SUMMARY POINTS
The tasks and requests are piling up.
Your inbox count is growing like mad.
The various stupid meetings and boring conference calls are taking up valuable open time in your calendar.
You know that you’ve got a lot to do and yet, with what little free time you have during the day, you often find yourself fucking around on bullshit things not related to work.
All it takes is one click-bait link and down the rabbit hole you go for a solid hour or two. Hell, maybe even half the damn day.
It’s all good when there are no critical fires you need to put out or urgent deadlines that you need to meet that day. So, you keep yourself amused and/or occupied with other distractions in your life.
You lose yourself in another alternate reality where work takes a distant back seat in your mind. Right now, this is all about selfish and mindless satisfaction.
But, there comes a moment when the pressures of work get to a point where you can’t push them off anymore. And now, you’re up against the wall. And, if you don’t get your act together, the shit will hit the fan.
This isn’t the first time that you’ve put yourself in a tough position. Yet, despite knowing that, you can’t stop yourself.
It’s time to break the cycle and get back on track for good.
Your inbox count is growing like mad.
The various stupid meetings and boring conference calls are taking up valuable open time in your calendar.
You know that you’ve got a lot to do and yet, with what little free time you have during the day, you often find yourself fucking around on bullshit things not related to work.
All it takes is one click-bait link and down the rabbit hole you go for a solid hour or two. Hell, maybe even half the damn day.
It’s all good when there are no critical fires you need to put out or urgent deadlines that you need to meet that day. So, you keep yourself amused and/or occupied with other distractions in your life.
You lose yourself in another alternate reality where work takes a distant back seat in your mind. Right now, this is all about selfish and mindless satisfaction.
But, there comes a moment when the pressures of work get to a point where you can’t push them off anymore. And now, you’re up against the wall. And, if you don’t get your act together, the shit will hit the fan.
This isn’t the first time that you’ve put yourself in a tough position. Yet, despite knowing that, you can’t stop yourself.
It’s time to break the cycle and get back on track for good.
Why Fucking Around Feels So Good
We've all been there. You're staring at a blank document with the blinking cursor, knowing you should start working on it, but instead you decide to do something else. Maybe you hop on social media or watch a few episodes of your favorite show.
Whatever is it, you’re just fucking around, aka procrastinating.
Even though you know you should be working, something about fucking around that feels so good. But why does it makes us feel good?
Here’s the simple answer.
Humans have a built-in survival mechanism to avoid pain. It served our ancestors well during the cave-dwelling days to avoid attacks from jungle animals but now, it’s totally different.
Fucking around provides an escape from the drudgery of reality and gives instant relief from the things we don’t want to do, namely work.
Then, on top of that, when we’re doing things we like to do when we’re messing around, our hormones release dopamine, a neurotransmitter that makes us feel happy.
This creates a blissful combination of avoiding pain and gaining pleasure at the same time. It’s an unbeatable combination.
But while this combination can be helpful in the short term, letting it take control of you at work can have some serious consequences on your career. There are crushing effects of procrastination.
More specifically, the dopamine boost we get from procrastinating and messing around makes us feel good and encourages us to do it more at the cost of falling behind at work.
Fucking around provides instant rewards with no effort, pain or discomfort. It creates an addictive cycle that is hard to break out of until work pressures get to a critical point.
Whatever is it, you’re just fucking around, aka procrastinating.
Even though you know you should be working, something about fucking around that feels so good. But why does it makes us feel good?
Here’s the simple answer.
Humans have a built-in survival mechanism to avoid pain. It served our ancestors well during the cave-dwelling days to avoid attacks from jungle animals but now, it’s totally different.
Fucking around provides an escape from the drudgery of reality and gives instant relief from the things we don’t want to do, namely work.
Then, on top of that, when we’re doing things we like to do when we’re messing around, our hormones release dopamine, a neurotransmitter that makes us feel happy.
