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Introduction

The amount of time most people spend not being present is massive. More than that, it's a massive amount of unproductive, useless, wasted time. It's not an exaggeration to say that many people spend the majority of their day in a state of non-presence.

We waste time dwelling on the past, usually on depressing things like losses, failed relationships, or other negative experiences. We play these experiences over and over in our heads, thinking that if we had done this or said that things would have turned out differently. We often blame others but more often, we blame ourselves.

Oftentimes, these negative memories are accompanied by unhealthy emotions like bitterness, resentment, and guilt. These emotions, when left to simmer inside of us can literally become toxic, affecting both our physical and mental wellbeing.

The other side of the coin is the future. We spend hours thinking about the future - worrying, more precisely. We worry about our health, our finances, our children, and our careers. We overload our brains with 'what if?' questions. What if I lose my job? What if I fail the exam? What if I don’t meet that deadline? What if I can’t make my mortgage payments?

Whatever your fears and worries are, join the club. We all have our personal 'what ifs' that keep us tossing and turning at night.

Why is this a waste of precious time? Because the past and the future are out of your control. There's no way on earth you can control either.

Yes, you can learn valuable lessons from past experiences and move on. But will dwelling on them transport you back in time to fix things?

You can - and should - plan for the future as best as you can. But will worry and anxiety about the future steer things to go your way?

This is why learning to live in the present is the best option for living a happy, productive, and fulfilling life. When you live in the present, you're in control. You're in control of what you say and do in the present moment and how you react and behave in certain situations. This is very empowering.

Stop here and reflect for a moment. When was the last time you were present, fully in the moment and totally focused on the here and now? When was the last time you were in control?

Another word for being present is mindfulness. It is one of the most powerful and transformative qualities you can develop. Mindfulness is an innate quality that each person is born with. As young children, we had no conception of past or future. We lived fully and completely in the present moment.

Re-learning this powerful trait is essential in order to become your best possible self.

The benefits of mindfulness

Here are just some of the benefits of mindfulness that can dramatically shift your mindset and change your life:

- It significantly reduces stress and anxiety.
- It improves personal relationships by promoting higher empathy.
- It allows us to release toxic emotions like bitterness, anger, jealousy and deep grudges.
- It breeds acceptance and helps us cope better with hardship and adversity.
- It promotes physical and mental health.
- It promotes better sleep.
- It enhances productivity.
- It improves mental focus and clarity.
- It improves emotional wellbeing.

7 Ways to Become More Present

Living mindfully can become second nature to you if you train your brain to make it a habit.

These 7 exercises will put that process into motion. The more you practice them, the faster your brain will make mindfulness a habit and guide your behavior accordingly.

Mindfulness breeds mindfulness. As your brain starts to develop the habit, you will stay mindful for longer periods of time until you are able to remain present throughout your day.

These exercises require nothing more than a few minutes of your time each day to begin a dramatic transformation that will amaze you.

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Introduction

Everyone wants to add some balance into their lives. This balance allows them to feel better, to avoid all of the overwhelming things that show up in their day, and can make them happier too. But in our modern world, it is hard to figure out what we need to work on in order to gain some of the balance that our lives need.

Knowing what our priorities are and focusing on those, while letting go of some of the things that are just busy work, or at least are not important to us, will make a difference. Balance is possible, but we need to take some of the necessary proactive steps to turn it into reality. Some of the secrets that anyone can follow in order to find the balance, and then the happiness, that they need, includes:

Identify Your Priorities

The first thing that you need to do to help gain some more balance in y our life is to figure out what your priorities are in the first place. There are a million things that will pull at your attention all the time. And this is part of what will make life overwhelming if you are not careful. You will not be able to do it all, so you need to focus on what is the most important to you along the way.

The things that you hold onto as priorities will be different compared to what someone else finds as important. And these things can change throughout your life as well. Spending time with the kids and making memories may not be as important once the kids get out of the house. Or you may want to spend more time working on your career when you are younger, before you have kids and a family.

You need to take some time to learn what your own priorities will be along the way. You can pick a few that you will focus on all the time, improving your life in those areas to add in more balance. Over time, you may want to pick out 5 to 7 priorities during the week or the month that you will focus on. This can help you to keep your schedule in order and not take on too much.

For example, if it is near the holidays, your priority will be more around family and getting things done at work so you can enjoy the time with family.

