Reach out if you have questions or want to say hi, and thanks for listening!

What led us to this decision...

• Well first, why did we start?
  • We wanted to talk about things we're interested in
  • We wanted practical tips, not the productivity trap
  • We were feeling the courage to experiment
• What decisions made us want to stop?
  • Growth was plateauing
  • We did the exercises in Traction by Gabriel Wineberg
  • Learned that growth would require more time and money
  • We were already constrained by both
  • We both want to focus on fewer initiatives in 2020

What we learned from the show

• Struggles that we learned from
  • Fully understanding marketing
  • Productivity is a diluted and saturated topic
  • Importance of organization
  • Balancing guests and topics
• The happy, fun, growing, learning side
  • Over 5,000 downloads
  • Documenting processes, scheduling, and content
• Leo’s growth
  • Interview skills
  • Organization
  • Recruitment
  • Self-reflection
• Erik’s growth
  • Learning from guests and each other
  • Improved image design that continues to be used in other projects
  • Channeling nervous energy into talkative yip-yap

Related episodes

• 001. A Sleepy Episode
• 009. Working On Your Own Episode
• 012. Saying No Episode
• 025. Productive Podcasting
• 031. Clear your Calendar! with Justin Jackson

Big thanks to our listeners and these amazing contributors:

❤️ Leah Fitch

❤️ Jonathan Baillie Strong

❤️ Will Gant

❤️ Christian Genco

❤️ Peta Sena

❤️ Jessica D'Amico

❤️ Tim Mitra

❤️ Justin Jackson

❤️ Allison Spooner

❤️ Sophia Dagnon

❤️ Laura Lopuch

❤️ Julien Borrelli

• Erik fully embraced Notion for planning
• Leo switched from Todoist to a spreadsheet
• Mastermind meetings for group accountability

Leo's Year in Review

• Improvements to health
• Successful speaking engagements
• A consistent schedule with podcasts
• Successful at writing output
• Audience improvements:
  • +156.32% at Learning Swift
  • +12.85% at BrightDigit
  • +726.15% at LeoGDion
• Future Improvements include email, more video, and audience research

Erik's Year in Review

• Came up with whole-year goals and broke down into quarterly, monthly, and weekly lists
• Also made weekly and monthly habits checklists
• About 20-30% of the anticipated objectives and habits changed over the year
• The habits that stuck were those that Erik had the most direct control, like stretching and diet
• The items that changed or were not met the most typically involved other people or deep research
• Erik's biggest regret: not enough "for-fun, but also is work" tasks
• Erik's biggest desire to change: more regular date nights
• Leo referred Erik to Derek Sivers' article: Stay in touch with hundreds of people

What's being cut in 2020

• Leo's stepping away from organizing meetups and local networking
• Erik is getting away from nonprofit administration, business social media management, and the status quo of local tech events
• We're stepping away from the podcast, too. More on that in the next episode!

• Laura's first email tip: write so the recipient will imagine how their life could be
• How to discover a love of email as a paralegal
• Realizing skills, eight years later
• The benefits of setting weekly email goals
• Treat email correspondence as a journey
• Wait 2 to 3 business days before the first followup
• Two types of cold email: making a pitch and making a connection

Anatomy of a Cold Email

• Where are people with your problem going to talk about their problem?  
• Explain why you chose the recipient over everyone else
• Start a close relationship with your contact and compliment them
• Prove a hypothesis, they should agree with each statement you make
• All of those small yesses lead toward a yes on the big ask
• Avoid exit language
• Avoid asking for more than one thing

Tools

• Streak, CRM for Gmail
• Boomerang
• Crystal Knows

Laura Lopuch online

• @waitingtoberead on Twitter
• lauralopuch.com
• How to double your conversion rate on cold outreach, a recap of Laura's talk at Microconf
• How to Optimize for Replies on Your Cold Emails on Laura’s blog
• I used cold emails to 14x my freelance copywriting business. Here’s how. on Copy Hackers

• Sophia's specialty and how she got there from archaeology
• How UpWork led to better pay in writing
• Dealing with the lack of comfort
• An approach to desiring income without being sleazy
• Making transactions mutually beneficial
• People don’t buy stuff, they buy solutions to problems
• How does your customer think about the solutions to their problems?
• How to ask the right questions to better understand your customer
• Improving pitches by trying different things

How to reach your customers

• The platforms with the lowest barriers or are easiest to self-promote
• Copy Hackers (Joanna Web sp.?)
• Researching, writing a lot, and sharing content where it will be read
• Understanding your reader’s familiarity and how informed they are
• Knowing what it will take for a reader to take action (lots of specific tips here!)
• Focus on and measure one action that you want your readers to take

Tips for getting started

• Low-risk and simple ways a person can practice self-promotion
• Reframe risk as an opportunity or something good for you
• Ways to manage the ever-present emotions that come when taking chances
• Are there books or other sources where people can learn more on the topic
• Follow Copy Hackers
• Read Drive by Daniel Pink
• Read Influence by Robert Cialdini
• Read Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz

Where to find Sophia Dagnon

• @SophiaDagnon on Twitter
• sophiadagnon.com
• Sophia Dagnon on LinkedIn

• NaNoWriMo and flash fiction
• Allison Spooner is the author of Flash in the Dark and The Problem with Humans
• Find Allison online at spoonfulstyle.com or @allyspoon

Outsource your writing parameters

• Accountability through writing groups, events, and contests
• Benefits of deadlines, prompts, settings, and other writing constraints
• Outlining and other ways to complete a novel in small pieces
• Writing exercises and parameters that help you get better with practice
• Telling a story with Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey
• Tips for writing when you need some structure

Methods for practicing writing

• Look for random writing prompts online or in your physical environment
• Start small, like 500 words
• Go to writing events near you
• Try writing at different times and with different techniques to find what works best for you
• Donald Miller's 5 Writing Tips
• Make your customer the hero of your business' stories
• Write for fun, define writing success for you, and a little progress is still progress
• Scale up to make a novel
• One flash fiction story per day will help you reach your NaNoWriMo goal
• Come up with writing prompts for the whole month in advance

• What does a "cleared" calendar look like?
• How can clearing the calendar improve one's productivity?
• Why you shouldn't fill up your calendar with work if you are self-employed
• A clear calendar is open to interruptions and stimulates creativity
• How to stay focused and avoid getting lost in free time
• How to be healthy active on social media
• An experiment that you can try at home or at the office
• How clearing the calendar can be used by employees at traditional or regimented offices
• How to observe the benefits of unstructured or free time
• Other ways to experiment with your calendar and free time

