Mental Traps that Destroys Productivity

Hey Reader,

As humans, we’re easily distracted. Today’s tech-driven world vies for our attention.

If you have watched my video on deep work, you know I’m a big fan of this method to help you achieve more in less time. It changed the way I work forever.

If you have ever lost days in a blur of notifications and email ping-ponging, there is a better way to get things done.

Today, I want to share 4 mental traps that can kill your productivity. After I became aware of them, I started working with more intention and focus every day.

1) Liminal Moments Trap – getting sidetracked during transitions between tasks.

For example, you might open a new tab while waiting for a website to load. Or, you might scroll on your phone while waiting for a meeting to start. By the time you look up, you realize you have been scrolling for half an hour.

Nir Eyal’s book, Indistractable, says to overcome distractions in liminal moments, use the 10-minute rule. Resist the urge to check distractions for 10 minutes. Once the time is over, you are likely to not want to do it anymore.

The 10-minute rule helped me to overcome distractions. These include times when I’m writing a talk. Instead of making the slides, I distract myself by Googling. Or when I’m bored, I binge on chocolate, and scrolling through Disney+ when I really should be going to bed.

2) Prioritizing urgent tasks over important ones.

A recent study found that humans prefer urgent, short tasks. They favor them over important tasks that take hours.

Think about the last time you sat down and thought about what to work on first, did email come to mind? This inbox has an unlimited supply of demands on your time.

The average office worker gets over 100 messages daily. A few minutes on each email can waste hours of your day. That’s time you could spend on deep, important work.

Planning focused time to work is a great solution to this. As a parent who works from home, I know the struggle. I schedule my deep work time. I block off Zoom calls and meetings during it. This also helped me resist the urge to do the laundry, even though it would only take 10 minutes!

3) Planning Fallacy – underestimating how long tasks will take.

We’ve all been there. We thought that the paper for class would take 3 hours to write. It took all day. Or, you decided to take on more work in your team for that promotion. Then, you realize you had too much to do and now have to work evenings and weekends.

Underestimating the time to finish something will leave you feeling behind. Whether you work for yourself or others, meeting deadlines is crucial to your success.

This caused my burnout so many times. I was too ambitious. I sacrificed self-care and family time to meet unrealistic deadlines.

Timeboxing is a great way to combat this. Track the time you take for daily tasks, like workouts, work projects, and cooking. Then, block out time for each task in your calendar. This will give you a realistic view of your day and how much you can actually get done.

4) Self-shame for not accomplishing everything

We are not robots, working tirelessly every day. So, we shouldn’t expect our productivity to stay constant all the time.

I still have days when I don’t feel like it. It’s part of life, and I embrace its imperfections.

If you woke up late and missed your workout, or lost time to a moment’s urge to check something on your phone, be kind to yourself. Accept it and move on.

Blaming ourselves creates stress and guilt. They make us feel worse. This starts a cycle of seeking distractions that only demotivates us further.

I always felt terrible with a never-ending to-do list. So I now only focus on 3 important tasks per day and anything else beyond that is a bonus.

Hope you have a productive rest of the week ahead.

Here is to growth,

Laurie 🙌

🎥 13 Harsh Truths I Wish I Knew at 20

Last week, I had a conversation with a young woman at an event.

She was lost, unsure of her direction, and overwhelmed by the pressure of adulthood as well as life in general.

I could identify with her story. It echoed my fears and worries from my 20s, when I worried about my uncertain future.

I’m sure we’ve all experienced this at some point. We’re all just trying to figure things out.

I wished I had known some things earlier in life. Inspired by our conversation, I made a list of 13 harsh truths I wish I had known sooner.

I want to go back and tell the younger Laurie, as I did with this young woman, that it’s OK not to know what to do with your life. In fact, it’s perfectly normal to change your mind multiple times.

And that is exactly what I did, I embraced every reinvention to grow as an individual. This is one of the best times to try new things and not be afraid to fail. Your life and career will likely evolve. So, don’t feel pressured to have it all figured out now.

And when you look back, maybe you are where you were supposed to be all along.

Full Video Here

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