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Counteract the Planning Fallacy

When you start to schedule your tasks, you may be too optimistic about how much you can get done. You may take on too much work or get stressed when tasks take longer than you expected.

To counteract the Planning Fallacy:

  • Work in a buffer into your schedule.
  • If the task is familiar, give yourself 1 - 1.5 times you think it will take.
  • If it is new, give yourself double the time you think it will take.

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Procrastination is inevitable, but it does not have to rule your day

To get over those initial feelings related to procrastination:

  • Follow the 5-minute rule. Tell yourself you're only going to do 5-minutes of work on a project. This is usually enough to get you motivated.
  • Block distracti...

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How to plan your day

Much advice about time management is about creating a to-do list, reminding you what you want to do. However, it's more important to use a schedule, which tells you when you're going to do it.

  • Create "bookends" for each day

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Optimize your study time for Flow

When you have a crammed schedule, it's tempting to think you can multitask. But studies find that focusing on a single task can be 500% more productive.

If you find it hard to focus on just one thing:

  • Remove distractions,

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Being purposeful with your day

Being purposeful with your day

Time management is about taking control of the time you do have available and using it optimally for productivity while creating balance.

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Take breaks at the right time

When you start to feel this way, take a break.

  • Disconnect from what you're working on.
  • Give your eyes a break. After every 20-minutes of work, stare at something at least 20 feet away from you for 20 s...

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Be aware of how you’re spending your time

To build a better time management system, you need to know what you currently spend your time on. You need to know where you're losing time to the wrong things.

To track your time, spend a few days writing a "time log" to track how you spend your day.

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Navigate your circadian rhythm

This means that you should do your most important work when you have the most energy and scheduling passive activities when you're more naturally low.

We all have moments in the day where we feel naturally more alert and energetic and other times where we lack energy. It is known ...

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Break large projects into small, actionable tasks

Decide what the smallest, most doable next step is. Then list all the next steps with a deadline for each.

It's easy to procrastinate when a project feels overwhelming. Part of proper goal-setting is to be able to break larger goals down into daily tasks. Focus on making p...

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Proper goals help you measure your progress

Goals work great to get you motivated to do your work, but they don't tell you how you're going to achieve your goals.

Ask yourself what you can do every day that will help you achieve your ultimate goal. If you need to write a 4,000 word essay by the end of t...

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CURATED FROM

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theodorexh

There is a difference between patience & procrastination.

MORE LIKE THIS

The planning fallacy

The planning fallacy

The term 'planning fallacy' was coined in 1977 and deals with how most of us are terrible at estimating how long a project will take. We are overly optimistic but terrible at predicting the future. If the project has a budget, we may underestimate that expense to...

Human Behaviour: The Planning Fallacy

We are bad at estimating the time it will take to accomplish a task, as we don’t take into account our distractions, procrastination, emergencies or delays.

To counter the planning fallacy, we need to assign blocks of time which are called ‘slacks’ by behavioural scientis...

Overcome the Planning Fallacy

  • The next time you find yourself struggling to estimate, ask: How much time and effort have similar tasks required in the past?
  • Schedule buffer time: Keep in mind that there will always be factors outside of your control, and moreover, you may very...

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