12 Marvellous Mind Hacks to Help Get Results Fast

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If you’re like me, you’re always on the lookout for ways to get the best results fast. With remote work becoming more common, setting yourself up for productivity is now more vital than ever. The trouble is, staying productive when you’re working from home for at least part of the time can bring a whole new slew of challenges.

Applying some marvellous mind hacks may be the answer you’re searching for.

The key to becoming productive and reaching your full potential lies in creating a framework that makes being productive easier. Making yourself accountable, tracking your time, and setting up a dedicated workspace are just three hacks you can employ to help you work more effectively.

Later, we’ll talk about how critical it is to have a set start and finish time for every workday. First, though, we’ll discover how putting fun things on your calendar first could help you get more done, strange as it may seem.

Ready? Let’s take a walk.

1. Put Fun First

Procrastinators often postpone doing fun things because they are forever catching up on work. Then the inevitable happens, the work doesn’t get done and fun is again deferred.

This can be hugely demoralising and make it hard to switch off from work mode, which can quickly exhaust you, make life tedious, and damage productivity.

Why not take a different approach and put fun first?

This idea was popularised by Neil Flore in his book, The Now Habit. You put the fun things on your calendar before anything else. Plan what activities you’re going to pursue in your free time before adding other commitments.

Work seems to swell or shrink to occupy the time you devote to it. By fencing off your free time, you force yourself to get work done in a shorter period, leaving you no room to procrastinate.

By giving yourself something to look forward to, you will also get an extra dash of motivation to help you power through your work in next to no time.

2. Don’t Label Yourself as a Procrastinator

We must exercise caution when identifying with things. If you identify with procrastination, you are effectively accepting that you can do nothing about your tendency to procrastinate and that’s that.

The truth is, accepting this label can be a convenient excuse not to change, and may even make you feel it is impossible to do so. We all procrastinate, but there are proven ways to beat it and make the most of your time.

You are someone who sometimes puts things off, like the rest of us, but you have tools at your disposal to help you refocus and manage your time and energy better.

Making yourself accountable for your work can help you start to do this, so we’ll talk about it next.

3. Make Yourself Accountable

If we are honest with ourselves, one of the reasons why we procrastinate is because of something we fear.

We might be afraid to make mistakes and look foolish in front of our colleagues. We might even fear being accused of being an imposter.

The best way to tackle this is to accept that it’s okay to make mistakes and be imperfect. Before you begin something, remember that you can learn from your mistakes and getting things wrong is fine. If you accept that it’s okay to fail, you might discover a wellspring of creativity you didn’t know you had. Being able to find creative solutions to problems may help you become more productive. You can make yourself accountable by:

• Checking in with your partner throughout the day to report on progress.
• Working to achieve goals alongside a friend so that you can spur each other on.

4. Set up a Work Area

The brain likes to categorise things according to their purpose. For example, if you do nothing but sleep and get intimate in your bedroom, your brain associates that room with rest. Therefore, when you lie down in bed, your brain understands it’s time to relax, and you drift off in no time at all.

Similarly, when your brain associates a particular room or space in your home with work, it will automatically switch into work mode whenever you enter it. Where possible, set aside an entire room to work in. This makes it easier to eliminate distractions caused by those around you and makes it more likely that your productivity will improve.

Don’t fret if you can’t set aside a whole room to work in, this will work well for any space available if you dedicate it solely to work. Check out this post, for some tips on how to set up a workspace.

Now it’s time to find out why it is essential to “clock in” and “clock out” at the same time each workday.

5. Figure out the Best Schedule for You and Stick to It

You might have the privilege of setting your own hours when doing remote work, but you should still have set working hours if you want to get things done. Keeping yourself to a strict schedule means you have less time to waste on distractions that could cause you to lose track. It conditions your brain to go into work mode at the same time each day.

Make sure you start and finish work at the same time every workday.

