Do you remember when you were in school? Did your teachers tell you that the best way to approach your homework and other projects was to do the hardest task first? They may have also told you to tackle the homework subject you dislike the most first, before moving on.
This same approach will help you get more done in less time, helping you to become a more productive person today.
Start with the Harder Tasks First
The way we think about productivity affects how much work we accomplish in a day. But it’s easier to get started than it is to stay focused on a task that takes a long time to complete.
Instead of beginning with a task you enjoy or that is easy, start with one you dislike or one that is more difficult. At the end of your workday, you may be surprised at how much you’ve accomplished. You will make feel that the day has gone much smoother and more productive than before.
So, start with the hard tasks first. When you focus on the hard things first, you can have an easier rest of the day.
If you’re thinking about what to do in an hour or two, you’re in for a long, frustrating day. Instead, break the problem down into a series of short steps. You’ll have a better chance at success when you tackle smaller, more manageable tasks.
This will help you build momentum and keep you motivated throughout the day.
Start with the Disliked Tasks First
Productive people usually begin their days by doing those things they dislike doing.
If you have a list of tasks on your desk that need to be completed today, try tackling the tasks that you dislike first. Not only will this allow you to tackle them in a more productive way, but it could also prevent you from being distracted by the other tasks you find interesting.
If you want to increase your productivity, do those tasks that you hate doing first.
Which Approach do I start with
Either approach will increase your productivity.
When you do not look at your workday as a long, uphill battle, you will naturally get more accomplished. Getting the disliked tasks out of the way first thing in the morning, will guarantee better results with all your tasks.
No matter which one you chose, you will get more done, be more satisfied, and feel less stressed.
Why Do These Approaches Work
When you start the beginning of your day you generally have more energy in the morning. With more energy, you can tackle the hardest or unliked tasks first. You won’t be as drained or frustrated with these tasks first thing in the morning.
If you begin with tasks you enjoy, you are more inclined to look ahead at the tasks you dislike more negatively throughout the day, dreading doing them, and they never get done.
When you do harder tasks first, you will not only have more energy left for the rest of the day, but you will also appreciate the other tasks more when you get to them.
While it is only human nature to want to do what you like first, having the harder things on the horizon can slow you down and drain your energy.
Plan the night before
Plan what you will for the next day. Have a plan in mind of what you want to do and when.
The plan in mind of what you want to do and when can be extremely helpful. It helps you to avoid wasting time and energy on things you don’t really want to do. It also allows you to keep your priorities in check.
Having a plan in mind of what you want to do and when can help you to achieve your daily goal and have a more productive day.
This helps your mind know what to expect the next day.
If you want to be more productive and achieve the absolute best results in everything you do, take the advice from your schoolteachers and tackle the hardest jobs first.
Your productivity will increase, and you will end each day with a refreshing feeling of accomplishment.
Simple Ideas to Get Started in the Morning
Eat a healthy breakfast
Spend a few minutes looking over your schedule
At the beginning of each week look ahead at what’s on the calendar
Cathy Gray is a natural adventurer in her personal and professional life. She adapts to overcome while maintaining an infectious laugh that will make you smile.
Professionally, Cathy currently works for an industrial hose and hydraulics company. While she was a green-horn in the hose business, she spearheaded the company’s eCommerce site from the ground up from a blank canvas to live and selling within 6 months. She continues to grow the company’s online and digital presence while increasing sales year over year.
There are few things that block productivity with some being in and out our control. The one that is in our control is distractions. When you’re distracted you cannot concentrate and focus properly.
You just won’t get things done. And even if you do accomplish something, it can be stressful and frustrating.
There are two key points which you should keep in mind when you are planning to reduce the distractions in your environment.
1. You must be able to focus on one task at a time
2. You do not want to be distracted by things around you, then you must be able to block out those things.
When you reduce distractions within your ability, you will be productive and get more done.
Find Your Distractions
You need to know what is distracting you. Are you spending too much time on social media? Do you find yourself looking at your phone or computer when you should be working?
Stop Being Distracted
If you are distracted by phone calls, social media, or other distractions, you need to remove them. You need to be able to focus on your task without interruption.
