I often get asked advice on productivity & motivation. I’ve been self-employed for most of my adult life & I’ve always worked from home, which takes dedication & serious discipline to get right. It’s not easy when you are the boss. The Internet can become a black hole of distractions if you allow it.

So I decided to layout a few of my favorite productivity hacks to help minimise your working day to the bare essentials. Better productivity means less hours working and more hours doing what you love (I love work, but I much prefer doing fun things).

Limit Distractions

For me, this involves leaving my phone in another room. If I have my phone to hand I know I’ll pick it up and get sidetracked. I now charge my phone in the kitchen. I use a bamboo iPhone dock which also charges my apple watch. I find that leaving it out of reach has increased my productivity vastly.

Set a Timer – The Pomodoro Method

I’m not sure where I first learned about the pomodoro method, but the name comes from those pomodoro tomato kitchen timers which many productivity gurus recommend using. I personally use my apple watch & Siri to set a timer, but feel free to use a kitchen timer or any other timer. I set specific timescales for different jobs. For cleaning the house or car I set a 15 minute timer. For replying to emails I set a 20 minute timer. For writing, I set a 30 minute timer. As soon as the time expires, you finish the task you are working on. The motivation of a countdown is enough to make sure I don’t procrastinate. I also find that I can commit full focus for a short period & knowing that I’ll soon be able to take a break makes sure I don’t waiver. An added bonus is that I clean, type or work much faster with a countdown & often finish before the timer runs out.

For this post for example, I’ve got a 30 minute timer running on my watch, so it’s a one shot deal. This makes my work more fluid & stops me putting off working.

Develop Habits

Good habits are essential to improved productivity. It took me 33 years to develop the habits I have today. Foster good habits & change bad habits. My daily habits include cleaning the bathroom as I go in the morning. Putting away any products I use & folding towels. Making the bed and tidying away everything in the bedroom, bathroom and office as I go.

I never leave dishes anymore. Straight in the dishwasher or washed in the sink, dried & put away. I even dry the draining board. I clean & tidy the kitchen as I go. I always clear my desk when I’m finished. I find that if the house is tidy & organised, I don’t find excuses not to do work. An added benefit is that I never have to clean & tidy to receive guests, and I don’t worry about an unanounced visitor. This allows me to sit down & concentrate on work.

Other work habits include setting aside time for certain tasks. If you want to write more, allocate a day of the week to write something. Once that habit sticks, extend it to two days and so on. Before you know it, you will write often & writing will now be a habit instead of a chore.

Install Forest

I use the forest app on my iPhone to cut distractions. Once you plant a tree in forest, you can’t use your iPhone for the specified number of minutes. This has helped me to break free of the smart phone. Forest is also available for the major web browsers. On the browser version, you specify a list of websites which you tend to use for procrastination. I’ve personally added all news sites, all social media sites & YouTube to mine. When I set a timer to sit and work, I set the same timer in forest. This ensures I don’t wander off onto distracting websites when I should be working. Also, by using the app you plant real trees for charity. Bonus!

Take Proper Breaks

This might sound counterintuitive, but your concentration is a finite resource. Sooner or later, you will become distracted & your work will suffer. The problem with distraction & procrastination is that you aren’t working, but you aren’t fully relaxing either. It’s a no mans land & isn’t helpful if you want to be productive. After each timer expires, take a decent break. I find that making a coffee or a snack is helpful. I also step outside weather permitting & have a stretch and a change of scenery. Whatever you would like to do with your break, make sure to do it often. Even 5 minutes every 30 minutes will make a difference.

Perfect your Environment

This will vary from person to person. I always find that music helps me to concentrate. While writing this post I’m listening to punk & punk rock on my headphones. I also enjoy listening to Soma FM when I work. It helps to block out ambient noise & I become more absorbed in my work. My wife on the other hand needs total silence to concentrate. Figure out what works for you and set the mood for productivity.

Single Task

I know I’ve been told a thousand times that I can’t multi task because I’m a man. I actually believe that nobody can successfully multi task. If your attention is fragmented between tasks, you can’t give any single one of those tasks 100% of your energy. I’m a firm believer in single tasking & it got me through my Masters degree.

I turn off emails. Emails coming in are the ultimate distraction. As mentioned, I also turn off the phone or put it in another room. A single notification or ring tone can ruin your concentration.

If I’m writing in WordPress, I only have a single tab open & no other apps (with the exception of my music). If I’m cleaning the house, I mute my phone and leave it on charge. No matter what task you are doing, if you want to improve your productivity you need to embrace single tasking.

Wake up early

I used to be a late riser. Working from home meant I could work any hours I liked as long as the work got done. I would wake up at 10am and not start working until lunchtime.

I now wake up early every day and have most of my emails done by 7am. I also find that I’m done with real work by lunch time and have the rest of the day to work on personal projects & spending time with my friends & family. It also means I fit in more exercise & spend time relaxing and thinking of new ideas.

