This may seem contradictory to what I just said, but it’s actually a relevant point to discuss.
Being productive is a rather relative term and depends on your goals, productivity techniques, and the environment you are in.
Personally, I would say I can be moderately productive for at least two hours.
I am efficient in my environment and effective with my time so I achieve two hours of productivity on the most perfect day, a few minutes less on an average day, and the occasional zero on a bad day.
If you’re an on-demand streamer, you’ll have even more data to work with
Let’s say you manage a shared playlist. Each day you play the playlist for 3 hours.
On average, you can play about 1.5 hours of a playlist in one day.
On average, you play 2 songs per hour. Let’s assume you have the best playlist possible.
The longest playlist is 10 hours long, so you can play 3 hours of it without playing the same song twice (this assumes all songs are really good).
To be more efficient, you’ll probably be averaging 2 hours of the song (1.5 hours on average).
This is an average, but it still gives you a good idea of the amount of time it takes to be completely productive on an average day.
If you’re working on a project that requires hours of work per day, then you should work with longer periods of work (of course not at the expense of efficiency)
For example, let’s say you work on a project for 1-3 hours a day, every day.
Every time you complete your work for that day, write down how long you actually spent on that work.
That way you can work towards getting more efficient with your time and hopefully try to reduce the amount of time you work.
Similarly, if you’re having trouble getting to sleep at night, try setting a bedtime goal that will enable you to get to bed by a certain time.
If you don’t reach the goal, you might as well stay up and spend another hour surfing or something like that.
This might seem counter-productive, but it will take the pressure off.
Set the alarm clock for a time that enables you to achieve your goal and try not to think about it anymore.
Working on a brand new project, do you really need to get everything done right away?
For new projects, you’re likely to have a lot of work to do.
To complete the project, you need to get up to speed quickly on the project and figure out how to do it.
That’s a lot of work and the timeline for completing it is relatively short.
At some point, you’re likely to make a mistake. That doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed later, but you can’t do anything about it right now.
It’s better to spend your time on other tasks.
It’s actually better to spend your time on other tasks.
This can be very difficult, especially if you’re trying to complete a brand new project. But that’s the way it goes.
It’s not productive to spend your time correcting an error. So instead of rushing and fixing a mistake, just abandon it and move on to something more interesting.
You’re less likely to make another mistake and it makes for an exciting experience.
Do you need to be productive all the time?
If you’re not completely productive all the time, it’s actually okay if you’re not productive for a day or two.
The idea behind productivity is not to do a bunch of work every day.
The idea is to make yourself more efficient and productive and to achieve results faster.
There’s a ton of great ideas out there and there’s no shortage of information, so getting something done faster doesn’t need to be as challenging as you might think.
For example, I’ve often found that knowing a few basic search engines makes it possible to find information really fast and find the right information you’re looking for.
It also takes the pressure off when you’re having trouble figuring something out.
For example, when I’m having trouble writing a blog post or finishing a short program, I use Google and I know I can always find something to help me.
There are tons of ways to become more efficient. The important thing is to avoid getting stuck in a cycle of working on something you can’t get to move forward.
For example, if you have a ton of research to do, do it once and move on to something else. That’s how it’s supposed to work.
Summary
There’s no such thing as a bad day. Everyone needs a day off to recharge and rest, but we should also spend the majority of our time doing something productive and useful.
The idea is not to be productive all the time, but rather to be productive more of the time and rest more of the time.
