air Pump and a Pool Mattress

You never know when you are going to end up sleeping in your vehicle (breakdowns, impromptu camping trips, etc.), so be prepared. Keep an air pump and an inflatable pool mattress in the trunk, and you will always have a bed to sleep on instead of the uncomfortable seats.

8. Have an Emergency Kit

Everyone should have an emergency kit in their vehicle, because you never know what can happen. The kit should include such things as water, snacks, a first-aid kit, blankets, toilet paper, and an inexpensive mobile phone. If you do a lot of winter driving, also include a bag of kitty litter (in case you get stuck and need traction), a candle, and a tin can (to create light and heat to melt snow around tires).

9. Use a Shower Caddy

It is important to keep oil, windshield washer fluid, brake fluid, etc. in your vehicle at all times. Keep all of the vehicle fluids organized by putting the smaller bottles inside a shower caddy. That way, nothing is going to roll around and end up leaking all over the trunk.

10. Use a Mesh Bungee

If you are traveling with clothing that you don’t want to pack because you don’t want wrinkles, hang them. All you need to do is hang a mesh bungee on the ceiling of the vehicle, and then hang the clothing from it. Make sure that you do this in the back seat, and that the rear-view window is not obstructed so you can see clearly.

Featured photo credit: jaymantri.com via pexels.com

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5 Simple Ways to Stop Procrastinating for Good

Procrastination is a dream killer. The goals, desires, and dreams we have can become reality once we overcome our procrastination. In this post, we’ll share 5 simple ways you can stop procrastinating for good.

1. Forgive yourself

As humans, we can’t expect ourselves to be perfect all the time. There will be times when we slip and fall, and instead of letting one moment bring us down, we should forgive ourselves and move on.

The language we use is often key here, and most of us are harder on ourselves than we think. While it’s important to have high expectations for ourselves, it can also be damaging.

Instead of saying “I’m so lazy…”, try saying “I’m just human, and even the most successful people have bad days.”

Instead of “I’m probably not going to succeed…”, try saying “I’m going to give it my best shot, and in the worst case scenario, I’ll still be fine.”

2. Prepare the night before

Studies have shown that humans have a finite amount of willpower, and procrastination usually comes from lack of motivation.

Preparing for our day the night before allows us to take action from the moment we wake up, instead of being in reaction mode. This is because planning can take up a significant amount of energy that should be used to get important tasks done instead.

The method of preparing will vary from person to person, but my personal favorite is to schedule my day using a digital calendar, like Google Calendar.

For others, it could be creating a to-do list or simply working on the most important task for the day. Whatever your method, it’s important that you have some level of structure to your day planning.

3. Say “No” more

What we say “No” to in our life will determine the quality of the work we do. It’s impossible to take on every opportunity that comes at us, and it’s critical that we have a framework for prioritizing our everyday decisions.

At Rype, we use a framework called the Eisenhower Matrix to make many of our decisions.

Here’s a plan of action for each quadrant:

1. Urgent & Important: Do it immediately.
2. Non-Urgent & Important: Decide when you’ll do it.
3. Urgent & Non-Important: Delegate to someone else.
4. Non-Urgent & Non-Important: Do it later.

4. Discover your “ONE Thing”

Most activities that we do during our day, week, or month, have little impact on our end result.

I’ve been personally guilty of this, trying to fill up my schedule with “busy” work instead of work that matters. The result was that I eventually burned out with very few results to show at the end of the day.

Then I discovered the “ONE Thing,” which was introduced by the bestselling author Gary Keller. The “ONE Thing” is described as the one activity or task that will make everything else easier or unnecessary.

If you want to get in shape, you can go for a run every morning instead of trying out every different diet system that is advertised on TV.

If you want to grow your business, you can increase your prices and focus your efforts on the 20% of clients bringing you 80% of sales instead of pleasing everyone.

If you want to learn a new language, you can find a professional teacher who can work with you one-on-one instead of learning from books, Youtube videos, mobile apps, etc.

5. Follow the 2-minute rule

Most of us have probably experienced a cliffhanger moment on TV. It’s that moment where something unexpected or exciting happens, and before you get to the conclusion, the episode ends.

It turns out that Hollywood has been leveraging what’s called the Zeigarnik Effect, which was named after the psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik.

The Zeigarnik Effect states that once we start something without finishing it, we have a natural tendency to finish what we started. Studies also show that our perception of the task changes after we start, and we often end up enjoying the task.

This is why the 2-minute rule is powerful. By simply starting a task, even for 2-minutes, it’s likely that we’ll continue what we started or end up finishing it at a later time.

If you want to read more books, read the first few pages and you’ll likely end up reading for hours.

If you want to get healthier, just get to the gym and you’ll probably work out for an hour.

If you want to learn Spanish, find a professional teacher online and you’ll be motivated to learn every week.

Over to you

What’s the one thing you’re procrastinating on? Which of these strategies will you use to take action?

The post 5 Simple Ways to Stop Procrastinating for Good appeared first on Lifehack.