Cut distractions that are taking away from your productivity. If you find yourself using Facebook, Twitter, or other websites during work hours, take a break and go somewhere else. If you find yourself looking at your phone while working, put it away. If you find yourself wasting time on the Internet, set a timer for 15 minutes and get back to work.
How to manage distractions
Tools such as an Evernote notebook or a whiteboard can help you focus on your tasks.
Set up a system: If you want to remove distractions, set up a system that works for you. If you want to keep your phone on vibrate, turn it off when you begin working on a task. If you want to keep your computer out of sight, put it in a different room.
How to be productive when you are distracted
Schedule time to end distractions. Set a specific time to use social media or spend time on your phone. Don’t use the Internet as a crutch to get through your day.
The good news is it does not require much time or effort to consider how your habits are affecting your productivity and begin to adjust them accordingly.
Avoid Multitasking to Eliminate Distractions
If you are like most people, multi-tasking has become a part of your everyday life and your everyday vocabulary. There may be several things which you need to do in one day, and you may be doing them simultaneously.
If you overdo multi-tasking, there can be two consequences.
You might not get everything done
You might spread yourself too thin and not have good results.
The same can be said about distractions.
Know Your Habits so You Can Improve Your Productivity
Productivity can only be improved by becoming more efficient, by analyzing your habits.
Some people can work with background noise on, people talking around them, or prefer to have the tv on for background noise.
You may even find that you can get the job done better, faster, and more effectively, without any distractions at all.
Experiment with one of the background distractions, and you may find that one of them help your concentration and focus.
While finding whatever works for you is easy if you work on your own, it can be a little more complicated if you work with others.
Avoiding Distractions When You Work in the Office
For many people, the office is a place of chaos, where there’s never enough time to get everything done. If you work at a desk or a computer, it’s easy to lose track of time.
We all know that distractions can be a real problem when we’re trying to focus. Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about that—but there are things we can do to minimize distractions and help us get more done.
Simple and Easy Tips for Minimizing Distractions and Keeping Your Workspace Distraction Free
Use headphones or keep your office door closed
Make sure your workspace is clutter-free
Control your email
Use a time tracker
Block time
List of Distractions
This list of distractions is to help you find your distractions so you can focus on them to eliminate. What may be a distraction to you may not be a distraction to someone else.
You can turn off some or all of these distractions and see if you are better able to focus on the task at hand.
Social media
Emails
Phone Calls
Phone notifications
Work interruptions
The Internet
Instant Messaging or DMs
Television
Music
Other people
Pets
Work
Other People’s Problems
Your Own Problems
In conclusion, I’m not sure if there’s a secret to productivity.
However, I do know that it’s hard to be productive when you’re distracted. We all have to deal with distractions, but if you can minimize them, you can be more productive.
Cathy Gray is a natural adventurer in her personal and professional life. She adapts to overcome while maintaining an infectious laugh that will make you smile.
Professionally, Cathy currently works for an industrial hose and hydraulics company. While she was a green-horn in the hose business, she spearheaded the company’s eCommerce site from the ground up from a blank canvas to live and selling within 6 months. She continues to grow the company’s online and digital presence while increasing sales year over year.
Effective time management is a factor that all successful people have in common. It may be called structure, setting yourself to the task, or a game plan.
No matter what the word or term you use, just as long as you take it seriously, and put it into practice, you can create a basic game plan.
Structure and time-management may come easy for you, if they have been a regular part of your life. If you are not use to it, now is the time to implement them into your everyday life.
It’s important to be organized and have a schedule. We all know how important this is, but it’s not always easy. You have to have a plan, and you have to stick with it.
When you’re creating a game plan, keep things simple at first. You can use an electronic planner or a simple pen and paper. This way, you’ll be able to keep track of what you need to do.
Set an Overall Goal for What You Want
A goal is a general idea of what you want to achieve. It’s good to have a goal in mind, but you must set a realistic one that you can actually accomplish.
If you set an overall goal for what you want, you will be more likely to achieve it. If you don’t set a goal, then you are less likely to achieve it.
An action plan is a way to break down what you need to do in order to achieve your goal into small steps. If you don’t have an action plan, you are probably going to get discouraged when you don’t see any results right away.
