Approaching Akrasia With Mindfulness

• Most people are unaware of their priorities. Our priorities are the things that are most important to us right now. Not serving them is non-negotiable.

• People are capable of having two or three priorities. More priorities leave them scattered and unfulfilled, filling their time with stuff that doesn't matter.

• Once you know your priorities, everything on your to-do list should serve them. Look out for the 'shoulds' - they are not serving your priorities.

Look over your to-do list and assign every task a value, such as a dollar-per-hour amount that you might have to pay someone else to do it. Score tasks from $10 per hour for administrative tasks up to $10,000 per hour for high-level strategy and sales-related tasks.

By giving dollar-per-hour values to specific tasks, you ensure you use your resources correctly.

It refers to our tendency to choose immediate rewards over future rewards. It's why we make plans, but don't take action.

When we make plans, we are actually making plans for our future selves. But when the time comes to make a decision, we are in the moment and our brain is thinking about the present self.

The ability to delay gratification is a great predictor of success in life.

If you really understand how to resist the attraction of instant gratification, you'll be able to bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

Progress on our goals feeds our well-being. So the most important thing to do is bootstrap a little progress: get a little progress, and that’s going to fuel your well-being and your motivation.

This is a self-regulatory strategy in the form of an "if-then plan": "If the phone rings, then I’m not going to answer it." "If my friends call me to say we’re going out, I’m going to say no." So you’ve already made these pre-commitments.

When you notice yourself procrastinating, use your procrastination as a trigger to examine a task’s characteristics and think about what you should change.

By breaking down exactly which attributes an aversive task has (boring, frustrating, difficult, meaningless, ambiguous, unstructured), you can take those qualities and turn them around to make the task more appealing to you.

... people have when they procrastinate:

• Distracting yourself, and thinking about other things
• Forgetting what you have to do, either actively or passively
• Downplaying the importance of what you have to do
• Focusing on your other values and qualities that will solidify your sense of self
• Denying responsibility to distance yourself from what you have to do
• Seeking out new information that supports your procrastination.

The “two-minute rule”  has two parts.

First, if something takes less than two minutes, do it now. Next, start building new habits for two minutes at a time. The rule for this is: When you start a new habit, it should take less than two minutes to do. The idea is to make your habits as easy to start as possible. 

Think of these “two-minute habits” as gateway habits that will lead to your overarching goal.

It takes time to get into a rhythm to work on a task. Instead of constantly starting and stopping that process, it’s better to keep your rhythm going by bundling similar tasks together.

By doing this, you avoid interruptions and prevents himself from procrastinating.

Music has a real impact on human emotions and perception. Music activates different areas of the brain in different people, but there are general brain and mood patterns revealed by music research.

For the most part, research suggests that listening to music can improve your efficiency, creativity and happiness in terms of work-related tasks. 

Scientists say doing hard work first ensures you tackle challenges when you’re at your most creative and prepared. Jump right into the biggest priority on your list and when you're ready to take a break, switch gears to the lower-impact tasks.

Working in crisis mode can make you less creative, since you’re less likely to collaborate and seek out new perspectives and find the best idea. You’re more likely to rely on hierarchy and produce average work, not breakthroughs.

We have two ways of dealing with our procrastination:

1. Make whatever we’re procrastinating on feel less uncomfortable, and
2. Convince our present selves into caring about our future selves.

Often starting a task is the biggest hurdle. Research shows that progress—no matter how small—can be a huge motivator to help us keep going.

Set the timer for just 5 or 10 minutes. While the timer’s running, you don’t have to work, but you can’t do anything else. You have to sit with your work, even if you don’t get started.

To increase the level of your health, and by default the level of productivity, because you will be more energetic and focused:

• Get enough sleep
• Create a healthy diet for yourself
• Move more.

A morning routine aims to make you alert, help you take care of your health, intellectual and spiritual growth. Develop 2 types of habits:

• Habits that can improve the quality of your life in the present
• Habits that can improve the quality of your life in the future

Ideally, you should focus to form habits that give you both — such as exercising.

Facing a task, experiencing the uncomfortable emotions associated with it and doing the task despite those  emotions.

It rationalizes the shit out of anything that’s just a little bit uncomfortable and create excuses as to why we shouldn’t do something now. Those excuses are irrational, but sound superficially reasonable.