The photo above shows a productivity death zone in my home.
Whenever I'm in this part of the house, the last thing I feel like doing is working. So usually I'll distract myself -- like, suddenly I'll get hungry, and then I'm snacking and watching YouTube for the rest of the afternoon!
It's so stupid, because I've known about the trappings of a low energy work environment for years.
Surviving at School
Back when I had just finished school, I was running a hundred Wordpress blogs, targeting all sorts of lucrative niches. It was pure grind work, and after several failed outsourcing attempts, I was left managing all those websites myself. The problem, as you can guess, was finding the motivation to meet this enormous challenge.
So I crept back on campus to recreated the exact environment that got me through school:
I plugged away at my laptop in the libraries, cafeterias, and empty lecture halls that I knew were conducive to highly productive work sessions.
I did more work as a fake student, on a borrowed wifi login, than when I was a real one the year before!
But somehow, years later, I forgot about this experience. Perhaps, because it's overshadowed by the painful memory of Google dropping the banhammer on my entire blog network soon after it launched...
The Evil Room
For several years, I've had my work desk in a corner of the room that I intuitively hate. It's dim, damp, and too close to my neighbor's residence -- I can often hear them gossiping.
So recently, I dragged my heavy desk, and all the computer equipment, to a somewhat awkward spot near the kitchen. It's a much higher energy location that I walk thru all the time. It just feels brighter and more alive.
This simple change has been amazingly good for my business. The struggle to initiate work has been significantly reduced, and I can work for longer periods without getting distracted or fatigued. (And it's also a lot closer to the coffee machine!)
Extending this workplace strategy, I've always wanted to work outside. I mentioned this in a previous blog.
Make The Move
Even a single productive hour, added to my weekly schedule, can have a significant impact on my overall goals. I've started to realize that physically moving to where ever I feel the most energy is a tiny cost for the benefit it provides.
My ultimate goal is to have all the power of my main workstation unchained from the desk. It's probably not a realistic goal for much of the work I do, but some things -- like using Steemit, or trading crypto -- can be done from almost anywhere.
I wonder if other people feel the same way.
Do you work better at home or at Starbucks?
Do you prefer a busy or quiet environment?
(Leave a decent comment, and I'll give ya the gigafart guaranteed upvote!)