Spend Your Energy On Those Priorities

After you have had a chance to figure out what your priorities are, it is time to take some action steps. It is not enough to just say that you find work as a priority or that you want to spend more time with your family. Talking and thinking are great, but you need to take some actions in order to reach your goals.

If you have decided that your priority is work, then you will need to find ways to get ahead in your career. You can learn how to work through some of the different time management options to help you get more done, learn how to say no so you are able to fit in the most important things, and even continue your education to make sure that you are ready for the next promotion.

Maybe you have decided that spending more time with your family is a top priority that you would like to work on. You may need to schedule time to get this done. Schedule a weekend away, a night to play some games, or even time having a meal together. This will allow you a way to get more done with your loved ones and get in some of that high-quality time that you want too.

The point is that you need to actively work towards your priorities. You can’t just say that they are important. You need to focus more on the actions that you are able to do to reach those priorities as well. With an action plan in place, you will be able to balance out your life and see great results.

Focus on One Things At a Time

When it is time to balance out your life, many people get excited and they want to jump right in and have a chance to do it all. This is an admirable quality to work with for most people, but they will overwhelm themselves and feel like a failure when things do not come into balance right away. This is because you are taking on too much at once, which can make it difficult to really focus and master the one thing that is the most important.

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Every technologist, futurist, or thinker that you can think of agrees: AI is going to be HUGE in the future.

People like Elon Musk warn that AI will bring about the downfall of man. Others point to the ways in which AI is going to revolutionize art, medicine, and science for the betterment of all mankind. Whichever side of the argument they land on, they all agree that AI is going to be a BIG deal.

What’s interesting though, is to think about how AI will affect specific industries and aspects of our lives. In particular, how will AI affect something like digital marketing?

Actually, we already have a lot of insight into that. Because Google, as it just so happens, is all about AI. In fact, the company has built its business around AI – to the point that it now describes itself as an “AI first business.”

The world of digital marketing is already being impacted by this to a large degree, and the effects are only going to become more far reaching as time goes on.

Understanding what Google means by this, and how it affects the very DNA of search, is of critical importance for any marketer that wants to perform well now and in the future. Read on and we’ll discover just how Google’s AI aspirations are transforming the way we promote ourselves online.

When Google says that it is an AI-first company, it means that all of its products have AI at their core. Specifically, it means that all of its products have Google Assistant at their core!

Google’s Sundar Pichai, says that he doesn’t want Google to simply use AI in its hardware and software, but rather to invent products and services from the ground up that couldn’t exist without AI. A perfect example of this is Google Clips – a camera that you wear that takes photos automatically when it thinks something exciting is happening. This is the kind of concept that is only possible thanks to machine learning and computer vision.

Even the Pixel line of phones can be seen primarily as an attempt to put Google Assistant right into people’s pockets.

And this is where the real “big idea” makes itself known. Google wants to get to a point where all of us talk to it every single day, using natural language. Google Assistant has the ability to answer questions about nearly any given topic, by understanding what the user is asking, looking for relevant information on the web, and then reading that back in an easy-to-understand manner.

Because if AI really is going to be the next HUGE thing on the web like everyone is saying, then Google wants to make sure that it is the go-to platform that everyone uses. This is Google betting BIG on the future, and going all-in on an AI focussed line of products and services.

So what does all this have to do with internet marketing?

The thing to recognize here, is that Google Assistant works using Google Search – the two products are in fact so closely linked as to be almost one and the same. Google Assistant is ultimately a very fancy form of voice search, and Google Search is essentially an assistant that you talk to by typing.

For a while now, Google has been leaning toward a more natural-language type of search. Back in the old days, Google worked essentially just by looking for matches between search terms and keyphrases. If someone searched for a specific phrase, then Google would look for content that used that precise term.

But this had problems. For one, it made it extremely easy for marketers to “game the system.” You could manipulate Google’s algorithms by inserting keyphrases repeatedly, even if your content wasn’t of any interest to the person looking for it.

At the same time, it meant that high quality content that didn’t happen to do keyword research wouldn’t get anywhere.

And it meant that Google would often serve up the wrong content. It would look for keyword matches, but with no regard to the sentence. If you searched for “decision tree” then it might bring up content about making decisions about trees – rather than the flow-chart meaning that you meant.