Related links

• Justin’s talk on YouTube
• Justin is the co-founder of Transistor.fm
• Learn more about Justin at JustinJackson.ca
• Follow @mijustin on Twitter
• Justin (megajustin) livestreams on Twitch
• Books by Basecamp
• Shape Up by Ryan Singer
• 11 Reasons Why You Should Schedule Free Time For Yourself by Glenn Santos

Related Episodes

• 003. Goals and Actions Episode
• 006. Top Disciplines Episode
• 009. Working On Your Own Episode
• 019. The Optimization Trap
• 020. Multitasking
• 021. Staying Organized with Idea Management
• 023. 3 Hat Productivity with Christian Genco
• 027. Productive Creativity with Pete Sena

• @TimMitra on Twitter
• Host of the More Than Just Code Podcast and Spockcast
• Cohost of RoundaboutFM
• it-guy.com
• Author of How to Keep Learning After 50
• Tim's SwiftTO talk about Neuroplasticity

Neuroplasticity

• Why should we keep learning?
• Neuroplasticity in simple terms
• The advantage of learning in 45-minute spurts
• Compound learning:
  1. Short-term memories
  2. Long-term memories through repetition
  3. Micro-skill development (building functions in the brain)
• Breaks help move memories from one level to the next
• Use communication to reinforce learning
  • Explain and seek confirmation
  • The rubber ducking technique
  • Using emoji to punctuate words with emotion
  • What the ~ at the end of a Tweet or text means
• Applying learning concepts to unlearning
  • The amygdala typically makes statements
  • The neocortex typically asks questions
  • Self-monitor and ask yourself questions to consciously replace habits

Related links

• Brainjo's Breakthrough Banjo Course
• Dr. Lara Boyd's TEDx Talk about Neuroplasticity
• Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language by Gretchen McCulloch

Related episodes

• Multitasking

• The value in public speaking for you and your audience
• How to understand your audience by researching the conference
• Different ways to organize a talk: story-telling, LEGO instructions, fireside chat, speed dating, and more
• How to handle interruptions and questions
• Following up with your audience after your talk
• Tips for promoting yourself and your work without giving a sales pitch
• Practice: it smooths out the wrinkles and lets your confidence shine
• Different ways to practice your talk before the big event
• Use simple slides, don't switch apps, use a clicker, more words, fewer pictures, use notes
• Observe your body language, tone, pace, and filler words
• How to turn your nervousness into confidence and excitement
• Get extra practice at Toastmasters, meetups, and lunch-and-learns, but remember to get feedback
• Figure out what to speak about by considering past conference topics, your own expertise, whatever excites you, and where you want to grow
• How to find speaking gigs and tips for getting accepted to speak

Special thanks to

• Justin Jackson
• Kristen Belcher
• Mohammad Faani
• Olivia Liddell
• Patrick Masi

Related episodes

• Event Planning with Jessica D'Amico

• Erik: Lansing Codes
• Leo: Lansing Marketing Hackers
• Jess: Peers Conference

As self-employed folks, events are a great way to get feedback from others and learn new things. Part of productivity isn’t just about doing it all yourself, but also about reaching out to others and educating yourself.

Getting started with event planning

• Organizing an event as a way to connect people that can help each other out
• Events have many benefits including establishing oneself in a community, educating others, reinforcing skills, developing new skills, and opportunities to travel
• Find speakers by paying attention to who's talking online and offer a way to accept proposals
• Find sponsors and volunteers by picking ambassadors who know an area well and are eager to ask others for help
• For a first event, start small, set reasonable goals, and keep logistics such as room size in mind
• As an event grows, try different things to keep things fresh and understand what the audience wants
• Some ways to get participants contributing:
  • Ask "what are you working on?"
  • Ask an audience about the challenges they face
  • Host speed-dating style events
  • Think about formats you've never used before
• Consider the power dynamics at your event
• Pick a venue that is physically accessible and easy to get to
• Reach a wider audience by repeating your message a lot, talk about what you're doing, help people be seen, offer discounts and free tickets to underrepresented people
• Twitter is a great place to practice talking to and helping others

There will be challenges

• Start locally and keep it simple to avoid unnecessary challenges
• Make sure to cover the basic necessities like water and bathrooms
• Help everyone feel welcome
• Don't make the event a sales pitch
• Pay attention to the things that feel right
• Paying a venue to manage logistics can reduce the stress and planning you need to do, but can cost more and seem less authentic
• Have a few backup speakers or audience members who can wing a conversation
• Layout a logistics plan down to the minute
• Audiences are often sympathetic when challenges arise
• Write down the things you want to pay attention to and keep it in mind when reading tweets, considering proposals, etc.
• Make sure your profiles on social media direct people where you want them to get involved
• Have a Code of Conduct and be clear about it
• Train on important issues like how to remove a disruptor and what to do in a medical emergency
• You can’t have a plan for everything, but planning helps prepare for the unexpected things too
• Be selective about where you’re spending your time
• Emulate people you think are doing it well

Useful tools

• Google Sheets for budget tracking
• TypeForm for forms and surveys
• Zapier for scheduling and automating communication
• Trello for task management
• Twitter Lists for reaching and connecting people
• TweetBot to more effectively navigate Twitter
• Buffer for scheduling social media
• Slack for coordinating with your team

Where to find Jess

• Twitter: @justjessdc
• Peers Conference
• DC Women Who Code

• Pete Sena (@petesena) is the founder, CEO, and CCO of Digital Surgeons, a design, branding, and digital marketing consultancy
• Pete explains his responsibilities as Chief Creative Officer

The intersection of creativity and productivity

• Create / Produce vs. Creativity / Productivity
• The seesaw of effectiveness and efficiency
• Creativity is born from curiosity
• Productivity is how people are a pro at their craft
• Critical thinking is important for becoming great creatives
• Being "Creatively productive"
• "Creativity is just connecting things." -Steve Jobs
• "My powers are ordinary. Only my application brings me success." -Isaac Newton
• Understanding shortcuts
• Repetitive vs. Unique

Managing creative duties and other responsibilities

• How productivity differs in a CEO and a CCO role
• “Labels are important but be careful how they define and limit you”
• Set a vision
• Remove obstacles
• Methods for giving all roles the attention they need
• Mitigating affronts to productivity in different roles

