This simple exercise will help you increase productivity, improve your quality of life, and understand yourself.
Thousands of thoughts visit us per day. Some of them are useless, some relate to momentary tasks. But there are those that would be very useful to us in the future. These are ideas for improving the workflow, creative ideas, things that we would like to do.
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The only way not to lose these thoughts is to fix them in some form. After all, this is valuable information that will help in making decisions and improving the quality of life.
Here are five types of thoughts to write down every day. It’s good if you can fix at least one item of each type, but if there are less of them, then it’s okay. For convenience, ideas of different types can be marked with different symbols: triangles, squares, spirals, check marks and so on.
1. Creative ideas
It happens that dozens of interesting ideas come to mind during the day. They are worth recording. Rich people are confident that their success is largely due to the habit of fixing all the unusual thoughts that appear in his head.
If you want, you can also include other people's inspirational quotes or ideas here. But choose carefully. Be guided by the question "Can these ideas inspire me for some important or brilliant decision in the future?" If the answer is “Yes”, then they have a place in your notebook.
2. Big wins
These thoughts are especially important for perfectionists and people who always think that they are not doing enough. Record your greatest achievements of the day. For example, you collected a package of documents for a visa, completed a complex project, did the cleaning , first went to the gym or finally met a friend whom you had wanted to see for a long time.
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Even just fixing these things is nice, but these recordings will be most useful if they are re-read every couple of weeks or even more often.
You will see that your days do not go aimlessly, your self-confidence will increase, and anxiety will decrease.
3. Signals and signs
During the day, many events and situations occur with us that affect our emotional state, productivity, way of thinking, and so on. Sometimes we may not notice these changes, but they always have signals - emotions or behaviors that differ from the usual ones.
For example, you suddenly realize that recently meeting with a friend does not bring joy. This means that something has changed in your relationship. After analyzing the situation, you understand that he has become passively aggressive and communication does not stick because of this.
By noting such signals and fixing them, you can find casual relationships between your living conditions and psychological state. So, you will know what needs to be changed so that life becomes better, and you - happier.
4. Important issues and discoveries
Sometimes we suddenly become aware of some very important things about ourselves and our lives. We suddenly realize that we don’t want to work in the current sphere anymore, or we ask ourselves what prevents us from being happy. Similar thoughts also need to be recorded.
Perhaps some of them are just fleeting trends that do not reflect your true desires. But they are in any case useful for self- knowledge and self-development .
It is necessary to periodically remind yourself of the meaning of life, values and aspirations, so as not to go astray.
5. Tasks and experiments
You need to write down not routine works or household chores, but those tasks that will help make life better. For example, the changes that you decide to make based on the marked signals. Or unusual productivity techniques you would like to try.
This also includes actions that bring you closer to an important life goal. For example, if you want to move to another country. Even small decisions carry weight, because they help you achieve more.
To make the desire to complete these tasks stronger, you can mark them with squares. You will unconsciously want to check them every time you reread the notes.