The 4-step process for creating a game plan.
Step 1: Define the goal: What do you want to achieve? This could be a specific goal or it could be a general goal.
Step 2: Identify the Obstacles: What are the things that will prevent you from achieving your goal? This could be external or internal.
Step 3: Plan How to Overcome the Obstacles: What are the steps you need to take in order to overcome the obstacles?
Step 4: Implement the Plan: Once you have a plan, implement the plan.
Schedule Your Time According to You Game Plan
It is important to schedule your time according to your game plan so you are more likely to finish. This will help you to avoid procrastination. Procrastination leads to the failure of your goals.
Step 1: Create a schedule: Create a schedule for your week, day, and/or hour. You can use a calendar, a whiteboard, a notebook, or anything else that works for you. Think about your deadline for each of your tasks.
Step 2: Review your schedule: Review your schedule daily. Check your schedule to make sure you’re on track.
Step 3: Be honest with yourself: When you schedule your time, be honest with yourself. If you don’t complete a task on your schedule, be honest with yourself. Don’t procrastinate.
Step 4: Use your time wisely: If you’re not using your time wisely, you’re wasting your time.
If You Have Difficulty Getting Started with Your Game Plan
The first thing to do is to set aside some time. Set aside an hour or so and then go at it.
If you don’t have an hour, start with 15 minutes. You will be amazed how much you can get done in just 15 minutes.
If you do this once a week, you will soon find that you have a lot more time than you thought. This is a simple and effective way to increase the number of hours in a day.
With a game-plan, you may find yourself getting more done each day than you usually accomplish in a week.
Not only will you be more productive, but achieving each goal will come much easier. You will soon appreciate this all-important factor in your success.
Cathy Gray is a natural adventurer in her personal and professional life. She adapts to overcome while maintaining an infectious laugh that will make you smile.
Professionally, Cathy currently works for an industrial hose and hydraulics company. While she was a green-horn in the hose business, she spearheaded the company’s eCommerce site from the ground up from a blank canvas to live and selling within 6 months. She continues to grow the company’s online and digital presence while increasing sales year over year.
Dahlonega is home to the Dahlonega Plateau and in 2018 it was recognized as a viticultural area. In layman’s terms it means that the area has unique soil characterizes, sunlight and climate that is special to growing grapes.
The Dahlonega Wineries
Etowah Meadery
The Etwowah Meadery offers a special unique wine to the Dahlonega area. Meads are a honey based wine that is made with fruits and spices from around the world, mainly China, Europe, and Africa. Mead has gained popularity in the US in recent years.
Their meads range in flavor and carry Southern Georgia naming conventions like: De Sotos Quest, Picking Up Paw Paws and Georgia Standard.
As a veteran owned business, sales from their Coop Dreams support disabled veterans.
This winery does not fall into the new category but their wines are just as delicious. This is a family ran business that sources fruits from Georgia, California, Texas and other locations which creates it’s complex flavors.
Accent Cellars offers wine tastings 7 days a week and have live music Friday evenings and Saturday afternoons. What is unique about this winery, is they explicitly state to bring your picnic and enjoy their wine, (on their website) while other places frown upon the practice.
What’s amazing is that this winery grows 25 different grape varieties and makes some of the best blended wines around.
Frogtown Cellars has a long track record of wine awards since 2010:
2 Platinum
36 Gold
82 Silver
92 Bronze Medals
These winemakers have adopted French and Italian winemaking rules as they require strict compliance which protects and assists wine drinkers in identification of terrior-based wines.
Frogtown Cellars offers dining for lunch, dinner, and Sunday brunch at their Italian Bistro. While their wines are made on site, so is many of their foods: pizza dough, pasta dough, and desserts. All of their meats are smoked and cured on site except for the Italian imports.
Grab a glass, a charcuterie board and enjoy their long porches with spectacular mountain views.
Kaya Vineyard was renamed from the original Blackstock Vineyards. Along with wines, serving as a retreat and wedding venue, they have craftsman style cottages to relax a weekend away in.
They offer a light lunch menu from Tuesdays to Sundays with live music on the covered patio. Offerings include simple artisanal charcuterie boards to hand-helds and plates.
