Top 5 Productivity Mistakes

[@ZGwoo888]

Mistake #5 is my downfall, I always under estimate how long a task will take, assuming I can finish things just as quickly as other people, when it usually takes me more time. Watching your video made me aware of why my productivity was suffering. I am setting goals each week, allocating time to complete essays and job applications but being realistic. I have already stuck a note on my wall and will evaluate each week, I no longer have to lie to myself about what I will actually get done!

[@nancyha7566]

One of my mistakes is constantly trying to do it all by myself. My boyfriend and I constantly say to each other the weekend is too short since we always wait until the weekend to do things like laundry, food shopping and house cleaning. It takes up the whole day and a half and by the end of the night we are exhausted and miserable because we didn't get to relax or do anything fun but cook and clean! We needed a new plan! I had sat down, turned everything electronic off even the lights and got underneath my blanket and closed my eyes. I sat there for almost an hour thinking and really rationalizing on everything I wanted but focusing more on what I needed. I then grabbed a notebook and pad and wrote down my biggest need which is to free myself from chores to focus on building my business of tank cleaning with my boyfriend. I proceeded to write down in one column my chores and miscellaneous errands that really didn’t take much time but needed to get done and then another column of tasks that will help me build my business. I stopped using Evernote and alarms because all i did was ignore them when they popped up. Instead I used paper and pencil and my boyfriend's help to keep myself accountable. These chores included sweeping and mopping the floors, vacuuming the carpet, doing the dishes, putting them away, cleaning the bathroom, taking out the trash, cleaning our cars, shopping in large quantities to make lunch/dinner for the week and washing/folding laundry. I used your suggestion and I “outsourced” I gave my mom some money and she purchased all the food and marinated them for me so all I had to do was in the morning wake up, take a frozen entree out of the freezer, put in the refrigerator to defrost then pop it in the oven when I get home and dinner is served with leftovers for lunch. As for the house cleaning and laundry my boyfriend and I divvy the house cleaning up and did a little at a time each day so by the weekend comes around our laundry and house chores were completed! We were tired from our 8-10 work day but we kept a mantra in our minds that if its done now then we will be able to party on the weekend. We worked from 7-6 Monday to Friday and then proceeded to come home and sweep and mop on one day. Do a load of laundry another, then fold the clothes on another day . We would continue the little chore list until we hit Friday where we actually finished the chore list and after dinner still have time to ourselves. It saved us 10 hours a week so we were able to profited an extra 300 bucks from our side business because we were able to make the time to go out to our clients instead of spending our weekend to upkeep on the house and prepping and shopping for our food. Your suggestion helped us formulate this awesome plan and its working great! Thank you!

[@JeffreyKaneBridges]

* Starting right now: paper only for productivity (besides my calendar) for 7 days. This will be killer, but I'm looking forward to seeing how it goes! * On Monday: three things to do for the week. I'll figure out the details on Monday, but there are two short pieces I need to write, and a business trip to plan. Already feeling more in control, thank you!

[@paurullan]

My problem came from 2, neglecting my real daily focus capacity. I am preparing my last university exam and took a part-time job thinking I would study in the afternoons. For the first month I only got to study two afternoons! The job was so interesting I would lose myself the rest of the day even thougth my duty was elsewhere. The solution came with an agreement: I will keep the part time contract but work even days and study the rest. It's been a week and this scheme is giving great results.

[@4InternalConsistency]

I'm going to tackle Mistake #5 by doing an honest assessment of performance. I have a paper monthly calendar that I'll write 3 things to accomplish for next week, and I'll track what I actually accomplished each day along with an end of week review. To do an honest assessment of performance, this will make it quite transparent what I accomplish each day.

[@rsqapug]

I find myself making both mistake no. 1 and mistake no. 3. I often put off doing things because I find I set goals for myself that I am unable to achieve on my own, or don't know how to do certain things. Such as redoing my baseboards, or putting up a new mailbox. I put these on my list knowing I should ask for help. However I don't they remain there. And I not only do not get those tasks accomplished I tend to not accomplish the simpler tasks on my list either. Thank you!

