1. In an article I wrote a few years ago called Do It Now, I expl
management techniques that allowed me to finish college m
usual. What I probably didn't make clear in the article w
overwhelm myself like a workaholic to pull it off. I had a gre
time every week, including taking at least one full day off e
time for doing extra homework mainly from the inefficienci
not from my personal time. Some classes require concentra
duration, but at least 80% of them don't. How much cumula
typical one-hour class are you fully engaged in listening, writ
kind of mental or physical activity? For me it was probably ab
per hour on average. The other 45 minutes would be spen
professor to show up, waiting for the teacher to finish the op
pointless administrative and announcement talk that co
eliminated with a handout, hearing further examples and e
concept I had already grasped, hearing students ask quest
2. See any similarities to corporate meetings? What percentag
are you truly 100% engaged? My guess would be 15-20% on
exact number doesn't matter.
3. But let's generalize this a bit more. What percentage of your
100% engaged in whatever it is you're doing? (I borrow t
engaged" from the book The Power of Full Engagement.) As
fully utilizing all my available personal resources right now?"
and body together as a factory where your goal is to maxim
free to define output however you wish). So you want to ke
running as efficiently as possible. If you have machines sitting
put to good use, you're operating below capac
4. Now the goal isn't to push yourself until the veins are burs
forehead. By all means enjoy your downtime. But if you're
kind of work, then it seems logical to work at full capacity.
really work. The work time will pass anyway whether you'r
capacity or 95%. But you'll experience a huge increase in out
engage yourself.
5. Children are a great model for seeing full engagement in act
my 4-year old daughter Emily, she's always fully 100% enga
doing. When she's playing, she's 100% playing. When she's e
playing. When she's napping, she's 100% play
6. Sometimes being fully engaged means focusing on one tas
tuning out everything else. If you're giving a presentation at
room for multitasking. But if you're preparing a meal or dr
cleaning up your office, you can also be listening to audio b
time.
7. If you work at full capacity for a while and get tired, then ta
100% break. Literally shut your brain off for a while, such as
meditating, or just close your eyes at your desk and breath
minutes. Many of the greatest achievers of all time were na
Thomas Edison. Acknowledge that you're switching from ful
taking a break. Don't remain stuck in that haze of not quite
quite resting, such as by doing web surfing for a while and t
work at 20% capacity. If you feel mentally tired and can't wo
100%, don't grind yourself into the ground. Stop for a while
mental factory, do the required maintenance, and then get
8. Finding blocks of time where you aren't fully engaged and up
of this time to fully engage yourself is a great way to squeeze
out of your life without becoming overloaded. When you w
fully engaged? Not even close. Even while watching TV, you
up, exercising, or giving your significant other a foot massa
nothing wrong with just relaxing either, but often you'll find
energy to be more fully engaged in tasks if you push yours
home gym where I do weight training, and I need to rest brie
My muscles need these breaks, but my brain doesn't. So I o
from magazines or newsletters during these minutes. Or I'll
book during the whole session. So I turn a sporadically enga
fully engaged one.
9. Now you might think that taking all your 20% engaged perio
upgrading them to near 100% will have the effect of exhau
quickly. But most likely you'll experience the opposite effec
engage yourself, you gain an obvious short-term boost in ou
the effect of boosting your energy and self-esteem as well. W
on your day and know you only worked at around 20% of ca
feel lousy about it. You know you could have done better an
of time, and years of this behavior tend to be very draining a
But when you fully engage yourself, you tend to feel really
performance. You'll still make mistakes, but they won't be du
When you go to bed, you'll be thinking, "Wow, I really did
couldn't have done it better."
10. Being fully engaged isn't just about doing. It's also about bein
you been off somewhere else mentally? Yesterday I went f
through various casinos along the Las Vegas Strip (Treasure I
Caesar's Palace, Bally's, and Paris). It was crowded due to the
and I saw a lot of people with vacuous expressions who cle
engaged. People were sitting at the blackjack tables looking
occasionally I'd see someone having the time of their life, reg
they were winning or losing. Now it could have been the free
very least, these people were fully engaged in what they wer
totally present and enjoying themselves. Those who weren't
clearly wandering mentally... thinking about work or other
zoning out completely. Such a sad way to spend a v
11. Fully engage yourself in the present moment. When you w
completely into work mode. When you play, forget about
yourself. Squeeze the maximum productivity out of your wo
fun out of your play, the maximum connection out of your co
can't seem to focus, take 15 minutes to put your complete at
about whatever is distracting you, and then let it go. If you f
give yourself some 100% dedicated worry time, during whic
worrying out of the way.
12. Incidentally, this site is now averaging about 500-600 visitors
than 1% coming from search engines (and 75% of those SE hi
on my name). That's wonderful for a site that's only 8 week
lot of hits coming from various web mail servers, which im
learning about this site primarily by word of mouth, or po
announced this site in an email newsletter. Either way, thank
word!