Stop Thinking & Start Doing

The key to being more productive is to just start doing the things you want to do. I’m now learning dutch with Duolingo. I’m also cycle riding once a day for an hour (timed) to get in much better physical shape. My wife & I walk for at least an hour every day. I’m doing background research for my PhD in my spare time. I’m writing more on this blog & over on my personal website. I’m still running my family e-commerce business each day. I’m still on my minimalism challenge. I’ve reduced my TV watching to an hour or less each evening. I’m getting ready to move to Amsterdam. I live in one of the most breathtaking parts of the UK (on the south coast of Cornwall in a picturesque place). I’m making my entire living from home.

I’ve always had grand plans, but until I started making time to work towards them & laying down the habits & skills to achieve them, they only existed in my head. I now live the life I want to live & continue to work towards my goals.

Changing your approach to productivity can change your relationship with time. I now have more free time while still getting more done with my days. I think productivity is an often forgotten part of minimalism. By minimising distractions & minimising the hours of work you need to do each day, we have more time to dedicate to ourselves & our families. It’s surprising what you can get done when you focus & avoid the distractions.

I’d love to add to this post, so if you have any productivity hacks, get in touch or leave a comment.

One of the first things I do after the Christmas period is to address my belongings. My family & friends have really got into a rhythm with what to buy me each year, so I don’t tend to get anything which throws me off my minimalist lifestyle, but I do get some really handy gifts. I tend to get new underwear, toiletries, a new aftershave and a couple of books to read.

I’ve asked my family to buy me the same kind of things each year, generally consumables. By getting a few sets of underwear each year I can go through my drawers and get rid of the tired looking items. I have a strict one in one out system now, which I find helps me to keep on top of my belongings. I also find that I personally feel better because I’m only replacing something that is worn out & due for a refresh.

With the toiletries, I tend to get enough deodorant, razor blades & aftershave to last me the entire year, until next christmas. So I start off the year with a few extra items than absolutely necessary, but they do get used up before I receive a fresh batch & I can live with storing a couple of essentials in the bathroom cabinet.

Christmas time used to be really hard for me as an aspiring minimalist. I’m super appreciative of all the gifts I receive & they are by no means bad gifts, but when you are trying to reduce the amount of stuff you hang on to, it can prove challenging. I used to get a lot of novelty items, fun presents which made you laugh & smile on the day, but then went into a drawer never to be seen again. After speaking with friends & family I have managed to save them money  by asking not to buy those items & requested only items I really need. I have a small Amazon wish list to which I add specific things I need & each family member also has set things they now tend to buy me. I find this works best & it makes their life easier if they do decide to give me a gift.

January is also a great time to address your wardrobe. For a few years now my wife and I have shared a single clothes rail. It wasnt always like that, we used to have a walk in wardrobe back in 2012 (walk in closet) and we had hundreds of different items of clothes collected over two lifetimes.

When we first started getting onto minimalism, sorting out the clothes was really hard. Many items had sentimental value, even though we knew we would never wear them again. Since minimising our wardrobe to a single rail, we have found it really easy to stay on top of clothing. Again we have a one in one out rule & with limited space we find we stick to it. If an item wears out we can replace it without feeling guilty & all the remaining items of clothing we have are the ones we wear daily.

I would recommend starting with your wardrobe if you are new to minimalism. It’s a good way to get used to letting things go & it is one of the best examples of how minimalism can make life easier. Just by selecting a daily outfit, you will feel lighter & less burdened by choice.

This year I also decided to address my smartphone & social media accounts. I had far too many time-consuming apps & so many twitter accounts which I followed that it was becoming less useful to me. I wrote about that earlier this week, but the general gist is that by reducing apps & information consumption on your smart phone, you can save a crazy amount of time & regain a lot of focus. With the time I’ve regained I intend to learn Dutch & play more guitar.

Another thing I like to do each new year is to address my finances. I am still paying down student debt on credit cards & I always shift my remaining debt to a 0% card in January. That way I’m always only paying off the debt & not the interest payments. I’m not sure how the banks feel about that, essentially giving me a free loan, but I find minimalism can be applied easily to finances if you treat the digital pounds just the same way you would treat physical clutter. To me, debt is clutter, it’s a burden & it has the ability to cripple you with worry & also to trap you in a situation. I intend to move to Amsterdam & debt is one thing I will not be taking with me.

You can also take this time to check all of your current bills, direct debits & subscriptions. See if you can reduce bills such as your phone or internet, cancel any subscriptions you no longer need & give all of your finances a health check. It’s surprising what a £5 a month subscription costs each year if you no longer read that magazine or watch Netflix.

Moving on to books. I no longer have many physical books. I used to have a massive collection of books in paperback and hardback format however I bought an eReader last year (kindle) and started to get most of my books in a digital format. I still buy the odd second-hand book or text-book, I don’t tend to buy new books as there are an abundance of used books out there for a fraction of the cost. I found moving to ebooks freed up a lot of my belongings. I’ve moved house before with perhaps 30 boxes of books. They are heavy & cumbersome. I now have most of my books on the kindle which can fit in my coat pocket. My kindle library is around 140 books strong. This is all part of a lifestyle I’m crafting to make it easier for me to pick up & go when I like. To a new house, to a new country. I’m no stranger to putting things in storage and moving around for a while. I like the freedom & it’s one of the things that attracted me to Minimalism in the first place.

