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  • The key to long term productivity is to find the action that you would, and could, repeat

  • forever.

  • And there are four key terms in this sentence: find the action, would, could, and forever.

  • Find the action is important because if you already knew what action to do, you would

  • already be productive.

  • There is a productive action out there, but it has to be discovered, and this requires

  • the willingness and the commitment on your part to find it.

  • The term 'would' is important because you actually have to want to do the action.

  • It makes you consider whether (A) you actually enjoy the action itself, and (B) whether you're

  • willing to prioritize it.

  • The term 'could' is important because it makes you consider whether the action is

  • actually possible for you to do.

  • Are you physically capable of doing it?

  • Do you have the right tools & resources?

  • Do you have enough energy to do it each day?

  • And lastly, the term 'forever' is a stress test.

  • It ensures the action is repeatable for, and compatible with, the rest of your life.

  • Now let's look at the lives of four different people, all of whom want to become poets,

  • and let's see whether or not they satisfy the four conditions of long-term productivity.

  • Brock says he wants to be a poet, but he believes that it's something he can never do.

  • He believes that it requires time, money, or talent, things which he believes he doesn't

  • have.

  • So Brock's doesn't even pass the first stage of finding an action.

  • He's not willing to find an action that'll get him to his goal, and so he'll never

  • get there.

  • Katie also wants to be a poet.

  • She imagines how awesome it would be to be famous for her works, make money, and spend

  • her time writing.

  • So Katie is determined to find the action that will allow her to accomplish her goal.

  • The obvious action is to write a bit of poetry each day.

  • The thing is, Katie hates the actual work of writing poetry.

  • It's tedious, boring, and not worth the effort.

  • Katie is in love with the idea of being a poet, the thing she's conjured in her imagination,

  • but she's not in love with the reality that is actually required to get there.

  • So Katie fails in the second stage: she's found the action, but it's not actually

  • something she would do.

  • So she'll never accomplish her goal.

  • Now Virginia, on the other hand, has decided that it's important to write poetry every

  • day, and she actually enjoys the act of writing poetry.

  • Vanessa's problem is that she also works a day job that she loves as an interior designer,

  • and she is the mother of two young kids.

  • So she's very busy.

  • While she wants to become a poet and write poetry every day, it's not something she

  • wants to do more than the other activities of her life.

  • So Virginia also falls off at the 'would' stage.

  • She found an activity she would do, but it's not really one she would do over others: it's

  • not really a priority.

  • Poetry will most likely remain a hobby for her, and she may or may not inch closer towards

  • her goal.

  • And lastly, there's Elliot.

  • Elliot writes daily, he enjoys the act of writing, and he actually wants to do it more

  • than most other activities in his life.

  • He wants to make a living out of it.

  • So he found an action that he would do.

  • But is it one he could do?

  • Elliot is quite busy.

  • He works as a nurse during the day, and he's quite tired when he comes home.

  • He has a limited amount of energy that he can spend on other activities.

  • Elliot decides, in the beginning, that he could do about 3 hours of writing every evening.

  • And he keeps this up for about a week, but he eventually falls off the wagon.

  • Why?

  • This brings us to the final component.

  • Elliot has found an action that he would do, and that he could do, but he hasn't found

  • a variation of the action that he could do forever.

  • So he shrinks his writing down 2 minutes a day to start.

  • And he finds that he can sustain this forever.

  • Now he's moving towards his goal of becoming a poet, and this is completely sustainable.

  • Then he works up to 10 minutes a day and finds it's still sustainable.

  • Then he goes up to 30 minutes, and then finally, he finds that an hour is the maximum amount

  • he can do each day after work and maintain forever, regardless of the other conditions

  • in his life.

  • And so I'll leave you with this.

  • The key to long-term productivity is consistency.

  • And the key to consistency is to find the action that you would, and could, repeat forever.

  • And each of the four stages is important.

  • Have you found the action?

  • Are you open and willing to search for it?

  • Would you actually do the action?

  • Do you enjoy the process, and is it something you enjoy more than other things?

  • Is it a priority for you?

  • Could you actually do the action?

  • Do you have the knowledge, the capacity, the tools, and the energy to do it?

  • And lastly, have you shrunk the action down so that you could repeat it forever?

  • Have you made it manageable?

  • Productivity is like movement, and if you pass all four stages, you've successfully

  • created a step that you can take each day, and if you take a step towards your goal each

  • day, you'll inevitably reach it.

  • If you're interested in learning 'how to 10x your productivity' check out my video

  • on the topic by clicking the card in the top right of your screen

  • or the link in the description.

The key to long term productivity is to find the action that you would, and could, repeat

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