Speaker 1: Welcome to Healthy Ish. Thanks for joining us on the
Speaker 1: Body and Soul podcast. I am Felicity Halle Now. Organizational
Speaker 1: psychologist and executive coach. Simmy Rayett wants us all to
Speaker 1: feel productivity joy. Yes, this is the name of her
Speaker 1: new book, and she is here today to discuss why
Speaker 1: you may struggle with productivity and how many tasks we
Speaker 1: should tackle each day to feel joy, to feel like
Speaker 1: we're getting stuff done. Make sure listening to our sister
Speaker 1: pod extra Healthy Ish, where she shares her five minute
Speaker 1: formula to be more effective in your day. You can
Speaker 1: catch that one wherever you get your podcasts. Simmy, thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today on Healthy Ish.
Speaker 2: How are you?
Speaker 3: I'm really good, Thank you? How are you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I'm actually very excited to talk to you
Speaker 1: because this is right up my ali, how to be
Speaker 1: more productive in your workday. It's something that every single
Speaker 1: listener and all of us want. What typically hinders people
Speaker 1: from achieving what they want in a day?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Look, I think there's a couple of things.
Speaker 3: One is just having.
Speaker 4: So much to do and having a lack of clarity
Speaker 4: on what are.
Speaker 3: The things that really.
Speaker 4: Will move the dial and that are the most meaningful
Speaker 4: and important, so I call them the high impact task.
Speaker 4: So that lack of clarity can make it harder to
Speaker 4: prioritize your goals, prioritize what you need to get done.
Speaker 4: And then also it can make it easy to get sidetracked,
Speaker 4: and we can then spend our time being busy rather
Speaker 4: than focusing on those impactful tasks. I think the other
Speaker 4: thing is energy and focus. So quite often, you know,
Speaker 4: if we've got limited physical energy or emotional energy, we
Speaker 4: can feel fatigued and it's so hard to stay focused
Speaker 4: and motivated. And then there's also the distractions like emails
Speaker 4: and vocals and notifications.
Speaker 3: Worry and stress.
Speaker 4: All these things can really hinder us from being able
Speaker 4: to achieve what we want in the day.
Speaker 2: Well answered, And you're so right about the distraction. I
Speaker 2: mean I find it myself.
Speaker 1: I go into Instagram and I'm like, oh, I just
Speaker 1: need to research this person, and then I'm on there
Speaker 1: for fifteen minutes and then I'm like, oh, what was
Speaker 1: I supposed to do? On he here again? It is
Speaker 1: so frustrating. You've got some different thinking patterns well three,
Speaker 1: that some of us can fall into when we put
Speaker 1: off things or procrastinate or overthink. Can you talk us
Speaker 1: through these well thinking patterns?
Speaker 4: Yeah, So the three thinking patterns, as you said, is
Speaker 4: what I refer to is action bias, procrastination, and overthinking.
Speaker 4: So if we start with action bias, this is that
Speaker 4: tendency to really urge ourselves to take action, to do
Speaker 4: something because we feel that if we are taking action,
Speaker 4: at least we're making some kind of progress. And often
Speaker 4: that's in a response to us feeling anxious and that
Speaker 4: we need to feel busy, so we'll quickly dive into things,
Speaker 4: perhaps not planning or preparing. So a lot of people
Speaker 4: experience action bias. The other one is procrastination, and this
Speaker 4: is essentially rooted in fear.
Speaker 3: It's a fear of either you know we're going to fail.
Speaker 4: We're not going to be successful, perhaps you know others
Speaker 4: are going to criticize us. So this is really about
Speaker 4: delaying what we really need to get done, so you
Speaker 4: just put it off and you kind of leave it
Speaker 4: till the last minute. And then the third one is overthinking,
Speaker 4: and this is where we essentially just think so.
Speaker 3: Much, we analyze, and we.
Speaker 4: Just avoid making a decision because we're so worried about
Speaker 4: making the wrong decision, we become really indecisive, and we
Speaker 4: can then stagnate in moving forward, and that over thinking
Speaker 4: can really paralyze us from taking action, making progress, and
Speaker 4: we can stay stuck. So they're the three thinking your patterns.
Speaker 1: Is it normal to oscillate between the three or are
Speaker 1: you just one? Does one type particularly dominate someone's thinking.
