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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.

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Introduction

Do you reach for your phone first thing in the morning- If you grab your smartphone within seconds of waking up, you might be addicted to it. This can happen to anyone, but it can be difficult to stop these bad phone habits.

That is why we gathered these five hacks to help you minimize your phone addiction! When you put the phone down more, you will notice that you have a lot more time. You might start picking up hobbies you dropped a while ago or start new activities.

Be sure to keep reading if you struggle with setting down your phone!

Are You Addicted?

Smartphone users check their phones more than 150 times a day on average. So, if you believe you are addicted, you are not alone. Many people suffer from smartphone addiction.

Apps are designed to keep your attention for as long as possible. Over time, they can become quite difficult to put down. But, the longer you stay scrolling, the more money social media platforms make off of you. This gives social media companies plenty of reasons to make their apps as addictive as possible.

These are some basic signs of phone addiction:

- Craving access to phone
- Checking phone constantly
- Anxious when it is not in sight
- Restlessness
- Sleep problems

If you believe you are suffering from cell phone addiction, you will want to take the needed steps to change this right away. Your relationships could go down hill if you do not. Plus, you will feel much better the less you are on your phone. You will have time for hobbies and things that you enjoy again!

Check-In On Your Phone Usage

Before you get started with the below hacks, you will want to check-in on your current phone usage. This allows you to know where you need to improve and cut back. There are many apps out there that can be used to track your usage.

“Moment” is a popular option. It tracks your usage and records how much time you spend on apps. Overall, phone tracking apps will give you a base point. From there, you can work on reducing the amount of time you spend checking it.

If you try to go into breaking a serious phone addiction without using a tool to track your progress, it will be much, much harder to overcome. By having numbers available to work with, you can also feel proud of your results.

Once you have your phone usage tracker installed, get to work on these hacks!

1. Turn Off Notifications

The first hack is to turn off your phone’s notifications. If you constantly reach for your phone the second it makes a sound, this will help you a lot. We are trained to respond to notifications- we react to each with a pleasure response. This makes our brains want more notifications.

If you want to stop bad phone habits, turning off notifications for most of your apps will help you stay productive. There will be a lot less interruptions ruining your focus. Plus, you will notice that you have a lot more time to yourself.