9 Ways to Make Your Home Office MORE Productive | Jim Kwik

I believe your external world is a reflection of your internal world. And when you organize your external world, all of a sudden you're organized inside also, and you have clarity of thought. And clarity is the beginning of all productivity. Clarity is the beginning of all productivity. There's a great quote from my friend Brian Tracy, and he says, take control of your environment. And ensure that it is predominantly positive. So how can you take that advice? How can you take control of your personal environment? To be more productive, you want to put yourself in a surrounding that makes productivity almost effortless, where you design your workspace, for example, as an encourager, where you could organically be triggered or reminded to be at your best. Now let's go through some of those elements. And again, these are just suggestions. These are suggestions that's worked for me, has worked with our private clients for the past 30 years, but find what works best for you. And definitely I'd love your thoughts in the comments on what you do to create a positive, productive environment, your surroundings. All right, let's get started. All right, let's talk about first your workspace. Now here's the thing. When it comes to your workspace, certain activities that you do repeatedly gets anchored to that place, meaning the state of mind, the mood of your mind and your body, your feelings get anchored to those activities, get anchored to the context. Often what the context is gives you more of your content. I talk about in the Kwik Recall memory improvement program, which again, if you haven't gone through, I highly suggest It's usually a starting point for all our programs. Because if you can't remember anything, how are you going to do well in your productivity? Right? I believe I forgot are the 2 most costly productivity whore in the human language. I forgot to do it. I forgot to bring it. I forgot that meeting. You know, I forgot that person's name. I forgot what I was going to say. You lose time and energy and effort and performance. And so the starting point when we talk about our memory really is that You know, certain memory is state dependent, meaning that when you imagine this, they take— they did a study where they took subjects and they submerged them underwater and gave them a list of words to memorize. And they had a breathing apparatus and they had to memorize and study these words. And then they quizzed them and they quizzed them both out of water. And then they put them underwater again and quizzed them again. Interesting. In which environment do you think they remembered more? Underwater. Because learning it underwater, that setting got anchored to the information. And so when they went back underwater, it helped trigger some of the memories. And that makes sense, right? So if you can learn to— if you study in the room that you have to be tested in, that would be a little bit of an advantage. Right. Right? Or if you rehearse for a play on the stage, you're more likely to remember it because you get anchored and triggered by the environment. They provide context, contextual cues to remind you of what you need to say or do, right? And sometimes you can't go in that environment. So what do we do? You take that environment in with you in your performance. So for example, maybe you can't study Yeah. On that stage or in that classroom or, or in that boardroom that you need to present in. What you could do is maybe use your sense of smell. You use a scent like a candle or a lip balm or a fragrance, a cologne, an essential oil or perfume when you're studying. And then when you need to perform it, you bring that environment back onto your person by using that same lip balm, essential oil, cologne, perfume. And more of those come back to you. More of those memories come back because of the external trigger. Now there are other triggers also as well when it comes to your surroundings. As you're looking in your surroundings, does it stress you out or do you feel clarity of mind? You know, they say that your external world is a reflection of your internal world. So when you organize your desk or you clean the screen, everything's in the right file folder, don't— doesn't it give you clarity of mind? Because it gives you more of an organized mind too, right? And on the other side, if you want to be more creative, some studies suggest that having more of a messy office is good for your creativity. Because you're like, yes, good. That's working for you. Because that stimulus gives you ideas and they spark new connections, right? And that's how a lot of creativity is built through stimulus. And that reminds you of this, or this plus this could create this, right? And so you design your surroundings the way you want to be able to perform. What I would suggest though is as best as you can, and we don't all have these options, but certain activities that you do in your home or in your office office, get anchored to that place. Which is why when I talk about optimizing your sleep, you don't work in your bedroom if it can be helped. You certainly don't want to work in your bed. You stick to that table, you know, on the side, or