3 Personal Items That Improve My Productivity

We’ve all heard dozens, if not hundreds of productivity hacks that are supposed to streamline out lives so we can hustle and grind our way to the top of the economic food chain. I have a particular interest saving time, especially in menial tasks—but the hustle life is not for me. 

When I’m in a task, I do my best to be all in. Constant presence. Its a difficult skill to cultivate, and maintenance is required—its always going to be easy for your mind to be distracted. Its your mind—you know how crazy shit can get in there. 

Having said that, there is a real peace found in mindfully washing dishes, or simply walking from A to B. Thich Nhat Hanh speaks about every action being an opportunity for meditation, and there is definitely a benefit in taking your time.

However, I believe in balance should be the lense through which you view everything in your life. So, why not do something efficiently as well as mindfully?

To that end, I dedicate a portion of my CPU to monitoring everyday processes and working to improve them, and improve them again if possible. 

So what are the 3 household items that boost my productivity?

Number one is the whiteboard. Maybe its an obvious choice, but I have found not only my productivity to be impacted, but also my motivation, discipline, and habit-building have all been easier to upkeep due to a few whiteboards scattered around my home. 

Thats correct, I have not just one, or two, but five whiteboards that my wife and I use on a daily basis. Let me break it down.

The all important office-whiteboard: the largest and most prominent, sits in front of my desk so I see it every time I look up. It takes higher priority on my HUD than the windows either side of it that look out to the forest I live by. That is in part because I get lost in the view constantly, but also because I’ve found that when I sit back and take my eyes off my work, it is much easier to stay on task if I have constant reminders of my goals in front of me.

So what’s on my office whiteboard? My highest priorities or goals, which include subgroups like, career, fitness, mental health, life, money, and home. Under each heading is around three smaller goals that I work on either passively or during a period I set aside for them. 

Also on the board is are reminders like a graphic of the Eisenhower Complex (a great task sorting system), Stoic tenets, and a column I call ‘Golden Points’, which is a list of phrases or excerpts that I find especially valuable or poignant.

It should act as both motivator and disciplinary device. Your goals should loom above you, alongside powerful words from philosophers and motivational speakers. Your office board is both the stick and the carrot.

To avoid the inevitable desensitization to the content, I clear and update this one every couple months. Change the format, use different fonts or colors. Make your titles pop and discard sections that no longer resonate or that you haven’t paid attention to since your last board refresh. 

What about the other whiteboards? Well, there is the one that my wife and I use for household work, shopping lists, and wishlist. By the way, that last is a really great way to determine if you actually need the thing you want to buy—I can’t count the amount of times we’ve erased an item that seemed essential at the time until we found a way to live without it. Keep it minimal, you headspace will thank you!

My wife has a board of her own, and as we often collaborate on joint projects together, we also have one we can both add to and work off of in our own time. Kind of like those group projects at school—we come together and work on something, then often we’ll find our own space to continue our respective tasks.

The last is a small magnetic board that I keep clear and use daily to write my ‘get to do’ lists and reminders. This is perhaps the best way I’ve found to keep my head clear and allow my brain to focus on one thing at a time—write down everything and tick tasks off as you go, no matter how small. If you need to empty the bin, write it down—even if you immediately empty it—there’s a chance you will be interrupted by life, and forget it. Then a task that needs doing and can be done in less that five minutes, gets delayed, fills up your headspace, and may interrupt your flow when you’re getting stuck into deep work.

Just write it down, and let it leave your brain. Your whiteboard has your back.

The second great household item that I’ve found jacks up my productivity—blue light filter glasses. 

As someone who struggled with constant headaches and eye strain that make you want to put both hot and cold packs on your eyeballs, I can say that the blue light lenses are essential for continuous work on a screen. Whether that’s social networking on my phone or writing on my laptop, the glasses help keep the headaches at bay and the eye strain to a minimum.

Maybe there’s a placebo effect going on, but in this case, I find that irrelevant—if it works, it works. 

How does this relate to productivity? Well you can hardly work with your head splitting open. Even if you did push through, your work would be subpar. Not to mention the horrendous moods that accompany a persistent migraine that starts as a throb behind your eyes before you even get to wake up fully. 

The healthier you are, and the clearer you are, the more capacity for focused attention you are going to have. Deep work requires that single-minded focus. Certainly, time-efficiency relies on your ability to complete tasks without being distracted. Which is much easier without a whomp whomp ticking off in the centre of your skull.

Last on my list is a timer. From the humble, 10-minute egg timer, to a digital stop-watch, you can use any device that keeps time, in order to track your time consumption. Parkinson’s law states that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” Setting yourself a time limit will not only force you work harder, but also make you less likely to procrastinate or spend more time and energy than is necessary on a task. 

On my wishlist I had a large digital timer ala the red gym clocks—it was wiped off the list when I found propping my phone up (on Do Not Disturb, of course), with the timer displayed works just as well.

Here’s how to use it—estimate a reasonable time to either complete the task or set the timer to one hour, whichever is smaller. Then put nose to the grindstone and work, uninterrupted until you hear the beep. At one hour, take a 5-10 minute break; go outside, stretch your legs, take thirty really deep breaths, have a glass of water, then get back to it. 

Breaking your work time down to 60, 30, or even 10 minute stretches will keep you focused, alert, and stop you from getting overwhelmed by a seemingly never-ending project. 

By eliminating distractions, offloading your mind-stuff, keeping your body and mind healthy, and breaking tasks down into bite-sized chunks, your productivity will increase—but why is it so important to save time? Why do we work so hard to shave minutes or seconds off chores or busywork? Well, I believe there are many very unhealthy reasons one might endeavor be highly productive. Working efficiently frees up more time for you to . . . what? Work more? No thanks.

I love my work, but that’s not all I love. I love meals with my family, playing with my daughter, long walks with my dog, exploring, hiking, adventuring—there is so much I enjoy and I DON’T want to be squeezing these things in between deadlines and monstrous workloads. 

So, while being present is the key to happyness—being time-savvy means having more opportunity to SLOW DOWN and enjoy the time you’ve saved, made, or dilated with focus and good practices.

As a bonus, here are a few more personal choices I make to get shit done;

- Use around-ear headphones—they don’t need to be noise-canceling. I use Bose Soundlink, and play instrumental music (anything lyric-free) to zone into my work and eliminate any other sound that may or may not consciously register. 

- Sit cross-legged on a daybed or wide couch. I don’t like chairs, and without going into the negative effects of sitting all day, I prefer to sit cross-legged, with my back supported and laptop on my lap. This keeps me alert and stops me getting too comfortable. It’s also great for the hips. A gym ball at your desk works as well.

- Have a kettlebell handy. Exercise is number two for giving me more energy in the day, next to sleep. If you feel yourself getting tired, you can bust out some KB swings, or simply squat 20-40 times. It gets the heart pumping and lungs breathing—mo’ oxygen to the brain = mo’ focus and mental clarity.

Speaking of sleep; 20 minute naps are a great investment. I force myself to close my eyes (at the very least), for 20 minutes in the mid-late afternoon when my energy starts declining. Those 20 minutes turn into 4-5 hours of extra physical, mental, and emotional energy. I often nap after I finish work for the day, so those hours that I spend time with family are that much more qualitative and enjoyable.

And isn’t that the overarching goal for most people?