Finally, after years of thinking I was merely odd, I have a diagnosis: I'm a "precrastinator".We precrastinators don't put things off until the last minute (well, actually, in other moods, we do that, too, but never mind). Instead, we do things sooner than they really need to be done, even if it costs us more time and energy that way, simply for the feeling of having them over with. I sometimes worry that that'll be my epitaph: "He crossed a lot of items off his to-do list."

What Is A Precrastinator

In the experiment that inspired the term, US researchers gave participants the choice of carrying one of two heavy buckets to the end of an alleyway. One bucket was positioned closer to the finish line, but most people chose the other bucket – the one nearer to them – even though they had to carry it farther, which meant expending more effort. The reason, according to the study's authors, was that the task they'd been given weighed on their minds; they wanted rid of it. "By picking up the near bucket, they could check that task off their mental to-do lists more quickly than if they picked up

And yet those emails do need to be answered, living rooms do need tidying. The best solution I've discovered is to stick to a simple rule: don't clear the decks first, clear them second. If your job permits it, schedule a daily deck-clearing hour – but at 4.30pm, not 9am. Switch your weekends around so that chores get done last (but assign a specific time, otherwise they won't get done at all). And whenever you catch yourself thinking, "Let me just get these little things out of the way first", consider the possibility that you'd be better off not bothering. Some don't need doing at all, while

'The special danger of precrastination is that, unlike procrastination, it doesn't feel naughty,' says Oliver Burkeman

productivity

Productivity

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

problemsolving

Problem Solving

timemanagement

Time Management

This column will change your life: precrastination

A freelance business owner can find it difficult to unplug and unwind when on vacation. There always seem to be deadlines to meet, emails to answer, clients to manage and marketing to do. This is all driven by the fear that you'll lose work or clients if you slow down. Time off means a loss of money and day-to-day business admin piling up. However, taking time off is vital to avoid burnout.

Taking time off is essential

Build vacation into your schedule ahead of time. Then, block out the time you'll dedicate to vacation and plan around it when scheduling client work.

Plan ahead

If your time off will impact regular client schedules, notify your clients a few weeks in advance. Tell your clients you're taking time off. For example, "I wanted to give you a heads up that I will be taking some time off next month and will be unavailable from [date to date]. In the meantime, please keep sending work my way - I have the capacity for 1-2 projects a week before I take off."

Tell your clients early

For freelancers, time off work is time not making money. However, it doesn't mean you shouldn't take a vacation - it means you need to budget for it. For example, it could mean raising your rates and taking on more assignments in the months leading to your vacation. Set up a business account for your freelance income, then schedule regular automatic payments to your personal account so that you have a regular "paycheck". Build some savings in for a cushion.

Budget for your vacation

Without burning yourself out, front-load your work so that you can fit all your projects early. This is easiest when planning ahead and communicating with clients early so that they have a chance to send projects your way. It might mean doubling up on work for a few weeks, but it keeps your income steady.

Get ahead on your work

A key to freelance survival is setting expectations up front. Learn to say no to work opportunities scheduled on your vacation, and communicate with clients to set deadlines that work for both of you.  During a vacation, refrain from checking in on email or following up on work.

Set boundaries for yourself

Consider hiring a subcontractor to keep things moving when you have busy seasons where you don't want to say no to work. If you want to subcontract work during your vacation, start the hiring process early as it can take time to onboard the right people.

Consider subcontracting work

Create a few mantras to help ground you in reality.<ul><li>Your clients will be there when you return.</li><li>You have found work before, and you can find more when you return.</li><li>Vacation is essential. It makes you better at your work.</li></ul>

Work on your mindset

If you can't afford an extended vacation, start small with a few days or a long weekend. Stepping back to unwind will give your mind and body a chance to recharge and allow you to return with a fresh perspective and renewed energy.

