We only are highly focused six hours per week. I see this in my personal work. I do a lot of busy-work such as working on my Twitter profile or writing blogs. But, the hours that we devote to deeper thinking are very critical. If you don’t use your focused hours right, your entire career will suffer. You need to figure out how to allocate your precious time — what to do more of and what to do less of.
When do you focus best and where?
When I first get out of bed, my brain can barely function. I do repetitive work then as I can’t really think. Then, I do emails and a few phone calls. But, my prime hours of focus are more in the evening. I do my deepest thinking between 10pm and 2am. I stay up late as a regular habit. I’m not sure if it is a good thing or not, but there are no distractions to my work at night when it is quiet. The problem is, that if I tired myself out with busy work, it is hard to focus.
I bet I would focus best if I did a little writing during the day, took a long walk, took a bath and then did my deep thinking. It is important to be refreshed from exercise, but not wiped out. Your brain is a very sensitive organ and performs well only under optimal conditions.
The key here is to identify not only which six hours you focus best, but which activities to do during those special six hours. Planning and analysis are very important to do during your peak hours of concentration as those are your most sophisticated and critical tasks.
Other people focus better in the morning. Should you waste your morning hours on meetings or other non-time sensitive work? Perhaps you should do your most critical tasks in the morning when you are fresh. Doing the right task at the right time of the day is absolutely essential. I have optimized my day by doing exactly what. What about you?