Slow down to speed up
“Slow is smooth; smooth is fast.” Mark Wahlberg’s terse comments from Shooter rarely come into play when considering how to increase your daily productivity, but this one in particular resonates.
In an age where the rush is everything, perhaps you should look into ways to slow down a bit. Not convinced by Marky Mark? Consider these arguments for having a modicum of patience.
More Energy
Stressing yourself out over a dozen little self-imposed deadlines is the emotional equivalent of a treadmill marathon. If you trust yourself to get your stuff done, you will—and you won’t be mentally exhausted when the actual deadlines roll around.
More Time with Your Thoughts
Spending a few extra moments questioning the hows and the whys of your process before actually implementing it can provide a much-needed mental check-in. If you’ve got your process down to a science, grab an extra cup of tea while you review your progress or plan your next step.
More Accuracy
As a general rule, rushing through your tasks leads to mistakes. This holds true for all fields; if you’re an editor, you’re more likely to miss a typo if you’re impatiently flipping through the pages than if you take your time. You don’t have to take a microscope to your manuscript, but being thorough will ultimately pay off in the efficiency department.
More Completion
Being patient leads to seeing tasks through the end rather than abandoning them halfway through and putting them off until the next day. Procrastination isn’t an easy habit to break, but if you can convince yourself to stick it out for some of your smaller tasks, you’ll have the satisfaction of completing more of them as well.
Better Rest
At the end of the day, you can’t fully relax if you’re wound tighter than a Swiss watch. Maintaining your patience throughout the day will culminate in an ability to “let it go” at the end, leading to better rest, peace of mind, and—you guessed it—more productivity.
Practice makes patience
To put it frankly, there isn’t a cut-and-dry way to turn yourself into a more patient person—like anything else, it takes time and practice.
If any of the above reasons appeal to you and your productivity goals, however, it’s a habit that merits that time and practice in spades.
#SlowDown