that desk on the side of your bedroom. But don't study in your bed, or don't be on your phone and work in your bed checking emails, because what happens? You're associating that bed to work, or maybe anxiety, or maybe stress, and you wonder why you toss and turn, you can't fall asleep, and you have insomnia, right? So certain activities get anchored to the environment. That's what I mean about setting management or surrounding management. This is where you're managing your environment, your workspace. So remember, when you're reading, like in, in bed, if I do any reading at all, it's not on executive thinking kind of part of my brain. What I'm doing is light fiction because I just want to have positive associations where I don't have to go in that kind of critical thinking mind of mine. I just want to learn stories and read light fiction, right? Or maybe a comic book. You know, I like to read comic books also as well because I love superheroes. But all of that learning is context dependent, and all that activity is context dependent. So when I say Manage your surroundings and your settings. Work in the same place each time, you know. And even if you have devices and you have an iPad, use that iPad just for entertainment or just for work, but don't do both because that's part of your setting, right? When you do that, you want to go in that place. Like, so when I want to write, there's one place I write in my home, and that's the only place. But it allows me a setting where I just— when I go there, I get anchored. Every morning when I journal, I journal in a very specific place. You know, while I'm drinking my tea. So that's the power of your settings. You're managing your setting, you're managing your surroundings, you're doing one activity in one place each and every time as best to your ability. We don't always have the flexibility to change rooms or go to a specific area, but we do our best. Now let's talk about your workspace. Most of us work on a computer, and we know that through studies Especially when you understand your nervous system and how you process information, that when you look down on something, you're not going to be as alert, right? Even look, practice now, look down. And we tend to, when we look down or down to the right, and it's even our language, like, I feel downright something, right? Tired or downright upset. You access more of your feelings. And so when you're looking at your screen, I would suggest having the screen right in front of you. I choose to use a standing desk. I prefer to stand because I heard years ago somebody say sitting is the new smoking. And I don't know if that's true, but I like to move my body. And so having a standing desk— now, before I could afford to have an electronic standing desk that kind of goes up and down, because I do like to stand and sit, so I alternate. I just don't want to be sitting all day, and I don't want to be standing all day either. So I kind of alternate, maybe do an hour of standing, an hour of sitting. As I do this for you, I like to stand 'cause it raises my energy, right? The other part of it is, you know, I used to create my own standing desk. I would put boxes and books so that my computer was at level. So it's at eye level. And so I think that's important because remember, eye fatigue, visual fatigue will lead to mental fatigue. All right, so that's part of my surroundings. Okay, another part of my surroundings is the light that's in the room. And it's challenging sometimes when you're in offices or you're in schools. Sometimes they use that fluorescent light that could really— it could tax your eyes more than indirect sunlight. And the reason they use it probably is because it's inexpensive. It's really cheap to be able to do, but it doesn't mean it's the best surroundings for your visual performance. And so I would say get the kind of lighting that would be least taxing. I would say the brighter it is in general, the more alert you're going to be, the more focused you will be. If you think about it, if you were in a room that's very dim and close to dark, it would hard— it'd be hard to maintain your focus because your eyes would be strained, and that visual strain will lead to mental strain, and that would affect it. So have good indirect sunlight, I think, would be optimal. They also sell bulbs at your local stores that mirror indirect sunlight also as well. What I would also say is temperature. That's part of your surroundings. Like right now, my team is here and I'm keeping it very cool, even though there are all these lights and there's human beings in the room, because it would tend to warm it up. But for me, keeping it cool keeps me alert, and I want to be alert when I want to be able to perform. And so What temperature works for you? When I sleep at night, I keep it very cool because think about it. First, better sleep. And then this is a little tangential, but there was a trigger for melatonin for you to rest and digest before modern conveniences was what? Dimming of lights and lowering of temperature. And so I want to sleep in a dark and cool room because that's when I know it's time to sleep. I create more melatonin and it puts me in that phase. Now for Being in a work environment, I