[@yuenjohann]

I'm practically guilty on all 5 mistakes. Thanks Ramit for the impressive content that enlightened to what's important. Just curious on the time & effort spent for the immersion on the topic, it sounded like you were reading my mind for a good 90% of the video. Here's my feedback/result from each mistake 1) Trying to do it all ourselves - Outsourced household cleaning cum babysitting to domestic helper. Paid mostly with my bonus. Saved at least 4-6 hours per day. Took me almost 10 years to internalize & decide. - Outsource grocery shopping with online Tesco shopping. Saved 1.5 hours per week. The opportunity appeared itself this year. 2) Neglecting the importance of limited energy, cognition and willpower - Invisible script saying "If I eliminate this one todo this week & postpone to next week, isn't that procrastinating?" - Response to invisible script "This is not procrastinating, rather it's about having laser focus (with limited energy, cognition & willpower) to complete on other urgent & important matter for this week 3) Feeling like you have to be productive all the time - Invisible script on making this mistake, "I'm overwhelmed with the amount of todo for the day, let alone to relax. If I don't cross at least 50-70% of the todo, I'll feel guilty about it & procrastinate more" - I do often find myself relaxing (off schedule) especially after crossing one big item from the todo list, but this mindset change (guilt free spending time) is absolutely liberating since the guilty conscience are gone/lesser while energy level/momentum can be sustained 4) Productivity porn - I had to confess & be honest here that I'm guilty as charged for this mistake since I started working years ago. I went from managing unread inbox folder, task from Outlook & Gmail, power point, Windows Notepad, AnyDo, Trello to Wunderlist etc. Spend a lot of time on Lifehacker & TED as well with lots of testing. - All that stop after I tried Brendon Burchard's method (from How Millionaires Schedule Their Day KZbin video) & use the most basic pen & paper. Watching Ramit's video here just "craved that into stone (referring to my mind)". - Key mindset change were to just note down what I can complete by the end of the day, in another words are focus & prioritize since there's only 24 hours in a day for everyone 5) Not doing honest assessments of our performance - Guilty of not enough information while reality shows I'm overloaded with information, I just need to start doing. - Definitely going to implement "Setting 3 goals to finish for the week on Monday & evaluating the progress on Friday" into my daily routine - On top of evaluating, I'll also raise my standards by setting a bigger goal on Monday after the evaluation on Friday

[@MrsJawes99]

God, I wish I got into this earlier. The more I see the more I realize I want to change in my life. So I'll still state what i want to change. I'll set my goals on monday and evaluate on friday. That starts with, getting my large cad project done. Making that my priority

[@URFI81]

love the way u speak ,its so amazing that anybody can listen to you for hours..........

[@sg-zj1ku]

Hey Ramit ! I am surely guilty of mistakes 1 and 2 here. I feel that I do not take my limited energy in account while planning my day and then at the end of the day, with some tasks not being done , I feel guilty ! I watched this video yesterday and last night my task list was in order of importance and keeping in mind that I have limited energy. I am happy to report that the day so far has gone very well with the most important tasks of the day already completed before noon and most important tasks of the week (which will take more time of course) are going good ! I plan to continue this for a week and then again observe how can i make the whole process better ! Thanks for a great video ! and thumbs up for the good work !

[@TiffanysDiamondDogs]

After watching this video, I immediately went and threw out the pile of magazine's that I've had for a year because I was going to read them. I acknowledged that that wasn't going to happen and threw them out. I also did the same thing for a couple of other items around the house that had been sitting unused and have grouped a few things together to give away to Goodwill. I feel so much better about this decision! So, the one mistake I'm going to be focusing most on is the limited willpower, cognition, and energy. I wake up ready to go and do things, and then my energy peters out with the million things to do in the afternoon. So I'm going to focus my limited willpower, cognition, and energy on a lesser amount of things that are of more importance (i.e. putting together information and materials to be published in a book as opposed to checking up on social media and networking there). Definitely agree with the outsourcing some things too-while it's necessary, cleaning takes up so much time (dusting, vacuuming, sweeping, etc.), and that is one thing that I do plan on outsourcing!

