What You Need To Do To Make Your Productivity System Stick

27 May 2021 | Podcast 184 This week, I’m answering a question about how to get started with and, more importantly, maintain a productivity system.   You can subscribe to this podcast on: Podbean | Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify | TUNEIN   Links: Email Me | Twitter | Facebook | Website | Linkedin Email Mastery 2021 Course Download the FREE Areas of Focus Workbook More about the Time Sector System The FREE Beginners Guide To Building Your Own COD System Carl Pullein Learning Centre Carl’s YouTube Channel Carl Pullein Coaching Programmes The Working With… Podcast Previous episodes page   Episode 184 Hello and welcome to episode 184 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show. A common type of question I get asked is one around building and maintaining a productivity and time management system. It’s not so much about how to do it—after all, there are thousands of books and videos on this subject—it’s more about taking what you have learned by reading those books and watching those videos and turning that knowledge into a functioning system that works for you. Now, before we get to the question, I would like to point out that June—which starts tomorrow (or Tuesday depending on when you listening to this podcast) is a 30-day month. Another golden opportunity for you to establish a habit. So, I thought I would suggest something.  In the book, Think And Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill tells us to take an idea (or a goal) that we want to accomplish, and begin and end every day imagining you have completed it successfully for thirty days.  Now the trick to doing this is to write down your idea or goal onto a piece of paper, or in your digital notes app, and read it out loud at the start and end of your day. As you read out your goal, imagine you have successfully accomplished it and really feel the emotions you experience by completing it.  The purpose of doing this is to engage your subconscious mind. That is the part of your mind that uses your knowledge and experience to come up with solutions to problems and gives you steps to take to accomplish goals and solve problems.  Remove all negative thoughts, only focus on the positives—the feelings you have when you accomplish your goal or successfully develop your idea. If a negative thought comes up, such as; I can’t do that, or that’s impossible, remove it. Replace it with a positive thought. At the end of June, you will have programmed your brain to seek ways of making whatever your dream, goal or idea happen. Try it. What have you to lose? Now, back to the show and that means it’s time for me now to hand you over to the mystery podcast voice for this week’s question. This week’s question comes from Alan. Alan asks: Hi Carl, for years I have been reading books and articles about productivity and how to become better at managing my time. I’ve taken your courses, and I’ve even been on a Getting Things Done Fundamentals course. Yet, despite all these courses, books and articles, I just cannot make a system work for me. I can do it for a few weeks, but I soon find myself falling back on bad habits. Do you know how to make one of these systems stick? Hi Alan. Thank you for the question. Firstly, I should tell you that you are not alone with this problem. I come across this a lot in my coaching programme and I get many comments on my YouTube videos about it.  With anything like creating and using a system, you need to start small. Radically changing the way you do something will inevitably result in falling back into old ways. It’s just the way the human mind works. We love routine and we evolved habit building to help us achieve that.  You see, there are so many distractions going on in our world—they’ve always been there. It started out on the savannah thousands of years ago when we needed to stay alert to the dangers that were