This doesn’t mean you must work for 8 hours though. You may discover that when you’re away from an office filled with distractions, you can get things done in less time.

6. Use Time Tracking

Time tracking has a lot to be said for it. It can help:

• Minimise distractions.
• Keep you on track.
• Motivate you to finish one task in the time allotted, before moving on to another.
• Make you accountable for getting through your work.
• Identify where you are wasting time and take steps to reduce the amount of time wasted.

There are several ways you can track your time. You can use time tracking apps, like Toggl Track or Timely. or you can use the Pomodoro or Flowtime Technique to supercharge your productivity.

7. Break Large Tasks into Small Ones

With work, as with life, you often have no idea where something will take you. If you have a large project on hand, it can be overwhelming. However, if you concentrate on the first small step towards completing it and get started, it can motivate you to continue, and you can gain perspective as you progress.

If you work up the courage to begin on a small task you’re familiar with, you’ve won half the battle to be productive and accomplish your goals.

The next steps you must take will become clear in time.

Now, let’s find out why moving around can give you an edge.

8. Move Around

It’s a good idea to move around a little during the day to avoid mental stagnation. This could help you get out of an afternoon slump and get the creative juices flowing again.

You could even try doing less demanding work, like checking emails, in another part of the house to refresh yourself.

Speaking of checking emails …

9. Schedule Times to Check Your Inbox During the Day

It’s a mistake to let checking your email become purely reactive. You will soon find yourself checking your inbox multiple times an hour to see if anything urgent has popped up. You’ll chase urgent, but ultimately unimportant tasks, and open the door to numerous potential distractions.

To avoid this, decide when you are going to deal with your emails, and only do so at those times. You could devote half an hour twice a day to them. That way, email won’t consume large chunks of your day. If you struggle with this, use web blocking software that will freeze you out of your emails for a while if you keep getting distracted. This can help you stay focused and productive, so you can get results fast!

This is a good rule to apply to social media during work hours too, as this can prove an enormous distraction and kill your productivity.

10. Don’t Work Overtime

The brain reaches a point where it needs to rest, and you will see diminishing returns for your efforts from that point onwards.

This is the reason working longer hours doesn’t always yield better results. If you work too much and doggedly continue when your brain is exhausted, you can become demoralised and receive little reward for your efforts. This will make you less productive.

So, the next time your usual clocking off time draws nigh and you haven’t made as much progress as you hoped, call it a day and make a fresh start in the morning. There is nothing to be gained by sitting there late at night getting nothing done and beating yourself up about it.

11. Create Deadlines for Yourself

When you’ve broken down larger or more complex projects into more manageable tasks, assign each milestone a deadline to help stay on track and keep things moving forward. Put them on the edge of what you’re comfortable with to challenge yourself and find out what you can do. The sense of urgency a deadline creates forces you to stop planning and start doing. Then if you do meet your self-imposed deadline and finish early, you will have time to devote due care and attention to any revisions you need to make before the real due date.

12. Find Purpose in Your Work

 It’s far easier to remain motivated and engaged with your work if you know why what you’re doing is important and meaningful.

It doesn’t matter what motivates you. It can be a simple desire to make money. If money is your motivator, you might want to list everything you want to do with the money you will earn. You can use this list to remind yourself why working hard is crucial to achieving what you wish.

Most people, however, will have a deeper reason for doing something.

Ask yourself how the work you do enriches your life and how doing it helps make the world around you better. Do your best to identify what it is that makes your work matter.

You never know, finding purpose in your work may go beyond helping you be productive, and may even help redefine your whole career.

Wrapping Up

We’ve seen how something as simple as prioritising fun, sticking to a schedule, and finding purpose in your work can all make you more productive. You don’t need to use all these tips, but if you make a habit of employing some of these marvellous mind hacks, you will get results fast.

If you found this post helpful, why not share it with others on social media, or leave a comment?

Good luck integrating these mind hacks into your own routines!