Start small

Here are 8 tips for how to unplug on vacation when you run a freelance business.

career

Career

Here’s how to take time off as a freelancer

Consider it done! is a research paper written by E. J. Masicampo and Roy F. Baumeister. The authors state that once we commit to a particular plan of action to complete a task, we think less about that task. We have, on average, about 15 ongoing goals and projects at any given time, each goal with its own set of milestones. We also know unfinished goals can be a burden, so we offload them onto a to-do list. We feel relieved from the need to hold on to it mentally.

The science behind to-do lists

To-do lists are effective to keep us aware of our goals. Simply maintaining awareness of our goals helps us to feel disciplined. But there is a downside too. To-do lists are not enough to help us commit to the work. A to-do list can be a way of postponing work. It is too easy to constantly order the easiest work while the more complex or undesirable tasks stay on the list. This happens because we don't specify when and how to do it.

The benefits and disadvantages of to-do lists

When we plan to complete a task, <ul><li>we ease the stress we may feel to remind ourselves that we need to constantly do this thing.</li><li>we have to figure out what actions we need to take to finish the task and how and when to do them.</li></ul>When we imagine the plan, it seems easier and likelier to happen. Even if we have not started on it, we feel we know how to attain success.

Why we feel that to-do lists help 

Making a to-do list takes effort, so use one for new and difficult tasks, not for daily tasks like clearing your inbox or getting dressed. It is useful to move more of your tasks into the "automatic" space so that you need to spend less effort thinking about them. The key is to establish routines. If something is showing up regularly on your to-do list, it may be because you find it effortful.

How to manage to-do lists

Make the things you do more fun, such as listening to a podcast while you jog.Remind yourself why you are doing this important work. For example, instead of putting off your research project, think of the people you will help.

Inspire yourself

It involves a vicious cycle of tension, release, and reward.

Why We Continue to Rely on (and Love) To-Do Lists

If you want to accomplish anything in life, whether it’s acing a test, writing a book, or starting a business, momentum is everything. We all know how good it feels to get excited about something new. Maybe you want to form a daily walking habit, or maybe you want to start writing articles after putting them off for many years.
You get started, and after a few weeks, you get stuck. You want to go for a walk, but you got in a fender bender on your way to the supermarket. Or you want to write, but you just can’t find a good way to end the story you’re working on.

Momentum Matters

Sometimes you just have to be strategic about skipping things. Especially if you want to make progress in life. Both our time and energy are limited, and it’s easy to lose sight of what really matters.
You want to skip some things because you don’t want to expend more energy on things than necessary. Life and work are already hard. Why make it harder for yourself by being so rigid? You want to be flexible and adapt to what comes your way. And sometimes, the best way to make progress is to decide NOT to do something.

Making Things Effortless

If you want to accomplish anything in life, whether it’s acing a test, writing a book, or starting a business, skipping some tasks is crucial.

If You're Not Skipping Some Tasks, You're Making Life Harder

I'm always searching on play store some productivity apps which can help me to improve my efficiency in my work.Today I mention here some apps hope that will helpful for you.<ol><li class="ql-align-justify"><a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cc.forestapp">Forest:Stay focused </a></li></ol>Break phone addiction, eliminate distractions, and maximise productivity easily...2.<a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.thehimalayanmeditation.englishmeditation">Himalyan Meditetion</a>Powerful Meditations, Mindfulness, Heartfulness and Soulfulness for everyone...3.<a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gethabitcoach.android2">Mentorist:Skills from books</a>.Start learning skills today. Put the best book summaries into action. Habits...4.<a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=alex.education.a_brain">ABrain:Improve your Memory</a>App for training your brain skills. Memory, attention, reaction...

Top Productivity Apps.

<a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.YaroslavGorbach.delusionalgenerator">Master of communication</a>Exercises to teach you how to talk to anyone...If you want next part on "Best Productivity Apps"then comment below.

Demand For Next Part In Comment Section......

Top Most🔥🔥 Productive Apps 🔥🔥for you

habits

Habits

Productivity Apps

Think about the last task you completed. Did it take you around the time you’d estimated? Probably not. 
Our perceptions of our available time, our abilities, and any roadblocks we may hit are greatly skewed. This is a phenomenon called the planning fallacy and it happens to professionals at all levels and in every occupation. What can we do along the way to keep us on target and help us meet our goals?

