Because the writer of greater than 70 books, Steve “S.J.” Scott is among the best and disciplined individuals I do know.
His newest title, Habit Stacking, turned a Wall Road Journal Bestseller and served because the inspiration for this episode.
(Lengthy-time listeners would possibly bear in mind Steve from WAY again within the archives; he was my visitor in episode 9 the place we mentioned how to earn money as a side hustling author.)
This time although we’re diving into a couple of of the habits that enable Steve to repeatedly drive his enterprise ahead, and lead a more healthy and happier life. Plus, you’ll study why we expect they’re necessary and how one can apply them in your individual life.
They’re not all immediately business-related, however most take 5 minutes or much less and are designed to:
- enhance your productiveness
- cut back stress
- prioritize your workload
- aid you discover a wholesome work-life stability
Tune in to listen to how Steve and I incorporate these habits into our day by day routines (or plan to, in my case).
As you’ll see within the hyperlinks part beneath, there are loads of books, apps, and assets talked about.
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1. Observe Your Time
Observe the way you spend your time engaged on totally different points of your small business.
You possibly can create blocks for writing, advertising and marketing, social media, analysis, and so on., and utilizing an app like aTimeLogger to trace your time throughout these classes.
The objective is to evaluation this knowledge month-to-month to see the place your time is definitely going and make adjustments if wanted to raised allocate your treasured time. For instance, goal to spend 30% of your time writing and 20% on guide advertising and marketing.
Give time monitoring a attempt for the subsequent month and see what insights it supplies on the place you’re truly spending (or losing) hours every day.
Simply having that self-awareness ought to aid you change into extra disciplined throughout working periods.
Professional tip: when your vital different needs to speak for “only a minute”…cease the timer!
2. Evaluate Your Targets Each day
I’m undoubtedly responsible of not setting clear annual targets in recent times. And even once I do set them, I’m horrible at reviewing them persistently.
That’s why you must evaluation your targets day by day to maintain them prime of thoughts all through your day. Whereas some goal to set 12-week targets (impressed by The 12 Week Year), Steve takes a extra holistic, much less traumatic strategy by specializing in key areas:
- Spending time with family and friends
- Writing books
- E-book advertising and marketing
- Engaged on his weblog
To ingrain these priorities, you’ll be able to create a day by day reminder that pops up each time he opens his Chrome browser.
The instrument Steve makes use of is an easy clean web page together with his targets listed. I exploit a Chrome extension referred to as Momentum that serves an analogous objective — it asks for my foremost focus every day to imprint my targets each time I open a brand new browser tab.
The day by day objective evaluation behavior retains your priorities entrance and middle irrespective of how busy life will get.
3. Write Down ALL of Your Duties
The objective is to doc all the pieces you do associated to your small business—writing, advertising and marketing, analysis, and so on.—in an ongoing checklist. Steve additionally suggests noting stuff you wish to do however can’t but.
You possibly can put this in Evernote. You possibly can have this as a textual content file and have this open always.
Evaluate this cumulative checklist weekly or month-to-month to search out alternatives to delegate duties that:
- You hate doing
- Can’t do your self
- Shouldn’t be doing
Choices embrace hiring a VA by way of VirtualStaffFinder.com, freelancers, or automating by way of IFTTT and Zapier.
This helps you focus vitality on high-impact duties whereas unloading much less important gadgets over time.
4. Repair Your “Damaged Home windows”
I like the analogy of “damaged home windows” from the Malcolm Gladwell guide The Tipping Point. The concept is that visible mess and dysfunction in your environment can negatively affect your motivation and mindset.
I took a look round my house workplace after he stated that and realized I’ve toy muddle chaos in every single place!
It’s necessary to begin your day by tidying up your instant workspace. One thing so simple as making your mattress can set off a constructive thoughts shift to set the tone for productiveness.
You wish to decrease visible distractions that may divert psychological bandwidth.
I discover this idea applies to inbox muddle too – I’m far more wired when I’ve 100+ unread emails observing me. But when I block out time to course of and manage messages very first thing within the morning, I really feel calmer and extra centered.
5. Put on a Step Monitoring Machine
I’ve seen family and friends members get obsessive about their Fitbits and step counts through the years. However Steve offered a compelling productiveness angle that I haven’t thought-about earlier than.
He makes use of step counts virtually like a Pavlovian set off to remind himself to take common motion breaks. His Fitbit Charge 2 buzzes each hour, prompting him to rise up and stroll round for a couple of minutes.
Only a fast lap round the home or workplace lets your thoughts recharge a bit.
And apparently, if you happen to do that each hour for a 10-hour workday, you simply accumulate 2,500+ day by day steps with out another train.
I like this as a result of I typically discover myself glued in place for a lot too lengthy whereas modifying podcast episodes. Now my objective is to implement this hourly step countdown to implement breaks and psychological resets.
The hot button is discovering small methods to recurrently transfer your physique, which pays vital rewards in vitality, well being, and wellbeing over time.
