7 habits that keep you from being productive

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Self-isolation frees up time and encourages creativity: everyone around is gushing with new ideas. If nothing fresh and interesting comes to your mind, it might be a matter of habits.

We've rounded up more tips on how to stay fresh and energized.

1. You move a little

If you work remotely and lie on the couch in the evening, you may notice a drop in productivity. When a person moves a little, the brain receives less oxygen. Hence fatigue, decreased performance, drowsiness. Sports activities will help: during them oxygen is supplied to the brain - due to this, it works better. Plus, exercising regularly enlarges the hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for attention and long-term memory. By the way, in order to practice, it is not at all necessary to leave the house, it is enough just to ventilate the room well before and after training.

What to do

Incorporate exercise into your daily schedule. Workouts should not necessarily be long and very intense: 10-15 minutes in the morning or in the evening is enough to keep your muscles and brain in good shape. You can find suitable exercise options on YouTube or in fitness apps for yoga, dance, and strength training that you can do at home.

2. You think too much and analyze too much

Think about how often you don't do something because you care about the opinions of others. You are comparing yourself to others and do not tackle the task simply because you are afraid of failing ahead of time. Or you go over all the old failures and mistakes in your head. Such thoughts only get in the way, and you need to get rid of them.

What to do

There are several ways to help you get your thoughts in order and relax.

• Meditation. It does not have any magical and magical properties, it is just a training of attention, which is not difficult to perform. Sit up straight and focus on your breathing: inhale and exhale slowly. Think only about the movement of air or repeat to yourself an inspiring phrase such as “I can do anything,” “I deserve success,” or something similar. If you get lost and start thinking about something else, stop and refocus on your breathing.
• Mindfulness practice. Notice your obsessive thoughts and transform them into tasks. For example, if you are thinking, "How could I have made such a trivial mistake?" Find the answer and solve the problem gradually.
• Abstraction. If you noticed that obsessive thoughts interfere with work, take a break for 2-3 minutes. During this time, solve a few puzzles, complete a jigsaw puzzle, or arrange the books on the shelf in alphabetical order - tackle the task that requires maximum concentration.
• Stop phrases. Come up with expressions that will help fight negative attitudes. For example, "I try" or "I can do anything." Remember them when you start analyzing your failures again.
• Diary. Throw out all your worries on paper - this will allow you to forget about them at least for a while.

3. You are eating incorrectly

If you are often unable to concentrate, constantly feel tired or sad, have begun to memorize information less well, and have difficulty controlling emotions, you may be eating too much sugary foods.

What to do

It is not necessary to give up sugar, but candy and cookies should not replace a full meal. And eating a whole box of sweets at a time is also not worth it. Include in your diet plenty of vegetables and fresh fruits, and do not forget about the ratio of KBZHU. You can calculate it for your age, body size and nutritional goals in special applications and online calculators. The required calorie content can also be determined manually using the Mifflin-Geor formula.

• For men: 5 + (10 × weight [kg]) + (6, 25 × height [cm]) - (5 × age [years]).
• For women: (10 × weight [kg]) + (6, 25 × height [cm]) - (5 × age [years]) - 161.

To easily solve any problems and come up with new ideas, you need to eat a lot of protein: men - from 65 to 117 grams per day, women - from 58 to 87 grams. You can get closer to the required amount if you eat a portion of natural cottage cheese "" with a fat content of 9% for breakfast and during the daytime snack. There are 24 grams of protein per 150 grams of the product, as well as a whole range of useful vitamins and minerals. This curd contains no preservatives, dyes or artificial fillers: it is prepared only from fresh cow's milk and sourdough.

4. You lack inspiration

You don't know where to get ideas from, everything seems too mundane and uninteresting. Because of this, you do your work and daily activities automatically, leaving no room for improvisation and creativity.

What to do

You can find inspiration by watching cool videos and lectures, such as TED, or by doing simple exercises.

