Ways to Be Productive From Home

Ways to Be Productive From Home With the Productivity Flywheel

While several people attribute their success to hard work, others believe that education had a huge role to play in their life endeavors.

However, there are several examples of well-educated and very hardworking people not getting any richer over time.

I used to read a lot of books and found that I was doing a lot of “spinning my wheels” and not getting much done.

It was easier to go through a book or a course then to actually test and run a campaign.

From my experience is that you have to manage all your resources well if you want to succeed in life.

I haven’t figured everything out yet, but I have made some progress and developed a framework the makes a difference in life.

I am writing this during quarantine time from the Corona Virus, and I think about the “other people” that are watching movies, playing dumb games, or just wasting these valuable days.

Today I want to Share The Productivity Flywheel

This is a system designed to get more done today, every day, and in life.

Productivity Flywheel

If you are not familiar with the productivity flywheel, then you are missing out.

The productivity flywheel suggests that you should use your time, energy, and attention effectively, which will help you in using your resources and job to get money.

Use the earned money effectively and invest money to create leverages.

Use these leverages to generate more funds. Repeat the cycle for consistent results.

The productivity wheel, much like other wheels, needs enough force, in the beginning, to start moving, but once it does start, there is no stopping it.

One of my favorite books talks about the “flywheel effect” that book was called Good to Great by Jim Collins.

I have used this momentum tactic in my businesses and have watched them grow year over year to record numbers.

The best part is every year I build more assets, such as site authority, reviews, and relationships, which makes it harder and harder to compete with me.

Now, I will discuss all the parts of the wheel in detail.

You Need To Understand Time, Energy, and Attention:

All the people get 24 hours a day, and they choose to utilize this time differently.

In the below image, you have Dawn, she is a young single mom, works in retail and holds a bartending gig on the weekends to make ends meet.

Below Dawn is Tim, now Tim is much like me, single, he works from home, has internet-based businesses, has time to learn new skills, and has found ways to be productive from home.

Phase #1: Time, Energy, and Attention to better use

We have limited time in a day.

All humans get 24 hours a day, and they choose to utilize this time differently.

Energy equates to your physical capability of doing things.

Try working or working out without sleep, and you will know that energy is crucial.

Lastly, attention is your ability to focus on a particular work for long, I know when I am tired I have a low attention span.

Attention is one of the more neglected resources of humans, and we give it away to things like social media.

In order to accomplish anything, you will need a combination of all three to work together.

If you have a career that requires you to spend some time in the car or public transportation to get to work then you are choosing to use that time to commute.

Let’s use the above example Dawn has to drive to her jobs and spends an average of 30 minutes a day in a car 6 days a week, that is a total of 3 hours spent in the car.

Tim, on the other hand, hardly leaves the house and has 3 more hours a week then Dawn does to use for whatever.

Time, energy, and attention

Tim simply put is able to get more stuff done, he is fewer life responsibilities, does not commute to work.

Now one might argue, that Dawn was a single mom at a young age, maybe she came for an underprivileged background, there could be any number of factors, but the point is she simply has less Time, Energy, and Attention to give to the productivity flywheel.

Sometimes you can’t help with the factor that raised you, but you do have control over the decisions you make in life.

If you choose to blow money on bottle service at the clubs, get wasted, and wake up with a raging hangover, then you made a decision to waste time, energy, and resources.

The same goes for Net Flix, video games, or social media, all are time sucks and a waster of all three of the above.

My point here is you can spend your time, energy, and attention to Level up and build assets, or acquire skill sets, that will help generate more traction or resources

Here are some of my tips:

Time:

1. Plan your Days or Weeks, I am old school with my paper planner.
2. Buy all your groceries for the week, get them delivered, or have a meal prep service deliver.
3. Use one of the many “blocking tools” to turn off apps and notifications.

Energy:

1. Eat a healthy diet, I have been pretty much on the same diet for 25 years!
2. Get at least 7 hours of sleep, shoot for 8-9 hours, 7 is my bare minimum to feel good, 8 is ideal.
3. I preach cardio and gym on my channel, I do cardio 7 days and week and weights 4-6 days a week, it’s unreal how much energy it gives me.

Attention:

1. Cut or highly decrease the app and social media time.
2. Get the most difficult and time-consuming tasks done when you can focus on “deep work”
3. Use some sort of decompression tool, some like affirmations, walks, meditation. I like to meditate.

home_productivity_before_and_after

Yes, you will have to make some sacrifices, that’s part of the deal.  This will not be easy, nothing in life is these days!

One thing I have noticed over the last five to six years is: “where there is money to be made online, you will have incredibly stiff competition”

Our 1st phase to improve all of the above.

Use Your Resources to Generate money

Generate moneyvia Giphy

You will have to use your time, attention, and energy to do a job, or put effort into your business, either way, you are making money.

You might be putting in the same amount of effort into your career as someone else but still earning less, because news flash, this is life.

Be it gender pay gap or the difference in per hour pay for a teacher and a doctor, and you will generate more money than some and less money than others for the same amount of work.
Productivity

Phase #2 Find Ways to Make More Money

A good example is a cleaning crew I use, I pay $80 including a tip to get my house cleaned. Now they do an ok job, but it’s good enough.