The Planning Fallacy

Research shows that we often underestimate the time and obstacles involved in completing a task even when it directly contradicts our past experiences. 
This can be explained by our optimism bias — our natural tendency to believe that the future will somehow be better than the past.

Optimism Bias

<ul>
<li>The next time you find yourself struggling to estimate, ask: How much time and effort have similar tasks required in the past?</li>
<li> Schedule buffer time: Keep in mind that there will always be factors outside of your control, and moreover, you may very well be overestimating your capabilities.</li>
<li>Commit early and publicly: Give yourself a little bit of external commitment pressure in order to not leave all of your work to the last minute.</li>
<li>Assume the worst: Start by imagining what will go wrong before it actually does. By doing so, you’ll be better able to foresee potential (if unlikely) issues. And you’ll be equipped to develop a suitable backup plan as a preventative measure.</li>
</ul>

Overcome the Planning Fallacy

It’s called “the planning fallacy” and we all fall victim to it.

Understand yourself and those around you.

psychology

Psychology

This Is Why You Keep Missing Deadlines

<ul><li>Not doing something will always be faster than doing it. </li><li>This statement reminds of the old computer programming saying, “Remember that there is no code faster than no code.”</li></ul>

Saying No

<ul><li>We agree to many requests not because we want to do them, but because we don't want to be seen as rude, arrogant, or unhelpful. </li><li>Often, you have to consider saying no to someone you will interact with again in the future.</li></ul>

Why We Say Yes

<ul><li>Saying no saves you time in the future.</li><li>Saying yes costs you time in the future.</li><li>No is a form of time credit. You retain the ability to spend your future time however you want.</li><li>Yes is a form of time debt. You have to pay back your commitment at some point.</li><li>No is a decision. Yes is a responsibility.</li></ul>

Difference Between Yes And No

<ul><li>Saying no is an important skill to develop at any stage of your career because it retains the most important asset in life: your time. </li><li>As the investor Pedro Sorrentino put it, “If you don’t guard your time, people will steal it from you.”</li></ul>

The Role Of No

<ul><li>Upgrading your no doesn't mean you'll never say yes.</li><li> It just means you default to saying no and only say yes when it really makes sense.</li><li> To quote the investor Brent Beshore, “Saying no is so powerful because it preserves the opportunity to say yes.”</li></ul>

Upgrading Your No

<ul><li><a href="https://deepstash.com/idea/262067/stop-doing-whats-not-working">This is similar to the well-known “Hell Yeah or No” method from Derek Sivers.</a></li><li>If someone asks you to do something and your first reaction is “Hell Yeah!”, then do it. If it doesn't excite you, then say no.</li></ul>

When To Say No

<ul><li>More effort is wasted doing things that don't matter than is wasted doing things inefficiently. </li><li>And if that is the case, elimination is a more useful skill than optimization.</li></ul>

The Power Of Saying No

"There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all."

communication

Communication

The Ultimate Productivity Hack is Saying No

The cycle of "One Day" is the reason I am not at my goal weight, not at the skill level, not at my fill-in-the-blank. One day I will go to the gym, one day I will get my degree, one day I will change to that career track. So start today, you might fail, give yourself grace, and get started that day again! How do we break it?

Breaking The Cycle Of One Day

I find that so much about understanding life is about knowing where you stand inside of it. Gaining a perspective will elevate you to a better place. The biggest perspective change I had was with death 💀. Let's think about time as money 💰The reality is, we are withdrawing from our bank account on day 1. Every single day we are just given an allowance. As the bank account gets smaller. When I finally realized this / accepted it. I gained a lot of perspective. I do not want to get to the end of my life to find out that I spent it on all of the wrong things.

Step One - Gaining Some Perspective

So often we make decisions in the MOMENT rather than making decisions ahead of time. I find that we make BETTER decisions ahead of time because we are not going to "cave" or "change our minds".

