Take the mindfulness approach to your daily to-do list and improve the quality and quantity of your work. Here are 3 ways to be mindfully productive for better results and a healthier mindset.
Has this ever happened to you?
It's Friday afternoon and you are preparing to close off your work week to enjoy your weekend. You review your week's to-do list and realize that many items will need to continue onto Monday's to-do list for next week.
You wonder, "How did the week get away from me?", even though you were moving as fast as you could all week. But perhaps that's exactly why.
For many of us, the to-do list is one continuous laundry list of all the tasks that need to be done in our daily lives. We attack the list as if on auto-pilot, tackling whatever is on the top of the list first and trying to check off as many items as possible.
This makes us incredibly busy but doesn't necessarily make us productive. Sometimes it takes slowing down to get more done.
This sounds counter-intuitive when we have been trained to believe that multi-tasking is better for productivity. Sometimes, being in the moment and focusing on one task effectively before moving on to the next is more productive and results in better quality of work.
The challenge is breaking our autopilot multitasking habits so that we can be mindfully productive.
Most of our workday is spent dealing with constant deadlines, distractions, and other stressors competing for attention at the same time. That's why we often resort to autopilot multitasking. However, studies show that multitasking can actually be less productive. It takes more time to shift mental gears between tasks, especially new and complicated ones.
Being mindfully productive can help us break the autopilot multitasking loop and improve how we navigate daily stressors, deadlines and distractions.
Mindfulness is about being fully present in the moment, consciously focused, free of judgement, open-minded and aware of what our body, mind and spirit are experiencing. This mindset can help us to accomplish our daily tasks and deal with stressors in an overall healthier way.
When we practice a mindful state at work to focus on one thing at a time, we can be more attentive, aware and productive while being less reactive and avoid feeling overwhelmed.
Being mindfully productive requires us to slow down and focus on one thing at a time with quality attention and care. In doing so, it can create opportunities for new perspectives, solutions and innovation which can result in higher-quality results and increase overall productivity.
Here are 3 ways to be mindfully productive for better results and a healthier mindset.
1. Build an Intentional To-Do List
Not all tasks on our to-do lists are created equal.
We tend to reactively see all the things on our to-do list with the same importance and urgency when in fact they yield different results and value in our lives. We can produce greater value when we are intentional with what goes onto our to-do list and focus time and energy on tasks that will yield more results.
In my blog, You Are More Than Your Job Title, I share 3 ways to separate who you are from your job title and how to realize more of your value and potential. One of the concepts I share is based on learning from Stephen Covey’s Time Management Matrix in his book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
Image Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, by Stephen Covey
If we examine our to-do list, we can separate tasks and activities in daily life into 4 quadrants as described in Stephen Covey's Time Matrix (image above).
The image below illustrates the categories of activities in each quadrant and what value they produce when we invest our time and energy in them.
Image Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, by Stephen Covey
Quadrant 1: Necessity/Urgent and Important (1=1)
Activities that are time-sensitive and require attention such as deadline-driven projects, crisis management and urgent problem-solving. These activities are transactional and yield the same return value as the time and energy invested. Focusing too much energy and time in this quadrant will make you feel like you're running on a hamster wheel.
Quadrant 2: Extraordinary Productivity/Not Urgent and Important. (1= +++)
Activities that are proactive, preventative, restorative and growth-oriented. They include things like planning, relationship building, learning and development, self-care and renewal. We need to be disciplined to make sure these activities are done because time and energy in this quadrant yield exponential returns. Focusing time and energy here can help to reduce activities in Quadrant 1.
Quadrant 3: Distraction/Urgent and Not Important (1= less than 1)
Activities that are urgent but do not directly impact our desired results such as unrelated meetings, others' emergencies, indirectly related communications and busy work. These activities make us feel needed, popular and busy, but time and energy spent here will detract from our desired results.
Quadrant 4: Waste/Not Urgent and Not Important (1=0)
These activities yield no return on our investment of time and energy to the results that we want to achieve as they are not urgent or important. They are often activities that we fill up time with to procrastinate from important work. (Note: It doesn't mean that you can't enjoy your favourite streaming channel, but if time spent there is excessive and hinders your ability to be productive, then it's harmful to your productivity.)
So the next time you prepare your to-do list, make it a mindfully productive one. Be aware of where the activities on your list fall on the Time Matrix. Focus on prioritizing activities that will give you the greatest return on your investment of time and energy.
2. Remove Judgement From the Task
How we perceive a task will affect how we achieve the task.
An important element of mindfulness is to be in the moment without judgment. This means being able to let go of automatic judgments that arise in our minds with each experience we go through.