If I were to clean my entire house  I am certain, it would take me 4 hours or more.

In 4 hours, I can easily write a blog or produce a good video that will make me money for years to come

So my 4 hours of time is worth more than that $80 because I have acquired skills that help me maximize my awake hours.

To produce more revenue, you can decide to

  • Get more education, college, tech school, or an online course.
  • Negotiate your salary better, or a bump up in the hourly rate.
  • Find the same job in a different company that pays more.
  • Improve your skills.
  • Look for a commission or other ways to earn more money for your time.

Nothing is fixed or perfect in this life, let me give you an example, I have a programmer that is amazing, I am certain in the United States he would make $200K working for a big corporation like IBM or Microsoft.

He is in Pakistan and life is tough over there, so I am able to get his amazing work for $6 an hour!

Use the money efficiently

Use the money efficiently
Money is a RESOURCE and it’s relative to your situation.

It’s unlikely anyone ever taught us how to manage this resource.

Phase #3 Utilize The Difference.

For this, we have to take time out of our adult life and learn how to use money efficiently.

Some people who earn quite a bit usually might not be able to save anything.

A person who receives $2400 in a month spends $3000 is not using his resources properly.

However, a man making $2000 a month and spending $1500 is better off from the first scenario.

My dad used to always say “you need to live within your means.”

As I have aged, I now say “you need to live below your means”

As I am writing this when we in the quarantine, and although I haven’t been all that great with my money in the last couple of years, I at least had enough money to make if for a decent amount of time without my main income stream.

I was planning on doing a real estate deal or investing in some dividend-paying stocks, but now that money is keeping the team running after my business was shut down.

Invest Money = Get Leverage

Invest money
The money you save from your daily expenses needs to be leveraged; possibly in the stock market, real estate, and other ventures that do not need as much of your time, attention, or energy but can yield results.

Phaze #4 Invest Wisely 

Invest in things that you know work; take the time to set up an efficient system of investing.

Save each month of your working life and improve your chances of leading a decent life even after retirement.

Investments:

This is a vehicle that you put your money in, with the anticipation for getting more out.

Usually, there is some level of risk, and that higher the risk, in most cases the higher the reward.

Let’s call it the risk vs. reward factor.

For someone who is busy like me with digital marketing, I find it easier to make some swing trades or invest in dividend-paying stocks for the long term.

Others with less time-intensive careers might find real estate, a less liquid asset to put their capital.

I have seen many cases over the years where people invest in projects they don’t know anything about and end of getting burned, I am a good example when I took a beating in the crypto market.

Although I had crypto knowledge my overall market knowledge was sub-par, and I paid dearly for it.

Systems and Technology:

This is a big one for me, I have invested and a ton of time and money into automation and web sites.  

These systems work for me 24/7 online and generate leads, which then produces more revenue.

Soon there will be self-driving trucks and cars, from an app you will be able to be productive in the back seat of a car.

Other People’s Resources and Smart Decisions:

You only can work so many hours a week effectively

At some point, you will need to, get rid of the superman syndrome and start using other people’s resources.

Here are some examples:

  • One of my buddies is a successful trader and has a full-time nanny for him and his daughter
  • I have 4 independent contractors that work with me, between graphic design, coding, and sales harnessing their high-paying skills I am able to grow my company faster
  • Buying all my food with a quick trip or delivery and not eating out

Generate More Resources via Your Leverage

Generate more resources via your leverage

Phase #5 Leverage for More Resources 

The Graphic is me in my 30’s and now the after me in the 40s.

I have more resources and I am on a hockey stick type growth trajectory.

You can gain more leverage by investments, systems, and technology, and other people as your employees, including nannies and others.

You want to decrease your time, energy, attention resources usage on trivial things.

You borrow other people’s resources of time, energy, and attention to get more time for your work and improve your overall productivity.

Think about Elon Musk and all the people that work for him at Tesla!

Pitfalls of the Productivity Flywheel

I have seen it with multiple guys on YouTube the get a big campaign or a course that converts they make a bunch of money and can’t seem to follow it up with anything.

A year later they are selling the Lambo and then go silent online.

I mentioned it earlier,  you need to live below your means, get that car you want when you flywheel is printing money.

Another problem I have had and sometimes still struggle with is putting into much work or money into a project that might not necessarily pay off.

I want to be the best at what I do and there have been a number of times I have put way to much time and money into a web site or project with little or no payoff.

The above can result in the falling of the productivity flywheel.
pitfallsvia Giphy

Conclusion

Getting the productivity flywheel to work takes a lot of understanding on your part.

I was brought up with a fairly frugal family that had dinner made at home 99% of the time, which I have carried with me over the years.

I have had buddies and dated girls that eat out for every meal!

Talk about a waste of money, not to mention the sodium on your health!

The Flywheel with yield a high reward and overall security in later life, which makes the whole experience worth it.

Start your journey of leading a more prosperous life, and get your money to get more money.

The wealthiest people in the world relied on these techniques and frameworks to get to their current position.

I think about just like Jeff Bezos and how the heck to they get some much done and you have observed the leverage they have at that level.

It might look like luxuries are far away, but in truth, these are the elements that help make them and can help you get more out of your day.

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