How Shorter Days Offer A Huge Advantage in Raising Our Productivity.

I'm not a fan of fall daylight savings. Everyone is excited about the extra hour of sleep while I mourn the loss of our longer days.  In my mind, shorter days equates to a loss of productivity.  There's less time to get everything done.

This year, instead of getting bummed out about losing several hours of sunlight, I'm going to take a different approach.   If done right, we might actually be able to leverage these shorter days to get a ton more accomplished...and I'll tell you exactly how to do that.
The easiest and most obvious strategy is to leverage that gained extra hour.  While everyone is laying in bed for the extra hour, I'm looking forward to waking up earlier without having to use any extra willpower.  If I typically wake up at 6:00 am, my new wake up time post daylight savings is now 5:00 am.   

Some of the activities I'd like to do with my newfound time include practicing focused meditation.  This is where I train my brain to avoid distractions by focusing on my breath for 15-20 minutes.  It may not seem like much but, when done consistently, that meditation practice pays off in a big way.  Over time, my mind becomes conditioned to avoid being distracted by random thoughts.  This means that my productivity goes way up as I'm able to get more done in less time. 

Aside from meditation, if you actually get up earlier, chances are you have at least an hour of uninterrupted time to work on whatever you want.  Before I quit my job, daylight savings time meant that I could work on my side hustle just a little bit more each day.  All of that extra activity adds up. By doing a little more each day, you ignite the Compound Effect....and we all know how powerful that can be. 

Think of all the things that you aren't doing now because you "don't have time."  How many of those actions can you do with that extra hour that we've been generously granted?

Although I often complain about shorter days, it might actually be a blessing to my productivity.  Shorter days mean less time.  Less time is actually an advantage with regards to getting things done.  Think about all the times when you were granted weeks to get a project done. Most of that time was squandered away doing things completely unrelated to the project at hand.  Eventually, time almost runs out and we feverishly to get everything done.  That short deadline causes to work with a heightened level of focus can't be recreated with infinite amounts of time.

This past Sunday, I planned on dedicating hours towards organizing a spare bedroom. I was putting this task off for a while, but the day of reckoning finally arrived.  While doing something completely unrelated, my husband asked if I wanted to go see a movie starting in less than 2 hours. At first, I was annoyed that I couldn't dedicate half a day into organizing the room.  But then I asked myself "what if I could get this done in less than an hour?"  With a heightened sense of urgency, I was able to get most of the room organized in time to make my movie date.  Without that ultra tight deadline, I would have taken my sweet time.

More time isn't necessarily a good thing when it comes to productivity.  I always thought that shorter days would rob me of my ability to get more done but, in actuality, it's the exact opposite.  This fall & winter, we have the potential to be more effective than we have all year!  With just a couple months left in the year, it's time to get focused! Time to serious. Time to get things done!