[@swethakulkarni3563]

I know most of the ideas you presented here, but the way you explain things is great!

[@JeffreyKaneBridges]

Ramit-Thank you so much for this video, and for the personal trainer giveaway! Today's Friday, so here's my detailed plan for Monday: * Outsourcing: My fiancée does most of the shopping, but she hates it, and that definitely impacts me. This weekend I'll teach her how to use Peapod-we'll plan our meals, and groceries will come to us! * One less things to focus on: Over the weekend I'm going to pick a magazine, and unsubscribe. I get too many, and the stress of not reading one of them-over!

[@mariasteel]

I just saw this video, and OMG, definitely I wanna change my daily to-do list with few really important things needed to be done first. The thing is that after on of the training I got this knowledge that our to-do list has to include literally every action (brushing the teeth and yes, dish washing 😁). They say when we do those simple things and cross out this task from the list, our brain gets used to fact that it's easy to get things done by fact and that increases the productivity. Every day I use this technique but rarely I get really all of the things done, especially important ones. So tomorrow I wanna try different approach: 1. First to do important things for self-acknowledgement (routine - meditation, quick workout, breakfast). 2. Then I think of the most important thing needed to be done to make a difference (one step further to my life goal). 3. Only after that make the list of work routine that just need to be done. And if not all of them be done this day, it's ok to make those next day. I feel like it may increase my productivity. Thank you for great video 😉 Maria

[@suttonma]

I took on Mistake #4 beginning earlier this week. At work, I stopped using a fancy macro-enabled worksheet that tracked all kinds of tasks that I had to accomplish for the next two weeks and instead listed my main three tasks for the day on a piece of paper with check boxes. At home, I also listed out a main task for the day on a note and stuck it to the refrigerator door as a visual reminder. Lastly, I unsubscribed to the Lifehacker RSS feed for the latest productivity tips - can't be tempted!

[@mattatwork2904]

I like the call for interaction. Good way to get engaged with the tips you offer. Also it helps people see the benefits of what you're talking about. Oh and I have implemented a policy of read a magazine once, and throw it out. If there is something I want to save for later, I scan/screenshot it to Evernote and move on.

[@BY-ix9ye]

Thank you so much for the advice

[@TheGreektrojan]

I am probably the least productive person who has read your material. Issues 2, 3, and 5 all tie in to that. I have a strong perfectionism streak that many IWT people have and get so overwhelmed and guilty that I don't maximize my time in 15min intervals that I do nothing at all. So tying in with issue 3, I'm doing to stop worrying about being optimally productive and start just being more productive. So I'm focusing on exercising first thing in the morning. I work shifts and I know that actively having to decide if I should work out when time allows doesn't work for me and early morning is the only time that makes sense. I wrote a rough plan of execution starting tomorrow morning (starting small and just going in to see how busy it is) and sleeping earlier tonight. Once a week I will review my progress and iterate on that. Once that habit is built, only then will I worry about the next productivity improvement I can make.

[@URFI81]

i watch your every vedio again and again its really very educative and impressive ............

[@YoniBinstock]

“Starting to invest early, negotiating your salary, finding a dream job, earning more, traveling, calling family. These things matter more.” - Ramit Sethi

[@Dougie24282428]

I watched this video and I set myself on different goals on improving my social skills! Tomorrow I have my brother's birthday meal at at restaurant N I've set myself on a goal to try and to be the memorable one out of everyone! I watched your other video on improving your social skill under 30 minutes and I took note of that! this is why I'm going to try and see if I can make a difference in my life! I can tell you now it means ALOT AND I MEAN A LOT Because I lost first lost my girl mates because I sucked at interacting ! I ended up with a low self esteem that I ended up losing my boys too :( ! Not because I done something to be an A-hole or anything but because I lost my courage in being good with interacting with anyone! I don't know what caused it but I'm going to try and set myself on a goal tomorrow and try and step out of my shell! Its going to be my brother's friends so its not going to be easy for me in meeting new people

[@lissetteg7051]