Tips for managing creative people

• Stop managing creative people!
• Understand their motivations and enable them
• Servant leadership
• Daniel Pink’s Drive: three intrinsic motivators
• Problems that are unique to creative teams and their work
• Pete's advice for a new manager of a creative team
• Dividing work up in a creative team
• Find out why work is important to the team and client
• Translating the needs and wants of the client
• Look at team members, project requirements, brands, rules, etc.
• Logistical planning meetings for dividing tasks and ensuring consistent messaging
• Create concepts to review
• Find opportunities for people to collaborate

Cultivating a creative skill

• Critical thinking is clearly listening to the intention of the person who is saying or writing something
• Design thinking exercises
• Combine uncommon things (three columns exercise)
• Idea discussion > brainstorming
• Keep using it. If you’re not, then the skill will diminish.
• Outside of work: make a vision board, mash sources from media (e.g. magazines)
• Improving a creative skill over lunch breaks
• Why do you want to start that creative thing? (5 why’s)
  • If there are multiple answers, split them up and explore them
  • Elon Musk's first-principles thinking
  • Use existing tools, read, and watch others
  • Micro progress and the power of getting started, a James Clear interview
  • Make a game out of it
• Other ways someone can grow a creative skill
• The importance of motivation, inspiration, technique, gumption, and experience
• Knowing where to focus your energy when developing a skill

Related links

• Digital Surgeons
• Warren Berger’s Three-Part Method for More Creativity on Farnam Street
• Pete Sena blogs about productivity on Medium
• Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott for better writing
• Write Dumb: Writing Better By Thinking Less by James Dowd

Related episodes

• 017. Atomic Habits by James Clear - Part 1
• 018. Atomic Habits by James Clear - Part 2

• First, have a good night of sleep (see episode 1)
• Erik drinks a high-calorie, low-sugar coffee shake (thanks, gallbladder) before doing anything else in the morning.
• Energy (calories) and caffeine work well to kickstart the day so long as they're not overdone
• What part of your day has the most momentum? (morning, afternoon, night)
  • It may depend on what you'll be doing (see "Have a plan to follow" below).
  • Identify which tasks you have planned and how they will affect your energy.
  • If you have something planned that requires lots of prolonged focus, engage "no distractions" mode.
  • If you have something planned that you have to split up (because of meetings or other interruptions) or it's something you don't have sustained energy for (making lots of phone calls), consider spreading the tasks out with pomodoros or other tasks.

Avoid distractions when getting in the "flow"

• Use Do-Not-Disturb when you can. Otherwise, consider turning off notifications for non-critical functions like Slack, email, etc. so you can still receive phone calls. This is especially useful for parents!
• Even easier parenting trick: set your phone across the room so you can still take calls, but you won't see all the other distracting notifications
• Don’t check email — there are apps and extensions to help with this!
• Work on a task for 10-20 minutes to build some momentum
• If you need to focus, avoid working at places with lots of distractions or use other environment-design techniques to lower the impact of those distractions
• Changing your phone screen to greyscale doesn't work as well as one might think
• Screen Time on iOS is a great tool and if you have an iPhone you should try it!
• Is flow endurance a thing? Erik can code for longer periods of time than he can do correspondence, social media, graphics, etc. on most days. Is this due to building endurance for programming or is it more nuanced?

Have a plan to follow

• The biggest challenge is not knowing what to do…
• Use your calendar for yourself to plan activities
• Erik’s weekly checklist marks the day of the week that certain tasks are due so he doesn't have to look at his calendar (which is yet another distraction!)
• Managing interruptions
• Managing unplanned time

Exercise!

• Morning vs Afternoon
• Exercise and play spread throughout the day can help with creative tasks and learning. If you take breaks, get up and move around, play, walk, exercise, please!
• Seriously, there's science behind this: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2013.00824/full

Related episodes

• Sleepy Episode
• Distractions Episode
• Christian Genco Episode

• Leo recently presented and wrote about getting started with podcasting
• Leo's motivation for taking a holistic look at what it takes to create, publish, and promote a podcast

The overall process

• Our overall publishing process, from brainstorming to recording, to promoting
• If you're considering starting a podcast, we recommend that you have two of audience, motivation, and purpose before moving forward

Schedule and format

• What our recording schedule looks like and how regularly we record
• How we get ready to talk about something in the days before we record
• We get very specific about our format
• Here are the "before" notes for this episode
• Research what your audience wants to know, not just what you want to share
• Ideas for podcast structure:
  • Answer the 5 Ws
  • Share a chronological story
  • Present a "thesis"

Hardware, software, and doing things the hard way

• We use Skype to record online
• Erik uses Audacity and a gaming headset to record his audio
• Leo uses Garage Band and ATR-2100 (with this combo)
• What Leo learned by editing episodes himself prepared us for asking Julien Borrelli to edit for us
• Just Fucking Ship by Amy Hoy is a great book to help decide what's worth making yourself and what's worth asking someone else to prepare
• For album art, Erik takes pics with his iPhone 6s Plus, arranges in Canva, and merges into video clips with FFmpeg
• Here's an example of how we use FFmpeg to make video clips from an MP3 and photo:
• ffmpeg -r 1 -loop 1 -i 023.okproductive/images/instagram.png -i okproductive-23-quote1.mp3 -acodec copy -r 1 -shortest -vf scale=720:720 023.okproductive/clips/1-instagram.mp4

Publishing and promoting

• When everything’s edited and ready to go, here's what we do:
  • Upload MP3 to transistor
  • Fill in title, description, and clean up notes
  • Use Buffer to queue up social media, one week at a time, saving all text in a Google Sheet
  • Write down new or changed schedule and processes in a Google Doc
• What we do to announce a new episode, drum up interest, and share what we’re creating

Let's do this again

• What Leo has learned by considering how we've changed since starting the podcast
• In another year, we'd expect to have better equipment and perhaps start putting more money into social media
• We'll definitely revisit our process in another year or two to see what's changed!

• Any active desktop issues with Endgame?
• The unexpected is so memorable, even for simple things like going to the movies

Sleep, habits, and apps

• How we've been sleeping
• What we've tried from Atomic Habits
• What we're using besides Google Inbox
• New parenting tips

Erik’s year (so far)

• Health is going the best of all categories, it's where he has the most control
• How do you give your kid challenges without breaking down their self-esteem?
• Staying in touch with friends that live far away
• How to stay in touch with hundreds of people, according to Derek Sivers

Leo's year (so far)

• Failed at Main Goal but very successful in others
• Trying to learn to delegate more
• Saying no to a lot, but saying yes when he can
• Struggling with the organization of tasks and delegation

Ideas for future topics

• What are some topics we could dig a little deeper on or new topics we haven’t covered yet?
  • Book reviews
  • Small experiments (trying apps, habits, etc.)
  • Small, actionable tips (2-minute episodes between the longer episodes)
  • Managing emotions
  • Productive advocacy
  • Productive learning
• Send us ideas or ask for more at:
  • hello@okproductive.com
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram

• A little about Christian and how he first met Leo
• Mister Money Mustache, spending less
• Patrick McKenzie, inventor of Bingo Card Creator
• A day in the life of Christian Genco
• Prepopulate your task list, start with your most important task and include lots of easy wins
• Put healthy snacks, hard tasks, and what to do if tired or feeling overwhelmed in your task list
• Plan for spending time in the sun, meditating, journaling, and cooking

Why 3 hats?

