So this post isn’t going to be a motivational speech about organization or calendar templates. 

Instead, I’m going to share with you the principle-based productivity system that I use to make time for everything that matters to me, and yea, basically manage my entire life. 

And this is coming from someone who works 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, has a family, exercises daily, and still gets over 7 hours of sleep every single night. 

So here’s the system: 

1. Determine your priorities & their levers using the 80/20 rule

2. Maintain a time and energy log to understand how and when you do your best work 

3. Overestimate the time it takes to do anything by 30%-50% and put it all in your calendar 

4. Use the N/X system to perform deep work & pace yourself - by the way this step won’t make sense until I explain it because it’s something I came up with

5. Before you start a deep work session, do a mini-meditation to clear your mind 

6. While working: use visual timers & micro-deadlines to be more efficient 

So let’s go through each part one-by-one. 

First,

the Pareto principle or 80/20 rule just says that 20% of the things that you do result in 80% of the outcomes. 

Now in the context of managing my life, there’s two things I’ve learnt that I want to pass onto you:

• One, is that you can do anything, but you can’t do everything. 

• Two, is that you need to find the best use of your time, for each thing that matters to you. 

I’ll use myself as an example, like I always do. 

My time’s limited just like yours, so my 4 priorities include: my health, my important relationships, my work/career, and my fun/adventure. 

If you’ve seen any of our older posts then you’ve heard of these categories before. 

Anyways, I use these priorities as filters for making decisions about what I spend my time on. So if I’m presented with an activity that doesn’t contribute to any of my 4 priorities, I don’t spend time on it.

This covers the first takeaway about how you can do anything, but not everything. 

For the second takeaway, consider the example of my work at The Healthy Kangaroo.

Building this company is one of the most fulfilling things I do because of the positive impact I hope I’m having. 

And seriously, please let me know if I’m not and what I can do to improve. 

But the point of mentioning that here is that The Healthy Kangaroo falls under my work/career category, so of course I’m spending time on it. But it’s not the only thing that I work on, so I can’t do everything to make progress on it. 

Therefore, I also need to spend the time that I’ve allocated for The Healthy Kangaroo, in the best way possible.

That means identifying the few activities, if done consistently, will allow me to make the most progress. These are my levers. 

And my biggest lever at The Healthy Kangaroo is writing these posts. If all we did was create these posts and make sure they got published, even if we did nothing else, we’d continue to make progress. 

So if you don’t know what your priorities are or you need some help identifying what your levers are, I’d highly suggest you check out our post about goal-setting.

Second,

maintaining a time and energy log. 

What does that even mean? 

Well, for the past 2 years, I’ve used a Google Sheet that currently has 4028 rows as of March 15th 2024, to document the time I spend working and how I feel while doing so. 

All I do is write down: 

• the time I start working on a task

• the time I stop working on it

• a quick description of what I worked on during that chunk of time

• and I rate on a scale of 1-10 how easy it was for me to concentrate & how my energy levels were 

If I can, I’ll also describe what I did before starting the task and what I did afterwards. My first entry often describes how I slept the previous night. 

The point of all of this is that it gives me data on my own behavior. It helps me understand what factors influence how productive I am, and the best times to work on certain tasks, based on those factors. 

Now, you don’t need to do this for 2 years like I have to figure the majority of this stuff out.

I learnt the most about myself and the way I operate best by doing this for 2 weeks. So if you want >90% of the benefits, just try it for 1-2 weeks. 

But as my routines and the things going on in my life change, I like continuing to document what I do in my log because it helps me adjust to new circumstances.

Again, it’s all because I’m measuring myself and collecting data to make informed decisions.

On another note, I find that it just helps me stay accountable, because by tracking how I’m spending my time, I can assess whether I’m using it according to my priorities, so that’s another reason I’ve done this for so long. 

Third,

overestimate the time it takes to do anything by 30%-50% and put it in your calendar. 

This is where the magic of the previous step comes in. Now that you know how your energy levels and focus fluctuate throughout the day, you can schedule things based on that data.

For example, I know that I have the most energy and focus in the mornings, which is why I schedule my most difficult, highest-priority tasks, first thing in the morning (after I’ve gone through my routine, of course).

And the reason I overestimate how long it takes to do anything is frankly because we just suck at predicting how much time things will take.

I’ve been time-blocking for over 6 years now, and I’m still completely off most of the time when I schedule something. 

Obviously I’ve gotten better over time, and for tasks that I do repeatedly, I have a pretty good idea of how long they take. But if I’ve never done a particular type of task before, I will overestimate the time I think it’ll take by 50%. 

This helps from a stress standpoint because it’s a lot easier to pull things in from tomorrow than it is to readjust your entire schedule because you underestimated how long something would take. 