Google adapted by introducing RankBrain – an algorithm designed to better understand what the user actually meant rather than what they said.

RankBrain can do a few things. For one, it takes words and segments them: categorizing them into phrases that it thinks might be related to one another. This helps Google to better understand what a user wants to learn about, and it means that Google can guess what a word it isn’t familiar with might mean.

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Introduction

Former U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt once said in a speech, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." If you take the statement literally, it doesn't really make sense because you can't really be afraid of fear. What Roosevelt was trying to say is that fear is a crippling emotion that can hold back nations and individuals from achieving greatness. In that sense, the consequences of fear can be terrifying.

Good fear vs. bad fear

Fear is a strong emotion, an instinctive reaction that we're endowed with to ensure the survival of our species. It’s also a primeval instinct that we see in animals as well. As human civilizations became more complex and advanced, so did our fears become more varied and compounded. The caveman in prehistoric times wasn't worrying about the financial risks of taking out a second mortgage or making a career change. His primary goal revolved around one thing - survival.

Our current fears stem from the same core instinct but in comparison to our earliest ancestors, are much less of a threat. Oftentimes, rather than help us survive in the modern world, they hinder our ability to lead our best possible lives.

Now, this book is in no way trying to underplay or belittle your fears. Your fears are very valid. In fact, some actions should be tempered with a little bit of fear and caution. However, some fears can get blown out of proportion and take over your life. In this case, you need to pay attention.

Your fears could cause you to miss out on amazing opportunities that could change your life. Letting fear control you could be the reason you feel stifled, lost, and demotivated. Your fears, rather than protecting you, could be destroying your chances for happiness and success.

For example, the fear of swimming in shark-infested waters is a good fear. The fear of quitting a job that you hate and that offers no chance for advancement is a bad fear. It can hold you back from pursuing your true passion and showcasing your skills. It's these types of fears that this book will help you address.

This book is going to help you identify 7 types of fear that could be limiting your ability to achieve success These are fears that could hinder your care advancement or hold you back from building strong, healthy relationships. They can be the roadblocks to finding happiness and fulfillment.

Here are these 7 most common fears and a few tips on how to overcome them.

1. Fear of Risk

Risk is related to a perceived loss resulting from an action. Oftentimes, there's also a potential gain but we tend to magnify the loss while minimizing the gains. The fear of taking risks is a very strong primal fear related to our survival instinct where our prehistoric ancestors were surrounded by peril. Taking risks could mean getting eaten by wild animals or some other horrible death.

This fear remains very strong in us and is the first emotion that overcomes us when we think of taking important action.

How it holds you back

Let's say you want to start your own business. You have a great idea for a useful product or service that's scalable. There's an audience for it and your initial market research tells you it will be in demand. You're very excited. Then, the fear of risk kicks in and your mind starts bombarding you with 'what if?’

What if the idea's not so good after all? What if you take out a loan and can't repay it? What if the product doesn't sell? What if the market collapses? What if there's a nuclear war and you lose everything?

The 'what if' questions typically escalate into gloom and doom scenarios until the fear paralyzes you into inaction. Realistically, if there's a nuclear war, everybody's going to be out of business, aren't they? This is how the concept of risk can really play on your fear of loss.

Your fear ends up holding you back from, doing something that can have some real benefits for you. So, you ditch the idea and decide to stay on in a job you hate that's stifling your potential and ambition. You convince yourself that being miserable is safer than failing miserably!

Now, consider the alternative: you realistically assess the risks involved, plan for them and start your own business. You embark on an exciting journey when you become your own boss, take control of your life, and grow a super successful business. This is just one example of how fear of risk can hold you back from great things.

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There comes a time in everyone’s lives when they know they are due for a change. Perhaps they have recently come to realize that the path they have taken is not the path they want to stay on, and they are seeking out ways that they can begin to make a difference in their lives, and maybe even make a difference in the world around them.

We all want to do something that matters. What that is can be very different from person to person, but it remains true that for the most part, we are beings with the drive to work toward goals larger than ourselves. That is what veganism is really about.

Living a vegan lifestyle can mean a number of things, depending on the person who is undergoing the transition. For one thing, it means being aware of the consequences of your choices. It means learning more about the way the world works, and the ethical stances of most popular corporations. It can even mean giving up your favorite foods in order to embrace a more non-violent lifestyle so that you can ease the guilt you may feel in supporting practices financially that you do not support in your mind or heart.

