What’s the Key to Maximize Personal Productivity?
My focus has been on the topic of Productivity lately as I’ve been asked to participate as a guest speaker for D’vorah Lansky’s Master Class on Productivity coming up in November. D’vorah focuses on providing training to help her author community reach more readers. You are, of course, welcome to attend. The upcoming webinar – 5 Productivity Secrets for Savvy Authors – will kick off a series of additional discussions on productivity. Here is a link if you are interested in learning more about it: http://goo.gl/4otZsu.
I’m very excited about being invited to be one of the participants. However, as I don’t think about the topic very often, the experience has translated into shining the spotlight on my own productivity in order to speak to others about it. Our show is certainly a productive space. We have to be in order to produce content for broadcast on a daily basis. Still, does that translate into personal productivity and, if so, how?
Perhaps a more important question, what would you like to know that can help you be more productive in your own life? There is no single answer to the question. The subject is far more complicated than that, but I have decided that effective personal productivity begins with knowing what you want.
Do you have untapped riches deep within that you have not begun to tap? Do you have the vaguest idea of what it will take to tap them, let alone a plan of action to do so? No amount of dreaming will yield results unless you take the time to visualize them. Only after you see a dream with enough detail can you develop the focus and plan that will enable you to persistently take action, step by step, until you accomplish the goals.
Do you have a system to discipline your thoughts during the time that it will take to do all that will be required? Disciplining your thoughts is central to overcoming the negative thought habits and paradigms of limited beliefs that interfere with our ability to do anything.
What we often fail to realize is that we can approach a goal with either negative or positive thoughts. We have the power of choice. However, brain research has demonstrated that the mind defaults to the negative. If we don’t learn how to cancel that negativity, we will struggle to see the desired results.
Traditionally, we have been taught to pray as part of the solution. The religious have developed a variety of prayer techniques to pray in more positive ways, to center and meditate. In the New Thought movement, the term scientific prayer is used to describe a mindful approach. Spiritual leaders, coaches and trainers help us find specific techniques to follow a positive train of thought that leads us to what you would like the desired results look and feel like.
I would be remiss if I didn’t include the importance of managing my thoughts as one of the most important aspects of my personal productivity. The challenge to stay focused on the desired result is a key to eliminating conflicts that negatively impact productivity. If I do nothing else, I block out time early in my day for my “Inner Game” which includes meditation, journaling, visualizations, affirmations and Afformations. I want to open to possibilities early in the day, before distractions and activities intrude.
Not to do so would open up the possibility of negative self-talk to creep in with excuses, self-criticism and second guessing my choices. That is the equivalent of driving with one foot on the brake. We do so much better when we realize that positive self-talk and visualization are supercharging fuel additives that help us reach maximum productivity.
I encourage you to explore some of these techniques to help you maximize your personal productivity. When done regularly, you gain some very positive results:
- The immediate result is emotional relief – you feel better. The emotional tangles smooth out. The knots give way and the emotional tugs cease so you can move through them without resistance.
- Without emotional obstacles, your mind can think through, imagine and follow trains of thought that inspire action, steps and systems, connections that remind you of previous situations and solutions that might apply to your current challenge, and other ideas out of the blue that are the exact solution you need. Thomas Alva Edison was known to “sit for ideas.” (I might call it meditation or centering.) Received in a dreamlike state, these ideas are elusive and quickly forgotten. It helps to capture them on paper or in the computer as soon as possible.
- You feel inspired to take some sort of action. Do it as soon as possible. Evaluate how you can implement the ideas you receive. Work it into a plan. Have you ever done something like this before? Make that phone call. Talk to a friend. Watch for new people, things, circumstances and events that tie in with this new perspective. They’ve been there all along, but your focus needed to shift to become aware of them. Then a path appears.
- “Overnight,” your productivity increases. Obstructions and thoughts of “impossibility” vanish and you are doing “it.” Progress can be incredibly fast.
Since beginning to use these visualization techniques as part of my daily routine, I have seen my personal productivity soar, as well as experiencing a radical shift in my lifestyle. If you are looking to see greater productivity yourself, I would suggest that you start here. Just remember to follow through with action.
May you find ideas that help you amp up your personal productivity.
To Your Success,
Susan