- [Matt] No matter how driven you are, you likely struggle with procrastination. And I'm guessing, as you've transitioned to working from home, the situation hasn't improved much. When it comes to putting off our work, let's just say it's a constant battle. (overlapping chatter) - Help me, help me, help me! Oh no! - Matt, no! - So close. (laughs) As Steven Pressfield
writes in The War of Art, procrastination is the most common manifestation of resistance because it's the easiest to rationalize. We don't tell ourselves, I'm never going to write my symphony. Instead we say, I'm going
to write my symphony; I'm just going to start tomorrow. Now think about what you're going through when you promise yourself that you'll do something tomorrow. All the sudden, in that moment, all that pressure, the
anxiety and the stress is alleviated. We feel almost productive in an odd way. We feel like we're
actually making progress when we're not. We convince ourselves, through
all these excuses like, tomorrow I'm gonna have more energy, tomorrow I'll feel more inspired. But the problem there is
that tomorrow never comes because tomorrow we don't feel inspired, we don't have more energy, and so we continue to push it off until the pain becomes so great that we can't not do that thing. The deadline has arrived,
and we have to get to work. Or else we'll face the consequences from our boss, the IRS,
or a significant other. - [Nat] Hey, did you get a chance
to cancel those flights? - Oh, my laptop broke actually. - Isn't that your computer? (laptop crashes) - What we need to do couldn't be simpler. Sit down and get to work. And yet, in practice, it's not so easy. And so in my years of working for myself as a freelancer and as an
independent content creator, mostly working from home, I've learned a whole lot about how to avoid procrastination. And I've realized that one
big difference that I've made is including an almost daily practice, a daily ritual that
takes about 15 minutes. This 15 minute ritual
includes five things that, not only help me to kickstart my day, but also to stay focused for
much longer periods of time. But first, this video is
brought to you by Skillshare because you're only as good as the skills that you invest
your time and energy into. And Skillshare is an amazing
platform for learning. In fact, my friend and the
author of the fantastic book, Essentialism, Greg McKeown just released a class called Simple Productivity: How to accomplish more with less. - [Greg] One of the things that makes
uncommitting hard for people is the sunk-cost bias. - [Matt] Get this class and tons
of others on productivity, creativity, and more. For a limited time only, use
the link in the description to get a two month free trial of the Skillshare premium membership. And after that, it's really affordable. With an annual subscription, get it for less than $10 a month. My daily ritual to avoid
procrastination begins with, you might've guessed, coffee. You've seen me make coffee
in so many videos by now, it's become cliche, but it's an important trigger that helps me get my day started. So the important of this ritual became pretty obvious to me when I
quit caffeine for 30 days. It wasn't the caffeine itself
that I missed the most. My headaches largely
went away in the first five or six days. But it was that daily ritual
of making a cup of coffee. It was almost a Pavlovian response. When I had that cup and I
sat down next to my laptop, I all of a sudden felt this surge of inspiration and motivation. It was the repetition,
doing it every single day, grabbing my coffee, getting to work, grabbing my coffee, getting to work. By the way, if you're
looking for good coffee, I get my beans delivered biweekly from a local California company
called Cat and Cloud. If you remember, one of
the owners of the company, Chris Baca, he's the guy
that quit caffeine with me for that experiment. - [Chris] Matt, thank you for ruining
the past month of my life. - [Matt] One thing that I've
started to reintroduce into my daily routine is
a hand-written to-do list. Before I ever started
this YouTube channel, I was a freelance filmmaker, and during that time, I relied largely on hand-written to-do lists to organize all of my tasks and all of my projects. And for some reason, over
the past couple years, I've lost touch with that. And I think maybe it
was something about now working completely and
living completely from home, never getting out of the house. I needed something tactical, something that I could
literally physically write down to keep track of the
most important things. And I find that, as opposed
to a digital system, I'm much more clear on
the one to three things that are most important. So this is what the coming
week has in store for me. Monday, edit procrastination video. That's the video that you're watching. Tuesday, write YouTube course. Wednesday, film social
content and take new photos. Thursday, plan next week's video. Friday, film next week's video. So now when I sit down each morning, for the rest of the week, I can identify the one to three things that are most important. Not the five to 15 things that