Whatever being vegan may mean for you personally, it is an important choice and one that can come with several complications. That is why the Going Vegan: A Complete Guide to a Cruelty Free Lifestyle is so beneficial. This book will take you on a journey of understanding so that the vegan lifestyle no longer seems so daunting.

By following the easy tips and tricks in this guide, you will be closer than ever to living the life you have always wanted. If you want to go vegan, but you have questions and concerns, then this is the book for you.

Going vegan isn’t just a diet choice. It is an entire lifestyle change. When someone goes vegan, that applies not only to the things that they eat, but also the products they use. To be vegan means devoting yourself to the liberation of animals and believing that practices that cause harm to our animal companions is a very needless and primitive thing.

Vegans prefer instead to support businesses that promote ethical treatment of animals. They want to allow room for the world to create better practices that take the needs and welfare of animals into consideration. They use products, like make up and hair care products, that have not been tested on animals. They don’t eat foods that are made from animals or animal byproducts, such as milk or eggs or other dairy.

This can be a huge choice to make. Going vegan is about far more than just a diet choice. It is a change in lifestyle. It means going for products that most of the time end up being far more expensive than commercially made and mass produced items that do not take animal welfare into consideration. A vegan supports the idea that we can build an economy without killing animals and exploiting them as resources. And it can change everything in their lives if they are truly devoted to this cause.

Don’t let that intimidate you. While it may sound like a lot of work, going vegan is easy once you have made the switch. Any change in lifestyle is an adjustment. Going vegan simply requires more research to be made and, at times, a little bit more of an investment in certain products.

But to those who are passionate believers in supporting ethical treatment of animals, or who simply want to be more environmentally conscious or alter their diets, it is a simple switch. Going vegan can even be seen as a political stance. There are vegans out there working to change the laws to favor ethical treatment of animals, and there is promise that some things may change for the better. However, it is a gradual change and not one that a whole lot of people find important. That is why every choice we make can make a difference. Money talks, and in supporting places that are aligned with our ideals and moral codes, we can begin to slowly shift the principles that companies adopt in order to favor the majority. And that’s a great win for vegans!

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Introduction

Here's a brief scenario for you to consider. Jeff, a young career professional, comes home from work, has dinner, watches some TV then sits back and spends a few minutes reflecting on his day. His self-talk runs along the following lines: "What a crappy day! Everything that could possibly go wrong did… Not my fault, though; my coworkers suck. They can't follow instructions or do anything right. Not to mention my monster boss! I hate my job… I need to look for a new one… life sucks!"

His thoughts are interrupted by the phone ringing. It's a friend calling to chat. "Are you busy with something right now?" the friend asks. Our hero replies, "Nah, just sitting back and doing some self-reflection. Life really sucks, man!"

If this is the general idea about self-reflection, it's no wonder that so many people think life sucks! This scenario is just so wrong. It's not self-reflection in any way, shape, or form. Thankfully, real self-reflection is completely different and it's good for you.

Let's be honest. We’re good at analyzing the flaws and weaknesses of others and blaming circumstances that we see as out of our control. However, we're hesitant to confront our own shortcomings and mistakes. We avoid confronting our emotions and fears or identifying patterns in our behavior that could be holding us back. Therefore, self-reflection is a powerful game-changer.

What is Self-Reflection?

Self-reflection is the process of looking into yourself to better understand your thought process, behaviors, strengths, and weaknesses. It's not a negative exercise by any means but an honest exploration of yourself, which makes you aware of some negative issues that need to be addressed.

Self-reflection is an intentional process, meaning that you don’t do it randomly on the bus home from work or as you’re walking down the street. Of course, you could do that in theory but it would probably be more of an aimless jumble of wandering thoughts rather than deep introspection. There can be too many distractions and interruptions.

Making the intention and making time for self-reflection is essential. This prepares you mentally for an exercise in deep, honest thought and gets your brain into focus mode. You should never be rushed or open to distractions or interruption. Think of self-reflection as a form of meditation and you'll get the idea.

Like meditation, self-reflecting should take place in quiet, relaxed surroundings. There's no set time limit. The exercises can be as long or as short as you choose. Daily self-reflection may only require a few minutes while weekly or monthly self-reflection may take some time. Some people also find it helpful to keep a journal where they jot down their key thoughts and findings but this isn't mandatory.

