Don’t Let These 3 Nasty Habits Kill Your Productivity

This past weekend I spent about a day and a half building a server that would become my dev environment for a side project. Prior to that, I had worked on a virtual machine that didn’t allow me to copy & paste nor have dual monitors.

For people who don’t understand tech gibberish, let’s just say it was like cutting wood with a butter knife. Not fun nor easy.

I spent about a month working like that. It was terrible.

Yup, I admit it. I was lazy to find a better way. Actually, I already knew of a better way (building a Linux server / using the right tool). My laziness stemmed from knowing the amount of time I’d need to invest to build it.

Somehow, I went on like that for a month. My frustration eventually overpowered my laziness and I got to business.

After a day and a half, I was set to go. Working on my side project is so much easier now that I have the right tools.

This experience got me thinking about our human nature.

How often would we rather live in difficulty instead of investing the time and effort to make our life easier?
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We’ve all been guilty of this. For some, this has become a way of life. Nasty habits are easily formed.

I specifically thought about 3 nasty habits that kill our productivity.

These habits are nasty ones. We see them within ourselves, our friends, family, and even coworkers. Yuck.

1. Procrastinating and hiding behind all kinds of excuses and distractions.
2. Repeating manual tasks that could be fixed or automated.
3. Staying within our comfort zone because we fear change.

It’s in our nature to live with these bad habits even if it costs us more time and effort (sometimes even money) in the long run.

The more I pondered, the more I realized that it’s precisely these pesky nasty habits that prevent people from acing their profession or hobby.

The ace kills these nasty habits

Think about it. All aces kill these nasty habits.

A great athlete invests tons of time into training. She constantly refines her skills to eliminate unnecessary movements to conserve energy and improve her precision. This allows her to endure and outperform her opponents.

A leading artist will continually evolve by thinking outside the box. He will push himself outside his comfort zone to create new enticing art.

Wise carpenters devote enough time planning their work before swinging a hammer. They understand that with enough planning and measuring, the rest of the project is significantly easier.

Don’t believe me? Try thinking about people who are aces within your profession. You’ll find that they follow a schedule that prevents procrastination, they simplify their tasks / efforts, and they try anything new if it means improvement.

I planned on writing a few tips about how to get rid of these nasty habits but decided not to. There’s no fun in that.

I rather hear from you. So tell me, how does an ace like yourself kill these nasty habits?

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By the way, I’m starting a new blogging schedule. I’ll be posting on Thursdays going forward.

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