• Challenges that Christian faced in order to balance all of his responsibilities:
  • Putting off difficult work
  • Lots of distractions from new or exciting opportunities
  • The constant questioning of priorities
• "You can take it seriously, give it the time, money and attention it deserves and build it into something real. But what you’re doing is not working, so either shut it down or double down." — Hiten Shah to Nathan Berry about ConvertKit
• What didn't work to solve these problems:
  • External accountability didn't align with his personality
  • Homegrown todo lists simply added more distractions
  • Pomodoros didn't help understand why work was important or handle administrative tasks well
  • No framework for breaking down tasks

3 Hat Productivity explained

• Separate work into 3 modes:
  • CEO - picks the direction
  • Manager - makes a list of tasks
  • Worker - completes the tasks
• Use Things app to communicate between the three roles
• Before developing the 3 Hat system, Christian was mostly in Worker mode. 
• Clear tasks get higher priority than undefined tasks
• Do not change direction until the most important task is done or a 4-hour daily limit is encountered

Dealing with distractions

• Don’t try to prevent distractions from happening — that would take an extraordinary amount of willpower
• Acknowledge distractions and use Things to send them away so you can intentionally revisit them later
• Review your list of distractions:
  • CEO triages the list
  • Review it every three days
  • Group related tasks
  • Remove the tasks that aren’t relevant anymore
  • Keeping something in the list means you’re ruling every other possibility out, so don't hold back when trimming the list!
  • The analogy of a donkey trapped between water and hay
• To keep the list from growing over time, separate the times when you have the idea, prioritize it, and do it

Batching administrative tasks

• Admin tasks are anything that isn't part of your most important task
• Group tasks based on the nature of the work being done
  • Buying things
  • Tracking finances
  • Contacting people
  • Compiling statistics and metrics
  • Research
  • Reading long-form articles in digests
• Do all admin tasks on Saturday

Bonus tips

• If you find Things to be expensive, try Fantastical
• Avoid introducing tools and tech into your process at first, they'll be distracting
• And a few more things for listeners to try 😉

Where to find Christian

• Christian Genco's personal website
• Fileinbox, Christian Genco's business
• Twitter: @cgenco

Related links and apps

• Task Batching by Christian Genco
• 3 Hat Productivity blog

• Will Gant is a co-host of the Complete Developer Podcast
• How Will and Leo met 
• Will's lightning talk at MicroConf

What's in Will's journal

• Will's familial history of journaling
• Unknown stresses as the impetus to start journaling
• Will's original journal was a spreadsheet that covered anything happening during the day that bugged him, taking roughly 20 minutes per day to write
• Switching to monthly journaling helped Will focus on opportunities instead of the bad stuff and takes about 10 minutes to write
• Other ways Will's approach to journaling has changed over the years
• Journaling well after something happens helps separate the act from the emotional state
• Journaling is also a great way to track things that are tough to remember
• Will's is an advocate and regular user of float/sensory-deprivation tanks for meditation
• Bonus lifehack: Rethink your internal calendar to start each year on April 1st, after winter and taxes

Keeping life organized with journaling

• How Will uses journaling and KanbanFlow to keep track of upcoming tasks
• Journaling can take many forms: a food diary, a workout journal, daily insights, monthly reflections, etc.

Tips to start journaling

• Pick a time period (daily, weekly, etc.)
• Write only what you remember
• Make a note of the emotions that you remember as well
• Keep it simple and easy: use paper or a plain text file
• After writing a new entry, revisit a few past entries
• Keep each entry short
• Don't out-write your previous entry
• Write only for yourself, be blunt

Effecting change with journaling

• Writing actions and (separately) your emotions is great for personal growth, especially for kids
• A food diary is an easy way to observe and adjust what's going in your body
• Write down repeating chores so you remember to do them and how to do them
• Keeping track of multi-step tasks is tough in simple journaling and to-do systems
• Nothing beats a text document when recording lots of details
• Recipes are some of the oldest types of journal entries

Will Gant on the interwebs

• Complete Developer Podcast
• Twitter: @gantsoftsys

Related links and apps

• Getting Started Journaling from the Complete Developer Podcast
• 9 Career Benefits of Journaling from the Complete Developer Podcast
• The 200th Episode of the Complete Developer Podcast
• Nozbe, an all-in-one to-do, project, and time management app
• KanbanFlow is a web-based lean project management tool
• Productivity in Tech blog by Jay Miller

• A little about Jonathan Baillie Strong and how he met Leo
• Jonathan's best practices for attending a conference
• Jonathan's daily work

Inbox management

• How Jonathan got interested in inbox management
• His general system for inbox management and how it relates to GTD
• How often Jonathan grooms his inbox
• The most obvious benefits to his inbox management approach
• Where does Jonathan put his ideas
• His system for keeping them organized
• How often you should revisit ideas and explore them more deeply
• How to consider which ideas are worth pursuing further, which should get tossed, and which need to sit for a while longer

The One-Touch approach

• Basic concepts:
  • Touch each email only once
  • When you touch an email, do one of the following:
    • Send it to your calendar
    • Create a to-do task
    • Make a note of the idea
    • Put it in a Read It Later app
• Keeping email in your inbox is like looking at mail and putting it back in your mailbox
• How to decide where to send an idea
• Ideas to keep evolving your own idea management system

Jonathan's app recommendations

• Things is a highly-streamlined, highly-recommended task manager
• Gestimer for daily reminders
• Numi is a beautiful calculator app
• Extensity is a Chrome extension for managing Chrome extensions
• Cisco Spark meeting notes, sadly discontinued on May 31, 2019 😭
• Video speed controller is a Chrome extension for playing videos faster or slower
• Autohotkey is a great hotkey automation tool for Windows
• Keyboard Maestro is a hotkey automation tool for Macs
• Focusmate helps you focus by pairing you with virtual coworking partners
• FIP Radio for listening to chill French music online
• Snagit for better screenshots (bonus trivia: it's made in OK Productive's neighborhood!)
• Listennotes.com for finding podcasts
• Castbox.fm is a great, free podcast app

