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Most people do 7+ hours on "unpaid digital labor" a week
Track your daily unpaid digital labor
It starts with an awareness of just how much you’re contributing to the problem.
The main issue with tracking your unpaid digital labor is that it comes in tiny increments. It’s hard to track the 3 minutes you checked email while making dinner or the 10 minutes on Slack before bed. But these small check-ins adds up–both in time and well-being.
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SIMILAR ARTICLES & IDEAS:
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Key Ideas
The urgency bias
We usually give priority to unimportant tasks when there is a sense of urgency around them.
We’re actually psychologically wired to put aside important tasks in favor of ta...
Why it’s hard to ignore urgent tasks
A few explanations as to why it’s so hard to reject urgent tasks:
- The completion bias. Our brains crave the reward we get from checking off small to-dos from our list.
- Tunnel vision: When we get overwhelmed by the things we have to do, we choose to act on those most available to us; these are usually emails, calls, meetings, and other low-friction tasks.
Urgency puts us into reactive mode
The problem is that we’re continually bombarded with urgent work: emails, meetings, calls, and instead of being in control of our time and attention, we respond and act on someone else’s priorities.
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Key Ideas
Getting Things Done: the basics
- Capture. Write down everything you need to do.
- Clarify. Break down each task into an actionable next step.
- Organize. Move each of those actionable ta...
The 2-minute rule
If the effort to keep remembering a task is more than just getting it out of the way now, then do it.
Fixing small tasks
- Fixing things is empowering. Our confidence increases or decreases based on our ability to make progress.
- Any progress builds momentum (and your mood): No matter how small the task is, crossing it off your to-do list gives you a boost of momentum and enhances your mood.
- Small steps turn into habits: When a task is easy to do and quickly completed, it’s much easier to turn it into a habit.
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Key Ideas
Time blocking
It's the practice of planning out every moment of your day in advance and dedicating specific time “blocks” for certain tasks and responsibilities.
When you fill your c...
Time blocking and focus
By scheduling every minute of your day you not only guard against distraction but also multiply your focus.
Also, focusing on one task at a time can make you up to 80% more productive than splitting your attention across multiple tasks.
Cons of the time blocking practice
- It takes a lot of time and effort.
- Few of us (if any) have the same schedule every day.
- We’re bad at estimating how long tasks will take to do.
- Constant interruptions and “urgent” tasks can destroy your system.
- Flexibility is key in most workplaces.
- You can lose sight of the bigger picture if you focus just on each day.