10 Things Highly Productive People Do Every Day

This is a guest contribution from personal growth blogger Samphy Y.

Productivity is never an accident. It is always the results of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning and, focused effort. – Paul J. Meyer

Productive people tend to be more successful than unproductive people. They produce and create. Some (if not many) of the stuffs they produce end up as a junk. But they keep moving until they can create what the market needs.

Thomas Edison produced more than 10,000 junks before he invented the light bulb we can’t live without today. Henry Ford, whose cars we use all over the world, went broke five times before he founded the successful Ford Motor Company.

They do different things yet they are productive. Highly productive.

What makes them different? They do these 10 things every day.

1. They visualize their dream life

While a lot of us has been advised to never lose hope, highly productive people tend to go a step further. They know what their dream life looks like and they visualize it every day. They know the secret of the Law of Attraction, which states you get whatever you attract.

2. They prioritize what to do

Highly productive people have a list of daily priorities. Lots of them do it in writing or use an app like Lift, Wunderlist, or 2Do. Others know exactly what to do every day without having to write them down. All of them make it a routine to do their “thing” every day.

3. They limit distractions

While we are watching TV, Facebooking away our time, chatting about how the world is going to collapse… highly productive people say no to distractions. Unless watching TV, Facebooking or chatting enable them to produce, they are considered distractions and never allowed to get in the way of their productivity.

4. They’re highly focused

Now with no distractions, productive people can direct their attention to what they want to do. They have very clear aims and are highly focused to indulge themselves in what it takes to achieve it. A good example is writing. Writers tend to wallow in words they have for what they have to write, to create for their audience. They don’t let anything get in their way until they’re done.

5. They produce every day

This is obvious. If you don’t produce, how can you become productive? What’s surprising is however little time they have, they still do their thing: produce. It can be a tiny thing that could form a tiny part of their invention. A productive writer, for example, writes every day without fail. They write when they can’t wait to write. They write when they don’t feel like writing. They write when they know what to write about. They write when they do not know what to write about. They write, how poorly.

6. They have timeframes

Like us, highly productive people have as many (if not, more) things on their plate. So they set timeframes for their to-do items. Lots of writers write for an hour or two early in the morning. They would aim to achieve their task within the set timeframes and leave perfectionism behind for the time being.

7. They celebrate small wins

Celebrating small wins (and really, really feeling it) is another thing highly productive people do without fail. It activates the reward pathway that sits in the middle of the brain and makes sure we repeat the action. Celebrating small wins is a way to stay motivated and enlarge the achievement.

8. They achieve their daily priorities without fail

How poor the achievement, highly productive people is focused on getting things done and leave perfectionism aside until later. Doing so allows them to make achievements for which they can celebrate. It also leaves room for continuous improvement, through daily reflection.

9. They reflect

Daily reflection enables highly productive people to look back on what they did in the day and learn from it in order to continue to improve how they do it the next day. It is also a way to be express gratitude towards what they’ve achieved and what went well.

10. They feel gratitude towards their day

When they lay down at night, highly productive people think of positive things that happened in the day – those things for which they are grateful. Some of them even use a gratitude journal. Daily gratitude is a powerful thing productive people do to expand their happiness, and specifically their daily productivity.

Five Easy Steps to Get Started with Productivity

Now let me tell you this. It is easier than you think to become more productive. Just follow these 5 easy steps.

Step 1: Think big. The secret behind why highly productive people are so productive is this. They have a big life purpose that scares them so much they can’t help but take action every day, that they live each day as if it were the last day of their life.

Ask yourself, what’s your sentence? Nelson Mandela is a Man of Peace. I am a writer. What’s yours?

Step 2: Pick just one if you find it overwhelming to do all these at once. For example, you can begin to prioritize what to do every day. (Use a reminder if it helps.) Keep in mind that your priorities should move you inch by inch towards your dream lifestyle.

Step 3: Start small. Take prioritizing. If 4 priorities a day are too much, have only 1. If writing 500 words a day is too much, for example, write 50 words a day. Make it so small you cannot not do it, that success is so easy. Read more my previous post onhow small steps could lead to big changes.

Step 4: Celebrate small wins. Here I go again! Well, it worked wonderful for me and people I’ve introduced this idea to. And it is backed by science.

When we feel celebratory about something, it will likely activate the Reward Pathway in the brain, which makes sure we will repeat our behavior.

Step 5: Repeat step 1 through 4 every day.

That’s it! Now it is your turn to get started and become more productive.

Got something to share? Great! It is how we grow. Let’s start a fruitful conversation by using the comments section below this post!

Samphy Y is the founder of WorkLifePointers.Com, which provides tips and advice about personal growth. Learn how to improve yourself. Work smart and live happy. Get started by reading his blog post on how to become decisive immediately. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook or Google+.