• Freewriting. Take a clean sheet. At the top, write a question that worries you, or a topic that you want to speculate on. Now, for 5-15 minutes, just write whatever comes to your mind. The main thing at this time is to observe six rules: not to exert extra efforts; write quickly and continuously; write the way you think; do not go beyond the time frame; develop thought; change the orientation of attention. After you finish writing, distract yourself with another task for seven minutes. Then re-read and look for interesting thoughts in the text.
• Neurographics. You will need paper here too. But now it is not necessary to write on it, but to draw an abstract picture. Take a pen, pencil, or felt-tip pen and move across the sheet in any direction without thinking or analyzing. What will turn out in the end - a beautiful picture or just kalyaks-malyaks - is not so important. Neurographics is a paper meditation that helps you calm down, collect your thoughts and find inspiration.
• Look for new things in common items. Take a few unrelated things and put together some kind of composition. Allocate a maximum of 10 minutes for this. So you look at everyday objects from the other side.

5. You have a mess on your desktop

If you are sitting at the table right now, take a look around. A pile of papers, a mug of cold coffee, books, a thousand pens, a mountain of souvenirs - if you saw any of this, it's time to clean up. Clutter negatively affects attention, interferes with work and coming up with new ideas.

What to do

Clean your desk and organize the space to help you work, not the other way around. For this:

• If you spend a lot of time at the computer, move the monitor 43–45 cm away from you.
• Place frequently used items, such as a pen or smartphone, next to your dominant hand so you don't have to reach for them.
• Put unnecessary stationery in the closet, leave only what you really use. You definitely don't need 10 pens.
• Don't overdo your personal belongings. Souvenirs, photographs, a mug, postcards - all this should be in moderation, a maximum of three items on the table.
• Leave an empty space for paperwork. If you have to sign or calculate something, you will not need to waste time clearing the space.

Try not to eat at your desk: not only can you dirty or dirty something important, you also mix work with leisure.

6. You are constantly busy with something

If you are not working, then sit on social networks, read books, watch videos, TV shows or films. It may seem like relaxation to you, but your brain thinks differently. He is constantly busy - he receives and processes a huge flow of information, and there is simply no time and effort left to come up with something of his own, fresh and interesting.

What to do

Arrange a digital detox on the weekend: put all devices aside, put your smartphone in airplane mode, or turn it off altogether so that notifications do not distract you. This will make the brain "bored", it will begin to entertain itself, coming up with something. At this time, you can sort things out in the closet, clean the apartment, prepare food for the week ahead.

If you are not enough for such feats, try the "do nothing" method. This is a 5-7 minute practice, similar to meditation. Their difference is that during "doing nothing" you can remember events from the past, but this must be done fleetingly and without analysis. Set a timer, sit comfortably, breathe slowly and calmly, flip through pleasant memories in your head.

7. You lack vitamins and minerals

If you do not follow a balanced diet, then you may not be getting enough of the beneficial elements. Hence, not only the lack of productivity and creativity, but also weakness, deterioration in the quality of hair and skin, apathy and other consequences.

What to do

If you're feeling sluggish and can't bring yourself to work, you may be missing one of the elements that affect productivity:

• Omega-3. Fatty acids improve metabolism, memory, and bone strength. Contained in oily fish, flaxseed oil, legumes, green vegetables.
• AT 3. Maintains the quality of vision, prevents memory loss. Found in fish, meat and legumes.
• AT 12. It improves memory, makes you more energetic, helps to synthesize serotonin, thereby improving mood and even fighting the symptoms of depression. B12 is found in meat, seafood and dairy products.
• Magnesium. It participates in more than 600 processes in the body, including helping to regulate the functioning of the nervous system. Magnesium is found in bananas, avocados, almonds, cashews, brown rice, soy products, and milk.

Calcium and vitamin D3 also help boost productivity. You will get enough of them if you include fish, eggs and dairy products in your daily diet. For example cottage cheese. And in order for calcium to be well absorbed, for every 10-15 milligrams of an element in the composition of the product, there should be about 1 gram of fat. This is the ratio of the components in the "Savushkin" curd with a fat content of 9%.