Hi there. I'm Graham Allcott. Every Sunday, I send out an upbeat idea for the week ahead, directly to your inbox.
Putting the boxes on Facebook Marketplace
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Hi Reader, Welcome to Rev Up for the Week, where every Sunday I deliver you a simple idea to help power your Monday. This week I've been moving house. I've spent the week going back and forth between the new place and the old place, shifting furniture and boxes, all while managing the roofers fixing the roof and getting ready for the sparkies and plumbers and plasterers, so they can all get to work. Oh, and all while managing an autistic son's aversion to change. It's been a lot. My todoist has been a hive of activity (yes, I manage that stuff in exactly the same Productivity Ninja way as my work). But do you know the most productive thing I did this week? It was putting the empty boxes on Facebook Marketplace so that they could be reused by someone else. I was feeling a bit like I'd had enough of all the unpacking. My motivation levels and energy levels had dipped. And I needed one last push to get everything else unpacked. So I made the ad. I set it live. I had instant responses, with people wanting free boxes. And now, I also had a deadline. I spent the rest of that evening enthusiastically unpacking the rest of the boxes. Here was my chance to get rid of the boxes elegantly and easily, without them clogging up my recycling bin. Here was my chance to help out the "me of a week ago" . To pay it forward. I knew that would feel good. It's all about looking for the extrinsic motivation: when you don't have it in you to create your own momentum, the best course of action is to find the thing that creates the momentum for you. Find the thing that sweeps you along with it. When you know you're not that enthused by a task, the best thing to do is to create a deadline or an expectation in someone else's world. And in doing so, the job of creating momentum is no longer all on you. So this week I invite you to think about the tasks that you're avoiding or where your motivation is flagging. How can you create a deadline or an expectation in someone else's world? Have a great week, Graham |
Rev Up for the Week
Productivity and Kindness at work
Hi there. I'm Graham Allcott. Every Sunday, I send out an upbeat idea for the week ahead, directly to your inbox.
Hi Reader, I was at a networking event this week (my first in many years!), when someone asked me what I did. I said I was the author of How to be a Productivity Ninja. "Wow", she said, "I've read your book!". We had a brief chat about what I was working on now, including the new book coming soon (October - and you'll hear about it here first!), and I mentioned how proud I am of what I'm about to share with the new book, and that when I occasionally read back snippets from 'Productivity...
Hi Reader, It’s often said that time is our most precious resource. I don’t think that’s true. I think attention is our most precious resource. Attention is a more limited resource than your time. Your productivity and indeed your mental wellbeing depends heavily on how you choose to ‘spend’ your attention. In an average day, you will have 3 different levels of attention: 1. Proactive attention: This is where you are fully focused, alert, in the zone, and ready to make your most important...
Hi Reader, Welcome to this week’s Rev Up for the Week, where each Sunday I deliver you an idea to help supercharge your work week. I moved house recently. It was my first house move in nearly a decade. I’d forgotten how much there is do, and how it disrupts little habits that you didn’t even know you had. For example, in the new house, I no longer eat bagels, I sit down and just relax more, I've stopped playing chess or looking at my iPad, I’ve taken some pleasure and even joy in tidying up...