More apps and related links

• Tropical MBA Podcast and in particular, this post about Standard Operating Procedures
• Work the System (Book)
• Process Street is great for managing workflows on a team
• ProcessKit has tons of business automation tools and makes it easy to create your own
• Unroll.me for mass-unsubscribing from email lists
• IFTTT to make apps talk to each other automatically and speed up mundane tasks
• Zapier to make apps talk to each other automatically and speed up mundane tasks
• Instapaper to save anything so you can read it offline
• How to Be More Productive with a Daily System for High Output by Nat Eliason
• The PARA Method: A Universal System for Organizing Digital Information by Tiago Forte
• One-Touch to Inbox Zero by Tiago Forte

Where to find Jonathan Baillie Strong

• On Twitter: @jonbstrong
• At ComDev Media

• Apparently, Leo doesn't like cupcakes 🧁
• 12 habits that destroy your focus and productivity, by Jari Roomer

Multitasking, defined

• Multitasking is trying to accomplish two or more tasks by quickly switching back and forth between them
• Multitasking is like juggling: you keep lots of things in motion for as long as possible, it looks like lots of work, but you’re not actually accomplishing anything except moving things around. You can get better at juggling, but you’re still just getting better at moving things around.
• Another analogy: texting while driving. This is the bad form of multitasking where you shift your attention rapidly between two tasks, each distracting from the other with potentially bad consequences. The good form of multitasking when driving: listening to an audiobook or music.
• We often conflate getting a lot done and doing lots of things at once.
• Queueing one background task while doing another is GOOD.
• Being distracted is BAD.

Context switching, defined

• Context switching is the time, effort, process, etc. required to switch from one task to another.
• For people, this typically involves finding an acceptable stopping point for the current task, performing some steps to actually switch to the next task, and reframing one’s mind to think about the new task.
• It’s a computing term that is commonly applied to people trying to actively change from doing one thing to doing another.
• Also called “shifting gears.”
• It may seem like you're saving time, but you’re not. Those context switches aren’t accomplishing tasks, they’re taking up little bits (hopefully) of time that add up over the hours you work on two or more things.
• Multitasking and context switching train yourself to be busy. “Oh, let me just do this one quick thing” over and over again encourages taking on more work and doing things in an order that probably doesn’t match your priorities.

Common triggers of multitasking

• Lots of open tabs encourage you to click links, read, or look for deprioritized work
• Leaving your email or calendar open are easy ways to distract oneself
• Notifications on your desktop or phone are just an older form of click bait
• Natural pauses or "downtime" create opportunities to switch to something else
• Any small distraction. Even a conversation nearby can completely pull your attention away from your work
• Staying focused is hard and takes practice, especially in this day and age of constant information overdose.

Know your trigger and declare an alternative response

• Write down your triggers when they happen
• Write down what you want to do instead of multitasking
• Pin them to your work area to make them visible
• Some positive alternatives to multitasking:
  • Take a drink of water
  • Do some in-place stretches
  • Look up from the computer and focus on something far away
  • Take some slow, deep breaths
  • Put on headphones
• Avoid these at all cost!
  • DO NOT switch to another program or tab
  • DO NOT pick up your phone or another device
  • DO NOT talk to other people around you while you're focused on work
  • DO NOT eavesdrop on other convos

• Premature optimization is when you try to improve a process before knowing how to measure the results of the change.
• An idea to improve your productivity can sound really appealing and make you want to do it right away, but without knowing how effective the change will be, the impact could be minuscule and use up more (decision-making) effort than is worthwhile.
• Making lots of small or arbitrary, immeasurable changes to your productivity is not the same as making a few changes that have a big, measurable impact.

How does one avoid the optimization trap?

• Recommendation #1: simplify! Reduce the number of changes you are actively trying to make. You probably have some semblance of a routine. Pick one thing to change and try it for a few weeks before assessing how well it worked.
• Recommendation #2: be scientific — in the simplest way possible!
  • The scientific method is one of Erik's favorite systems humans have devised.
  • Here's our simplified scientific method:
    1. collect data
    2. analyze it
    3. make a prediction
    4. test it
    5. repeat
  • We reordered the steps to prioritize measuring results. Presented this way, the scientific method can be seen in lots of other processes, like in agile software development, experience design, and other human-centered, creative processes.
  • This order also allows you to practically know when scientific optimization is worth pursuing:
    Measure first to see how much room there is for improvement before you try something!
  • Example: Alarmy. The app first asks simple questions to identify an effective way to wake you up. By collecting this data first, the app can either turn on extra features or suggest that you don't need the app and are perhaps fixing the wrong problem.
  • Example: Screen Time. This Apple app gathers social media and other app usages for a week and then provides a report of its analysis. The results are a quick and easy way to determine if you should avoid your phone and which apps consume most of your phone time.
• Recommendation #3: Take breaks. Resting and recharging are not wasted time! They help power you up to take on your next task with maximum effort and energy.
• Here are some simple ways to practice recharging:
  • Take the scenic route home.
  • Go for a short walk.
  • Close your eyes and breathe (seriously, try this when stretching or exercising — be safe about it). Call it meditation if that helps you feel better about it.
• Our bodies need to recharge and they can’t do that if we treat downtime as lost productivity.

Warning signs that you may have fallen in the optimization trap

• Beware of anything that saves you time so that you can work more
  • Meal prep. services, delivered groceries, home cleaning or yard services, etc.
  • If you use these services because you’re not hitting your work goals each day then you’re optimizing the wrong thing
  • Improving productivity means producing more in less time, not producing more with more time
  • Make sure the “optimization” you choose directly corresponds to producing more in less time
  • Erik's example: uninstalling Facebook and using Buffer/News Feed Eradicator directly affected his productivity because he was getting sucked into reading his timeline at times when he was supposed to be producing social copy for work
• Start being sensitive to how you divide your attention while you’re working
  • Avoid or schedule time-wasters at work (reading social media, commuting, texting/chatting, etc.)
  • Focus on one thing at a time so you can also focus on being most productive at one thing at a time
  • Practice making decisions quickly. Idling and deciding is also not the same as recharging.