This winery was the first in the region. All their fruit is Georgia grown with most on their 184 acres. The property was purchased in 1995 with the first harvest in 2000 and named after Three Sisters Mountain.
When you arrive inside, you will be greeted with their large cherry wood tasting room. On Summer Saturdays, they have live music. If weather permits, enjoy a glass on their rock wall patio.
When you are at Wolf Mountain, you will feel like you are in Europe enjoying your wine instead of North Georgia. They use French winemaking processes and the European varieties make for much different wines than the other Dahlonega wineries.
And just to fit in with the wines, Wolf Mountain is designed to resemble a craftsman cottage that sits atop of the fieldstone encased cellar.
Along with their wines, they offer farm focused menus that are carefully paired with their wine selection. Their team prepares everything on-site and menus change seasonally with local selections.
Offers tastings 7 days a week. Cavendar Creek Vineyards was started when the original owner hand planted the original grape vines and produced the first vintage in 2009.
A mainstay and mascot on the property are the donkeys, so much so that they are affectionately knows as “the winery with the donkeys”.
They offer lodging, but it is limited to two cabins. One of them being 200 years old.
They offer wine tastings and represent Georgia’s oldest winery Georgia Winery located near Ringold, GA. They offer wine and pub tours along with ghost and history tours.
19 E. Main Street, Suite F, Dahlonega, GA 30533
CANVAS AND CORK, WINE TASTING, ART GALLERY, ARTISTS STUDIOS AND CLASSROOM
Their wine selection is from Gin Creek Vineyards in Hartsfield GA and is a satellite tasting room.
Canvas and Cork has a selection of 16 wines to select from: Fine wines, muscadines, dessert wines, Moscato, dry, off dry, semi sweet and sweet, so be assured there’s something for everyone!
Stating start at $12 for 5 tastings or $20 for 5 tastings and get your choice of a hand painted wine glass!
Cork and Canvas is part of the Dahlonega Wine Walk, where participates receive discounts. Among other things to do here, are painting classes from watercolor to acrylic. Other crafts are taught here as well along with summer classes for kids. Private classes are also available.
Cathy Gray is a natural adventurer in her personal and professional life. She adapts to overcome while maintaining an infectious laugh that will make you smile.
Professionally, Cathy currently works for an industrial hose and hydraulics company. While she was a green-horn in the hose business, she spearheaded the company’s eCommerce site from the ground up from a blank canvas to live and selling within 6 months. She continues to grow the company’s online and digital presence while increasing sales year over year.
Is your work or life in general ho-hum that you are just going through the motions on autopilot. At work, are you just there? If this is you now, there is not a good chance that you will find success if you continue.
Success is in your judgement and attitude. Success is doing what it is that you truly love. This does not mean that there aren’t struggles and battles along the way. It does mean that for most of the time, we are happy with what we are doing.
Success Starts Internally
First off, lets discuss mindset and attitude.
When your mindset and attitude is positive, you see the good things that are coming, and you don’t hyper focus on the bad. It makes life gentler and easier, not such a struggle all the time.
You are able to take appreciation from what you are doing. Your interacting with others in a more confident manner. Your self-talk and your words with others is much more happier and more cheerful and that makes it easier for you and everyone around you to be happier. It makes what you are doing more enjoyable.
Work on your mentality and your self-talk. Catch the negative ideas and words then change them to the positive.
When you start getting negative about yourself, remember:
it’s a trash can, not a trash can’t.
Success Externally
Now let’s discuss what you are doing.
To be successful you need to be doing something you love. That does not mean there will be some parts you don’t like so much or don’t do so well. However the majority of what you are doing will be what you enjoy.
How do you figure out what that is?
Let’s take a hint from your past.
Think about the times where you were doing something you were really happy doing. These instances don’t even have to be when you doing anything well. Anything that come to mind are called accomplishments.
The goal is to have more of them over a time.
Write them out then look for trends and bases affecting what you were doing, how you were doing it, what the conditions were, what you worked with and how you were relating with people.
Your list will give you a good idea of what you need to be doing. These will act as bases and trends.
The end is just as important as the beginning.