Step Two - Make the Decision BEFORE the moment

Having a person that knows your goals and will ask you about them spurs you to accomplish them.

Step Three - Get Accountable

Substituting our distractions with other things that improve our life I have found to aid me in motivating me to change what I spend my time on. The biggest change I made by far was switching all of my social media to LinkedIn. I find that there is a community of people building, inspiring, growing, and supporting others. Joining that during my "downtime" really helped me to start pushing myself.

Step Four - Replace Distractions

People make all of the difference in our life. From what we do or do not do. To what we believe we can or can not accomplish. Find a community of people that inspire you, challenge you, elevate you. Then make sure you be that to someone else one day 😊

Final Thought - Get a Community

The "One Day" cycle is a dangerous lie that we tell ourselves. It's a lie that we can wake up from 10 years later and realize we never really did anything that we really wanted to.

The "One Day" cycle is a dangerous lie that we tell ourselves. It's a lie that we can wake up from 10 years later and realize we never really did anything that we really wanted to. 

The cycle of "One Day" is the reason I am not at my goal weight, not at the skill level, not at my fill-in-the-blank. One day I will go to the gym, one day I will get my degree, one day I will change to that career track. How do we break this cycle of "One Day". Rather than focusing on the future efforts WE BELIEVE are going to happen, how do we shift into working at the moment to get our goals and our vision for our life accomplished? So let us break down a few elements that I think can go into

Breaking the Cycle of "One Day"

Single tasking is a great way to focus on big workloads.It allows you to parse out what you are doing into bit sized pieces and accomplish easily.I have been using PomoFocus as my daily focus tool.Allowing you to track lists, time and give yourself mental breaks. If you try it, your performance will increase. No doubt Not a Sponsor ☺️

Power Of Single Tasking

A simple Pomodoro Timer app that works on a desktop & mobile browser. Pomofucus will help you manage your time and let you focus on any tasks such as study, writing, or coding.

Pomofocus

Everyone gets the same 24 hours in a day, but it's what we do with those 1440 minutes that separates the successful from the stagnant. If you want to edge out the competition, hit your goals and achieve more than the week should allow, these following clock hacks should help...

Instead of simply sitting down to do tedious work, see if you can find a way to make the work less tedious. Create workflows, automations and innovations that allow you to do more with less effort, then use that time tackling the next problem. By the time you take a break to look back you will realize that you are miles ahead of the competition.<a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/380976"> </a>

#1 Think like a lazy person

The risk with to-do lists is that most people assume they must be completed linearly. When it comes to these chores, it isn’t wise to simply start at the top. Instead, apply time estimations to every item. Find yourself with ten minutes between meetings? Knock-off a tiny task. Plane delayed by two hours? Tackle a larger item. Do what you can when you can and be amazed by what you can accomplish throughout the day.Don't do your tasks in order

#2 Don't do your tasks in order

Instead of staring out your cabin window on a plane, scrolling through Instagram in an Uber, or people-watching on the subway, make travel work for you. Commuting can be great for replying to emails, prepping for upcoming meetings and, when all else fails, continuing education. The idea is to treat every moment spent sitting as an opportunity.

#3 Maximize transit time

Every time you think about committing to something, consider the potential return on investment. Ask yourself if the reward justifies the cost. Rest and relaxation are, of course, important---but anything you do strictly out of obligation may not be worth the time spent, and it is ok to say "no" when the ROI is not favorable.<a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/379074"> </a>

#4 Consider the ROI

Outsource the restFigure out what your superpower is and develop that until absolutely no one can do it better than you. Do not concern yourself with the things you do not naturally excel at. Find people that excel in areas that you are weak and let them fly. When you get the proper people in the right roles, no one will be bogged down by things that challenge them. Everything gets streamlined and the results can be truly astounding. <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshow/378589"> </a>

#5 Outsource the rest

There aren't enough hours in the day, but these tips will make them feel slightly more productive.

6 Habits That Help Successful People Maximize Their Time

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