Why is Self-Reflection Important?

The simple process of immersing yourself in honest introspection has some amazingly powerful benefits which include:

It leads to greater self-awareness and a better understanding of why you’re where you are in your life right now. More importantly, it helps you identify what you need to be doing to get where you want to be.
It allows you to identify and set clear goals.
It helps you assess your goals regularly and modify or change them if you need to.
It helps you recognize your priorities and the obstacles that could be causing you to lose sight of them.
It helps you get in touch with your emotions and identify those that could be holding you back.
It allows you to identify your weaknesses and work on them.
It helps you recognize your limitations and how they can be overcome.
It enables you to acknowledge and take responsibility for mistakes.
It gives you more control over your life and the direction in which it's heading.
It's a great way to reduce stress and release repressed emotions.
It brings inner peace and mental tranquility.

So, how exactly do you practice self-reflection? Just follow these 10 powerful methods. They'll ease you into the practice and develop it into a consistent habit. Over time, you'll master the art of self-reflecting and be able to practice it on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis.

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Introduction

Everyone has been there. Your to-do list is a mile long. You sit down to get to work, but your brain just doesn't want to turn on. The more you try to force it, the more your attention wanders.

For some, this is just an every once in a while type problem. For others, it can be an all-day, everyday struggle. The modern world is full of distractions. Even if you love what you do, there is always something more interesting you could be doing with your day. You live in a world where the next notification is just a second or two away. All of your devices are constantly begging for your attention.

So how do you cut through the digital clutter, overlook the flashing lights, and make your brain get to work? Improving your mental focus is as simple as "practice makes perfect." By creating a clear plan and establishing healthy habits, even the most distractable mind can cut through the fog and be productive.

1. Identify Clear Goals

The first step is to identify what you need your focus to be on. When you don't have a clearly defined goal, your mind will wander. Give your attention something to use as an anchor.

Sounds simple, right?. Sometimes defining goals is simple. Report A is due to the boss by 2 pm, which is the morning's only goal. But when you don't have a hard deadline for every item on your mile-long list, defining the goal can get complicated.

Make a process that you can use every day to help keep that to-do list organized.

- First, identify your priorities. Write down that to-do list. Whether it's handwritten or digital, the important thing is seeing everything laid out in front of you.

- Now that you have your priorities straight, put them in order of importance.

Tackle the most urgent ones first. The idea is to get those tasks that are the very highest priorities taken care of before anything else can get the chance to distract you.

- Make sure that everything you add to your to-do list gets separated into small steps. Then set aside small blocks of time to focus only on the specific things on your list. Set a timer if it helps you stay on track.

- Don't overextend yourself. That two-mile-long list of goals for the day isn't helping the matter at all. Long lists don't often get finished. So just put some of those less urgent things on the shelf. You can tackle them another day when they are more pressing.

Overextending yourself or not setting realistic expectations can do real damage to your focus over time. When you set unrealistic goals and then fail to meet them over and over, you are training your brain to expect failure.

Instead of a two-mile-long list, limit yourself to just the highest priority items. Remember that once you get those high priorities done, you can always come back and set a new list of goals.

1. Get Rid of Distractions

Eliminating distractions is a vital part of preparing your mind to be able to focus. Distractions in modern times are complicated and are a large part of the problem. Whether it's the notifications on your phone or something in your office, it can be impossible to pay attention to the task at hand.

So what might be distracting you? To get rid of it, you have to identify what it is.

Physical Distractions

You can easily anticipate and plan for physical distractions in advance. Often it's just a matter of having a consistent daily routine. Take the time to anticipate problems and solve them before they can affect your focus.

- Hunger

Always realizing you are hungry when you are trying to get started? Don't skip breakfast.

Even if you aren't the type to start your day with a meal, you can plan ahead and keep an easy-to-grab snack in your work area. Eat before you try to get started.

- Temperature

When you are too cold or too hot, it quickly becomes challenging to keep your brain focused on a computer screen. Ideally, you can control your environment's temperature and find that sweet temperature spot before it's time to get started. In reality, though, you might not have any control at all. You can still plan ahead.
Work in a chronically cold office environment? Keep a sweater or light jacket on hand to put on when you get a chill. Regularly feel way warmer than your co-workers? Keep a fan at your desk.