Some closing thoughts

1. When it comes to productivity, avoid premature optimization. Know the potential impact of a change will be significant before you try it.
2. Measure your productivity before you make changes to it. Otherwise, how do you know the change was even an improvement?
3. Take Breaks. Your brain is a muscle and needs rest in order to grow.
4. Optimize the systems you’re using to produce, not other parts of your life that will give you more time to produce.

Mentioned in this episode

• MicroConf - a big conference for small, self-funded software companies
• Peers Conference - a conference where creative and technical professionals can share their experiences
• We’re Optimizing Ourselves to Death by Zander Nethercutt
• A Twitter thread where Christopher Hawkins offers ways Emma Wedekind might combat feeling like she has to always be "on"
• The Secret to Having Enough Time by Megan Holstein

Related episodes

• Episode 10 - Dealing with Time Wasters
• Episode 5 - Making Quick Decisions

• Be specific about your habits!
• From the book:
  • People who make a specific plan for when and where they will perform a new habit are more likely to follow through. Too many people try to change their habits without these basic details. 
• Don't be a busy-body. Make sure your habits are moving you toward that ideal vision of yourself and your goals.

Motivation and Environment

• In practice, being aware of your motivation at the times you need it is hard to do. It makes a lot more sense to identify your motivation and build a system around it so that you don’t have to remind yourself of your motivation. This is especially true when you are attempting to transform your identity to build better habits.
• We're fangs of the inversion of the steps to form a habit as ways to kick out bad habits. For example, the opposite of make it obvious is make it invisible.
• It’s worth using this approach to the extreme to break your worst habits: uninstall social media apps, hide the remote, throw away the sugary processed foods, and so on.

Find, Fix, and Track Habits

• Yes, yes, yes: find alternative ways to reduce stress as opposed to trying to remove the stress. Align your approach with who you want to be to amplify the results of your habits.
• Remember that each step is small and leads to incremental change but over time they really add up.
• Erik really wants to go through the exercise of listing his habits and marking them bad, good, or neutral. It was hard not to do it while reading this book. Who’s with him?

The Power of Sticking to a Habit

• When you are trying to form a habit, focus on making the habit easy to repeat instead of trying to be perfect at doing it.
• Repetition is more important than getting it right the first time. Preparation rarely reduces failure
• This reminds us of the melting ice example. You have to know that adding heat will eventually cause the ice to melt. You have to pick habits that eventually lead to results.

Law of Least Effort

• Leo actually practices this example from the book:
  • You are more likely to go to the gym if it is on your way to work because stopping doesn’t add much friction to your lifestyle. By comparison, if the gym is off the path of your normal commute—even by just a few blocks—now you’re going “out of your way” to get there.
• This works well for Erik in a lot of situations. The first that comes to mind is taking care of his body: home gym, body weight exercises, and stretching have been a lot easier to stick with than going to a gym or yoga studio.
• There are examples that don't fit the Law of Least Effort very well, like studying. Free time can be severely limited during the day and the times where studying may require the least effort may not be the best time to learn or dedicate time to the habit of studying.
• Sometimes if something is important, it’s worth extra effort. Not to mention that the effort can be reduced and simplified with environment design. In other words, this "Law" is not a hard and fast rule and the book does offer strategies for approaching exceptional situations.

Using Extrinsic Motivation

• Hint: make the good stuff feel great right away and make the bad stuff feel bad.
• Linking extrinsic motivation (immediate reward) of a habit to the intrinsic motivation (your goal) makes a lot of sense!
• Love this quote from the book:
  • It’s possible to train yourself to delay gratification but you have to work with the grain of human nature, not against it.
• Erik connects with identity-based habits so much in this book. He loves the idea of making avoidance habits visible and looking holistically at your identity to find the right ways to immediately reward yourself so that they don’t conflict with your other habits (e.g. choosing a massage instead of a big bowl of ice cream to align with your healthy lifestyle).
• An important lesson from this portion of the book: tracking habits is good, but it’s important to measure the right thing and apply all of the habit rules to measuring (make it obvious, easy, etc). Beware of vanity metrics and if a measure plateaus, pick a different one to keep you from stalling out on your habit.

Drawbacks of Good Habits

• This part of the book is very humbling!
• Developing good habits won’t get you to mastery of a skill, it will only get you good enough (OK Productive approves this message). To keep getting better and to reach mastery you need dedicated practice and regular revising of your habits.
• Reflection and review make sure your habits continue to help you grow.
• Don’t cling to your identity and reframe your identity in ways that can be changed, because it can and will.

Closing Thoughts

• Always be working at your habits!
• Track your habits over multiple time ranges. Track the day-to-day, aggregate and average them over time, too.
• We want all “self help” books to be like Atomic Habits: short, well-organized, easy to summarize, with cheat sheets, templates, and lots of actionable information, and loads of supplemental material that continues to release after your purchase and is given in formats that will always be yours.
• Erik reserves 5/5-star ratings for books with lasting sticking power. It's only a little while after reading, but Atomic Habits is one of those books that will be coming up time and time again in the future.
• Let's start using the concepts in the book and run some experiments in habit making and breaking!

Related Episodes

• 001 - A Sleepy Episode: Erik’s approach to getting a good night’s rest and a great start to the day is a good example of habit stacking
• 003 - Goals and Actions: One point we make is to pursue goals in small, actionable ways
• 004 - Power of Habit Review: We read and review The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg
• 005 - Making Quick Decisions: The 5-Second Rule is strikingly similar to the 2-Minute Rule outlined in Atomic Habits
• 009 - Working On Your Own: Environment design is very important to getting the most out of your work day when you’re a freelancer/solopreneur
• 010 - Time Wasters: Another exercise in environment design focused on removing bad habits that waste your time
• 011 - Year in Review: Habits aren’t enough, you also have to stop occasionally and consciously look at and re-evaluate what you’re doing
• 014 - Project Breakdown: Our process of breaking a big project down into actionable and measurable pieces is really similar to breaking a big goal or identity shift into atomic habits
• 015 - The One Big Thing: Leo and Erik both use habit tracking, writing things down, and environment design as the biggest boosts to their productivity
...

Leo's take:

I compare this to Derek Sivers book on which felt much more disconnected. (It had great elements but there was as much cohesion as this book). This book is filled with so many lessons - many I practice without thinking (and I have talked about on the podcast) but this book explains them so clearly.

Erik's take:

The supplemental material offered with the book purchase is great, too. Cheat sheets, templates, Q&A, bonus chapters... I’ve never read a nonfiction book that got me so geeked to apply the lessons and use the extra tools. And while some of the concepts from the book tend to come more easily to me than what I see of some of my peers, I’m still eager to try the approach to both break a habit and adopt a new (good) one.

