The Simple Productivity Formula That Completely Changed My Life & Priorities
We live in a fast-paced world that becomes more demanding day by day. Your day is full of things that you need to do, and you have no idea where to start or how to finish. Let me tell you a little bit about what happened to me:
I launched my website shortly after getting pregnant, and it was effortless to manage. I would go to college, come home, work on my site, do my homework, go to sleep, and repeat. I was an automated machine! However, when my baby was born (prematurely), I had no idea how I was going to manage everything! Let’s face it — being a mom itself is a full-time job, especially when your baby is requiring even more attention. On top of that, I was still going to college, still had homework, still had an apartment that wasn’t going to clean itself, and I had my website which I knew I was not giving up on.
In simple words, I felt like a disaster! However, I never decided to give any of those things up, so I came up with ways to save as much time (and money) as I possibly could. I cut my hair above my shoulders, which was initially past my waistline, just to save time on hair styling and money. I transferred to an online college to save time commuting, and to save babysitting money. Hey, at least I get to raise my daughter and go to school at the same time.
I purchased the best agenda/planner I could find. However, I realized that the problem was not planning my day; it was prioritizing my tasks correctly. I found that there is no point in writing things down in a planner if you don’t even know where or how to begin your day.
Due to that, I created my GID — or Get It Done — formula, which I talk about substantially in my online course. Here’s how it looks:
Important Task = Time + Energy – Irrelevancy
To calculate a specific task’s number, I would rank it for the various components of the formula:
Time: 1 = Not so time-consuming, 5 = Very time-consuming
Energy: 1 = Not a large amount of energy required, 5 = Very large amount of energy
Irrelevancy: 1 = Not irrelevant to your life at all, 5 = Meh, pretty irrelevant
So, if a task ranks highest for the amount of time and energy it takes and is very relevant to your life right now, it will end up with a score of 9 — and that is your most important task.
You need to know the approximate amount of time it takes to get that specific task done AND how much energy you have to put in. However, if the task has a high level of irrelevancy, you need to take that number out of the equation (subtract).
Once you’ve got your list from most significant to least significant tasks, go ahead and transfer them to your agenda. You should be able to do the most important tasks at your peak times (the time(s) of the day where you have more energy and feel more productive).
When I created that formula, I did it out of desperation and frustration. I never thought that it would change my life, and now it is changing others’. Can you believe that now, I am an author, business owner, writer, mother, instructor, almost a college graduate, and I read many books and burn a few calories (walking to the fridge counts, right?)?
It is an incredibly easy formula to learn, and when used in conjunction with my other systems, you will become what I like to call a “Productivity Freak.” Feel free to read a bit more about it on my website, or head straight to the course and pre-enroll. And let me give you a piece of motivational advice: you have no idea how much you can do until you decide that you are the boss of your life and prioritize yourself.
Elenny leads a finance, career, and entrepreneurship-focused website. She is also the instructor of the productivity course GetItDone Boss dedicated to changing people’s lives by turning them into “Productive Freaks.”
Image via Unsplash
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