So, well, that was fun. I tested a new cover and title for my book and rankings *plummeted*. About 92% worse, it seems.

Regardless, the content is still the same, and it is still awesome. In my humble (but accurate) opinion.

I’m devising a new evil scheme to test things like covers and titles much faster. More on that later, maybe.

Hmm. What to write about today? I started the day by breaking my two commandments of productivity:

1. Thou shalt not consume before creating. I read and answered two comments on my last post. Several hundred words of shockingly great advice for aspiring marketers and copywriters. If you ever wanted to master the fine art of using words to persuade & influence, you should check it out. To be honest, most of the value in the post is in the comment section.
   
2. Thou shalt not check email before doing something relevant. Criminally stupid of me. I don’t know what I was thinking.
   

Both of these fall under my general commandment for life:

Anyway. Let’s talk about productivity. It appears I’m headed in that direction already, so I might as well keep going.

• Limit your max browser tabs to three. If you are forced to work in a web browser, I don’t know any one task for which you would need more than three tabs open. So just keeping this in mind will help you stay focused. Most things require one. The most important things shouldn’t be done in a browser at all, and you should disconnect from the internet while doing them.
  
• Set deadlines for everything. If you are going to write a blog post, set a timer for 30 minute and tell yourself that you must finish writing before that time. Whatever you have down at the 30 minute mark, you have to publish. This forces you to get serious and get it done. Parkinson’s Law states that a given task will expand to fill the time allotted to it. So if you give yourself two weeks to write a blog post, you will probably see that it takes you about two weeks to finish it. Or it could take 30 minutes.
  
• Use a timer and work in focused blocks of time. Eugene Schwartz’s method for creating his near-unbeatable advertisements: He would sit down in front of his computer with a cup of coffee and a timer. He would set the timer for 33 minutes and 33 seconds and start it. During the 33:33 minutes, he didn’t have to do anything. No pressure. He could sip his coffee. He could work on his sales letter. He could sit and stare. But he could not get out of his chair, or do anything else except those things. Those were the only rules. Usually he would sit and do nothing for a few minutes, and then he would get bored and get to work.
  
• After the timer is up, take a 5 minute break. Get a glass of water. Stretch a little. Do a MobilityWOD. Meditate. Make a cup of coffee. Shave. Do something away from the computer. Then reset the timer and get back to work.
  
• Eben Pagan’s 60-60-30 method: Focus hard for 50 minutes, then take a break for 10 minutes. That’s the first “60” block. Repeat for another 50 + 10 minutes. Then take a longer break for 30 minutes. Get something to eat. Take a nap. Shower. Go for a short walk.
  
• Another one: The Pomodoro Technique. This is effectively the same as Eben’s method, except sliced and diced differently. 25 minutes of work, 5 minutes break. That is one session. Every 4 sessions, take a longer break for 30 minutes.
  
• Go for walks. And take naps.
  
• Don’t check email in the morning.
  
• Don’t check email/facebook/twitter/etc more than twice per day. Never in the mornings.
  
• Track your time. When you start doing something - anything - keep a notebook by your side and just note it down. "2.06 PM - Begin writing blog post." -- etc. Then, when you have finished writing the blog post, or whatever it is you're doing, note that down too. "2.32 PM - Finished writing blog post." What this does is give you a painful awareness of how you spend each moment. If you force yourself to actually write down everything you do, you'll waste much less time. You'll be compelled to put down productive things. So instead of checking facebook (again), you might put down "2.33 PM - publish blog post." ... This works from the same psychology as the "Flash Diet" -- the experiment where tons of people lost whole bunches of weight by following only one rule: You have to take a picture of everything you eat, and upload it to an online community. A lot of people lost a lot of weight, just because they didn't want to embarrass themselves by uploading photos of chocolate chip cookies.
  
• Outline your day before beginning it. A big time-suck is just deciding what to do. Do that beforehand, perhaps even the night before. So when the time comes to do the thing, you don’t have to think too much to get started.
  
• Prioritize the high-impact tasks first.
  
• Read books, not blogs. Consuming things: We all do it a lot, and usually to distract ourselves from important things. Vegg out on a fun blog, check facebook, email. Whatever. If you are going to consume things, consume good things. Pick a handful of blogs you get definite value out of. And in nearly all cases: Books contain far greater value than blog posts. Always be reading a book or two.
  
• Take one day off per week. No work allowed. Try to not even think about work-related things. Expansion and contraction are essential parts of the human experience, and it is a good idea to build it into your routine. I get more things done by taking a day off than by working. Personally, I never work on Saturdays.
  
• Have fun.

On a personal note: the above is just my advice and opinion, and they are things which have worked for me. That said, I'm terrible at following my own advice sometimes. This is one of those times when you should do what I say, not what I do...

Here’s a brilliant 30 minute presentation from one of my favorite comedians, Kyle Cease. It’s not a stand-up, but an actual presentation. It’ll change how you think about creativity. A lot of parallels to my book, too, which you should also buy.

- Linus