1) Have A Solid Daily Ritual

　　STEP 1 (5 Minutes): Your Morning Minutes. This is your opportunity to plan ahead. Beforeturning on your computer, sit down with the to-do list you created…and decide what will makethis day highly successful…

　　STEP 2 (1 Minute Every Hour): Refocus. …Set your watch, phone, or computer to ring everyhour and start the work that’s listed on your calendar. When you hear the beep, take a deepbreath and ask yourself if you spent your last hour productively. Then look at your calendarand deliberately recommit to how you are going to use the next hour. Manage your day hourby hour. Don’t let the hours manage you.

　　STEP 3 (5 Minutes): Your Evening Minutes. At the end of your day, shut off your computer andreview how the day went, asking yourself… questions like: How did the day go? What did I learnabout myself? Is there anyone I need to update? Shoot off a couple of emails or calls to makesure you’ve communicated with the people you need to contact.

　　2) Make Things Automatic

　　The secret to getting more done is to make things automatic. Decisons exhaust you: Thecounterintuitive secret to getting things done is to make them more automatic, so they requireless energy.

　　It turns out we each have one reservoir of will and discipline, and it gets progressivelydepleted by any act of conscious self-regulation. In other words, if you spend energy tryingto resist a fragrant chocolate chip cookie, you’ll have less energy left over to solve a difficultproblem. Will and discipline decline inexorably as the day wears on.

　　Build routines and habits so that you’re not deciding, you’re just doing. When you first learn todrive it’s 1000 activities like steering, shifting, checking mirrors, braking — but with practiceyou turned it into autopilot and it’s no stress at all.

　　3) Checklists are magic

　　Be specific and make sure to include a time estimate for all tasks. A well-maintained list is anessential tool for staying grounded, for saving your energy and for doing things rather thantrying to remember what to do.

　　Effective to-do lists are limited to specific tasks that can be tackled right away and finishedfairly soon. Instead of listing solve client issue, spend one hour defining the scope of clientproblem.

　　A list should reflect a time estimate needed for each task. And it should be integrated into acalendar or schedule, to avoid planning 17 things for tomorrow which, if you added them up,are going to take 20 hours.

　　4) Beat Procrastination

　　A big part of procrastination is dread. The task seems terrible and overwhelming. Andthat’s the first issue that needs attacking: those feelings.

　　By breaking the problem down into smaller chunks — even comically small ones that requireonly 1 minute of activity — and doing just that one little thing, you prove to yourself the taskisn’t insurmountable.

　　The most motivating thing in the world is progress. Any trivial progress can motivate andboost positive emotions that will help build a productive momentum.

　　So this sounds good in theory but you’re probably thinking: what’s that first step and won’tthat be horribly, horribly painful? For any procrastinated task, first thing is to take one minuteand just write down the steps you need to do to finish the task.

　　This should be enough to kill negative emotions, build some momentum and get you going.

　　1)養(yǎng)成固定的日常習(xí)慣。

　　第一步(五分鐘)：你的晨間時(shí)光。這是你提前計(jì)劃的機(jī)會。在打開電腦之前，坐下來看看你建立的任務(wù)清單，想想做些什么會讓這一整天過得充實(shí)。

　　第二步(每小時(shí)1分鐘)：重新調(diào)整注意力。把你的手表、手機(jī)或者電腦設(shè)定為每個(gè)小時(shí)響一次鈴，以此提醒你日程表上列出的事項(xiàng)。當(dāng)你聽到鈴聲時(shí)，做一個(gè)深呼吸，然后反躬自問剛過去的一小時(shí)是否過得有效率。接著看看你的日程表，好好重新計(jì)劃下你要如何利用接下來的一個(gè)小時(shí)。以小時(shí)為節(jié)點(diǎn)地支配你的一天，而不要讓時(shí)間支配你。

　　第三步(5分鐘)：你的晚間時(shí)光。在一天結(jié)束的時(shí)候，關(guān)掉電腦并回憶這一天是怎么過的，捫心自問這些問題：我是怎么過這一天的?我今天學(xué)到了什么?我有什么需要改進(jìn)的嗎?另外，大量回復(fù)郵件和電話以保證你已經(jīng)和所有需要聯(lián)系的人聯(lián)系過了。

　　2)讓事情程序化。

　　完成更多事情的訣竅是讓事情程序化。做選擇會讓你覺得筋疲力盡。所以想要完成更多事情，訣竅就在于讓事情程序化(雖然這和我們直覺認(rèn)為的不同)，程序化做事會節(jié)省你的很多精力。

　　我們每個(gè)人都有一個(gè)裝載意志力和自控力的容器，它會隨著我們有意識的自我規(guī)律行為而逐漸排空。換句話來說，假如你花精力拒絕一塊美味的巧克力曲奇，你就沒有精力去解決一個(gè)難題。意志力和自控力會隨著時(shí)間流逝而無情地減少。

　　建立一些例行公事和習(xí)慣，這樣你就不用總是做決定，你只是按部就班做事而已。當(dāng)你第一次學(xué)駕駛時(shí)要做1000種動作，比如握方向盤，轉(zhuǎn)彎，看后視鏡，踩剎車——但隨著練習(xí)，你把它變成了“自動駕駛”，你根本沒有什么壓力了。

　　3)檢查清單很神奇

　　注意細(xì)節(jié)，并且確保對你所有的任務(wù)都進(jìn)行時(shí)間預(yù)估。一個(gè)維護(hù)良好的任務(wù)清單是腳踏實(shí)地辦事的必要條件。這樣你能為做事節(jié)約精力，而不是總要試著去記住要做些什么。

　　有效率的任務(wù)清單要局限于那些能夠馬上解決并且能短時(shí)間內(nèi)完成的特定任務(wù)。與其列出要解決的客戶問題，不如花一個(gè)小時(shí)來確定客戶問題的范圍。

　　清單必須反映每個(gè)任務(wù)的時(shí)間預(yù)估，而且應(yīng)該整合進(jìn)你的日歷或時(shí)間表里，以免你為明天計(jì)劃總計(jì)要20小時(shí)的17件事情。

　　4)擊敗拖延癥。

　　拖延的很大一部分是畏懼。任務(wù)看上去又難又費(fèi)時(shí)。你首先要克服的就是這種感覺。

　　通過把這些任務(wù)分解成小塊，甚至滑稽地把它們分解成1分鐘一個(gè)的小任務(wù)。然后僅僅做那些小事情，你會向自己證明這些任務(wù)不是難以對付的。

　　世界上最激勵人心的事情就是進(jìn)步。任何微小的進(jìn)步都會激勵和促進(jìn)積極情緒，而那會讓你的高效工作更有勁。

　　理論上這聽起來不錯(cuò)，但你也許會想：第一步是什么呢?第一步會不會非常非常的痛苦?對所有延遲的任務(wù)而言，你要做的第一件事都是花一分鐘寫下你完成這個(gè)任務(wù)需要做的每個(gè)步驟。

　　這樣應(yīng)該足以擊敗負(fù)面情緒，并為你前進(jìn)建立起一些動力了。