On pursuit of productivity

Published:
Tags:

Don’t care too much about productivity tools, care about yourself!

The problem

Ok, I confess, a few years ago, I had serious issues to keep a productive routine, the procrastination was my archenemy, the lack of discipline, I mean, my life was messy, it was a crazy, old and stupid roller coaster. You see, I’m not productive as I wished to be, but now I’m able to complete my imaginary TODO list.

Being productive requires behavioral changes and a lot of discipline! The problem is, bad habits take so much time to be overcome and replaced with good and healthy habits, and these good habits take even much more time to become habits in fact.

Solutions?

There are tons of techniques, methodologies, and tools to help us become more productive, and, while I’m not an unbeliever that they can make a difference, I sometimes have the feeling that this kind of approach is not good in long term, I see them only as a medicine for some disease.

There’s a book on this topic called The Marshmallow Test: Why Self-Control Is the Engine of Success.

I’ve tried Pomodoro, I’ve tried GTD, heck, I spent so many hours testing tools to help me be more productive… I was so naive.

So what?

I believe that before adopting any approach or methodology to increase productivity, we should pay more attention to ourselves. If I don’t know what I want, I will probably not be a productive person, because I will probably be in an eternal loop wandering the internet trying to find out what to do.

So here are the two most important things that I’ve learned until now in this long journey to productivity:

  • Tools are not that important.
  • Know yourself.

In the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what tool or methodology you use, sure tools and methodologies can help us, but if you don’t have discipline/self-control, none of this really matter, none of this will work.