Defer poisoning your day
The simplest and most effective productivity idea I am trying to orient my life around is the idea of trying to avoid distractions in the morning.
This recent interview with prolific musician and producer Jack Antonoff, perfectly summarizes this concept as deferring as much as possible the “poisoning of your day”.
What he means is this:
”Every day I wake up and can get to the studio before something has shattered my existence, I am grateful. And I can do things.
Then, at some point throughout the day — whether it’s reading about the state of the world, or something happens in my personal life, or even just my own emotions. I disintegrate. That’s when I focus on food, calling friends and family, or watching TV.”
For me this means: no phone first thing in the morning (or preferably all morning), try to wake up early and focus on the most important tasks before your existence is “shattered” once again. Then rinse and repeat.
