How I Can Study 10h a Day: The Perfect Schedule for Chaotic People

it's funny isn't it we've got all this technology all these clever machines rules and schedules to organize ourselves but when it comes down to it it's just us able to force ourselves to do something but unable to force ourselves to actually pay attention to the thing the solution to the problem of getting things done i'm told is more discipline and habits which i'm sure works for most people but as a medical student with a bunch of other jobs i actually found that when i went from this mainstream scheduling advice which made me absolutely miserable to a more elizabeth chaotically organized schedule and just doing things when it felt like a reasonable time to do them my results and happiness actually increased a lot i've now realized i can get a lot more done easier if i work alongside my brain instead of forcing it to do things on an arbitrary schedule which it absolutely hates and punishes me for so if habits also don't work for you and if your current schedule is driving you nuts today i'm going to be breaking down in detail my brain's instinct with all of the principles and the lines of reasoning that i have built over years of trying to successfully live a chaotically organized life in the hope that by the end of this video you can also internalize all of the same instincts and rethink the way that you approach your schedule to be able to succeed without habits in chaos i'm going to use how i study in medical school as an example and as detailed as this may seem once it's internalized it only takes a few seconds to apply let's jump straight into it the very first thing that i do before i even think of working or scheduling is identifying and introducing all of the tasks that i am due to do to my brain and seeing how my brain reacts to them in this way i can see what sort of skills are required of me when doing the task so i can figure out what is the best version of me that can show up for this task let me explain what i mean even though studying in medical school seems like one huge thing it's obviously composed of so many different sorts of studying and tasks that i need to do and all of these things will naturally for me fall into some sort of category so i'm going to list all of these things and i'm just going to let my brain instinctively group them and what tends to happen to me for my studying is that they fall under four categories reading writing problem solving and physical practice the reason that this is valuable is that i can then evaluate how much attention drive and energy is required for all of the tasks in these different categories so for example so the reading category is something that requires relatively low attention compared to everything else that i need to do it also requires low levels of drive because i'm likely to want to do things here because if i want to study the easiest thing i can do realistically is just read something about it it's quite fun and also when it comes to energy it's very low level energy i can do it lying in bed before i go to sleep i can compare this with writing for example which is an activity which requires high levels of attention i really really need to do active work to get the task done also it requires high levels of drive i usually don't find writing essays or writing projects or writing kind of studies and research interesting i find it really challenging and also it requires high levels of energy just because it requires so much motivation and work on my end so i can see how any task that falls in a category that requires little attention little drive and little energy is an activity that i'm likely to have high levels of motivation to do on the other end any tasks that requires high levels of attention high levels of drive and high levels of energy will be a task that i will generally have low motivation to do because it takes a lot of work so i will explain in a moment why this categorization helps a lot when it comes to scheduling but just now we can see how this breakdown kind of adds color and adds life and empowers my brain in the way that it approaches work in general because given a day where i have for example low levels of motivation if i thought of studying as one huge big thing this level of motivation wouldn't be enough to get it done however there will always be tasks that require so little energy or so little drive or so little attention that means that they fall under the amount of motivation that is required and therefore i have enough to do it and i'm actually enjoying and able to do this activity so whenever i'm approaching tasks i will kind of categorize them in this way and see therefore based on the attention drive and energy that is required for them how much motivation does this task require of me and how much brain power does this task require next i'm moving on to my second point which is perhaps the most important one of all for me and this is basically understanding how my brain conceptualizes time because not all time off is made the same and it's not appropriate or functional for me to just book in something to work whenever i have time off because i won't be able to work that way the way that my brain conceptualizes time or what's a good time or a bad time to do something is very much based on my energy and motivation and therefore when i think of scheduling or when i think of time in general it's always done on a motivation map and i'm going to show you how you can do motivation mapping for yourself it pays a lot in the future to understand exactly how you work and how your levels of motivation fluctuate throughout the day week month year etc etc i'm going to show you how i do this for example i know that on a daily basis i am not a morning person in the morning my levels of motivation and energy tend to be quite low i'm a night owl so as the day progresses my levels of motivation tend to increase and they peak at around evening and night time until obviously they crash because i i need to sleep so this is how my levels of motivation increase throughout the day it's also important to realize here that my self-restraint however goes down throughout the day so what this means is that i don't have the ability to force myself to do things during the night time so even though i have more energy to do things then i can't force myself to do things if i schedule something for late at night i'm very likely to go ah square i'll just do it tomorrow however first thing in the morning or in the early part of the day i'm able to do tasks that i don't want to do a lot easier even though i have a lot less energy so what this means is for the evening is a good time for me to do a high energy task that i enjoy the morning time is a good time for me to do a low energy task which i hate and in the midday or the early evening or as soon as i finish my main obligations is a good time for me to do a task which is high energy which i don't enjoy so this sort of motivation mapping throughout the day is something that i always keep in mind when i'm going to discuss what i discuss later but this doesn't only happen on a daily basis for example a