Ask HN: How do you maintain daily productivity in a non-structured setting?
Good q! This was really hard for me at first, as a business owner.<p>When I transitioned from FT at-work to FT on-my-own back in 2005 it was practically a nightmare at first. I would think, &quot;can I trust myself alone at home all day&quot; but then immediately find a distraction before I could answer--&quot;no lol&quot;<p>I overate, I turned procrastination into a high art form, I gained a lot of weight, and I found myself becoming really emotional in what seemed the quietest, most resentfully-pitiful, embarrassing of ways.<p>Eventually I figured out some leverage points and got to work. I studied myself and took all kinds of online tests. I hired a coach who used to be an SV exec. I started tracking results and journaling to really get to the bottom of things. And it worked! It worked really well.<p>Since that point in time I think I wrote like hundreds? Over a hundred, anyway--of productivity articles, and kind of put that general topic to rest, personally.<p>You can look at my articles (all free) if you want details, but some quick pointers that I&#x27;d offer:<p>- Keep an eye on what you _do_ vs. what you _expect_. For example, you may find that you have one solid, reliable half hour of productivity a day. If so--accept it. Figure out how to absolutely ninja tf out of that half hour whenever it arrives. Don&#x27;t try to force yourself to go higher than that &quot;what I can do&quot; level without mastering it first.<p>- Use timing cues. I like to set a 45m timer that beeps. I use it throughout the day unless I&#x27;m napping or exercising. When that timer goes off, I try to have a little mental cue in mind--what&#x27;s my loop? For example: 1) Write down my status 2) write down what kind of thing I have the energy to do 3) write down what that means I&#x27;ll do next.<p>- Watch the clock and note your energy fluctuations. I discovered that there are five-star times of day and one-star times of day, productivity-wise. And they are pretty solid. But I also have some four-star times--OK, I can still get some work done then! And three-star, OK, maybe I need to have an interesting movie or podcast on, but I can do some basic planning or scheduling.<p>- Connect with your need to have a schedule. Does a schedule help you focus? How flexible does it need to be? You will want to figure this out fast.<p>For a beginner, every to-do list should resolve directly into a schedule. A beginner should almost never have a checkbox-list only. This is extremely dangerous because it can easily lead to a loss of task momentum.<p>Also, beginners should almost _always_ have more fun, interesting, procrastination-style stuff on the schedule than their normal work stuff. Beginners should be VERY careful not to make the typical beginner mistake of turning into a workaholic. Life still needs to be interesting and colorful or you aren&#x27;t really learning sustainable productivity.<p>Beginners should also be extremely careful about priority ordering. Always consider ordering by the momentum you feel you can gain by starting in a preferred order. Ask which item resists your attention least.<p>Scheduled items should clearly reveal their estimated time duration, and medium-to-difficult tasks should be broken down into small increments of a few minutes each. Please see my Task BATL system for more info on this if you&#x27;re interested.<p>Finally:<p>- Many beginner productivity or procrastination issues are relational, they are between you and something else. They are not about you personally. It can help to understand this.<p>Maybe you lost equity in the working &#x2F; studying &#x2F; etc. relationship &#x2F; deal &#x2F; whatever, and so part of you is preventing you from doing the work you said you&#x27;d do, because some part of the situation isn&#x27;t fair or right anymore. Like in business, maybe you are doing too much work and watching your client ignore all of it.<p>To keep grinding really could be a terrible idea, so your mind might find clever ways of helping you procrastinate as a way of venting or rebalancing your energy during that intense time of life.<p>But is that really a problem of you procrastinating? A lot of people who are inexperienced at addressing issues in relationships will say--yep!!! And continue wondering why they keep procrastinating. Watch out for this, it&#x27;s very common.<p>It could also be your intuition telling you--something&#x27;s off, maybe there&#x27;s a bigger picture issue. Maybe you&#x27;re absolutely in the wrong work situation, or college major, or maybe you&#x27;re about to start a sick day and your body is telling you to slow way down.<p>Please be sure to listen to this part of you. Write it down or talk it out: What doesn&#x27;t feel fair, what doesn&#x27;t seem equitable, what doesn&#x27;t seem right, what seems off?<p>Make solid, simple, forward-thinking decisions that will readjust things back to an equitable state. This is a huge component to self-trust that a lot of people are frankly terrified to make. But that strength will come with time spent on relationships and outside factors, instead of time spent blaming ourselves. And with that strength will come resolve and a higher level of productivity.<p>The above should apply if you are worker, student, consort, whatever.<p>Anyway--just some that were helpful to me. Good luck &quot;whoever could use this&quot; as I know the Ask is not written as if you actually have this problem yourself, and we have lots of hard workers here. Take good care of yourself and keep going.