DEV Community

Cover image for Transform your habits into productivity routine ⌚️ + 💻 = 💪

Transform your habits into productivity routine ⌚️ + 💻 = 💪

Francesco Leardini on August 29, 2019

Do not worry, this will not be another article telling you to wake up at 4am to be more productive or to shout "I am a winner" in front of the mir...
Collapse
 
chrisachard profile image
Chris Achard

Great points, thanks; being productive is something I'm constantly fighting for: against youtube, HN, reddit, twitter... 😅

Whenever I'm feeling unproductive, I try to write down exactly what I'm feeling, and why my mind is trying to skip the work I have to do. It doesn't always work, but I often find that I'm able to get back on task after just writing down why I'm trying to sidetrack myself.

I also like your point about doing at least one productive thing everyday, and developing a habit out of that. Recently, I've been trying to produce at least one quick code tutorial everyday; and that's been working pretty well... but it's still a struggle!

Collapse
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini • Edited

Creating a code tutorial a day (no matter how quick) is a great challenge!! You have all my admiration.

It takes a lot of energy and determination to find an interesting topic and then code a practical example out of it!

Collapse
 
chrisachard profile image
Chris Achard

Yeah, it's often a challenge 😅 But it keeps me learning all the time.

Example: my latest round has been all about React hooks; and I chose hooks, because I wanted to get better at them myself. And it's definitely worked: I can now say that I know hooks pretty well, and all because I had to force myself to learn them in order to teach them. It's a great "hack"!

Thread Thread
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini

That's great! I started learning React since a couple of weeks (currently I work with Angular). After some initial conflicts (aka JSX 😂) I started liking it's way of writing, very close to vanilla JS.
I will definitely read your posts about React, please keep writing!!

Collapse
 
mdhesari profile image
Mohammad Fazel

This is so true, when we help other people and cooperate open source projects we learn a lot by doing that!

For instance if we do it everyday and answer 1 question on stack overflow and making this job consistent, after 1 year we have answered up to 300 questions and that's awesome.

Collapse
 
marceliwac profile image
Marceli-Wac

Great tips! I've set up a series of Google Keep notes for several different categories. These include front-end ideas, movies to watch / books to read, app ideas, game ideas, blog post ideas and last but not least technologies to learn in the current year.

Some of these also work great as paper-based checklists that I keep displayed in my flat, but regardless of what it is, making lists like these helped me get my ideas together!

Collapse
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini • Edited

Cool! I think it is always good to keep track of our intuitions/ideas, even if we do not have time at that moment.

Google Keep notes is indeed another very valuable resource! I will try it next time too, thanks for sharing!

Collapse
 
nerdghost profile image
Yorum P. Kanema

Another Thing I Find Helpful Is Scheduling The 'Burnout'. I Find It Ruins My Habits If I Go At Them, But Then Get Worn Out. My Solution Is To Make The Wear Itself Regular. Schedule A Daily Meditation, Or A Weekly Zero Productivity Day. This Helps Me Maintain Consistency And Keep The Train Chugging On.

Collapse
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini

It is indeed important to decompress from time To time in order to break down under stress and pressure.

Do you have regular days scheduled or do you plan a relaxing day only when you feel the need?

Collapse
 
guinasc profile image
Guilherme Nascimento

Nice post!!

I like to use a pomodoro extension in chrome to help me manage time at work.

Collapse
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini

I used a Chrome Extension implementing the pomodoro technique for some time.

However I found it strange having to take a break after 10 minutes, when eventually I was just right in the middle of implementing an algorithm.

I think it is a valuable instrument, but for me unfortunately it did not work well.

Collapse
 
guinasc profile image
Guilherme Nascimento

hehe, you can change the amount of time with this one

chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/...

If you want to try. It helps me a lot.

:)

Thread Thread
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini • Edited

I will give it a try tomorrow morning, trying to find the best tune with my working times, but still within the Pomodoro technique principles. Thanks for the hint.

Collapse
 
elijahcorleone profile image
£.j

consistency is what is hard to achieve

Collapse
 
paco_ita profile image
Francesco Leardini

It needs good will and training. It might be hard at the beginning, therefore I suggest to start with a simple or small task and try to keep it up with it. With time that task will become a natural part of our day life, therefore the "cost" of maintaining it constant will be low or null.

The most critical part is the first two weeks, in my opinion. But then, as soon as you can see the benefits, it should get easier.