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May 16, 2012 in
Systems & Tips
In only two minutes a day, one simple tip could increase your productivity by 100%, 400%, or even 1,000%.
I know that sounds like an informercial, but it’s really just taking advantage of the most powerful, yet the most underrated, productivity technique you have.
Thinking.
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May 10, 2012 in
Balanced Life
The pace of our society is go, go, go. All day, every day, we’re battling with our to-do lists.
So the idea of resting for one day each week seems like a quaint, old-fashioned ideal that you’d see in a Norman Rockwell painting.
We know that we should have a day of rest, but our schedules just don’t allow it right now. Maybe someday. But this week? Seven days of work aren’t enough – how can we possibly take a day off?
But there’s one powerful mindset change that can revolutionize how we approach a day of rest. It can make that elusive Sabbath day a reality.
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April 30, 2012 in
Balanced Life
Almost any task you could take up has some value.
Working serves others and provides an income. Time with family grows relationships and expresses love. Evenings with friends cultivate community. Devotional time nourishes our spirit. Even leisure is a blessed time of needed rejuvenation.
But this can lead us to a dangerous mistake in our prioritization.
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Duration: 25:12Today, I answer a listener question about being a serial starter and a serial quitter.
It’s a tendency I can identify with, because I find so much of the same behaviors in myself. So I hope that I can peel back the layers and talk about what’s really going on deep down with serial starters and serial quitters.
Towards the end, I ran far off-script and got quite personal. Hopefully, you’ll find the podcast comforting and enlightening.
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April 23, 2012 in
Balanced Life, Systems & Tips
You may have heard of Steven Covey’s prioritization system. He stresses the need for us to differentiate the truly important from the merely urgent.
To be sure, Covey has contributed a lot of great thinking on how to manage our time well. But there are some areas where I think people misunderstand his points.
And although it’s a nice conversation piece, I think Covey’s famous “big rocks” illustration leads people in the wrong direction.
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29
April 17, 2012 in
Biblical Worldview
The key to biblical time management isn’t stressing about the newest app or the organization of your task lists.
It’s all about how you think: how you view success, productivity, and motivation.
And one of the most important concepts to properly understand is failure.
Misconceptions here not only make us unfruitful, but they keep us in a constant state of stress and worry.
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April 13, 2012 in
Systems & Tips
The following is a guest post from Nick Thacker.
If you’re involved in business (or life) in pretty much any way, you probably have little rules for improving your day-to-day productivity. For me, as a writer, these “rules” look like “write every day,” or even “write 1,000 words every day,” for example.
Even if you’re not a writer, you probably have to-do lists, task managers, or an Evernote account–something that helps you organize and store your thoughts, tasks, and goals. Much has already been written on how to get the most out of all of these great productivity tools, so I’ll take a different approach in this post.
Instead, I’ll look at the flip side of productivity–not how to be more productive so you can write or produce more, but how to use writing itself to help you be more productive.
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26
April 11, 2012 in
Balanced Life
In the last podcast episode, I talked about why I think it’s biblically acceptable to occasionally work long hours. A lot of people may initially bristle when they hear that, so I encourage you to go take a listen.
I wanted to continue that subject today with some practical tips on how to keep the rest of our lives intact when we do have to work long hours.
With a little wisdom, we can do our best to avoid any damage to our relationships, our physical health, or our other priorities.
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April 9, 2012 in
Balanced Life, Podcast
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Duration: 14:05Things have been pretty hectic for me lately, and I’ve been working some long hours.
Is that a problem? Is that biblically acceptable?
After discussing rest in the last episode, it seemed appropriate to discuss some perspectives on work in this episode.
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April 3, 2012 in
Systems & Tips
I saw a recent interview with Seth Godin, the marketing expert, creativity thought-leader, and author of several bestsellers such as Linchpin.
In the interview, Godin shared a pretty unique way of determining the priority of his tasks. It seems to be the exact opposite of what most people do.
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