You get up at whatever time you need to get up. Maybe it’s early because you go to bed early and want those morning hours for yourself or maybe it’s later because you’re more of a night owl and thrive in the evening hours.
You grab some form of breakfast. Sometimes it’s whatever you can throw together. Sometimes it’s something you prepared in advance. Sometimes it’s drive-thru.
You get anyone other than you ready for the day ahead. Maybe it’s your partner at home. Maybe it’s your partner (or partners) at work. It could be your children. It could be your colleagues. It could be anyone but you.
You start your commute. You listen to whatever is available – the car stereo, your mobile device, the din of your surroundings. Sometimes you have a plan for this so you can enjoy the journey. Sometimes you just want to get to your destination and could care less about what happens along the way.
You get to work. You do the things at work that you have to do. There are days when that goes smoothly. There are days when more things show up than usual. That’s when you long for those days that go smoothly.
You take breaks. Sometimes. You might even leave your desk for some of them.
Your workday officially comes to a close. Sometimes you end it at that time and head home. Sometimes you work beyond those hours so you can get that “one last thing” done before heading home. Sometimes you do it once you are home.
And sometimes work time and home time bleed into one another.
You eat dinner. If it’s planned in advance, you know what to expect. If not, you could be eating take-out. Or you could just be eating late.
You help the household settle in for the night. You might read your youngest a story, being mindful that you won’t always get to do this. Sometimes you might read a story but your mind is full of something else entirely.
You spend time with your partner. Sometimes it’s in animated conversation. Sometimes it’s reading a book…separately but together. Sometimes it’s reading your mobile phones…separately. Sometimes that partner is (once again) the one you have at the office.
You go to bed when you need to go to bed. Maybe it’s early because you’re an early riser and you’re at your best in the morning hours. Maybe it’s late because your primetime is in the evening.
Then what you do starts all over again.
If any part of the above describes what you do, then I’d like you to ask yourself the following:
- Is that really what you need or want to be doing?
- Think about why any (or all) of that is your “what” and write that down. Be brutally honest with yourself on this. As Simon Sinek said, “People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it. And what you do simply proves what you believe.” (Remember that you are people too.)
- Wonder how you can align “why you do what you do” with “what you are doing” so that course correcting is less challenging. Then put ONE of those into action.
If you want to be more personally productive, then this is what you do. Doing anything less removes the “personally” from the equation. And that’s when you find yourself doing productive instead of being productive.
