The pressure has never been greater to perform at the highest level in your career and at the same time to balance this with having enough time to enjoy life to its’ fullest.
This month our focus is on providing you with tips to significantly increase your productivity, help you overcome procrastination and ultimately to achieve greater happiness and success.
In our Newsletter we are going to focus on one of the key areas for transforming your productivity – your energy levels.
We are also including the first of our free book summaries which is “Eat that Frog” by Brian Tracy. This books contains an additional 20 practical tips for increasing productivity. If you even implement one or two of these suggestions you can transform the results you achieve in your life.
We are sure you will find many of these suggestions really helpful and welcome your comment, feedback or questions you may have on this topic.
Thanks
Mick
TRANSFORMING YOUR ENERGY LEVELS
Our physical, mental and emotional energies are the raw material for personal productivity and performance. If we don’t actively manage to keep our energy levels high then, not only will we begin to feel tired and, very often, in bad form we also seriously reduce our ability to get things done quickly and effectively. However we can transform our energy levels with some relatively small changes to our habits. Here are some simple, yet very effective ways of achieving this.
· Avoid working long hours
· Get more sleep
· Exercise regularly
· Eat better (not necessarily less – just better)
· Watch Your Language
Avoid Working Long Hours
Although occasionally working long hours is important, very often it is done out of habit. We must avoid the mental fog caused by working long hours. Your productivity will become less and less and your key tasks will take longer to do. This means you will need to work longer hours to complete them. This, of course will reduce your energy levels further which again reduces your effectiveness and a vicious circle occurs. Soon you will find yourself working longer and longer days to get the same amount of work completed. Eventually you will be like a battery that has run out and you will hit “the wall”. Therefore avoid very long days unless in certain exceptional situations.
Get more sleep
We have all stayed up too late from time to time and managed to get through a day on just 5 or 6 hours sleep the previous night. However make no mistake about it, if you don’t get enough sleep on a regular basis this will have serious implications on what you will achieve each day. Again, this becomes a vicious circle as we work longer hours to make up for a lower productivity, which further eats into our sleep time. Therefore make sure you get enough sleep. Try to avoid T.V. late in the evening and get to bed early instead. Getting an extra 1 hour sleep each night can make an amazing difference to your energy, enthusiasm and productivity levels.
Exercise Regularly
One of the main factors in improving your energy is exercise – the more you do the more you can do. The general guideline is 200 minutes per week (approx 30 mins per day) for an excellent level of fitness. However, this does not mean having to join a gym and using up your valuable time and money. Going for regular walks is one option. Look for other options that you could build into your daily routine with minimal effort. The simple commitment of deciding to only use stairs and not escalators or lifts can significantly increase the amount of exercise you take in any one week.
Eat better
We are not talking about diets here although obviously if you are overweight it will impact on your energy levels. We need to recognise that what we put into our bodies is our fuel for life and therefore if you eat the wrong types of food you can dramatically reduce your energy levels.
This is particularly true when you eat shortly before an important meeting or event in your life. Do you think an athlete would eat a chocolate bar just before a big race. Whenever you are preparing for a big event, plan what you will eat in advance. In particular avoid sugary foods which may give you a quick burst of energy but then can leave you tired afterwards.
In the morning avoid sugary or high carb foods. A great tip I got from an Anthony Robbins Health Seminar was to try to eat only fruit up until lunchtime. This one change made a great difference to my own energy levels during the morning time.
Watch Your Language
I have noticed that there are some people who continuously complain about being “tired” or “exhausted” (even when they are not asked). Apart from the small percentage of these people who have a medical condition most of the others have no less energy than the rest of us. If you are one of these people you need to recognise that by constantly focusing on your lack of energy and telling others about it you are re-inforcing that feeling of tiredness and making yourself feel even more exhausted. In future when you are asked how are you why not say “I’m great” or even “I’m fantastic”. I can assure you that by changing your focus away from your feeling of tiredness and considering the other options you will immediately start developing more energy.
BOOK SUMMARY – “EAT THAT FROG”
We are delighted to offer you a summary of this truly exceptional book which contains 21 distinct tips on how to reduce or eliminate procrastination in your life and dramatically increase your effectiveness. I have personally implemented many of these suggestions and experienced the dramatic results that the author promises throughout.
Our book summaries are only currently available to our newsletter subscribers. If you are interested in this book summary simply sign-up for our free monthly newsletter and you will receive the correct link and password in the next edition
FORTHCOMING PROGRAMMES
Act Now often run training programmes or seminars which are open to members of the public or specific groups or organisations. We will keep you informed of any programmes planned throughout the year. We have 3 events currently scheduled. These are
- Assertiveness and Confidence – 9th March
- How to Develop Quality Relationships in Life and Business – 20th April and 28th April
- Time Management for Business Success – 6th May
To find out more about these events please click here
We sincerely hope you enjoy our newsletters and welcome any feedback you may have to improve future editions.
See you next month
Mick Rock
Act Now
