Why are you Progressing Slowly?

We have limited brain energy every day.

There are many sources of brain energy drainage.

Example -

1) Solving puzzle

2) Talking

3) Studying

4) Thinking

One source is cognitive energy drainage.

This drainage happens unknowingly.

Example -

1) Holding yourself from speaking.

2) Attending meetings which are not being helpful. (though you don’t want to go, you still have to attend.)

3) Stuck in the traffic.(feeling irritated)

4) Juggling between many tasks.

Now the main question comes how long am I going to take to complete any particular task?

Any task that needs to be completed or any skill that needs to be learned goes through following 3 phases-

A    (Planned)  

B    (In progress)             

C    (Mastered)

When we execute any task, it stays in phase B.

We keep picking tasks from A and put in B. And this happens continuously.

A                            B                           C

..                            ...                           ..

                              ...

                              ...           

So when B gets piled up we slow down and so does the progress.

Piled up B = consumption of your cognitive energy.

It is like RAM of our system.

Because of this state we no longer have the energy to involve ourselves in any such activities which requires attention, focus.

So when the time comes to work on anything productive, we no longer have the energy to involve ourselves in any such tasks.

So the solution to save ourselves from such drainage is -

Granulize each and every task and keep sub tasks in B, as least as possible.

Just focus on one task at a time until it gets mastered.

If A piles up that's okay, but when B does it starts draining your cognitive energy and hence your overall energy.

Now the question comes how granular tasks should be?

How much time should be allocated to every task so as to make sure it may not sit in B for forever?

The sub task can be allowed some time limit so as to make sure in between one may not get derailed.

Pomodoro method is one way that can be used.

Toggl is a software which could be used.

So the overall summary is -

Don't take your brain energy for granted. Everything we do one way or the other takes energy.

It is onto us how we want to distribute it.