Feel-Good Productivity: How to Do More of What Matters to You

by Ali Abdaal

Choosing your ‘character’ doesn’t mean reinventing your personality overnight (nor pretending to be a goblin in front of your colleagues). Rather, it means identifying the type of play that most resonates with who you are, so you can choose a type of player to embody.

Be self-aware and choose how to bring out your strengths in a way that aligns with your true self without forcing yourself into an uncomfortable or artificial persona.

Every day as I sit down to work, I look at my calendar and to-do list, and I ask myself: ‘What’s today’s side quest going to be?’ This question helps me shift my mindset from the obvious tasks that lie ahead to the potential alternative avenues they might take me down.

View daily tasks as opportunities for exploration and growth. Reframe work as a journey with the potential for new experiences and insights.

With an experimental mindset, a date that doesn’t lead to a second one or a friendship that doesn’t blossom wouldn’t be a failure; it’d just be another data point to help you understand your compatibility.

Treat unsuccessful dates or friendships as learning experiences. Each interaction provides insights into your preferences, needs, and compatibility with others. By viewing these experiences as opportunities for growth and self-discovery, you can focus on what you've learned and aim for more meaningful connections.

She got rid of traditional policies like vacation days, set work hours and performance reviews, and gave more autonomy to employees. As long as employees met their goals, they could do what they liked.

Netflix’s culture not only helped the company attract and retain top talent, but also led to better ideas: rather than relying on traditional methods of market research and focus groups, Netflix let their creative teams take the lead in developing and producing new shows and movies.

When McCord used the word, she meant a sense of personal empowerment: the sense that your job is in your control, your life is in your hands, and that decisions about your future are yours alone.

Power is our second energiser; a crucial ingredient in feeling good and being productive. And best of all, it’s not something you seize from others – it’s something you create for yourself.

Feeling confident about our ability to complete a task makes us feel good when we’re doing it, and helps us do it better.

After decades of research, he concluded that confidence isn’t something you’re born with; it’s something you learn.

that the things you say often become the things you believe. As such, the very act of hearing small positive interventions, like ‘You can do it!’ or ‘Nearly there!’, can have a remarkable effect on our self-confidence levels.

My favourite method involves what I call ‘flipping the confidence switch’; in other words, challenging yourself to behave as if you’re confident in your task, even if you’re not.

If Albert Bandura were to comment he’d probably attribute it to something called the ‘vicarious mastery experience’. This is when you witness or hear about someone else’s performance related to a task that you’re going to undertake yourself. You see other people’s examples, and it boosts your confidence.

According to Bandura, an enactive mastery experience refers to the process of learning through doing.

Shoshin refers to a state of mind in which we approach every task and situation with the curiosity, openness and humility of a beginner.

However, shoshin can have a remarkable impact precisely because it allows us to see things afresh.

Older siblings take on the role of teacher or mentor to their siblings: older siblings (like me) often help their younger siblings (like my brother) with homework, answer their questions about the world, and share their own experiences and insights, however dubious.

As the philosopher Seneca said, Qui docet discit – ‘He who teaches learns’.

When you teach, you reinforce and deepen your own understanding of the subject. The process of explaining concepts to others often reveals new insights and solidifies your knowledge. In this way, teaching becomes a powerful tool for learning and growth, benefiting both the teacher and the learner.

And if you’re concerned that you’re not ‘qualified’ enough to teach someone else, it’s worth remembering that the people we learn from best are often the ones who are just a step ahead of us in the journey. So anyone can become a teacher.

Often, the most effective teachers are those who are just slightly ahead in their learning journey. They can relate to the challenges and struggles of those learning because they’ve recently overcome them themselves.

Intrinsic motivation comes from the inside: driven by self-fulfilment, curiosity and a genuine desire to learn. Extrinsic motivation comes from the outside: driven by pay-rises, material rewards and social approval.

Understanding the balance between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation can help you identify what drives your behavior and how to cultivate a deeper sense of purpose in your work and life.

When we can’t take ownership of the situation, we can still take ownership of the process.

FiletOfFish1066 had realised that he might not have ownership over what he did as he had to do what his boss said. But he chose to take ownership over how he did it.

There’s a lesson here for us all. There’s almost always a way for us to own the process of a task, even when the outcome has been determined by someone else.

Simply switching their mindset from ‘have to’ to ‘choose to’ they boosted their sense of control, power and, in turn, what they were capable of.

First, we need to get over our reluctance to ask. The easiest way to do this is by simply adopting a maxim: people are more eager to help than you think.

