Naming Our Productivity Thieves

An effective strategy for taking our productivity to a whole new level is getting really honest with ourselves about the personal Productivity Thieves which break our moving forward momentum. Here are some of the thieves I personally notice.

1) Codependency. Being overly nice. Not setting boundaries. I find that I am most productive when I am focused on what I need to take care of for myself in my own life. I am much less productive when I am no longer "on my side of the net" and am involving myself in others' experiences rather than my own. In taking over responsibility for what others are choosing to experience I trip up my own momentum.

2) Fatalism. The belief that "That is just too hard" or "I can't do that well enough." There are items that stay on my action lists week after week, sometimes month after month, sometimes year after year. This is because I am still believing in some story I came up with a long time ago without questioning it.

3) Being A Rebel. "No one can make me do that." What helps me stop this accomplishment thief at the gate is my realizing that no one is making me do that. No one out there really cares. It is to my own benefit that I complete that task.

4) Self-Denial. Not eating when I need to eat or not sleeping when I need to sleep. This is a brilliant and reliable strategy to slow down my moving forward. It works every time.

5) Not Being Organized. If there is a task I am telling myself I do not want to do, how convenient it is to misplace the paperwork I need in order to do it. Then I have a perfect excuse to not move forward with that yet. What helps me with this one is to focus on the joy I feel when I am able to find a piece of paper within a minute or two of needing it. There is really nothing quite like this.

6) Avoiding Details. There is a saying in financial circles that "just a small leak can sink a big ship." This is true of our productivity as well. A single missing detail can sink a whole hour of our time, or a whole day.

7) Indecision and Ambiguity. Not being willing to commit to a certain direction.

8) Unrealistic expectations.

9) Delegating Phobia.

10) Withheld Communications.

11) Relationship Drama.

What are your productivity thieves?

Stay tuned for my next post: "Naming Our Productivity Angels"

This is fun. Thank you for being part of this dance.

Where Those Distractions Are Really Located.

One thing that really helps me stay on an accomplishment roll is keeping close track of how productive I am actually being. Measurement supports mastery.

I use a scale of one to ten for this. "10" is the score for "Wow, I am really sizzling here" and "1" is the score for being frozen in the ice of perplexing and mortifying inertia.

I have been doing this tracking while starting this blog. I came into this project as a 10. In fact, most mornings for me look like 10 10 10 10 10. I wrote a long introduction to this blog and the words were flowing thorough like melted butter. More of 10, 10, 10, 10.

And then, oh my god, the program was not taking all my text. I had to keep editing down and editing down and editing down and my productivity scale went down with it. 9,6,4,2,1. From watching this I got an important insight about sustaining productivity.

The limitation of this blog template had nothing to do with my productivity drop; it was my attitude about it, my inner aversion to having to edit my words.

Distractions are not about what is on the outside -- they are about what we do inside with what is going on outside. Good! As I recognize this, as I release my reactions, my scores are on the way up again...6,7,8,9. I can't get higher than 9 right now. I think it is time to get something to eat.

I am a lover of comments and feedback and taking in the different universes of different folks. I would love to hear from you.