- Noise

Noise is another environmental element you might not always be able to control. It could be phones ringing at another desk or annoying music coming through the shared wall. Some individuals are quite easily distracted by any sounds, while others can tune it all out at will.

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Introduction

As a solopreneur, no one is going to be telling you when you need to work. You will need to learn when to complete tasks and handle the management of your business yourself. Many solopreneurs love working by themselves, but it can be difficult to stay productive.

When you are more productive, your brand is going to make more conversions- leading to more funds. If you want to work more efficiently, be sure to read this brief article.

We are going to offer you plenty of tips to increase solopreneur productivity. Let’s begin.

Manage Your Tasks

To start, you will want to make sure that you are always managing your tasks and errands. It will help if you know what tasks need completed soon and what ones you can put off. Plus, are you able to consolidate any errands or tasks together?

When you are grocery shopping, you probably make sure to pick up all your items that are in the same aisle at once. It does not make sense to walk across the store to grab eggs, then get the bread, then go back for milk. You are going to be using your time more efficiently if you can consolidate tasks.

You can do this by grouping your tasks and projects together. At the start of each day, take ten minutes or so to sit down and determine what needs to be finished. Then, group your tasks together where it makes sense. Maybe you can check your emails and brand social media at the same time, then get to work on creating content after.

When you group your tasks together, your mind does not have to shift its focus. This allows you to better stay in a strong workflow.

Simplify Your Meetings

Do you dread meetings? Do they feel like a waste of time? Well, then they might be. You might want to make some changes.

If your meetings are long, pointless, and seem to never solve anything, you will want to do implement the following change:

Keep them short, to the point, and as brief as possible.

Once you can do that, you will be on a much more productive path. It helps when your meetings are forced to be brief- only the most important subjects are brought up. You can start by having one goal in mind for each meeting. Once you have covered that goal, the meeting ends.

Shorter meetings are better for everyone involved. You can spend more time being productive on your work, without feeling drained after the meeting. As long as your meetings encourage open communication and not long discussion, the change will be present right away.

You can also keep your emails direct and to the point- phone or Zoom calls too!

Follow the Three Minute Rule

This little rule is an excellent tool to get rid of nonessential tasks, so that you can get abc to the more important matters at hand. The rule states that you should only complete the task if you can do it in three minutes or less. This could be for anything during your workday.

Responding to emails, doing chores at home, organizing your files, or other tasks. If they are taking away from your work during your scheduled hours, then you will want to avoid anything that does not take less than three minutes once you get to work.

It is best to complete these small tasks earlier in the day, before you start your solopreneur schedule. That way, they are done quickly and will not distract you later on.

Pay Attention to Your Energy

Our energy levels throughout the day shift. We are not constantly productive or constantly relaxed. We tend to each have our own periods of productivity- some hours the work comes naturally. Others, you might feel like you have to force yourself to complete a project.

Start paying attention to your energy levels throughout the day. This will let you see some patterns over time. Then, you will be able to work during the times when you are most productive and relax during the times your body wants you to rest.

There are many benefits to this. However, the most important is that you are never going to have to force yourself to work! When working during your most productive times, you will feel less stress and notice the quality of your work improving too.

If you want to try tracking your energy, you can record it in a notebook or in an app. By simply making note of your energy levels, you can become an exceptional solopreneur. Checking in with yourself often will help you to stay grounded as well.

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Introduction

Where does the time go? People talk about minutes passing like hours so why isn't that the case when you're working? Why is that analogy turned upside down where the hours fly by like minutes? Could it be that unseen aliens are fiddling with the cosmic clock somehow? With everyone you know complaining that there's not enough time in the day, perhaps it's not such an outlandish possibility!

One of the most frustrating things for busy people is that there's just not enough time in the day to get everything done. You wake up early full of vim and vigor, looking forward to a busy and productive day. You put in the hours, work diligently, and try to get through your carefully planned schedule as efficiently as you can.

But before you know it, the day's over. You're mentally and physically exhausted and yet, you've only got half of the things on your to-do list done. What are you doing wrong? Do you need to manage your time better? Are you scheduling your day unrealistically? Should you multitask or delegate more? More importantly, why do you feel that your work (that you do manage to get done) just isn’t up to par?

The short answer is that you're not doing anything wrong - at least not intentionally. The problem often lies in one word: distractions. And that word needs to be eliminated from your vocabulary!