Introduction 

Content warning: the introduction starts with a graphic description of bodily harm. If you may find this unsettling, skip the intro. It merely serves as a source of credibility and using the lessons described in the other chapters to overcome adversity.

James captures you right off the bat (no pun intended) with a great anecdote about a serious injury and how he slowly recovered from it through habits.

The Analogy of the Ice Cube 

• The overall thesis of the book is that small changes can compound themselves and how with time those small changes can lead to big outcomes.
• This idea is best illustrated through the financial concept of compound interest.
• The book also compares persistent atomic habits to melting ice:
  • A one-degree shift, seemingly no different from the temperature increases before it, has unlocked a huge change.
  • Complaining about not achieving success despite working hard is like complaining about an ice cube not melting when you heated it from twenty-five to thirty-one degrees.
• We like the analogy of melting ice. Sometimes change takes a long time. Sometimes change requires persistent effort. In both cases you either must trust that results will start to happen (i.e. don’t arbitrarily give up) or know at what point the scales will tip in your favor.

Reshaping Your Identity 

• This chapter is where the book really hooked Erik. He looooooves the notion of Identity-based Habits, which is the idea of using your identity or reframing your identity to acquire better habits. For example, think “I am vegetarian” instead of “I want to eat less meat” to lock those habits in your mindset and transition to the person you really want to be.
• Something we wish was covered a bit more is that other people project their images of our identity onto us (a.k.a. peer pressure). It can be difficult to reframe something such as “I am a confident person” after years of nourishing an identity that we are anxious, shakeable, and easily give into peer pressure (as an example).
• The overall point here is to communicate to yourself and others that you are changing. Declare who you are and let the people who care about you know it too so they can better support your new habits.

The Habit Loop 

• The stages of a habit, from the book:
  1. cue,
  2. craving, 
  3. response,
  4. reward
• The steps to develop a good habit, from the book: 
  1. make it obvious, 
  2. make it attractive, 
  3. make it easy, 
  4. make it satisfying
• Simple does not mean easy, and that’s where the book's templates, strategies, and examples become really useful.
• We like the big-picture thinking here: use habits to make your behavior automatic so you get lots of small rewards to keep you going and then you get the big, long-term intrinsically motivated pay-offs as well.

Are Habits Boring? 

• Habits do not make life dull. They eliminate (or at least diminish) the arduous process of doing things we don't want to do. They also free our minds from thinking about things we don't want to do.
• In the long term, we learn to enjoy those things when they become automatic and we continue to reap the benefits of the habits.

Comparing to Power of Habit

• Atomic Habits contains many personal short examples, analogies, and stories whereas The Power of Habit contains longer stories about newsworthy examples of habits at scale. We found Atomic Habits' stories much more relatable and reproducible.
• The stages of a habit in Atomic Habits involves four steps: cue, craving, response, reward. This is a longer list than the habit loop from The Power of Habit (cue, routine, reward), but we find Atomic Habits' list easier to remember, perhaps because of the double alliteration and parallels it draws with both making new habits and breaking bad habits.
• The Atomic Habits process of making new habits and breaking new habits seems much more concrete to us than those from The Power of Habit. The steps to form a good habit and the inversion of that same process to break a bad habit also seems much more simple!

Related Episodes

• 001 - A Sleepy Episode: Erik’s approach to getting a good night’s rest and a great start to the day is a good example of habit stacking
• 003 - Goals and Actions: One point we make is to pursue goals in small, actionable ways
• 004 - Power of Habit Review: We read and review The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg
• 005 - Making Quick Decisions: The 5-Second Rule is strikingly similar to the 2-Minute Rule outlined in Atomic Habits
• 009 - Working On Your Own: Environment design is very important to getting the most out of your work day when you’re a freelancer/solopreneur
• 010 - Time Wasters: Another exercise in environment design focused on removing bad habits that waste your time
• 011 - Year in Review: Habits aren’t enough, you also have to stop occasionally and consciously look at and re-evaluate what you’re doing
• 014 - Project Breakdown: Our process of breaking a big project down into actionable and measurable pieces is ...

• We tested Alarmy and share our thoughts. This app was recommended to us more than once on r/productivity as a great way to jumpstart your day.
• We have our own subreddit now. Check out r/okproductive for more discussion about topics covered on our podcast, make recommendations, and get to know the hosts!

Apps Reviewed

• Alfred - a fast and powerful command center/assistant on Apple products 

Security and Privacy

• AdGuard - a really good way to block unwanted ads
• Encrypt.me - a simple, reliable, and secure VPN
• Adblock Plus - another great browser extension for blocking all the ads
• Avast - really good antivirus and web protect that runs on Macs and Windows
• KeePass - a file system for managing your passwords that is free and open source
• KeePass Tusk - a browser extension on Firefox and Chrome for auto-filling KeePass usernames and passwords

Cloud Storage

• Dropbox - securely sync files across all your computers
• GDrive - Google's place for creating and sharing files online and on your computer
• Adobe Creative Cloud - powerful tools for creating media
• Apple iCloud - store your photos and files easily from Apple devices

Notes and Tasks

• Bear - a focused writing app for Apple devices
• Todoist - an online todo list and task manager
• Google Docs - Google's tool for creating and editing online documents
• Grammarly - an online tool for checking your spelling and grammar

Miscellaneous

• Skyfonts - an easy way to search for and install fonts
• DND Me - do not disturb me. really, go away
• Rocket - a Mac app that makes it easy to add emoji wherever you're typing

Big Announcement - Reviewing Atomic Habit By James Clear in the next episode

• Post Your Thoughts On the Book at Our Reddit Thread

Also discussed in this episode:

Leo’s One Thing: Writing things down...

• for record keeping (sleep, exercise, health, etc.)
• to collect thoughts (reviewing, reflecting, and venting)
• to avoid interruptions (finish what you start, save the rest for later)
• as reminders for later (todo lists, idea bucket)

Erik’s One Thing: Focus

• Treat social media as a write-only medium
• Remove badges and notifications on phone
• Remove noisy or distracting apps
• Use Do Not Disturb, A LOT
• Use apps that block distractions
• Set aside blocks of time for email, code reviews, and "necessary" distractions

Products mentioned

• Todoist
• Bear
• News Feed Eradicator for Facebook
• Screen Time
• Instagram (post to FB, IG, Twitter all at once)
• Alarmy

• Work is rarely handed to us in small, easily achievable pieces
• Breaking a project down into small pieces gives you a map
• Measuring your progress improves your odds of succeeding

Know your limitations

• You only have so much capacity to do work
• Time, energy, resources, people, knowledge
• Identify what your constraints are

Start whittling away

• Name a few things that represent success for the project
• What needs to happen to accomplish each of those things?
• Prioritize your list
• How can you group similar tasks?