Instead, emphasise the positive reasons for why you’re going to that specific person for advice: ‘I saw your work on X, Y, Z and it really had an impact on me. I would love to hear how you did A, B, C.’ By emphasising the positive aspects of the person you admire, they’ll think you genuinely value their opinion – and be more likely to help you.

When one person shares good news with another, both people are happy. And when one person shares something sad with another, the act of sharing takes some of the sadness away.

being candid doesn’t assume that we know the truth. The spirit of being candid is more like: ‘Here’s what I think. Can you hear me out or help me out? We can do it together.’

First, root your analysis in objective, non-judgemental terms. ‘I noticed you cut Hermione off a few times in that meeting’ is much more effective than ‘You are incredibly rude.’

Second, focus on the tangible results of what’s gone wrong. Again, subjectivity is your enemy. So simply highlight, factually, the consequence of what you observed.

Finally, turn your attention away from the problem and towards the solution. Provide alternatives of what you’d like to see happen.

Put simply, discipline is when we do stuff that we don’t feel like doing. It’s the opposite of motivation; it’s taking action despite how unmotivated you are.

In the words of psychology professor Joseph Ferrari, ‘to tell the chronic procrastinator to just do it would be like saying to a clinically depressed person, cheer up.’

Motivation and discipline are useful strategies, but they’re band-aids covering up deeper wounds. They might sometimes work to treat the symptoms, but they don’t change the underlying condition.

While the motivation method advised us to make ourselves feel like doing the thing, and the discipline method advised us to ignore how we feel and do it anyway, the unblock method encourages us to understand why we’re feeling bad about work in the first place – and tackle the issue head on.

Often, the reason we don’t make a start is because we don’t know what we’re supposed to be doing in the first place

one that scientists call ‘uncertainty paralysis’. It happens when we become overwhelmed by the unknowns or the complexity of a situation, leading to an inability to act.

Uncertainty makes us feel bad, and so achieve less. Humans have an innate aversion to what we don’t know. We naturally prefer predictability and stability, which is what allows us to be decisive and effective.

People with a low tolerance of uncertainty tend to view uncertain situations as threatening and anxiety-provoking, leading them to put things off – particularly on tasks involving any ambiguity.

So now, before embarking on a new project, I ask myself the first commander’s intent question: ‘What is the purpose behind this?’ And I build my to-do list from there.

uncertainty about what exactly you’re supposed to be doing can act as a daunting barrier to even getting started – one that saps your energy and leaves you feeling exhausted before you’ve even begun.

You might block out 9am to 10am on Tuesday for clearing your email inbox. Treat this time block as you would any other appointment. When the allocated time arrives, focus solely on the task at hand.

You’re essentially turning your to-do list into a schedule. By allocating specific time slots for each task, you’re creating a clear plan for when and how your day’s work will get done.

Ensure that all aspects of your life get the attention they deserve. Identify all the things that are important to you: work, family, hobbies, exercise, relaxation, personal development, etc. Then, carve out specific times in your week for each of them.

This technique is called ‘affective labelling’. Put simply, it’s the act of putting your feelings into words, which forces you to identify and get to know the sensations you’re experiencing.

But if I were to write a fictional story about someone like me, in my position, who was procrastinating on this task because they feared something, what might they be scared of? What fear might be holding this fictional character back from starting their task?

But what we’re afraid others will notice about us – our mistakes, small missteps, our worst qualities – aren’t typically what we notice in others. When we look at ourselves, these things seem a lot bigger and more important than they really are.

I’d fallen prey to an interesting phenomenon known as the ‘spotlight effect’. We’re highly attuned to what others think of us. This makes sense – as social creatures, our amygdala is always on the hunt for threats to our status. But this means that we spend our lives believing a spotlight is always trained on us, and that everyone around is constantly looking at us, analysing our behaviours, and passing judgement on our worth as human beings.

everyone is concerned mostly about themselves, and how they’re coming across. They’re not spending much time (if any) thinking about us.

We can think of these changes as reducing the amount of energy it takes to get started on a task. They eliminate the friction that stands between us and the goal we seek. If you’re constantly being reminded to buy veg, it takes much less energy to remember to do so. And if you’ve been told which are the most popular vegetables in your community, it takes much less energy to decide which ones to choose.

If you’re learning a new skill, you can track your progress by keeping a learning journal to write down what you’re learning, any questions you have, and any breakthroughs or ‘aha’ moments you experience.