Speaker 4: It's a great question because most of us tend to
Speaker 4: have a tendency to fall into one of those three,
Speaker 4: and it's really important just to try and recognize which
Speaker 4: of those three is you because it will be your
Speaker 4: general preferred style and once you're aware of it, you
Speaker 4: can then take steps and actions to help with that.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, tendency is to fall into one of the three.
Speaker 1: In the beginning, you answer that we have so many
Speaker 1: things to do. I mean, you've been in this space
Speaker 1: for a while. Do you think I have to lists
Speaker 1: have got bigger?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I really do.
Speaker 4: I think the demands placed on us at work, in
Speaker 4: our businesses, in our home life, in our personal life
Speaker 4: is so much more. We're trying to do a lot
Speaker 4: more with less in you.
Speaker 3: Know, quicker time and speed, and you know a lot
Speaker 3: of people don't want to let others down, so it's
Speaker 3: hard to say no or decline things.
Speaker 4: There's a lot of new We call it the shiny syndrome,
Speaker 4: the shiny object syndrome, where we get distracted and we
Speaker 4: want to move on to the next thing we don't
Speaker 4: want to miss out. So FOMO is really apparent and
Speaker 4: clear for many people as well. So we placed a
Speaker 4: lot of demands on ourselves, and that to do list
Speaker 4: is not getting any smaller. And the thing is, we
Speaker 4: might even knock off a few things off our list
Speaker 4: because we're actually all doing a lot of things, and
Speaker 4: then the list is still growing and growing, and at
Speaker 4: the end of the day or end of the week,
Speaker 4: you still feel dissatisfied, unfulfilled, and it can feel really
Speaker 4: overwhelming or that you're just stuck in that ongoing rout.
Speaker 1: So you've got well a magic formulaere I call it
Speaker 1: one that spoke to me personally about how many tasks
Speaker 1: we should tackle in a day that perhaps can stop
Speaker 1: those feelings at the end of the week of not
Speaker 1: being able to get anything done or not ticking off
Speaker 1: the list. What is the magic number of tasks we
Speaker 1: should tackle per day?
Speaker 2: From your expertise as psychologist, thanksfull.
Speaker 4: As do look, the magic number I believe and from
Speaker 4: the research and trialing and testing the web that we've
Speaker 4: done is limiting your task to three high impact tasks
Speaker 4: a day. Now, you know some of your listeners over
Speaker 4: that you're, oh my god, I have so many more.
Speaker 2: Yes, maybe twenty.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, and then completely get it, completely get it.
Speaker 4: But if in terms of planning your day, if you
Speaker 4: really focus on the three, limiting it to three core tasks,
Speaker 4: it really prevents that sense of overwhelm. It makes your
Speaker 4: day more fulfilling and achievable and a more of a
Speaker 4: focused day. And it helps in terms of your cognitive
Speaker 4: load because our brains are equipped to handle a limited
Speaker 4: number of complex.
Speaker 3: Tasks in a day, and.
Speaker 4: When we're committing to three high impact primary tasks, you're
Speaker 4: reducing that cognitive load and you're really increasing your chance
Speaker 4: for real success. So also, having three high impact tasks
Speaker 4: means that you can leave space for any unexpected demands
Speaker 4: or even opportunities that may come up in your day.
Speaker 4: So I know I say three. In the book, we
Speaker 4: share a way to pick and choose and help you
Speaker 4: select what your three high impact tasks are. Think if
Speaker 4: you did that every single day after a week, you
Speaker 4: would have completed.
Speaker 3: Fifteen high impact tasks. In a month, in.
Speaker 4: A working week, you would have completed sixty high impact tasks.
Speaker 2: Wow, that really sounds impressive.
Speaker 1: That speaks to me that number seem Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for coming on healthy Ish.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for listening.
Speaker 1: Well, if you do want to feel energized and me
Speaker 1: more effective in five minutes a day, grab Seem's new book.
Speaker 1: It is called a Productivity Joy. Doesn't the title just
Speaker 1: make you feel joyous?
Speaker 2: Well? Her book is out now now.
Speaker 1: If you do have any ideas for upcoming apps on
Speaker 1: healthy ish or Extra healthy Ish anything before Christmas, dmme
Speaker 1: at Felicity highly across social media, anything else, head to
Speaker 1: Body and soul dot com, dot you follows on socials.
Speaker 1: Grab our print edition which is out in your local
Speaker 1: Sunday paper. Thanks again for listening, and stay healthy ish