Distractions are probably the number one cause of your lack of time - and lack of productivity. A few minutes here, a few minutes there, and suddenly you have distractions building up and eating a huge chunk out of your day and totally derailing your mental clarity.

Distractions don't only waste time but they have an immense impact on your ability to stay focused and get tasks done efficiently and on time. The reason many people don’t understand this is because distractions happen a few minutes at a time, which seems quite harmless. You'd be amazed at how many hours those minutes add up to. Whichever way you look at it, distractions are bad.

Why keep reading?

This book will help you identify and explore 10 common distractions that are massive productivity killers. You'll probably recognize several of them right away (and plead guilty!) Some of the others may come as a surprise because you never realized they were distractions.

After each distraction, you'll get a quick fix to help you overcome it. Once your most common distractions become a thing of the past, you'll notice a surge in your overall productivity, as well as in your ability to focus and function with amazing mental clarity. Yes, it's that simple! So, let's jump right in!

10 Productivity-Killing Distractions

These 10 distractions aren't in order of worst to least productivity killers. This is because, for one person, a given distraction can be worse than another.

Additionally, these distractions may change from day to day, with a certain one being worse on a particular day. The bottom line is that you'll recognize several – or even all of them – as the culprits for your low productivity and lack of time.

These are the most common distractions that cause seriously low productivity and very poor work outcomes.

Social media

I know I said that these distractions are in no particular order – with this one exception. Social media distraction just has to top the list! It's possibly the biggest simply because of the sheer number of people affected by it - and by the amount of time it wastes.

What is it about social media that's so addictive? It's the number one digital addiction in the world, followed by gaming. Naturally, there are lots of theories about why people get hooked on social media but that's another discussion altogether.

Here's a typical scenario: you're busy doing something when you get a Facebook notification. Your best friend has just posted a photo. You really know you shouldn't but she always posts such amazing photos and you're dying to see it.

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It is natural for human beings to compare themselves with others. If this didn’t take place then nobody would be able to see how well they are doing. Most people do not use comparisons in a good way and end up causing themselves all kinds of problems.

Unhealthy comparisons can cause low self esteem, dependency and even depression. If you are constantly comparing yourself with others and becoming bitter and angry then you need to stop doing it.

The techniques in this guide will help you to stop comparing yourself with others in a negative way. You will need to work on these techniques to perfect them so that everything is on autopilot. There is no miracle solution.

How do you really think about yourself? We all have an opinion about ourselves and this is a very important step to take if you want to stop comparing yourself with others in a negative way. You need to be aware of the root cause as to why you keep comparing yourself in an unhealthy way.

This is not the easiest thing to do but you must do it. It is essential for you to break the pattern that you have of negative comparisons with others. You can ask a trusted friend or family member to help you with this task and support you through the process.

Write down how you see yourself at the moment. This will help you to identify the behavior that you need to change. Accept the fact that changing this behavior is going to take time and effort and break everything down into smaller achievable steps.

Having low self esteem is a major reason why people make negative comparisons with others. Self esteem is all about the feelings that you have for yourself. You are going to have some negative feelings and some positive feelings. If the negative feelings far outweigh the positive feelings then you definitely need to work on your self esteem.

If you tend to let others control how you feel then this is a sign of low self esteem. You do not want to be reliant on others to feel happy about your life. It is a good idea to work on improving your self esteem every day regardless of how you feel about yourself at this current moment.

When you feel the need to compare yourself to others write down your thoughts and feelings about this. Why did you want to compare yourself to somebody else in the first place? As soon as you experience these thoughts then write them down. Add as much detail as you can.

If you have already made the comparison then ask yourself how you felt about it. Be sure to record all of the feelings and thoughts that you have about this. Be specific here and write down the exact reasons for feeling down about a comparison. For example a co-worker got a promotion before you did.

This is not always easy to do but certainly worth the effort. Think back to a time when you didn’t feel the need to compare yourself with others. Write this down in your journal and keep thinking about the time when you started to make regular comparisons.

This is powerful because it can help to identify the root causes behind your comparison habit. For example you may have compared yourself to your sister in a negative way because you felt that she got more attention from your parents than you did.

Often people do not realize the damage that negative comparisons do to them. When you write down how a comparison makes you feel then you will develop the necessary motivation to change this destructive habit.