Clarity In Direction

When we think about productivity, it is often a discussion about production.

How much can we produce?

How quickly can we produce results?

How efficiently can we generate this production?

Productivity is often considered by a simple equation of:

The challenge is it is very easy to become ceaselessly busy and stuck with ‘busy’ work. Busy work can be organizing the aesthetics of a room, a folder, a desk. Busy work can be creating the best music playlist to listen to while working to enhance your focus And in their own rights, those tasks can in fact be productive if they are clearly and definitely your focus for the day and part of your designed life.

However, if they are not your ‘prioritized tasks’ for the day, this kind of busy work can be distracting and detracting from your life design.

And I intentionally write it as a detraction from your life design because these day-to-day impacts, although minimally impacting in a short-term perspective, can have wide-reaching impact on your life in the grand scheme of things.

Clarity in direction and clarity in goals is therefore a vital component of productive work because it shapes and defines what it means to be productive. It clarifies the objectives you are pursuing.

Asking clarifying questions on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual basis is helpful. Looking even 3 years, 5 years, 10 years in the future, although quite far into the future, can equally provide benefits as you adjust your trajectory.

Asking yourself some clarifying questions regularly likewise ensure they remain on the forefront of your mind.

Question 1: What things have been on my to do list for a long time?

If I continue to defer and neglect these items on my to-do list, are the truly important to me. They may feel like they should be important, but do they actually matter to me.

Question 2: What will help me achieve long term goals?

Does this to-do item bring me closer to my long-term goal. Our long-term goals are aspirations that require time, dedication and persistence. They cannot be accomplished in a week or month’s time and require consistent work. As such, creating short-term goals that align and directly support the fulfillment of our long term desires requires careful design.

Question 3: why am I making my current decisions?

Asking why is an effective tool to get at the core of your actions. If you cannot answer this question clearly, it may mean that you haven’t pinned down your rationale. Especially when we want to have clear, focused efforts, this needs to be rectified. Be clear on why you are working on something and why it is important to you. You may not know the full scope of the long-term ramifications of your actions, but recognizing it, even if it’s a gut feeling that something positive is coming out of this effort is important. For example, with creative and artistic endeavours, it may not be clear at the beginning whether a new technique, a new subject matter, a new artistic medium is “productive” but the act of exploring this new artistic expression may be important.

Question 4: what do you wish was different in your life right now?

Thinking about what you would choose to be different in your current life can help you think about what is the most important to you. By understanding and contrasting your varied desires for change, you can better understand what areas of your life need to be prioritized. If I have 5 areas of change I want in my life but when compared and contrasted I can clearly identify change #4 as the biggest need over change #1, #2, #3, or #5, then change #4 is the clear priority.

Question 5: what should I be doing more of?

This sounds like an obvious and perhaps silly and redundant question to ask but it is often neglected because it seems so obvious. Many times you already know the answer but it is hard to accept that answer or to hear yourself. So make sure you are regularly asking yourself what you should be doing more of to help you think about your priories and dreams.

Question 6: what daily changes would I like to make?

Asking yourself about what things you can do differently each day can help you think abut daily priorities and your life on a smaller scale. These small scope changes can snowball into much larger changes in our lives over the course of a year. Every little change can create a new habit, a new behaviour, and the culminatory effect of 365 small changes in our lives can drastically impact its trajectory.

Question 7: what things give me energy?

Being awarer of how certain things give or take energy from you is an effective tool in designing your life. As you become more attune with what activities give you energy, you can start to build those into your day-to-day life more often. You want activities in your life that give you energy because these activities will keep your energized and seeking to do more.

Question 8: is there anything I feel like I’m missing in my life?

What do you think is missing in your life? ‘Missing’ is an interesting word because it suggests an expectation that it should be there. If there’s something that you feel so strongly about that you feel it should exist in your life, then it’s a good starting point to designing how you will get it. Whether that is a life partner, a workout routine, a set time for administrative and self-care, these can all be good starting points to designing a more productive life.

Question 9: am I ready to start improving my life?

Sometimes our plates are just full. Sometimes we don’t have the room to tweak, adjust, or revamp our lifestyles. Maybe we just had a kid. Not the greatest time to consider making changes. Asking ourselves whether we are currently able ot take on such an undertaking is a good strategy for timing. It is still helpful to recognize areas we do eventually want to target and improve, but recognizing whether we have the capacity to make those changes currently or if they can be deferred is equally important.

Clarity and vision is important because it opens you up to both opportunity and distraction. As you continue to think about your vision and goals, it becomes easier to recognize what is distracting and what aligns with your designs for yourself.