Our judgements are the source of internal stress in our lives when we perceive or label something as being "bad" in our lives.
When we let go of judgment and assumptions about tasks or experiences in this way, we are freeing ourselves to be open and objective in our execution. Practicing non-judgement can help us to be more creative, innovative and productive because we have removed the self-limiting box created with automatic judgment.
So the next time you find yourself procrastinating or dreading a task on your to-do list, try the following:
Take 3 deep breaths and connect with your thoughts and feelings about the task.
Notice what judgments are arising and how your mind and body are reacting to those judgments.
Recognize your thoughts and feelings without denouncing them or clinging to them.
Let go of your judgments and focus on the task for what it is.
Move forward with clarity and stay present with the task at hand and the process of getting the result you want.
Repeat the steps if you find your mind wandering and drifting back to judgment as you work through an activity or task.
Example: A task on my to-do list that puts me into overwhelm and procrastination is reorganizing my home office after I gave it up to become a bedroom for my son visiting home from college for the summer.
Take 3 deep breaths. My thoughts and feelings about this task are reminders of missing my son, being overwhelmed with so much to reorganize, and worrying about getting it done so I can conduct upcoming projects.
My mind is judging the amount of work involved to be too complicated.
My breath becomes shallow and I feel tense. I feel like I am throwing away my son's space and time spent with us this summer.
Objectively, the task is decluttering and reorganizing.
Make a simple task list with a realistic timeline that doesn't make me feel rushed. Focus on one task at a time. Focus on getting to the clean, efficient workspace that will let me create results comfortably.
Ultimately there are bound to be tasks in our daily lives that are not ones we want to do but still have to be done. Setting down the judging mind can help us to see the task objectively for what it is and take the stress out of the process.
3. Be Mindful of What Your Mind and Body Are Telling You
Know when you need a break and take it.
It's easy to get caught up in a task and lose track of time. We cement ourselves to a task for hours forgetting to drink water, stretch and move, or refuel our bodies in a timely manner. We don't expect our car to run on empty, so why do we expect ourselves to?
Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn is the founder of the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at UMass Medical School. He is also the creator of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program which has become the gold standard for applying mindfulness to the stresses of everyday life and for researching whether mindfulness practice can improve mental and physical health.
Dr. Kabat-Zinn says, "Mindfulness isn’t about 'curing' anything; it is about being in a 'wiser relationship' with our thoughts. It would be misleading for anyone to claim otherwise because stress is an inevitable part of the reality of life. Instead, mindfulness helps you manage that stress better. It teaches you to become aware of how you’re reacting to the causes of stress, disengage yourself from that reaction, and instead respond in a healthier way."
It may sound like a no-brainer, but we need to be mindful of what our mind and body need in order to be productive. So here are some things you can do to ensure that you can stay mindfully productive and healthy.
Keep yourself well hydrated with a measured water bottle and set reminder prompts in your daily calendar to hydrate.
Breathe! Deep breathing sends a message to your brain to calm down and relax. The brain then sends this message to your body. When you breathe deeply, you lower your heart rate and blood pressure and reduce stress.
Set a timer to remind you to get up, stretch, and move every hour. Here is a fun video of simple movement exercises you can do at your desk.
Lastly, don't forget that life can be fun, even at work. One thing that we learned from the pandemic times and being isolated in a work-from-home environment is that we all need connection. Sometimes the best thing we can do to be productive is to step away and connect over a cup of coffee (or water) with a colleague.
Dr. Kabat-Zinn says it best, "(mindfulness) teaches you to become aware of how you’re reacting to the causes of stress, disengage yourself from that reaction, and instead respond in a healthier way."
To be mindfully productive, we need to become aware of what our minds and bodies are saying and take care of ourselves accordingly.
Building a Mindfully Productive Way of Life
"Mindfulness is about love and loving life. When you cultivate this love, it gives you clarity and compassion for life, and your actions happen in accordance with that."
Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn
Our culture and social norms promote productivity as our drive and ability to succeed, usually focused only on professional career results. Our work is only one facet of our whole person.
For years in my corporate career, I struggled with work-life balance. In truth, I was struggling to find work-life harmony.
Building a mindfully productive way of life means looking at your whole life and the results that are important to you in your life, not just your career. So get intentional about the results that you want, remove judgment from your experiences, and regularly listen to what your mind and body are telling you.
Some great additional articles to help you be mindfully productive:
Build Focus, Creativity and Gratitude Through Mindful Art - Online Article - AYCLimitless.com
Why Nonjudgment is Part of Mindfulness Practice - Online Article - Mindful.org
Make Mindfulness a Habit - Article, HBR
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