Don’t break everything down at once

• You can’t do everything at once
• You need a list of small things to work on for a short period of time
• When do you resume the project breakdown?
• Doing this exercise takes time and is part of the project
• Ask yourself if you’re close enough to stop

Overview of the process

1. Write down your constraints (time, energy, resources, people, knowledge)
2. Identify your main objectives (this is what success looks like)
3. Prioritize that list
4. Describe high-level steps to achieve each objective
5. Repeat numbers 2 through 4 for each step until you can start working
6. Resume the process when you need to

A fun Twitter exercise

• From Tinker Elle (@elle91): Without using the title of your job, tell me what you do.
• Erik: I help people find ways that tech and tabletop games can make them feel powerful.
• Leo: I teach people about productivity and technology in order to make their lives easier.

• Raising and loving children is productive
• Don’t over strain yourself
• Your priorities change once you have kids, too, and sometimes it's difficult to imagine just how much the little ones can change your world for the better
• Try this: research how much it would cost to hire someone to do a home-related task for you vs. doing it yourself

Include your children and establish boundaries

• Sleep when they sleep
• The YMCA has great childcare options
• Have a room for work as a physical boundary between working on your business and working with your kids
• Have a support network for help: daycare, babysitter, relatives, friends with kids, and so on
• Teach your child (as early as 3-4) to play independently and be safe — they'll carry this with them into adulthood

Break down large projects

• Small, manageable goals are good in general
• Small, achievable tasks are especially good when the kids are home
• Use timers to allocate "me time" and "us time"

Products mentioned in this episode

• Echo Dot: Kids Edition
• Circle Round Podcast
• Wow in the World Podcast
• Bounce houses near you
• Rock Painting Kits
• Board games for little kids (psst, follow Erik for more board games)

In the next episode...

• We'll talk more about breaking down tasks
• We're still looking for books to read and review!

• The Derek Sivers way: “Hell yeah” or “No”
• If you're in unfamiliar territory: “Hell no” or “Let’s try”
• Many decisions aren’t permanent

Finish what’s on your plate first

• Identify the commitments that are important to you and your values
• What are your priorities?
• Where does an opportunity fit in?
• Goal: don’t dilute yourself

Alternate Strategies

• Stop thinking in terms of “yes” and “no” and make a counter-proposal
• You don’t need to respond to everything that comes your way
• Ask about when your decision should be made
• Defer until you have the time or it becomes urgent

Making Boundaries

• Make Yourself Valuable!

"Never half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing." -Advice from Ron Swanson

• Book Review Suggestions

• New Years Resolutions vs Year in Review
• The importance of reflection and guidance
• How a Year in Review helps give direction and addresses changes you should make
• How to deal with the unexpected throughout the years
• How to address new opportunities
• How do you measure results and asses your goals
• How do you cope and adjust for changes
• Be Honest and Forthright - Lying to Yourself Only Hurts You
• Understand What You Want Out Of It
• Get Feedback or Outside Perspective from Others

Previous Episodes

• New Year’s Resolutions
• Power of Habit
• Time Wasters
• Goals and Actions

Year In Review

• Leo’s Year in Review
• Lansing Codes
• Hacktoberfest

Movies

• MoviePass
• Blockers
• Grave of the Fireflies
• Ralph Breaks the Internet
• Mission Impossible: Fallout
• Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse

Nintendo Switch Games

• Breath of the Wild
• Snipperclips
• Super Mario Party
• Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
• Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
• Rayman Legends Definitive Edition
• Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy
• New Super Mario Bros U Deluxe
• GHAMIC - Leo's Twitch Stream
• January 22 9pm - Next Stream 
• Poll for Next Stream - Water or Ice?

Music by Murkok from Fugue

• Power of Habits
• Goals and Actions
• Top Apps Episode
• A Sleepy Episode

Covered in this episode:

• What is a time waster?
• What time of day are you most likely to waste time or get interrupted?
• Are you doing things that bring you joy, motivate you, or satisfy one of your needs?
• Are you consciously choosing to waste time?
• How can you quickly identify when and how you are wasting time?
• How many ways can people interrupt you?
• Which time wasters should be the first to go?
• What are some strategies for limiting and wasting time intentionally?
• How can some scheduled downtime improve your productivity?

Links

• Screen Time on iOS
• Toggl
• Pomodoro
• Rescue Time
• Time Doctor
• Pi-hole

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• CamCard
• HealthCare.Gov

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• Transportation
  • Amtrak
  • Lyft
  • Delta Airlines + Lyft
  • Best Credit Cards For Travel (Forbes)
  • South Shore Line
  • Hertz Gold
• Destinations
  • AirBnB
  • KOA
  • Marriott Rewards
  • 101 Restaurants Where Kids Eat Free (Mr. Free Stuff)
• Kid stuff
  • Ergobaby Baby Carrier 
  • Mac Sports Collapsible Folding Outdoor Utility Wagon

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

Previous Episodes

• Episode 6. List #1 – Top Disciplines Episode (Part 1)
• Episode 3. Goals and Actions
  • Leo talks about scheduling todo items
• Episode 1. A Sleepy Episode
  • Leo talks about sleep tracking

Time Tracking and Scheduling Apps

• Toggl
• Google Calendar
• Doodle
• Time Doctor

Reminders and Todo List Apps

• Reminders (Apple)
• Todoist
• Google Inbox

Note Apps

• Evernote
• Notes (Apple)
• Google Docs
• Bear (Apple)

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• Check-ins 
  • Example of Erik’s weekly task list (Google Doc)
  • Episode 3 – Goals and Actions
  • Episode 2 – New Years Episode
• Waking Up 
  • Episode 1 – A Sleepy Episode
• Restricting Availability 
  • News Feed Eradicator for Facebook (Chrome Extension)

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• The 5 Second Rule by Mel Robbins

Music by Leah Fitch

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• Leo’s Article
• Homework Assignment

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• Sleep Cycle
• Auto Sleep
• Pillow
• Hack Green 80%
• Paradox of Choice
• Old Company Logos were Terrible

Music by Leah Fitch

Show Notes and Links

• Thor: Ragnarok
• Active Desktop
• Sleep Cycle
• Auto Sleep
• Pillow
• HeadSpace