sunday night is not a good time for me to work i have low levels of motivation even though it's technically evening time because i just think oh it's a new week i deserve time off saturday is a good time for me to work so kind of thinking how these levels fluctuate throughout the week but also very importantly there are unique things that will act as motivation boosters that i am aware of so for example if i finish a huge project let's say a youtube video i know that once i finish a big task i get a huge motivation boost in general in life i just feel like i've accomplished something and i'm happy so i know as soon as i publish something the next day is a good time for me to actually have higher levels of motivation so i can put in a task there that is more difficult that i don't want to do or for example when i do very well in something like an exam or when i finish a semester and a new semester starts or for example after my birthday or when a new year starts or a new season starts i know that i have this renewed level of motivation boosters which kind of fades in a few days or weeks depending on how big the thing is that happened but i know that i am due these motivation boosters after something good happens in my life now as this motivation map is coming into life one super important part of it is putting in the real deadlines for what i'm supposed to do so this for example is when is the project due when is the practice exam happening when is the final exam happening when is the academic year closing all of these things will go in my calendar and these will be the only things that i will put in there as strict deadlines the reason for this is that i'm creating little motivational loops for example between now and when my final exam is i know that i will have a slowly increasing which at some point will go exponential motivation level to study for that exam also i know if i have a project kind of sooner i will have the same sort of pattern like low motivation and it will greatly increase as i go around it so i know as i'm creating this little cycles and bubbles of tasks that are due i know that as i get closer to the task my motivation for getting that task done will increase with the anxiety of the deadline increasing now i know that i should not and very often actually now i don't rely on that last minute motivation to get things done but in the back of my mind i always know that it is there so worst case scenario i know that i shouldn't feel too too bad if five days before something is due i don't feel like doing it because i know three days later i'm going to want to do it a lot more because my motivation is due to increase as the task is due so these are also things that i will add to my motivation map now we move on to the last stage as i said up to now everything is instinctual nothing has actually gone on to my schedule apart from the strict deadlines but i have all of the instincts to get things done on one level i know all of the tasks that i am due to do and what categories they fall into what my levels of motivation are for this task how much energy and focus they will require what is the best mindset that i can be in to do this task on the other level i'm intimately familiar with every day all of the free time that will be available in my calendar is time that also based on this motivation mapping i know what my energy will be at the time what my motivation will be at the time kind of what's going on in my life and how i'm emotionally feeling around this time so basically what i then do is that every single day i will pick a task based on what the motivation requirements and the energy requirements for that task are and what i'm feeling at the moment and what my motivation map instinctively looks like at the moment and so once i match these with one another the only question i need to ask myself is what's the best thing for me to do right now and what do i feel like doing right now and that's what i will just sit down and do because i am picking everything that i need to do every single day i'm kind of avoiding that pain of putting my brain into this arbitrary regular schedule of things because it has the freedom to pick what it needs to do when it makes sense what this also means is that then i am guaranteeing that i am showing up as the most motivated as the most focused as the most excited version of myself to do that task this is a very intelligent elizabeth that shows up because when i need to do things that do not match my motivation at the moment that do not match my energy at the moment i can show up as a very slow bored annoyed elizabeth that will not get this task done properly which then means that the difference between this arbitrary schedule and this motivation mapped schedule is night and day the results that i get are absolutely so different because i'm always working as my motivated and focused version of myself which doesn't need to stick to routines which i hate because the deadlines are always in the calendar i never forget or skip them they are always done in time and on a day-to-day basis i just do what i feel like very often i do end up falling behind on things but i have a video where i explain my fall behind catch up and go ahead schedule which is definitely a good way to get things done chaotically within these real frameworks of real deadlines and also the end of the day in the long term i'm showing up as my focused and motivated version to do most things an activity which definitely requires low levels of energy drive and attention to do and therefore i do not need a lot of motivation to make myself do is improving on my logical and problem-solving skills and generally making myself a better thinker through brilliant which are very kindly sponsoring this video i definitely think that there are compounding benefits in my problem solving and thinking skills and especially the way that i approach learning in general i think has changed ever since i've started to use brilliant at the moment i am doing the new course on everyday maths because surprisingly unsurprisingly i very much enjoyed doing more complicated maths in school than the pure basics i definitely think the broader principles behind how brilliant to create lessons and do teaching is something that i try to apply myself when i'm teaching myself things in medicine so if you also want to have a look at brilliant there will be a link in my description that will give you 20 off but otherwise if you made it so far thank you so much for spending this time with me i hope you have a wonderful rest of your day be count yourself and others and don't believe everything you think thanks bye

Channel: Elizabeth Filips

Views: 483,417

Keywords: how to study, study, how to create a calendar, scheduling tips, schedule, how to schedule, productive, how to be productive, how to study for exams, how to study effectively, how to stop wastsing time, how to stop wasting time, how to stop wasting time and study, how to organise your day, how to organize your time, how to organize your life, learn english

Id: v8EaeKusFvA

Length: 13min 0sec (780 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 06 2022