This creates a blissful combination of avoiding pain and gaining pleasure at the same time. It’s an unbeatable combination.
But while this combination can be helpful in the short term, letting it take control of you at work can have some serious consequences on your career. There are crushing effects of procrastination.
More specifically, the dopamine boost we get from procrastinating and messing around makes us feel good and encourages us to do it more at the cost of falling behind at work.
Fucking around provides instant rewards with no effort, pain or discomfort. It creates an addictive cycle that is hard to break out of until work pressures get to a critical point.
Reframe Your Mindset For Productivity Joy
There are a bunch of ways to overcome procrastination. The one that we’re going to explain here is reframing your mindset.
If you're like most office workers, you spend the majority of your day struggling to stay focused and productive. You may feel like you're constantly waging a battle against distractions, gossipy co-workers, and procrastination.
But what if there was another way?
What if you could reframe your mindset to see productivity as a joy instead of a struggle?
It sounds too good to be true, but it's not. By making a simple change in how you think about productivity, you can start to experience it as an exciting challenge rather than a mundane obligation.
Think about a small personal project that you did all on your own.
It could’ve been something as simple as framing a fav photo and hanging it on the wall, decluttering your crazy cubicle or maybe, a small DIY home project.
When you’re all done with the mini project, you can see your results and it triggers a sense of joyful satisfaction. You feel like you’ve done something worthwhile. And by extension, it gives you that feeling of accomplishment and progress.
And it's this sense of finishing something and crossing the finish line that is the key to changing your perspective on work tasks and projects.
Progress is happiness.
Read that again.
You need to be able to celebrate small victories to give yourself that little shot of dopamine joy from making progress. Essentially, you’re tricking your brain into seeing progress and productivity as a source of happiness.
If you're like most office workers, you spend the majority of your day struggling to stay focused and productive. You may feel like you're constantly waging a battle against distractions, gossipy co-workers, and procrastination.
But what if there was another way?
What if you could reframe your mindset to see productivity as a joy instead of a struggle?
It sounds too good to be true, but it's not. By making a simple change in how you think about productivity, you can start to experience it as an exciting challenge rather than a mundane obligation.
Think about a small personal project that you did all on your own.
It could’ve been something as simple as framing a fav photo and hanging it on the wall, decluttering your crazy cubicle or maybe, a small DIY home project.
When you’re all done with the mini project, you can see your results and it triggers a sense of joyful satisfaction. You feel like you’ve done something worthwhile. And by extension, it gives you that feeling of accomplishment and progress.
And it's this sense of finishing something and crossing the finish line that is the key to changing your perspective on work tasks and projects.
Progress is happiness.
Read that again.
You need to be able to celebrate small victories to give yourself that little shot of dopamine joy from making progress. Essentially, you’re tricking your brain into seeing progress and productivity as a source of happiness.
How To Stop Messing Around & Get Work Done
It's easy to see work as a necessary evil. You have to do it, but it's not necessarily fun.
However, if you changed your mindset and started seeing progress as a rewarding source of joy and happiness, then grunt work tasks become opportunities to check something off your list and get that dopamine hit of joy.
The challenge is how to get yourself into that state of mind when you’re in the middle of fucking around. It’s not easy to overcome this.
The solution?
You’ve gotta be the boss of your mind and start calling the shots here. Here are the steps to getting it done.
However, if you changed your mindset and started seeing progress as a rewarding source of joy and happiness, then grunt work tasks become opportunities to check something off your list and get that dopamine hit of joy.
The challenge is how to get yourself into that state of mind when you’re in the middle of fucking around. It’s not easy to overcome this.
The solution?
You’ve gotta be the boss of your mind and start calling the shots here. Here are the steps to getting it done.
1) Make A “For Later” Distractions List
There’s no way that you can permanently block out all distractions. It’s impossible to do that. Your mind will think about other shit all the time.
Instead, you have to use another tactic. You’ve gotta tell your mind that you’re only putting the distractions on temporary hold. By doing it this way, your mind will give in ‘cause it knows that it’ll be able to get back to it later.
