It’s almost the end of September, and I’m super proud to look back and see that I’ve gotten infinitely more done this month than in the past few months.
With one week left in September, I currently have eight Medium articles published, nine Seeking Alpha articles, and two videos out.
Compare this to August, when I only wrote three Medium articles and zero Seeking Alpha articles (though I did have five videos created instead).
The difference can be attributed to this new strategy I’ve been using to increase my productivity.
Lighting the Fire Underneath Me
Toward the end of August, a spark set the fuel in my tanks on fire. I was disrespected, unhappy, and fed up with my life situation, so I decided to make a drastic change.
I am set to leave for an 11-month trip to Asia in Malaysia in October. The primary focus will be training and pushing myself to reach my dream of competing on the international level.
Doing something like this has always been on my mind, but it was always somewhat out of reach. I wanted to be more financially stable and at a stronger badminton level.
But as I stood around coaching and dealing with continual mismanagement, I realized I wasn’t moving any closer to my goal.
I wasn’t improving, and I wasn’t making more money. I was a glorified babysitter working for management that did not respect my time.
Things needed to change… and they needed to change drastically.
So I decided that I’ll leave for Asia in October for an 11-month training trip that would lead me to Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and a few other countries that are currently undecided.
It was a premature decision compared to what I had envisioned.
My original vision was one of comfort. I wanted to be financially free, where investment dividends could support my travels and provide a comfortable level of luxury. Something like $7-$10K per month from multiple income sources was my original requisite.
I also wanted to be pretty good at my sport before leaving. My original goal was to be ranked at least in the top five in my province.
But with the way things were going, that dream was getting further and further out of reach. My skills were deteriorating along with my finances.
Thus, in August, I had enough. It was time to go, regardless of my current situation.
The Strategy That Helped Me Become 533% More Productive
I’m a risk-taker and have made rash decisions before, but I’m not that unthoughtful to end up booking a flight to a foreign country without any means to support myself.
The YouTube channel my brother and I started and my blogging work here on Medium and Seeking Alpha do make enough to cover my travel expenses.
The problem, however, is I must work. If I don’t write articles or create videos, my income undoubtedly goes down, and I don’t have enough investments to let myself take a year off from doing nothing.
With my coaching income gone as well, my online ventures will also need to increase in value to support my life as a digital nomad.
Hence, I needed to improve my productivity in September to get in the habit of working a lot while training in Asia.
One evening, I was standing in my washroom after showering, and a great idea popped into my head to help me be more productive and stay on track.
I was thinking about online courses and how I was always very motivated to work when I saw a progress bar moving closer to being filled up.
Thinking about this made me wonder, “What if I created a progress bar to track my work?”
It was a phenomenal idea.
Although I never created an actual progress bar, I made a makeshift one in my Apple Journal app, where I wrote the number of articles I had published out of the number I intended to publish.
For example, at the start of the month, my original target was to write 10 Seeking Alpha articles. Every week, I wrote down the total number of articles I had written out of 10, and I could see my progress over time.
The first week, it was 1/10.
The second week, it was 4/10.
The third week, it was 9/10.
As you can see, writing down my progress every week kept me on track. I went from publishing one article to three and then to five.
And it’s not like I did anything particularly fancy. Every week, on a Saturday night or Sunday morning, I make a new journal entry by writing down the number of articles or videos I have accumulated out of my original goal for the month.
The Weekly Productivity Report Motivation
It is weird and unfortunate that I did not think of this earlier.
I’ve been a blogger for over five years, and staying consistently productive has always been an issue. If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ve probably seen some of my monthly reports.
There was a pattern that I could never break out of.
At the start of every month, I was highly motivated. I would reflect on my actions last month and see that I had barely reached halfway to my goal.
With a little bit of anger towards myself, I would pump myself up in my report, saying that I would change things this month.
My motivation would be sky-high for the next week and sometimes a little more. I pumped out articles daily, sometimes twice a day.
It was great until a week later when all my motivation disappeared.
Something always appeared that killed my momentum. It may have been a family thing where I had to help them instead of working. An article may have been pending for longer than expected, and I was waiting to submit another article to the same publication. Or I caught shiny object syndrome and found something else to work on.
Regardless of the reason, I could never find my rhythm again until the next month when I reflected on my results.
I seemed to have broken this rhythm with my new strategy of writing down the number of articles and videos I published weekly.
This strategy is essentially having a weekly review, and I don’t know why I didn’t think of doing this earlier.
Two things happen when I count up my activity every week.
A. I see that I did nothing or less than I wanted and get motivated to accomplish something.
B. I see I did a lot and get even more motivated to continue working harder.
I’m basically getting my monthly report productivity bonus every week, which is how I’ve been able to get so much more done this month than before.
Adjust Weekly
Additionally, weekly reports have helped me adjust to various situations.
For an overambitious person like myself, I often vastly overestimate how much I can get done in a month and set unrealistic goals that kill my motivation.
For example, my goals for September were to publish 10 videos, 10 Seeking Alpha articles, and 25 Medium articles.
It’s the third week of September, and here are my stats:
- YouTube Videos: 2/10
- Seeking Alpha Articles: 9/10
- Medium Articles: 8/25
As you can see, I am far from reaching my YouTube video and Medium article goals, though I’m about to reach my Seeking Alpha publishing goal.
Usually, I would be procrastinating and be far off for every goal. This is mainly because the goal seems so far away, so I just try to forget about it and plan to restart anew next month.
The problem, however, is that I never learn where my limits lie, so I repeat the process of setting overambitious goals and giving up early.
Weekly reports have helped me stay on track much better. They remind me of my original goals and give me a clear picture of what I should do every week.
Thus, every week, I try my best and work hard on the things I need to work on. And even if I don’t reach my goals, that’s okay because I’ve seen my limits and can set better goals for the future months.
Reflect on Your Weekly Progress To Stay on Track
I am glad I had the idea to reflect on my weekly progress early this month. It has done wonders for my productivity as a content creator, as it is pushing me closer and closer to my goals.
Have you given weekly reports a try? Let me know!
Originally published on Medium.com. Get a Medium membership and read articles like this one ad-free.
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