So I’d rather have the buffer to ensure I have enough time to do what I need to do, and not get too stressed about it. 

Also, time-blocking & breaking down your tasks into as many actionable steps as possible, really helps with reducing procrastination because mentally it’s like making a commitment to yourself. 

And it does help me stay organized, ensuring that I’m spending time on the things that matter to me. So I don’t just schedule in when to work on a specific task. I also schedule my meals, my exercise time, my family time, etc. 

It might seem really rigid and restrictive, but that’s only if you make a schedule you don’t like. If you design a schedule that aligns with your priorities, you’re not gonna hate it. 

I know that’s easier said than done; different people face different circumstances, but I think it’s at least worth trying it for a week if nothing else is working for you. 

Fourth,

using the N/X system. 

So, I’ll definitely write an entire post just to talk about this in the future, but for now, here’s what you need to know. 

When you’re working, you wanna prioritize deep work and flow. Deep work is when you do something with total focus and no distractions. I know that’s not always feasible, especially if you have kids, but do the best you can.

As for flow, that just means you’re working on something that’s difficult enough to slightly challenge you. That’s when you, quote unquote, get “into the zone”. 

Flow is also just a mental state where you’re mindful, present and experiencing the moment as it is; so you don’t need to be working to maintain a flow state. 

Oftentimes we achieve flow when we’re doing something we really enjoy. For me, one of those things is playing basketball.

I’ve been playing for nearly 20 years now, and whenever I get onto the court, I’m 100% present, just enjoying the game because I love it. 

Now the N/X system just means, whenever you notice your focus is starting to slip or you’re feeling lethargic or you’re just not being very productive, stop and take a break. 

The length of your break is based on how much time you spent doing focused work. For me, I use N/4, where the letter N is just a variable that represents how much time I spent working.

For example, if I spent 90 minutes writing a post, then 90 divided by 4 is 22.5, or 22 minutes and 30 seconds. So, I allow myself to take a break for up to 22 minutes and 30 seconds before getting back to work.

The reason this works so well is because it doesn’t restrict you to only working a certain amount of time like the traditional Pomodoro technique does.

Instead, it allows you to do focused work for as long as you can, and then take a break based on that, guilt-free. 

Studies have repeatedly proven that taking breaks to recharge helps you work more efficiently & prevents you from getting burnt out. 

Now, there’s a good way to take a break and a bad way to take a break. 

A bad way would be scrolling social media, because that’s not gonna recharge you for another work session.

It’s just gonna distract you because it’ll give you a greater dopamine hit than the one you’ll get from actually doing your work; that’s what causes procrastination. 

A good way to take a break would be following some of the guidelines that I use, which include: 

• No screens, to give my eyes a break 

• No sitting, because my posture and back thank me for it 

• Hydrating 

• Meditating 

• Doing some actual exercise like push-ups or squats if the break’s long enough 

• Taking care of small tasks that don’t require much thinking (eg. laundry) 

• Having a conversation with a family member or even a friend over the phone

• Etc. 

Again, I’ll make an entire post dedicated just to using this portion of the system properly because it has literally changed my life.

I can’t even describe in words how much it’s helped me!

Fifth,

do a mini-meditation before you go back to working. 

This doesn’t require much explanation. 

I like using the quote “Be where your feet are.”

It helps me bring awareness to my feet, which then helps me bring awareness to the rest of my body, physical sensations and my surroundings. 

As a result, I’m grounded, I’m present and I’m mentally ready to get back to work. 

Sixth,

use visual timers and micro-deadlines while working.

So you know how I mentioned in the time-blocking part how it’s a good idea to break your tasks down into actionable steps to reduce procrastination?

I’ll make a separate post on removing barriers, procrastination and the like, so I won’t get into it here. 

The point is that you can sort of “guestimate” how long you think it’ll take for you to accomplish a particular action-step, that leads you to completing the overarching task. 

You can then create an artificial deadline to complete that action-step by setting a timer that you can see while you’re working. Your micro-deadline would be completing that action step before the timer elapses.

It’s like a personal challenge, with no real consequences, that’ll make you more efficient because of Parkinson’s law. 

All it means is that the rate at which you do something expands to fill the time you allotted for it. 

So an extreme example would be, if you gave yourself all day to do something, it’ll probably take you all day to do it. 

But if you had to get that thing done in the next 2 hours, you’d figure out a way to get it done in the next 2 hours. 

That’s A Wrap!

Ok, I know that was a lot, but I hope it was valuable!!

If you couldn’t already tell, I’m a really big productivity-nerd, so we’ll be making plenty more posts in the future about productivity. 

Thanks again!

Your Internet Siblings,

The Healthy Kangaroo Team ;)