One simple mind hack is to have a “For Later” list handy. Whatever the distractions or other things are, write them down on a piece of paper and title it “For Later” so that your mind can let that shit go. This will make the transition from cyberloafing to working much easier.
So, make the list, minimize the non-work related browser tabs, silence and put away your phone, forward desk calls to voice mail and get situated to start banging out work.
Instead, you have to use another tactic. You’ve gotta tell your mind that you’re only putting the distractions on temporary hold. By doing it this way, your mind will give in ‘cause it knows that it’ll be able to get back to it later.
One simple mind hack is to have a “For Later” list handy. Whatever the distractions or other things are, write them down on a piece of paper and title it “For Later” so that your mind can let that shit go. This will make the transition from cyberloafing to working much easier.
So, make the list, minimize the non-work related browser tabs, silence and put away your phone, forward desk calls to voice mail and get situated to start banging out work.
2) Block Out A 15-30 Minute Work Session
Ever have one of those moments where you go all out on something and shit doesn’t work out?
It’s like when you’re trying to get in shape and your ambitions are way higher than your fitness. You go hard on the first day and then your body is all achy and sore. So much so that you throw in the towel and give up.
However, if you had started out smaller and in phases, you’d be more likely to keep going. It’d be like starting out with low sweat easy workouts instead of going for a long run.
The same principle applies here with work. You gotta start small with shorter working sessions, ideally a 15 to 30 minute session. So, block out a 15-30 minute time slot on your calendar to get started.
It’s like when you’re trying to get in shape and your ambitions are way higher than your fitness. You go hard on the first day and then your body is all achy and sore. So much so that you throw in the towel and give up.
However, if you had started out smaller and in phases, you’d be more likely to keep going. It’d be like starting out with low sweat easy workouts instead of going for a long run.
The same principle applies here with work. You gotta start small with shorter working sessions, ideally a 15 to 30 minute session. So, block out a 15-30 minute time slot on your calendar to get started.
3) Get Momentum Going With Small Sub-Tasks
If you want to really up the odds that this works, you want to focus on getting that dopamine hit of productivity joy that we mentioned earlier. And, you need to get this dopamine hit quickly and early to avoid the fallback.
Just like the fitness example, you don’t want to jump into something big and overwhelming. You gotta start out small.
So, instead of thinking about finishing that monster project, break it down into smaller more manageable tasks, like much smaller tasks like sub-tasks that you can knock out in the 15-30 minute session.
For example, instead of trying to finish the entire executive presentation, shift your focus to just a single task like creating the outline or agenda. Or even a sub-task like formatting the slide template. Or perhaps a sub-sub-task like putting page numbers on each slide.
And don’t do multiple sub-tasks at the same time. You wanna mono-task each sub-task one at a time. In fact, you can do more with less stress by mono-tasking.
Just like the fitness example, you don’t want to jump into something big and overwhelming. You gotta start out small.
So, instead of thinking about finishing that monster project, break it down into smaller more manageable tasks, like much smaller tasks like sub-tasks that you can knock out in the 15-30 minute session.
For example, instead of trying to finish the entire executive presentation, shift your focus to just a single task like creating the outline or agenda. Or even a sub-task like formatting the slide template. Or perhaps a sub-sub-task like putting page numbers on each slide.
And don’t do multiple sub-tasks at the same time. You wanna mono-task each sub-task one at a time. In fact, you can do more with less stress by mono-tasking.
4) Give Yourself A High-Five With Each Win
So long as you’ve focused on doing simple sub-tasks, you’ll be able to get it done easily. You want to be able to cross a mini finish line during this work session. This is important because you want to give your brain a mini dopamine hit.
When you finish that sub-task, take a few seconds and do a little fist-pump at your desk or give yourself a mental high-five, maybe even a real one!
Or if you’re feeling nostalgic, hit the “easy” button.