I need to do during the day. Because chances are, if those small things don't get addressed, don't get touched, then it's not the end of the world. But if I don't get those
one to three things done, then it'll likely really stilt
my progress going forward. I also really like to lay out my week to see what's happening, and how much progress I can get by Friday. Because sometimes if we're
just looking at today, it can be, I guess for
somebody like myself, who's a little bit impatient, it can get kind of frustrating. But when you can see that whole progress that you're able to achieve
if you stay on task today. That motivates and inspires me because I don't wanna continue to push things until the next week and the next week. Now I still use the app
TeuxDeux do as a digital version of my to-do list. But lately it's mostly a
place to collect things that I need to do, but
aren't a top priority. Like shooting some B-roll for
a friend's YouTube channel, calling my accountant to
get an update on my taxes, or reminders for ideas I
like to include in my course. The next thing that's essential for me to avoid procrastination
is to find solitude. Peace, quiet, and no other humans, which, in a way is easier now that we're all locked in at home. And in another way,
it's just as difficult. Some people seem to thrive in chaos, they don't get disturbed by a messy desk, harsh lighting, or a penguin
dancing next to your workspace. That's not the case for me. Whether I'm in a room alone,
or ideally, home alone, I find that the stillness
motivates me into action, and it's far less likely that I'll stop once I get into the state of flow. Now, solitude is not always possible, especially at times like
these when we're locked inside with our roommates, our
spouse, or our kids. And so we have to get a
little bit more creative to find that same kind of solitude. And one thing that really helps me is to put on a pair of
noise canceling headphones. By the way, if you're keeping track, this is thing number four. Most days when I sit
down to begin my work, I'll put on my noise canceling headphones and play from one of
two Spotify playlists: deep focus or Lo-fi beats. I can't listen to anything
with vocals because it's nearly impossible for me to focus. But having some kind of
instrumental track in the background acts to lock me into my work. I'm sure people that work
in an office environment know how powerful it is to
have over-ear headphones. It's the universal sign for get fucked. It is incredibly helpful for letting people know that
you're locked into work, and you do not want to be disturbed. I've heard of other
people doing things like placing flags next to their desk when they are really locked in and trying to get some deep work done. I personally have
conversations with Natalie, we talk about, when
we're wearing headphones, that's a do not disturb sign. The added benefit of the music, the noise cancellation,
the over ear headphones, it's just one way that
I'm able to find solitude when there maybe isn't
solitude to be found anywhere. And the last thing that really helps me is to remove as many other distractions as I possibly can. There are some measures that I take before I even start working, like having the freedom app installed that blocks websites that I designate. Lately I've blocked
popular news sites I go to, as well as Reddit. Just that barrier, just
that little bit of like, don't do it. It just prevents that instant flinch to wanna check those sites. And it helps me to get back to work. It doesn't always work. There are lots and lots
of times where I'm like, you know, I just wanna hit little hit, I just wanna see what's
going on with the news today. But then I find that, even if it works 40 or 50% of the time, that's enough to avoid that procrastination
and to get to work. And on my phone, I delete social apps like Instagram and Tik Tok. I usually keep these apps on my phone a couple days a week. But if they happen to be on my phone and I can sense the distraction coming in, I'll simply delete them. And those are the five things that help me avoid procrastination and
stay focused on my work. The important thing about this ritual is that it takes me less
than 15 minutes to complete. And once I've done it, I find
that I'm much more locked in and much more productive. There's probably nothing magical about the combination of these activities besides maybe the caffeine. But it does help me to build some momentum towards the work that
I need to do each day. Thank you to Skillshare
for sponsoring this video, and thank you so much for tuning in and watching these videos every week. Hey guys, by the way, I cut my own hair. What do you think? Like, serious feedback in the comments. I think I did a pretty damn good job. The back is kinda fucked up. The back, I don't know
if you can see that, I don't know if that's in focus, but I kinda fucked up
the back a little bit. But you know, eh, I think
it's pretty good, ya know? Nobody has to see the back of my head. Just from now on out, you're never gonna see the
back of my head in a video. K, bye.
