Practical Productivity, Please Everybody, & More
The Saturday Edition
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In today’s newsletter
Quote: Please everybody?
Question: feel happy; doing enough?
Article: How to live an experimental life?
Book I am reading this week
Bonus: Trick to waking up
Quote on pleasing everybody
I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time. ― Herbert Bayard Swope
Question of the Week
Ask yourself this question at least three times and try to improve your answer each time.
It's your weekly reflection.
What are the day-to-day things you do that really make you feel happy? Do you find them doing enough, or do you want to do less?
Article — Practical Productivity (Experimental lifestyle), no BS
I am not perfect, and I am proud of it.
In fact, no one is perfect.
I always advocate if someone is saying they believe in perfection, they are procrastinating instead of completing.
It reminds me my early product management days when the speaker said if your product is too perfect, means you are already way behind than your competitor.
Live an action-oriented life. Focus on shipping rather than perfecting it. Even a PhD is not 100% done. It’s always partially completed.
Okay, back to the topic.
I spent a lot of time making things beautiful rather than shipping them. We learn this bad habit at school, especially in business classes, to polish our slides and make them beautiful and appealing.
They are not worth it in the professional world. They consume much more time than needed to convince someone of what you are trying to say.
I am naturally inclined to develop a system, a process that helps me get more done than lurking and perfecting it.
Personally, I used to suck at efficiency. I used to spend too much time in the thinking process rather than doing it.
Here is my 5-step mechanism to get done the most important things.
Step-1
I wake up at 4:27 AM each morning.
Why?
The why part — we will learn in the following steps.
Note:
If you can avoid screening 100% in the first 1–3 hours of each morning, check your email only after that.
Step-2
I am a huge fan of experimental models. If someone says something is working for them, instead of blindly following, I do a 30-day experiment on myself.
As soon as I wake up after brushing my teeth, I drink a tall glass of water, and sometimes, I squeeze a fresh lemon for the taste of freshness.
Step-3
Recently, I have been following Sahil Bloom’s morning routine. As soon as he is up, he follows his 5–5–5–30 method to boost energy.
5 squats
5 pushups
5 lunges
30-second plank
I changed it a little bit based on what works for me.
I call this method 5–5–6–60.
5 squats
5 pushups
6 lunges [I felt weird doing two steps on one leg and three on the other. lol)
60-second plank [I did a plank challenge in the past for 30+ days, and 30 seconds was too easy for me)
Step-4
After following the 5–5–6–60 rule, I go to the garage, where I have a cold plunge pod.
I placed the pod in the backyard a couple of months ago. Now that the weather is changing keeping the pod indoors will also give it a long life span.
It’s not fancy, but it does the job. I will upgrade later to regulate the temperature and freshwater more often.
I change the water once a week.
Adding ice each morning to reduce water temperature is also a bit of resistance.
I am lucky to live in a cold climate where the temperature is less than 10 at night and a maximum of 15 in the morning.
My cold water temp
4C or 39F
I sit in the pod for 3 minutes.
I shiver.
I think. Deep Think about life at 4:45 AM
I enjoy.
I suffer for a good reason.
I am curious to know if the cold lunge has any physical or long-term health benefits; that’s what time will tell me, but the immediate results are excellent.
As soon as you finish your cold plunge, you will feel alert, have a lot of energy, and feel accomplished.
That’s all you need to handle the most challenging task in the morning.
Step-5
Then, I make dark-roasted black coffee. I used to think dark roasts were more acidic than light roasts, but I was wrong.
I am a huge fan of black dark roast coffee.
The smell put me in the mood to start work.
After the cold plunge, I usually take a shower or dry my body and shower later.
Wrapping up
These five steps usually take 30 minutes. I start my deep work session between 5 and 7:30 AM and, on weekends, between 5 and 8 AM.
I work six days a week.
I don’t mind working at all.
I don’t know anyone who actually minds working on the weekend as long as they are working on themselves (not for an employer) to improve their lives and those of their loved ones.
It’s not a simple routine.
It’s working for me.
It’s possible it won’t work for you.
But there is nothing wrong with giving it a try.
You may start working on one of your most ambitious projects before even starting your full day.
Bonus
The trick to waking up early is to go to bed early. I go to bed at 8 PM and believe in quality 8-hour sleep. It reminds me of Andrew Huberman.
Don’t ask how people are doing,
ask how they are sleeping.
You’ll learn a lot more.
Book I am reading this week
I finished reading Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday.
I have read many books on leadership, but this one, Ego is the Enemy, by one of my favorite authors, stands out.
It will help you if you are struggling with your ego in your professional and personal life.
Ryan's approach is straightforward. He will provide examples from the ancient world by bringing his interest in stories and using his modern knowledge to compare. He will also show that the ego is not a new thing; it has been going on for centuries. But there is a practical way to handle it.
The ego we see most commonly goes by a more casual definition: an unhealthy belief in our own importance. Arrogance. Self-centered ambition. - Ryan, Ego is The Enemy
If you know Ryan, his writing is not oversimplified but intriguing to keep on the pages to know what will happen next or how that person overcomes his egotistic personality.
Are we driven by genuine purposes, or is it about feeding our egos?
If you're drawn to this book, chances are you're aware of your own ego.
It's a paradox—those who need to read it most might resist the idea of examining their ego.
If you are aware or maybe unaware of your ego or want to learn how ego is destroying us in the long run, this one is for your ego or want to learn how ego is destroying us in the long run - this one's for you.
6. Bonus
Include a fun fact, an inspiring image, a productivity tip, or a quick challenge. For example:
Bonus Challenge: Spend 30 minutes today reflecting on your week and jotting down three things you’re grateful for. This can boost your mood and set a positive tone for the weekend!
In Case You Missed It:
In Tuesday's issue, I shared a practical SYSTEM for remembering everything.
Some people have a remarkable ability to remember information, while others, like me, struggle with it.
Experimenting is the only way to find the best system!
Do the trial and error practice. It will help you. What works for you?
Don’t worry about tweaking or evolving.
A system should be dynamic.
I don't follow Ryan’s notetaking system, as he said it's evolving. My system is half digital and half manual. It's something that works for me.
Let’s learn how to remember what you read. Can you recall a non-fiction you read a couple of months ago?
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