6. Preserve a Meals Diary
I don’t suppose I’ve ever consciously tracked what I eat each day.
Whereas I usually attempt to preserve wholesome consuming habits, Steve raised an attention-grabbing level about accountability, which is to maintain a meals diary utilizing an app like MyFitnessPal.
Writing down all the pieces you eat brings two foremost advantages:
- Accountability and honesty concerning the energy you’re truly consuming
- Unconscious discouragement from making much less wholesome decisions (when you recognize you’ll must doc them later!)
The concept right here is “what will get measured will get managed.” So when you know the way a lot you’re placing your physique, you can begin to make small decisions to enhance your well being.
Now once you’re grabbing that second chocolate chip cookie, there’s a psychological pace bump in place. As a result of you recognize you’ll must doc it later in your meals diary! Over time this heightened consciousness can nudge you towards higher choices.
Give holding a meals diary a attempt in case your present strategy to food regimen isn’t yielding the outcomes you want. And leverage the info to consciously enhance!
7. Analysis One Facet Hustle
Because the host of The Facet Hustle Present, I imagine studying about new revenue concepts can spark creativity and inspiration.
Select one potential hustle to analysis for 5-10 minutes every day. I like this incremental strategy as an “elephant behavior” technique.
You possibly can discover alternatives from assets resembling my guide, Buy Buttons: The Fast-Track Strategy to Make Extra Money and Start a Business in Your Spare Time.
You may as well preserve a spreadsheet monitoring the required time, prices, gear, and persona match for concepts that intrigue you.
Important inquiries to ask your self for every prospect embrace:
- Do I’ve time for this?
- What gear is required?
- How a lot cash do I would like to take a position upfront?
- Does this match my persona and expertise?
The objective is to search out ONE promising match to start testing and see if it will possibly scale slightly than leaping from thought to thought. Use a instrument like the professional calculator at ListenMoneyMatters.com to judge monetary viability.
The objective right here is to identification choices aligned together with your expertise and pursuits. However don’t let evaluation paralysis set in!
As soon as an thought appears viable and thrilling, take motion to get it off the bottom even earlier than you’re feeling “prepared.” You’ll study probably the most by doing, and course right as wanted primarily based on real-world buyer suggestions.
8. Break Down a Huge Challenge into Manageable Steps
The eighth behavior attracts from David Allen’s Getting Things Done strategy of breaking massive initiatives down into particular subsequent step actions.
Everytime you’re confronted with one thing with a number of steps, you wish to break it down right into a single motion that you are able to do in simply sooner or later.
You should utilize apps like Todoist to handle intensive writing pipeline, with 70+ granular steps assigned to every guide venture. This transforms an intimidating objective like “write guide” into small, day by day progress.
For instance, if you happen to’re planning to revamp your web site, you would embrace:
- Determine a theme
- Get some new photos taken
- Rent any individual to change it
The hot button is to “determine the subsequent actionable step.” Map out the total roadmap upfront into concrete checkpoints then deal with each bit alongside the way in which.
9. Comply with an Night Shutdown Routine
Set up a night shutdown routine to create higher work-life stability as an entrepreneur. With out definitive alerts, it’s simple to endlessly work nights and weekends with out enjoyment.
You are able to do a 5 to 10 minute observe on the finish of every day, impressed by Cal Newport’s guide, Deep Work:
- Evaluate tomorrow’s calendar
- Make sure that no important duties had been missed
- Determine the 1-3 most necessary duties for tomorrow
- Totally energy down laptop
- Plug telephone into charger throughout the room
- Concentrate on household time/hobbies
Creating area for non-work actions and actually being current with family members requires the self-discipline to “flip off” every night. Give it a attempt to stop burnout!
10. Deep Respiration / Meditation / Progressive Rest
- Deep Respiration – As John Lee Dumas has famous in Ep 436, taking gradual breaths deep into your stomach is tremendously enjoyable. Make time to focus in your breath.
- Meditation – An everyday meditation observe clears psychological muddle. Begin small with 5-10 minutes day by day.
- Progressive Rest – Primarily based on the approach from the guide Declutter Your Mind, systematically tense and launch muscle teams throughout your whole physique to soften away rigidity.
Decide one or two of those that attraction and make time to construct the ritual. You may additionally discover profit in layering all three into a night routine.
The objective is solely to infuse extra mindfulness into day by day life—to be absolutely current regardless of chaos and preserve perspective on what actually issues. Small habits can yield big adjustments over time.
Steve’s #1 Tip for Facet Hustle Nation
“Determine your 80/20. Determine what’s truly driving the outcomes and give attention to that very first thing each morning.”
Your Flip
I hope you loved exploring these 10 foundational habits. Even implementing one or two of those practices will pay big rewards over time.
Begin small and be constant above all. Observe your progress to remain motivated and construct momentum. And let me know which habits resonate most with you or what’s working in your individual routine!
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