I’ve been experimenting over the past two weeks with adding more structure to my workday. The key areas of focus for me have been the start and end of the day.
Starting Strong
At the start of the day, I’m getting up at 6 AM and giving myself 1.5 to 2 hours of time for a morning routine + reading before starting work at 7:30 AM.
Have the time to ease into my day, and having the time to read in the morning makes getting up easier. The temptation to hit the snooze button goes away when I know I have time to do a number of things I will enjoy (like drinking coffee and reading).
The consistency in waking up has some subconscious benefit, but more importantly, it creates a consistent early win. Getting out of bed and avoiding the temptation to hit snooze is the first act of discipline that sets the tone for the rest of the day. It creates positive momentum and avoids the negative momentum that comes from surrendering to comfort first thing in the morning.
Ending the Day
At the end of the day, I’ve focused on having a hard end time for work and an end of day journalling routine.
Yesterday, I wrote about the journalling I do at the end of the day. I answer three questions about the day, review my calendar for the next day, and organize my to-do list so I know what tasks I am starting in the morning.
Those activities help me clear my head for the evening and make it easy to get started on work the next day.
Having an end-time for the day has noticeably improved my ability to focus in the afternoon.
Working remotely is great, but when you work from home it is easy to end up working late at night. When you get accustomed to working at night, it gets easy to give yourself breaks or get distracted during the afternoon and you always feel like you can make it up later, so you give yourself permission to get off track in a way that you wouldn’t under a time crunch.
Setting an end-time for the day creates that time crunch. You feel the end of the day approaching and it just naturally eases the urge to distraction.
This isn’t an earth-shattering piece of advice but the effects on my ability to get things done have really impressed me over the past two weeks.
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