VIDEO: That was easy
YOUTUBE: Zacklegend
LENGTH: 00:05
When you finish that sub-task, take a few seconds and do a little fist-pump at your desk or give yourself a mental high-five, maybe even a real one!
Or if you’re feeling nostalgic, hit the “easy” button.
VIDEO: That was easy
YOUTUBE: Zacklegend
LENGTH: 00:05
When you give yourself an “attaboy” reward, you’re creating your own happiness and feeding your brain with a bit of joy. And this results in wanting another one - quickly.
So, you jump to the next little sub-task to get another quick hit of joy. The result is that with each little win, you’re creating an upward cycle of productivity joy. It’s a positive addiction.
So, you jump to the next little sub-task to get another quick hit of joy. The result is that with each little win, you’re creating an upward cycle of productivity joy. It’s a positive addiction.
5) Build Up To Medium Tasks
As you get better at completing sub-tasks, it’s only natural that you move up a level to normal tasks because the sum of sub-tasks is the normal task. A lot of times, this happens without you even knowing it.
This is when you’re getting in the zone with work. And it’s an awesome feeling.
What you’ll notice is that when you knock out a bunch of related sub-tasks in one work session, you’re actually completing the normal task at hand. In many cases, these normal tasks can take up most of the 15-30 minute session.
If you experience a roadblock or challenge, you can keep the momentum going by shifting to another area of the project or a different project altogether and starting with another set of sub-tasks to trigger another workflow.
This is when you’re getting in the zone with work. And it’s an awesome feeling.
What you’ll notice is that when you knock out a bunch of related sub-tasks in one work session, you’re actually completing the normal task at hand. In many cases, these normal tasks can take up most of the 15-30 minute session.
If you experience a roadblock or challenge, you can keep the momentum going by shifting to another area of the project or a different project altogether and starting with another set of sub-tasks to trigger another workflow.
6) Take A 5-minute Break Every Hour
When you’ve successfully completed an hour’s worth of work, give yourself a 5-10 minute break. This is your chance to allow your mind to relax and satisfy its curiosity or other to-do’s on the “For Later” list.
Ideally, you should use this time to relieve any digital eye strain that may have built up. Get up from your desk and go for a walk outside, maybe a lap or two around the building.
Or if you’re pressed for time, head to the break room and make yourself some cofftea as a reward.
If you’re at this stage, congratulations!
You’ve successfully stopped fucking around and got shit done.
Ideally, you should use this time to relieve any digital eye strain that may have built up. Get up from your desk and go for a walk outside, maybe a lap or two around the building.
Or if you’re pressed for time, head to the break room and make yourself some cofftea as a reward.
If you’re at this stage, congratulations!
You’ve successfully stopped fucking around and got shit done.
Get Down To Business & Kick Ass
Being productive doesn't have to be a drag. In fact, it can be quite the opposite. When you're productive, you're using your time in a way that feels good and is beneficial to you. That's something to be happy about.
Remember, progress is happiness.
What's more, being productive can make your job more fulfilling and awesomer. You won’t feel stuck at work or in your career as much.
The sense of accomplishment you'll feel from knocking out items off your work list is gonna put a smile on your face - for sure.
The challenge is overcoming that initial friction of getting started.
The key is to start small and get quick wins to get the momentum going. And once you’re moving, keep up the pace with consistent little wins.
You can do this. Now, get at it!
Feel Better,
[Cubicle|Therapy]
Remember, progress is happiness.
What's more, being productive can make your job more fulfilling and awesomer. You won’t feel stuck at work or in your career as much.
The sense of accomplishment you'll feel from knocking out items off your work list is gonna put a smile on your face - for sure.
The challenge is overcoming that initial friction of getting started.
The key is to start small and get quick wins to get the momentum going. And once you’re moving, keep up the pace with consistent little wins.
You can do this. Now, get at it!
Feel Better,
[Cubicle|Therapy]