want it more brightly lit and I want it cool also to keep me awake, but not so cold it's distracting, right? Just like at night, I don't want it so cold that it keeps me up because I'm freezing and that's distracting me. So find a good temperature for you. Everybody else is bio-individual, all right? What works for you might not work for somebody else and vice versa. You are your own expert, so you take responsibility for it. So we talk about your screen, we talk about the lighting, we talk about temperature. What also is part of your surroundings? Part of your surroundings is the quality of the air. So if you could afford to have, you know, there are a lot of toxins sometimes in the air. It could come from our furniture. There's sometimes off-gassing from carpets or furniture, and that could be a challenge for some people. Some people, there are certain allergens in the air also as well, where there happens to be animal or dust, and having an air filter Something that's quiet, that doesn't distract you while you're working, it might be an option. Or having a window open also as well, getting fresh air, it keeps— kind of clears out the cobwebs, if you will. What else? You know, there's other things in your surroundings. Some people talk about EMFs, and I've interviewed a number of experts on our podcast about electromagnetic frequencies. You might want to look into it because is it good or is it bad? You could do your own research. But my Point in bringing this up is your surroundings affect your internal surroundings, that your external environment is affecting your internal environment. It's affecting your focus. It's affecting your creativity. It's affecting your level of energy. It's affecting your ability to problem solve. Did you know that if you, in a closed environment, for example, lower ceilings, or if you're wearing a cap, it's kind of like those blinders that they put on horses, right? It forces your focus, and that could help you with more analytical, logical thinking. But if you want to be a big thinker, have you ever walked into, uh, an area where it has very lofted ceilings, uh, where it's more cathedral-like? That will be more expansive thinking, more creativity, more abstract thinking. So your environment affects your internal mental environment, emotional environment, energetic environment, psychological environment. So What I'm talking about here, really manage your surroundings. Setting management. And so it's— there's different settings from when you work to when you play to when you study. And so in the comments, tell me about where you work and what's your ideal setting. Tell me about the temperature. Tell me about the lighting. Tell me where you like to— if you like to stand or if you're on a treadmill or you're on an elliptical. I have like a little device I bought on Amazon And it just holds like magazines or my laptop. I could put it on a treadmill. So if I go to the gym, I could bring it along and I could look and edit my reading, or I could watch, you know, certain videos or listen to something and I'll take notes there also as well. Sometimes when you actually do something rhythmic, like listen to a podcast or listen to our audiobook of Limitless, and you're doing something rhythmic, like you're on an elliptical or you're taking a brisk walk, you can actually understand it and comprehend it and retain it better. Remember, as your body moves, your brain grooves. So how are you setting up your environment to win? Even when you're habit stacking, often what I'll do is I'll set up my environment. So if I want to read more, like I'll set up my environment so it's really easy. If I don't want to be distracted, I don't want to look at my phone the first 30 minutes a day. I'll have my phone in my bathroom, right? I won't look at it for the first 30 minutes of the day. Or if I want to drink water first thing in the morning or read a book, I'll put that book there the night before and I'll set that water there the night before. Right. If I want to, in my office, I'll put a kettlebell right by the doorway. So it just makes it easier for me to do. You know what the key is for your environment and habits and how they relate? You want to make the things that are good for you easy, and you want to make the things that are not so good for you hard, right? Touching your phone for an hour a day, keep it out of arm's length distance. If you have the junk food in your kitchen, you're making it very easy To, to binge eat something, right? And eat those midnight snacks, right? You set up your environment to win because your external world is going to impact your internal world, and that's how you truly become limitless. So in the comments, how do you design your environment? Look at your surroundings right now. What does it look like right now? And what is your ideal environment to work in? And what's one thing you could do to move yourself closer to that goal? And remember, review this session, listen to it, watch it again if you need to, review your notes, quiz yourself, and what else? Apply it. Apply it and teach it, because when you teach it, you get to learn it twice. I'm your brain coach, Jim Kwik. I'll see you in our next lesson. Until then, be limitless.