If you have books, sort through them & give to charity any you have read & won’t reference, or those you have no intention of reading. If you do this every few months you can regain a lot of space, shed a lot of weight & if you give them to a charity shop you can help a good cause in the process (not to mention people can get great books for a fraction of retail & it saves them from landfill).

January is always a quiet month for me work wise. My business customers are coming to terms with a new year & the serious overspend of the previous months. I used to get quite low in January, but I’ve now come to terms with the fact that it is quiet & treat it more as a holiday. It’s the perfect time for me to sort and organise. I normally take a drawer at a time & sort it out. I do this often, but it’s surprising what you find in them. Old bank statements which should have been filed, batteries long since flat, packaging & junk. Minimalism for most is an ongoing process, and I’m still finding things I missed the first, second or tenth time I sorted out a drawer.

If you are new, start small. Choose a drawer a day and sort into three piles, keep, donate/sell & rubbish. Then organise your keep things back into a home, somewhere you know where they will be when you need them. The donate/sell pile should be dealt with ASAP to make sure you don’t start taking things back out, as should the rubbish pile. It’s a great way to start out organising by taking small steps. Decluttering takes time & patience.

I no longer buy CD’s or DVD’s as I tend to rent, stream or buy digital versions. I used to have a large collection of media but I donated and sold the whole lot when I started minimising. I do buy the odd Xbox game on a disc, but I buy these second-hand from shops in the UK like CEX and Game. This way I make a huge saving & I’m reusing media. Once I’ve finished I pass them on to friends or put them up on ebay for a nominal amount. I’d rather someone else benefit from them when I finished, just as I have. It’s a nice process to be involved with.

There are loads of things you can do to get started on your decluttering & simplifying journey. These are just a few to get you started. Please do let me know in the comments if you have any other suggestions or personal preferences for starting a minimalists new year.

My wife & I sat down to watch the documentary last night. The great thing about buying on Vimeo is that you can download a 1080p version of the documentary (HD) and watch it on any device you choose as it’s DRM free. This meant that I could watch on my media centre without worrying about having the Vimeo app installed & also means I can copy it to my laptop or tablet for watching on the go. A real bonus for me.

The documentary itself follows Ryan’s & Joshua’s book tour across the USA. They interview various bloggers, scientists and minimalists along the way & they really do highlight the benefits of living a more minimal lifestyle. I can totally relate to a lot of the issues raised in the documentary. My upbringing was very similar to Joshua’s & I feel a need to constantly reassess my life & check that everything is going in the right direction. I also have a real issue with wasting time & not wasting my day doing something that is meaningless.

I’ve already adopted a lot of minimalist values in my life. I only buy high quality items & I limit the items I own to ensure they meet multiple needs & add value to my life. It’s certainly an ongoing process and I find reading blogs & watching documentaries like this enable me to stay on track and address issues I’m having based on others experiences.

The documentary suggests that there is a real movement of people rejecting the modern norms of mass consumerism & debt. In their year of travel the boys start off giving talks to a few people in small halls & end up doing TV interviews and selling out talking venues & book shops. There is one scene in a Barnes & Noble store where people are literally standing on the bookshelves to listen. It’s nice to see that other people are adopting this lifestyle & with that brings more experiences and ideas.

I like it when Joshua mentioned someone he had met who kept a library of books & derived real joy from his book collection. Joshua’s answer to that was that it’s OK to keep things that bring you real value, but most things we bring into our home are faddy and don’t contribute anything to our lives in the long run.

Books used to be something I couldn’t part with, but I’ve slowly been converting my book addiction over to ebooks. I got the Amazon app for my iPad and just yesterday I took delivery of my first Kindle. My wife has had a kindle for years, she tends to read a lot of novels & never feels the need to hang onto them when she has finished. I, on the other hand tend to read a lot of non fiction, technical & text books. I find real value in having these available for reference, but I’ve actually found that having digital versions of these allows me to carry them everywhere with me on a single small device & makes me much lighter as a human being who tends to move house a lot (books weigh an absolute ton when moving house). The biggest benefit I’ve found however is the ability to search within the text of ebooks. It’s a game changer.

Anyway, back to the documentary. So far I’ve watched the documentary itself, which if you are even remotely interested in simple living or minimalism, you should watch. I’ve also watched the 40 minute full interview with Leo Babauta of Zen Habits which is well worth a watch. I’m nowhere near as far into this journey as Leo, but I do relate to what he said about thinking of himself 10 years ago & giving that person advice. It definitely helps me to see how far I’ve come & the work I’ve still got to do. I’ll be working through the other bonus features this week.

For £13 you get the documentary which is 1 hour and 18 minutes and you also get over 6 hours of interviews. This is an absolute bargain. Go watch it now! Other people included in the documentary are Joshua Becker, Tammy Strobel of Tiny House fame, Colin Beavan (the Low Impact Man – another great documentary) & Patrick Rhone along with some neuroscientists, sociologists and other scientists.

Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things from The Minimalists on Vimeo.