I can't even say after watching this.. I am guilty of all of them. WOW. I watched this with a view of myself like a 3rd party and as a stay-at-home mom, new to the entrepreneur world and thinking I can use the latest and greatest to build this business, I find myself not achieving the very reason I am now home. By Friday I do wonder what the heck I did all week! First.. I threw out all of the magazines I have "wanted" to read - none of which I do. Second I will be writing out things I need to declutter from my house. I started already by giving away shoes and clothes that I have held onto since my daughter was born. I am so organized at "work" but here I seem to lose myself in where I should put everything to be able to find it again. While starting my own business I also want the best stuff out there to increase sales.. BUT i put down the phone the last couple of days and talk, face to face, with people. People I have just met and have conversation. Being able to put the phone down wasn't hard, it was necessary. Getting to know people that were strangers and finding out we are more similar that we could have ever known through an app. Talking to people, getting to know interests, looking at the world not from an app, but rather that everyone has a story that you can learn from. I didn't need a a pen and paper but I find that just listening to the retired people that have made money enough to go on vacations 3x a year, made me wonder what I was doing wrong. How I can be effective is to be me.

[@linusdsouza7803]

Ramit You are better than Western gurus here these 5 points: i could not have learnt from these gurus. i wish we had more Desi teachers, like You, to teach me so that the lessons were geared for Indian conditions.

[@k8tie5videos]

Wow, this is awesome advice! I think I'm going to implement all of them!! I know the challenge was from last year, but I'm inspired so...GOAL: For the next 5 weeks, I'm going to focus on one of these 5 things for a week at a time. 😀 I feel like I've been getting so much bad advice lately from people with very limited beliefs about what is possible, so it's really refreshing to hear something different!

[@AngelaProffitt]

Great video Ramit:) Love all you do to help entrepreneurs:) I am a productivity coach and teach small business owners to go paperless; I wanted to share with you there is no way I can be productive and run my businesses without apps. LOL! I would die! Not really!! But, I have learned from coaching business owners; they don't know what they don't know; they don't know how to use apps to be productive. With the right guidance and mentor; apps can help businesses be more productive and more profitable!!

[@philtrem]

The mistake I make is that I don't set up enough time to relax, although I know this is a great thing to do, I have the feeling I have not put enough work on what is important to me so I feel I should be doing something but while I'm thinking that I feel stressed and unable to jump into what it is I have to do, so I end up wasting my time in conflict. What I'm goin' to do, starting right now, is have a good time watching tv.

[@syfriamedia]

Good advice

[@generalqwer]

I am very guilty of mistake number three. On my days off of work I read 3 self help books. I start when I wake up around 9am and it takes me until midnight to finish all three with no significant breaks in between.

[@nupur_shukla]

I will work upon point number 4, ie., productivity porn. I am going to unscubscribe all the apps/social media account/subscriptions just to fill my inbox i.e., are good for nothing, and youtube and google surfing as well for a week and test myself whether I am more produtctive in the week when i was with myself or the weeks when I spend lots of time on internet and apps and mails, get info about anything but never get time to apply them into my life. I will now start living life to explore the info and ideas I have learnt from past life or from outsource, and will bake them for better life, than to race and collecting more and more info and then shutting eyes without making any move.

[@MaryMary-ty3rh]

woooooooow great.. Thank you .

[@svetlanashmatova9996]

Great video! What if I watch this video and others by the way ;) like 2 years after posting)) it would be better to set the date for winner announcement in the video.

[@frederickventuri6854]

Tip nº1: stop wasting time watching online videos on productivity and get some work done instead. 😜

[@shalzone444]

+Frederick Venturi Feeling guilty :'(

[@harshithchandragirivijaya5743]

Live a Guilt free life!

[@papermason]

Save an hour -- get rid of extra email accounts, and linkedin -- I don't bother with it at all, and Twitter. Unsubscribe some email newsletters.

[@philtrem]

A 5 item card. That is all the productivity tools I have..

[@andrewmandeya]

It's called procrastination.

[@chickenpermissiontheshaved75]

"Metaphysical woowoo" 😂

[@vladutzzvm]

Getting your clothes ironed is extravagant? XD